Ingram : Romano-British Period And After (AD 70 - 500)

Towards the end of the first millennium BC, pollen evidence suggests that all remaining upland forest had been cleared, and small-enclosed settlements or “homesteads” were established in increasing numbers on slopes and high moorland. Some of these new settlements seem to have been established within the ramparts of earlier hillforts, or overlying the defences, which in some cases were seen to have been abandoned for some time (Welfare 2002, 75).

The stone-built huts at Greaves Ash, the Phase 6 stone-built roundhouses at Wether Hill, and the stone-founded huts at Brough Law (No.16, NT 998163) are typical examples of Late Iron Age and Romano-British period settlements. In the Cheviots - which for most of the period lay beyond the Roman frontier - the influence of Roman culture is likely to have been slight and very indirect (Higham 1986, 224-6). ‘Homesteads’ of this type are likely to have continued in use for several centuries.

These upland settlements were eventually replaced by the lower-lying hamlets and villages, although the processes by which this occurred are very unclear. The evidence for occupation in this area during the early medieval period is extremely scant, but the gradual adoption of lower-lying sites may have occurred in the eighth or ninth centuries AD, probably as a result of a complex mixture of social, political and environmental factors, which included the arrival of some settlers from Northern Europe and, later, Scandinavia.