Glastonbury Lake Village – Iron Age Crannog Cluster
Glastonbury Lake Villages · Meare-Glastonbury settlement · Somerset Lake Village
Iron Age, British Middle–Late (Hod Hill + Glastonbury ware)·Iron Age Somerset wetland Britons (Durotriges–Dumnonii border)·🇬🇧 Somerset, England, United Kingdom
About
About Glastonbury Lake Village – Iron Age Crannog Cluster
5 km away. Excavated 1892 Arthur Bulleid, houses yielded Iron Age's richest Welsh–Somerset artifact trove: Glastonbury ware, antler weaving combs, tin-bronze fibulae, iron Currency bars, and Glastonbury Bowl lathe-turned wood. Demonstrates central Somerset Levels as populous Iron Age wetland capital analogous to Alpine lake dwellings but uniquely British peat-mound technique, antecedent to Sweet Track's causeway tradition 3,600 years later (same Levels).
Why it mattersType site for Glastonbury ware late Iron Age ceramics and for British crannog technique independent of Alpine/Scottish models; showcases Levels fenland continuity from Sweet Track (3800 BCE) to Iron Age.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Whether dual villages (Glastonbury + Meare) were seasonal pair or ranked elite vs commoner
- 02Reason exactly 90 houses built quickly vs gradual accretion
Theories
- 01Twin villages as elite-craft specialist moiety vs subsistence satellite
- 02Fen islets as wetland power theatre projecting control of causeways
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- c.250–50 BCE (Middle–Late Iron Age)
- Period
- Iron Age, British Middle–Late (Hod Hill + Glastonbury ware)
- Culture
- Iron Age Somerset wetland Britons (Durotriges–Dumnonii border)
- Builders
- Southwest British Iron Age fen communities
- Purpose
- Artificial peat-mound lake villages for defensive living, weaving and metalworking over fen waters
- Abandoned
- c.50 BCE gradual abandonment with peat drying
- Rediscovered
- 1892 Bulleid & St George Gray excavation; 1970s Coles Levels Project re-survey
- Excavation
- Excavated
250 BCE
Initial Godney peat mound raised with brush raft
200 BCE
Peak—90 houses with palisade and causeway to Meare
1892
Bulleid locates mounds probing with peat poles
1911
St George Gray monograph defines Glastonbury ware
On the ground
Structures & features
51.1770° N · 2.8220° W · 5 m · 3 mapped features
Godney Moor West Mound
islet60-m peat islet with 14-house ridge and timber trackway
51.1770° N · 2.8220° WMeare Lake Village East (linked)
crannogContemporary 1.5-km neighbor crannog connected by causeway
51.1710° N · 2.8000° WCentral Causeway Hurdle Track
causewayHazel hurdle causeway linking islands over submerged peat
51.1740° N · 2.8150° W
Gallery