Dress, adornment and identity in Late Iron Age and Roman Britain
~Vain trifles as they seem, clothes have, they say, more important offices than to merely keep us warm. They change our view of the world and the world's view of us.~ - Virginia Woolf, Orlando The aim of this thesis is to examine the chronological, spatial and social distribution of brooches, hairpins, finger-rings and bracelets in Late Iron Age and Roman Britain (50 BC - 410 AD), in order to better understand how cultural change in this period was embodied through personal ornamentation, and how different identities were created from mixtures of indigenous and imported traditions. A large corpus of material has been compiled for this study. It has been drawn from a range of sources but the majority is taken from the significant new corpus recorded by the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS), which is distinctive because the finds derive predominantly from rural sites and as such represent the belongings of the majority of the Romano-British population. The theoretical framework for the project is Structuration Theory, and thus the underlying assumption is that personal adornment is an active element in the practice of 'appearing' and therefore that patterns of similarity and difference in the distribution of
Statton, M.
Dress, adornment and identity in Late Iron Age and Roman Britain. ~Vain trifles as they seem, clothes have, they say, more important offices than to merely keep us warm. They change our view of the world and the world's view of us.~ - Virginia Woolf, Orlando The aim of this thesis is to examine the chronological, spatial and social distribution of brooches, hairpins, finger-rings and bracelets in Late Iron Age and Roman Britain (50 BC - 410 AD), in order to better understand how cultural change in this period was embodied through personal ornamentation, and how different identities were created from mixtures of indigenous and imported traditions. A large corpus of material has been compiled for this study. It has been drawn from a range of sources but the majority is taken from the significant new corpus recorded by the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS), which is distinctive because the finds derive predominantly from rural sites and as such represent the belongings of the majority of the Romano-British population. The theoretical framework for the project is Structuration Theory, and thus the underlying assumption is that personal adornment is an active element in the practice of 'appearing' and therefore that patterns of similarity and difference in the distribution of
dress adornment identity late_iron age_roman britain seem clothes say important office merely keep warm change view world world_view aim_examine chronological_spatial social distribution brooch finger late_iron age_roman britain order_well cultural_change period embody personal different identity create mixture indigenous import tradition large_corpus material compile study drawn range_source majority take significant new corpus record portable antiquities scheme pas distinctive find derive predominantly rural_site represent belonging majority romano_british population theoretical_framework project structuration theory thus underlie assumption personal_adornment active element practice therefore pattern similarity_difference distribution