South Cadbury in Somerset is a hilltop archaeological site covering an area of around 8ha, 12km northeast of Yeovil and near the historical hillfort Cadbury Castle. Somerset is a county in the south-west of England. ... Map sources for Yeovil at grid reference ST5516 Yeovil is a town in south Somerset, England, on the A30 and A37. ... Cadbury Castle is a hill fort near the village of South Cadbury in Somerset, England, five miles north west of Yeovil. ...

Leslie Alcock's excavations in 1966–70 identified a long sequence of occupation on the site. Many of the finds are displayed in the Somerset County Museum, Taunton. The earliest settlement was represented by Neolithic pottery and flints along with a bank feature. The site was also occupied in the Bronze Age and early Iron Age. Map sources for Taunton at grid reference ST2324 Taunton is the county town of Somerset, England. ... Jump to: navigation, search The Neolithic, (Greek neos = new, lithos = stone, or New Stone Age) was a period in the development of human technology that is traditionally the last part of the Stone Age. ... The Bronze Age is a period in a civilizations development when the most advanced metalworking has developed the techniques of smelting copper from natural outcroppings and alloys it to cast bronze. ... Iron Age Axe found on Gotland This article is about the archaeological period known as the Iron Age, for the mythological Iron Age see Iron Age (mythology). ...

A multivallate hillfort was built around 500 BC and large ramparts and elaborate timber defences were erected and re-erected at least five times over the following centuries. Excavation revealed rectangular house foundations, a blacksmith's and a possible temple indicating permanent oppidum-like occupation. There is evidence that the fort was violently taken and reoccupied by the Romans around AD 50. To the Romans, an oppidum (pl: oppida) was Latin for the main settlement in any administrative area. ...

Following the Roman withdrawal the site is thought to have been in use from c. 470 until some time after 580. Alcock revealed a substantial 'Great Hall' (20 metres x 10) and showed that the innermost Iron Age defences had been refortified providing a defended site double the size of any other known fort of the period. Sherds of pottery from the eastern Mediterranean were also found from this period indicating wide trade links. The Mediterranean Sea is an intercontinental sea positioned between Europe to the north, Africa to the south and Asia to the east, covering an approximate area of 2. ...

Beyond reasonable doubt it was the chief caer (castle or palace) of a major ruler and home to his royal family, his teulu (band of faithful followers), servants and horses. In Welsh language, a caer or kaer was a royal residence during the 1st millennium AD or earlier. ...

Between 1010 and 1020 the hill was reoccupied for use as a temporary Saxon mint, briefly standing in for that at Bruton. Jump to: navigation, search A map showing the general locations of the major Anglo-Saxon kingdoms The Anglo-Saxons were originally a collection of differing Germanic tribes from Angeln—a peninsula in the southern part of Schleswig, protruding into the Baltic Sea, and what is now Lower Saxony, in the... A mint is a facility which manufactures coins for currency. ... Bruton is a village and parish in Somerset, England, situated on the River Brue seven miles south east of Shepton Mallet, ten miles north west of Gillingham and twelve miles south west of Frome in the South Somerset district. ...

Local tradition, first written down by John Leland in 1532, says this was Camelot. John Leland (September 13, 1502–April 18, 1552) was an English antiquary. ... Camelot is the name of the stronghold of the legendary King Arthur, from which he fought many of the battles that made up his life. ...

The site and the Great Hall are extensive, and the writer Geoffrey Ashe asserted in an article in the journal Speculum that it was the base for the Arthur of history. His opinion has not been widely accepted by all students of the period. Jump to: navigation, search King Arthur is an important figure in the mythology of Great Britain, where he appears as the ideal of kingship in both war and peace. ...

Militarily the location makes sense as a place where the south-western Britons (the kingdom of Kernyw) could have defended themselves against attacks from lowland Britons. Refortification could credibly have been a response to the great Saxon raid of c. 473. If Arthur was indeed born at Tintagel as a prince of Kernyw, Cadbury would have been close to his eastern frontier. Situated on the north Atlantic coast of Cornwall, the village of Tintagel (pronounced with the stress on the second syllable; Cornish: Dintagell) and nearby Tintagel Castle are associated with the legends surrounding King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table. ...

It has been suggested that the name Cadbury derives from Cado, King of Kernyw in the time of Arthur. The Kingdom of Kernyw existed during the Dark Ages in Britains southwestern peninsula. ...

See also

• Somerset Levels

The Somerset Levels (or Somerset Levels and Moors as they are less commonly but more correctly called) is a sparsely populated wetland area of central Somerset between the Quantock and Mendip hills, consisting of marine clay levels along the coast, and the inland (often peat based) moors. The total area...

Bibliography

• Leslie Alcock, Was this Camelot? Excavations at Cadbury Castle 1966-70. New York: Stein and Day, 1972. ISBN 81281505

• Leslie Alcock, Arthur's Britain Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Pelican, 1973. ISBN 0140213961