La Mothe de Pineuilh

Hunting horn from Pineuilh, circa 1000 AD

In 975 AD, a French noble family began constructing a new home in the hills east of Bordeaux. They chose a site along a marshy tributary of the Monsabeau River. Digging a circular ditch about 30 meters (100 feet) across, they piled the mud on the interior to form a platform. There they lived for about 150 years. That a wealthy family chose to live on a little island in this marshy spot tells you all you need to know about the security situation at the time. This was close to the nadir of public order and govenrment power in medieval France.

Ceramics from the site

A charter of 1077 records that some land in this vicinity was donated to the Abbey of Conques by a man called Falco de Barta, which may give us the name of this family.

Aerial view of the excavation

In 2002, the French government began building a new road through the valley. This road, as it happens, ran smack across the site, ultimately destroying the eastern third of the mound.

But before that happened, French archaeologists took a close look at this wonderful site. They discovered that around 1043 (these are all tree ring dates) the ditch was deepened and the height of the mound was greatly increased, forming a "motte" like those you may know from Norman England's motte and bailey castles. This had the effect of burying and thus preserving the earlier occupation of the site. A plan of the early phase is shown above. Notice the three bridges that cross the river to the mound, only one of which would have stood at any given time. The marshy ground around those bridges was full of artifacts, inlcuding objects of wood, horn, and leather preserved by the wet environment.

Detail of the mound area. Notice that there were only two buildings in this section of the moung: an outbuilding at the end of the bridge, possibly a guardhouse or stable, and a large timber hall. This noble French family lived mostly in one great wooden hall like Vikings would have.

Wooden bowl

Much less evidence survived of the later buildings, since they were built on top of the mound, which has eroded considerably since the site was abandoned. But the mound preserved the early period wonderfully, and the marshy ground preserved these wonderful artifacts.

One technical detail the archaeologists were able to work out was that the residents kept reusing wooden beams as they tore down some buildings and built new ones, so that any given structure of the later period might include beams from 975 was well as others that had been freshly cut.

Shoe

Chess pieces

Makes me wish I could teach early medieval history again, so I could share this with my students.