The evolution of territoriality and societal transitions

ABSTRACT

This paper seeks to explore how territorial structures address the continuing requirements and needs of the controlling elements of a society and how they mirror evolving principles of administration, taxation and exploitation. Early territories in Cornwall reflected relatively simple social structures of economic resource exploitation and personal spheres of power, very much based around kinship patterns. As transitions in society produced a more sophisticated hierarchical network of control and income generation through dues and tax, so the territorial strategy grew more complex. This resulted in the development of a territorialised state structure. Phenomena were now seen in relation to territorial units rather than in relation to social groups, and each portion of land was delineated and locked into a territorial hierarchy controlled from above.

Investigation is undertaken through analysis of early ecclesiastical and judicial organisation in west Cornwall, and the vestiges of very early forms of landscape arrangement are explored. The mechanisms of control and exploitation, developed before the Norman conquest, gave territorial expression to previous socially recognised institutions and it is within the context of these developments that later territories should be understood.

KEYWORDS:

• Cornwall
• landscape organisation
• territoriality