Anglo-Saxon burial mounds

rdf:langString Anglo-Saxon burial mounds

rdf:langString An Anglo-Saxon burial mound is an accumulation of earth and stones erected over a grave or crypt during the late sixth and seventh centuries AD in Anglo-Saxon England. These burial mounds are also known as barrows or tumuli. Early Anglo-Saxon burial involved both inhumation and cremation, with burials then being deposited in cemeteries. At this time, the Anglo-Saxons adhered to a pagan religion, but as Christianity was introduced in the seventh century, it gradually became the dominant and eventually sole religion amongst the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. Many of those buried in barrows were pagan, but others were instead Christian, and it is usually impossible for archaeologists to know which religion an individual belonged to. Earlier peoples living in Britain during the Neolithic and Bronze Ages had also constructed barrows for use as places of burial, something that was recognised by the Anglo-Saxon burial builders, who in many cases re-used these earlier barrows for their own uses.