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History

History

The story of the Isle of Wight reflects national history and also illustrates something of the Island's unique character. It was conquered or settled by various peoples just as the mainland was; its vulnerability to invasion gave it a national strategic importance; it achieved national fame as the prison of a King and the home of a Queen. At the same time (at any rate for the last 8000 years or so) it has been separate and different, with both sea and land playing a significant part in people's lives.

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Romans, Anglo Saxons and Vikings in Britain

By the time the Romans invaded, the Island had already seen thousands of years of human history and successive peoples and cultures had left their legacy. Flint tools, pottery and the bones of slaughtered animals remind us of the Island's Stone Age inhabitants. Their Bronze Age successors buried their dead in round barrows which still survive on the Island's downs. Iron Age peoples have left a hill fort on Chillerton Down and quantities of pottery, much of it on sites later occupied by Roman Villas.

According to the Roman historian Suetonius, the Island of Vectis (as the Romans called it) was subdued by Vespasian the future emperor. There is no evidence of any military operation on the Island: the conquest seems to have been a peaceful surrender to the inevitable by the local chiefs. During the occupation, the Island remained a rural backwater. There were no Roman towns or Roman roads. However, some of the local native landowners adopted Roman culture and were wealthy enough to build villas -farmhouses in Roman style. At least seven are known to have existed on the Island.

These villas were the centres of prosperous farm estates which probably sold surplus grain and wool in mainland markets. Two of these villas are open to the public. Newport Villa has a very well preserved bath-suite and hypocaust, while Brading Villa is noted for its high-quality mosaics, many of them illustrating classical stories like Orpheus and Medusa (there are obvious links here with the Ancient Greece study unit). Both villas also have displays of artefacts illustrating Island life in Roman times.

Settlement by Germanic peoples followed the Roman occupation. According to the Anglo-Saxon historian Bede, the Island was settled by Jutes. Bede also tells us that the Island was the last province of Britain to be converted to Christianity, and that this was achieved through conquest by the West Sussex King Cadwalla in 686. Pre-Christian Jutish cemeteries on Chessell and Bowcombe Downs, excavated in the 19th century, yielded finds of weapons and jewellery. Surprisingly, no archaeological evidence of occupation by the Vikings has yet been found on the Island, although they used the Island as a base camp during the late 10th and early 11th century.

Medieval Realms

The Norman Conquest gave the Island its most impressive medieval building -Carisbrooke Castle, which still survives as a good example of a medieval castle. After the conquest, William gave the Lordship of the Island to his relative William FitzOsbern. FitzOsbern began the building of a castle at Carisbrooke on an easily defended site in the centre of the Island. It was a symbol of Norman authority and a stronghold from which the potentially hostile population of the Island could be controlled. The Lordship was hereditary and the castle remained in private hands until 1293, when Countess Isabella de Fortibus, the last survivor of the De Redvers family, was persuaded on her death bed to sell the castle, together with all her lands and rights on the Island, to King Edward I for £4,000.

This was a particularly significant purchase for the King, because it gave him more control over Island defence - an important issue since the Island was a target for French raids during the Hundred Years' War. Not that Carisbrooke was much help in this respect: being in the middle of the Island, away from the coast, its garrison could do nothing to prevent raids. In 1377, for example, a French raiding party was able to devastate Yarmouth, Newtown and Newport before laying siege to the castle. The siege was in fact unsuccessful: the French withdrew after their commander was killed by a crossbow bolt
shot from the Castle's west wall.

The Castle is now in the care of English Heritage. Its design is a typical Norman motte and bailey. The motte with its shell keep, the curtain wall, the gatehouse with drum towers and machicolation, the great hall, the two medieval wells: these features make Carisbrooke an excellent resource for a castle study. A model in the Castle Museum, showing the Castle as it may have looked in 1377, is also a useful resource for discussing evidence and change.

A contrast in size to the castle, a tiny medieval building stands on St Catherine's Hill above Blackgang, about 15 minutes' climb from the nearby car park. This is a medieval lighthouse known as the Pepperpot. Built by a local landowner, Walter de Godeton, after a notorious wreck in Chale Bay, it originally had a chapel attached to it where a priest said masses for the souls of those lost at sea. Unfortunately, the lighthouse was rarely useful, as low cloud over the hill frequently obscured the light.

Schools sometimes visit the small vilIage of Newtown for its nature reserve. It is also worth studying in itself for its evidence of its past as a thriving medieval town. The ancient street pattern still survives, several of the streets now represented by grassy lanes or narrow fields. The town was destroyed by the French in 1377.