ThePecsætan (Old English:Pēcsǣtan; singularPēcsǣta, literally "Peak-dweller"),[1] also calledPeaklanders orPeakrills in modern English, were anAnglo-Saxon tribe who inhabited the central and northern parts of thePeak District area inEngland.[2]
The area was in the southern part of theBrigantia, a Brythonic tribal domain. Early Anglo-Saxon settlements were by WestAngles. This tribe advanced up the valleys of the riversDerwent and Dove during their northern conquests in the 6th century. The area became known locally as the Pecsætan, Peak-set or land of the Peak peoples.[3] Later their territory formed the northern division ofMercia, and in 848 the MercianWitenagemot assembled atRepton.[3]
InA tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain,Daniel Defoe mentions a later group of people called The Peakrills writing, "ThePeakrills, as they are called, are a rude boorish kind of People; but bold, daring, and even desperate in their Search into the Bowels of the Earth: for which Reason they are often employed by our Engineers in the Wars to carry on theSap, when they lay Siege to strong fortified Places."[4]
^Defoe, Daniel (1753).A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain. Divided into circuits or journeys giving a particular and entertaining account of whatever is curious and worth observation, Vol. 3. London: London : Printed for S. Birt [and others]. p. 78.
Bigsby, R. (1854)Historical and Topographical Description of Repton. London.
Collis, J. (1983)Wigber Low Derbyshire: A Bronze Age and Anglian Burial site in the White Peak. Department of Archaeology and Prehistory, University of Sheffield.
Davies, W. and Vierk, H. "The contexts of Tribal Hidage: social aggregates and settlement patterns", inFrühmittelalterliche Studien, viii (1974)
Dumville, D. "The Tribal Hidage: an introduction to its texts and their history", inThe Origins of the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms ed. S.Bassett, 1989.ISBN0-7185-1317-7
Fowler, M. J. (1954) "The Anglian Settlement of the Derbyshire and Staffordshire Peak District."DAJ 74, 134–151.
Hart, C. R. (1981)The North Derbyshire Archaeological Survey. Leeds: A. Wigley & Sons
Hodges, R. and Wildgoose, M. (1980) "Roman or native in the White Peak", in Branigan, K. (ed)Rome and the Brigantes, 48–53. Sheffield, Sheffield University Press.
Hodges, R. (1991a) "Notes on the Medieval Archaeology of the White Peak." In R. Hodges and K. Smith (eds)Recent Developments in the Archaeology of the Peak District :111–122 (Sheffield Archaeological Monographs 2) Sheffield.
Hughes, R. G (1961) "Archaeological Sites in the Trent Valley, South Derbyshire"DAJ 81, 149–50.
Jones, H. (1997)The Region of Derbyshire and North Staffordshire from AD350 to AD700: an analysis of Romano-British and Anglian barrow use in the White Peak. Ph.D. thesis, University of Nottingham.
