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As someone who 1st saw the C7th chapel of St. Peter-on-the-Wall at Bradwell from a boat I have always found descriptions of its setting as being 'remote' and 'isolated' a bit unsatisfactory. 
1/5
1/5
St. Peter's stood at the end of a long clay ridge at the only place land meets the sea without extensive marshes between the Thames and the Colne. S of the monastery complex was a major tidal creek, clearly visible using lidar. 2/5
From Bradwell you can take the tide up the Blackwater to Maldon, up the Colne to Colchester and up St. Osyth's creek to the important early Christian site at Chich. (nb. there is a lot of mud to negotiate) 3/5
Christopher Ferguson has estimated travel times from the Northumbrian royal centre at Bamburgh to various sites in the early medieval world. He estimates that Bamburgh to Bradwell would have taken 25.3 days to walk
, but only between 28 and 45 hours to sail 4/5
, but only between 28 and 45 hours to sail 4/5
Viewed through this lens St. Peter's doesn't seem so 'peripheral' - it was as, if not more, accessible from Bamburgh than some places in the interior of Cedd's home kingdom of Northumbria and it was very well connected to important local centres in the East Saxon kingdom. 5/5
