Snape Ship Burial - Location

Location

The Snape Anglo-Saxon cemetery is located in the north-east corner of the modern parish of Snape, approximately 550 metres from the parish boundary with Friston. Although several modern houses stand on or near to the cemetery site, the main settlement at Snape village is located 1.5 kilometres away, with the village of Friston slightly nearer, at 1.25 kilometres away. The site is situated 2.5 kilometres north of the River Alde and 7 kilometres west of the coastal town of Aldeburgh and the North Sea. The cemetery is 17 kilometres north-east of the more famous Anglo-Saxon ship burial at Sutton Hoo.

Prior to the 20th century, the site was a part of a large area of acid Sandlings Heathland which stretched from Snape all the way to Aldeburgh and which was used primarily for sheep grazing. By the 19th century at the latest, a road was built that bisected the cemetery, now designated the A1094. However, in the 1950s much of the heath was developed for agricultural use growing rape, linseed, potatoes and rye. The largely stone-free glacial sand of the heath is highly free-draining, and so extensive irrigation is required in the growing season. Alongside the farmland and the A1094, parts of the cemetery were also converted into a house, named St. Margaret's, along with an accompanying garden.

The acidic soils in the area would have prevented the growth of most species of native British trees, and therefore it is probably that prior to the plantation of predominantly pine woodland in the vicinity of the cemetery during the 20th century, both the River Alde and the sea would have been visible from the mounds, as would the town of Iken.