Abstract Landscape and space were important to how radicals and reformers in the early 19th century organised public and protest events. However, landscape has often not been considered to play an active role in the organisation of such occasions. This article uses St Peter's Field and Peterloo as a case study to demonstrate how landscape's agency influenced the organisation of radical politics in Manchester through using a map progression from 1800 to 1836. Part of landscape's role is how it connects to memory, which can be as much about forgetting as remembering. This work sits within the interdisciplinary field of historical archaeology, drawing upon archaeological theories on landscape, space and materiality. The framework of palimpsests is used to examine how landscape is in constant flux, being built, modified, destroyed and built again in order to demonstrate how processes of urbanisation, industrialisation and memory‐making shaped how radicals and reformers in Manchester could organise their politics.
Caitlin Kitchener (Sun,) studied this question.