The research undertaken compares the impact of heritage planning and management at Maldon in Victoria, with Tumbarumba in New South Wales and to a lesser extent with a number of other municipalities. Maldon and Tumbarumba are former gold mining towns of similar size and age. Maldon has been subject to rigorous planning controls following its declaration as a 'Notable Town' by the National Trust of Australia (Victoria) in the 1960s and was the forerunner for heritage planning in Australia, while Tumbarumba was later to be recognised for its heritage value and has less detailed planning controls. Maldon has been the centre of ongoing conflict for decades while Tumbarumba has been relatively free of conflict. Through research into existing documents, community consultation and use of questionnaires, this thesis sets out to look at how the conservation of heritage towns fits into the broader picture of conservation management, and examines the dynamics of conserving heritage towns. By undertaking a heritage study in the town of Tumbarumba, and looking closely at how heritage planning was implemented at Maldon, two dimensions of heritage management are examined. Firstly, the consistency in the planning process and the duration of events are compared, and secondly the extent of conflict is examined with contributing factors being isolated. Within the thesis, models are developed for analysing the conflict at Maldon, and for implementing heritage management in towns. The latter is through examining the accepted approaches to heritage management against the evidence of conflict, external control, community involvement and the presence of incentives. The thesis concludes that the dynamics of working with the community can be as important as the technical aspects of conservation.

In The Battle of Maldon, the valor of the English who fight is never in question. The infamy of the cowards who flee is evident. The way the poet views the Vikings, however, is slightly less obvious. The poet treats all characters who act within the contract of battle with a sort of biased equanimity—of course, the English are portrayed as more heroic and sympathetic, but the Vikings are referred to in a practical manner as seafarers or warriors. It is my contention that the Maldon poet treats the Vikings as natural parts of the battlefield, as if they had their own maxim pairing and were acting according to expectation. By defining how maxims function in the Old English corpus, illustrating the prevalence of Viking violence leading up to the battle, and presenting literary evidence of a Viking maxim in Maldon and The Battle of Brunanburh, I will define what I believe to be the integral parts of the "Viking maxim" and clarify how its presence in The Battle of Maldon informs the poem overall. / Master of Arts

“Hostages in Old English Literature” examines the various roles that hostages have played in Anglo-Saxon texts, specifically focusing on the characterization of Æscferth in The Battle of Maldon. Historical context is considered in order to contextualize behavioral expectations that a 10th century Anglo-Saxon audience might have held. Since the poem was composed during the reign of Æthelred the Unready, an examination of hostages and incidents recorded in The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle during his rule helps ground a socio-cultural approach. Furthermore, since Æscferth is among only a handful of named hostages in Old English literature, these other hostages have been analyzed and compared with him in order to further contextualize the hostage character. These hostages have been identified based on a broadened concept of the term “hostage” to include the social expectations of a medieval stranger. Through a consideration of these other hostages, a continuum for changing hostage loyalty emerges and reflects the evolving warrior ethics at the end of the 10th century. Based on the presented evidence, this thesis concludes that Æscferth, as a hostage, best symbolizes The Battle of Maldon’s call for English unity at the end of the 10th century.