This volume contains the first results from the excavation of a terp at Wijnaldum in the province of Friesland, the Netherlands. The excavation was carried out as a joint venture between the University of Groningen and the University of Amsterdam from 1991 until 1993, and was the starting point of an interdisciplinary project on Frisia Magna in the first millennium AD: a time when Frisia became an important influence on the international trade and political stage in Northwest Europe. This volume describes Wijnaldum, how it was once a cradle of political and economic growth, and how the cultural heritage of the great days of Frisian history is now severely threatened in parts of the terp region.