Archaeology of East Midlands Class 2 Beeston Winter 2015

An Archaeology of the
East Midlands
Class 2: Earlier Prehistory in the Midlands
Tutor: Keith Challis
east-midlands-archaeology.blogspot.co.ukBeeston, Winter 2015

Recap: Last Week
We looked at:
•What is archaeology
•Theoretical approaches
•Different archaeological disciplines
•The physical character of the East
Midland
•Fluvial Geoarchaeology
east-midlands-archaeology.blogspot.co.uk

Class Summary
• The early prehistory of the Midlands
• The Neolithic and Early Bronze Age (transitions)
• Coffee Break
• Themes in Archaeological Research:
Aerial Archaeology

Section 1: The Early
Prehistory of the Midlands

The Early Prehistory of the Midlands
• How far back can we go in the Midlands?
• The Bytham River and the colonisation of
England
• The end of the last glaciation
– Doggerland and the changing face of the land
• The Late Upper Palaolithic of the Midlands

How far back can we go in the Midlands?

• The Bytham River
• The largest river in England until
the Anglian Glaciation
• Joined the Thames and Rhine
before flowing into northern
North Sea
• Bytham gravels associated with
very early hand axes
• The river provided a routeway for
the earliest human colonists of
Britain

• Brooksby Quarry, Leicestershire.
• The Bytham deposits are
covered by thick glacial Till but
exposed by later rivers in some
locations
• At Brooksby quarrying of the
Bytham gravels has recovered
hand axes and important
evidence for the landscape and
environment of the time
• Remains, including Beetles,
point to an open very cold arctic
like environment

• Brooksby Quarry, Leicestershire.
Brooksby Lower Palaeolithic find -
handaxe of volcanic rock
• These very early hand axes are of
quartzite or andesitic Tuff (a volcanic
rock)
• After the Anglian glaciation flint using
colonist reoccupied parts of the Midlands
• Britain as a whole may have been
unoccupied during the Ipswichian
glaciation and interglacial
• Neanderthal colonists appear around
60000BC in the Devensian

The end of the last glaciation…
•From about 10k BC warming climate melted the ice
sheets of the last glaciation
•This lead to dramatic sea level rises, flooding the
formerly dry land of the southern North Sea and
English Channel
•There is compelling evidence for both the
landscape, fauna and presence of people in this
now lost landscape

• Doggerland
• Artefacts and faunal
remains trawled up from
the 1930s onward
• Bryony Coles work in the
1990s speculated on the
topography of the lost land
based on the present sea
bed.
• She coined the name
“Doggerland”

• The Pre Inundation
Landscape
• Recent work using oil industry
seismic data has identified the
detail of the lost landscape,
including river valleys, lakes
and marshes
• Coring programmes have
recovered environmental
samples for analysis

• Artefacts from the
Sea
• Artefacts trawled and
dredged from the sea
include spear points,
mammoth remains and
parts of the skull of a
Neanderthal
LUP Bone points

• The Midlands –
Creswell Crags
• A limestone gorge on the
Notts/Derbys border
• Caves seasonally
occupied by late upper
Palaeolithic groups
• Nomadic hunter
gatherers ranged widely
over the Midlands
probably following animal
migrations

• The Midlands – Farndon
• Evidence for seasonal activity
on wetlands over a 2000 year
period from 12,700 –
10,700BP
• Hearths, occupational debris
and flint knapping
• Rare survival of LUP flint
knapping scatter – one
summer afternoon 10000BP!

Section 2: The Neolithic and
Early Bronze Age

The Neolithic and Early Bronze Age
• When?
• In British Isles Neolithic 4000 – 2500 BC
• Some migration from Central European
• Spread of agriculture and sedentary living
• Ceremonial and funerary monuments
• 2500 – 800 BC
• Adoption of copper and bronze working
• Increased agriculture
• Megalithic monuments

• Landscape and Environment
• Earlier Neolithic – undisturbed
mixed woodland
• By third millennium BC evidence of
forest clearance and cereal pollen
• Evidence for woodland clearance
by burning and burning out of
stumps of felled trees
• From River Trent substantial oaks
with felling evidence

• Evidence for Settlement
• Debate, mobile populous and short
lived settlements or permanence?
• Lismore Field, Buxton. Three Earlier
Neolithic long houses, floors, pits
• Charred plant remains from the
buildings included emmer grains
and chaff, flax seeds, hazlenuts and
crab apple fruits and seeds.
• C14 dates ranging between 3990-
3105 BC

• Death and Burial
• Long barrows and
chambered cairns in Peak
District and Lincolnshire
• Long (mortuary) enclosures
as cropmarks in
Nottinghamshire
• Evidence for excarnation
(Giant’s Hills, Lincs)

Cropmark Neolithic Enclosures, Nottinghamshire

• The Cursus
• Double ditch linear features
• Function uncertain – ritual path,
linking or transitional zone, etc.
• Feature of classic Neolithic
landscapes in Wessex
• Examples in Derbyshire (Aston and
Potlock) and Nottinghamshire
(Normanton)
• Linear post/pit alignments serve
similar purpose elsewhere in
Midlands

• Potlock and Aston Cursus, Derbyshire

• The Henge
• Circular earthworks with bank enclosing a
ditch
• Date from Late Neolithic
• Often continue in use in Bronze Age,
sometimes with addition of megaliths
• Ritual, perhaps astronomical functions
• Henges (Peak District Arbor Low, Bull Ring
• Bingham and Gunthorpe, Nottinghamshire,
Gunthorpe, West Ashby, Lincolnshire,
Twyford, South Derbyshire

• Group of BA round
barrows
• One excavated in
1950s
• Further excavations in
1994 during
construction of A50
• A spectacular hoard
associated with the
barrow
• Bronze Age Burial: Lockington

• Lockington
• Parts of two pots and a dagger were also found
alongside two gold armlets.
• The dagger is an early form characteristic of Brittany
and is the first example to be found in Britain.
• The pottery is interesting as it appears that the two pots
were already fragmentary and weathered when they
were placed on top of the hoard.
• The hoard was buried in a pit without any skeletal
remains and situated on the northern edge of a funerary
enclosure.
• Its position suggests that it was placed very precisely,
possibly to observe some funerary rite, but at the same
time allowing the option of later retrieval

• Lockington
• The embossed armlets illustrate the
great skill that was being achieved in
gold-working
• On the right-hand armlet, the
encircling ribs swell at intervals to
form lozenge bosses, which are
thought to mimic contemporary
strings of beads in jet and amber.
• The surviving gold bands were
probably originally attached to an
organic backing, such as leather, that
has since decayed
The Rillaton Cup

• Assignment for next week (details on the
website)
• Pick a county (Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire,
Leicestershire)
• Read the summary
• Come with thoughts on evidence for settlement
and burial and changes across the period
Further Study

Archaeology of East Midlands Class 2 Beeston Winter 2015

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

What's hot

What's hot (20)

Viewers also liked

Viewers also liked (6)

Similar to Archaeology of East Midlands Class 2 Beeston Winter 2015

Similar to Archaeology of East Midlands Class 2 Beeston Winter 2015 (20)

More from Keith Challis

More from Keith Challis (16)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

Archaeology of East Midlands Class 2 Beeston Winter 2015