First visitors to Ireland arrived around 7,000 BC during the Mesolithic Period after huge sheets of ice up to a mile thick covering much of Ireland had melted, creating new opportunities for humans to live there. These early hunter-gatherer people hunted wild animals and gathered wild fruit and berries for food.

1. First visitors to Ireland

3. Huge sheets of ice up to a mile thick covered much of Ireland
When the ice melted it created new opportunities for people
to live here
Oldest artefacts showing humans in Ireland – 7,000 BC
These people arrived during the Mesolithic Period
Mesolithic – middle stone age
These people were hunter-gatherers – they hunted wild
animals for food and also gathered wild fruit and berries