Imperial College Sports Grounds and RMC Land, Harlington
Imperial College Sports Grounds and RMC Land, Harlington

Author: Andrew B. Powell

Publisher: Wessex Archaeology

Published: 2016-02-16

Total Pages: 472

ISBN-13: 1874350752

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This volume brings together the results from the excavations at the former Imperial College Sports Ground, RMC Land and Land East of Wall Garden Farm, near the villages of Harlington and Sipson in the London Borough of Hillingdon. The excavations revealed parts of an archaeological landscape with a rich history of development from before 4000 BC to the post-medieval period. The opportunity to investigate two large areas of this landscape provided evidence for possible settlement continuity and shift over a period of 6000 years. Early to Middle Neolithic occupation was represented by a rectangular ditched mortuary enclosure and a large spread of pits, many containing deposits of Peterborough Ware pottery, flint and charred plant remains. A possible dispersed monument complex of three hengiform enclosures was associated with the rare remains of cremation burials radiocarbon dated to the Middle Neolithic. Limited Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age activity was identified, which is in stark contrast to the Middle to Late Bronze Age when a formalized landscape of extensive rectangular fields, enclosures, wells and pits was established. This major reorganized land division can be traced across the two sites and over large parts of the adjacent Heathrow terraces. A small, Iron Age and Romano-British nucleated settlement was constructed, with associated enclosures flanking a trackway. There were wayside inhumations, cremation burials and middens and more widely dispersed wells and quarries. Two possible sunken-featured buildings of early Saxon date were found. There was also a small cemetery. Subsequently, a middle Saxon and medieval field system of small enclosures and wells was established.

The Social Context of Technology
The Social Context of Technology

Author: Leo Webley

Publisher: Oxbow Books

Published: 2020-06-30

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 1789251796

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The Social Context of Technology explores non-ferrous metalworking in Britain and Ireland during the Bronze and Iron Ages (c. 2500 BC to 1st century AD). Bronze-working dominates the evidence, though the crafting of other non-ferrous metals – including gold, silver, tin and lead – is also considered. Metalwork has long played a central role in accounts of European later prehistory. Metals were important for making functional tools, and elaborate decorated objects that were symbols of prestige. Metalwork could be treated in special or ritualised ways, by being accumulated in large hoards or placed in rivers or bogs. But who made these objects? Prehistoric smiths have been portrayed by some as prosaic technicians, and by others as mystical figures akin to magicians. They have been seen both as independent, travelling ‘entrepreneurs’, and as the dependents of elite patrons. Hitherto, these competing models have not been tested through a comprehensive assessment of the archaeological evidence for metalworking. This volume fills that gap, with analysis focused on metalworking tools and waste, such as crucibles, moulds, casting debris and smithing implements. The find contexts of these objects are examined, both to identify places where metalworking occurred, and to investigate the cultural practices behind the deposition of metalworking debris. The key questions are: what was the social context of this craft, and what was its ideological significance? How did this vary regionally and change over time? As well as elucidating a key aspect of later prehistoric life in Britain and Ireland, this important examination by leading scholars contributes to broader debates on material culture and the social role of craft.

Bronze Age Worlds
Bronze Age Worlds

Author: Robert Johnston

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2020-10-26

Total Pages: 437

ISBN-13: 1351710974

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Bronze Age Worlds brings a new way of thinking about kinship to the task of explaining the formation of social life in Bronze Age Britain and Ireland. Britain and Ireland’s diverse landscapes and societies experienced varied and profound transformations during the twenty-fifth to eighth centuries BC. People’s lives were shaped by migrations, changing beliefs about death, making and thinking with metals, and living in houses and field systems. This book offers accounts of how these processes emerged from social life, from events, places and landscapes, informed by a novel theory of kinship. Kinship was a rich and inventive sphere of culture that incorporated biological relations but was not determined by them. Kinship formed personhood and collective belonging, and associated people with nonhuman beings, things and places. The differences in kinship and kinwork across Ireland and Britain brought textures to social life and the formation of Bronze Age worlds. Bronze Age Worlds offers new perspectives to archaeologists and anthropologists interested in the place of kinship in Bronze Age societies and cultural development.

Territoriality and the Early Medieval Landscape
Territoriality and the Early Medieval Landscape

Author: Stephen Rippon

Publisher: Boydell & Brewer

Published: 2022-04-05

Total Pages: 407

ISBN-13: 1783276800

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All communities have a strong sense of identity with the area in which they live, which for England in the early medieval period manifested itself in a series of territorial entities, ranging from large kingdoms down to small districts known as pagi or regiones. This book investigates these small early folk territories, and the way that they evolved into the administrative units recorded in Domesday, across an entire kingdom - that of the East Saxons (broadly speaking, what is now Essex, Middlesex, most of Hertfordshire, and south Suffolk). A wide range of evidence is drawn upon, including archaeology, written documents, place-names and the early cartographic sources. The book looks in particular at the relationship between Saxon immigrants and the native British population, and argues that initially these ethnic groups occupied different parts of the landscape, until a dynasty which assumed an Anglo-Saxon identity achieved political ascendency (its members included the so-called "Prittlewell Prince", buried with spectacular grave-good in Prittlewell, near Southend-on- Sea in southern Essex). Other significant places discussed include London, the seat of the first East Saxon bishopric, the possible royal vills at Wicken Bonhunt near Saffron Walden and Maldon, and St Peter's Chapel at Bradwell-on-Sea, one of the most important surviving churches from the early Christian period.

The Prehistory of Britain and Ireland
The Prehistory of Britain and Ireland

Author: Richard Bradley

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2019-05-16

Total Pages: 391

ISBN-13: 1108329632

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Sited at the furthest limits of the Neolithic revolution and standing at the confluence of the two great sea routes of prehistory, Britain and Ireland are distinct from continental Europe for much of the prehistoric sequence. In this landmark study, Richard Bradley offers an interpretation of the unique archaeological record of these islands. Highlighting the achievements of its inhabitants, Bradley surveys the entire archaeological sequence over a 5,000 year period, from the last hunter-gatherers and the adoption of agriculture in the Neolithic period, to the discovery of Britain and Ireland by travellers from the Mediterranean during the later pre-Roman Iron Age. His study places special emphasis on landscapes, settlements, monuments, and ritual practices. This edition has been thoroughly revised and updated. The text takes account of recent developments in archaeological science, such as isotopic analyses of human and animal bone, recovery of ancient DNA, and more subtle and precise methods of radiocarbon dating.

Cliffs End Farm Isle of Thanet, Kent
Cliffs End Farm Isle of Thanet, Kent

Author: Jacqueline I. McKinley

Publisher: Wessex Archaeology

Published: 2015-02-05

Total Pages: 338

ISBN-13: 1874350728

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Excavations at Cliffs End Farm, Thanet, Kent, undertaken in 2004/5 uncovered a dense area of archaeological remains including Bronze Age barrows and enclosures, and a large prehistoric mortuary feature, as well as a small early 6th to late 7th century Anglo-Saxon inhumation cemetery. An extraordinary series of human and animal remains were recovered from the Late Bronze Age–Middle Iron Age mortuary feature, revealing a wealth of evidence for mortuary rites including exposure, excarnation and curation. The site seems to have been largely abandoned in the later Iron Age and very little Romano-British activity was identified. In the early 6th century a small inhumation cemetery was established. Very little human bone survived within the 21 graves, where the burial environment differed from that within the prehistoric mortuary feature, but grave goods indicate ‘females’ and ‘males’ were buried here. Richly furnished graves included that of a ‘female’ buried with a necklace, a pair of brooches and a purse, as well as a ‘male’ with a shield covering his face, a knife and spearhead. In the Middle Saxon period lines of pits, possibly delineating boundaries, were dug, some of which contained large deposits of marine shells. English Heritage funded an extensive programme of radiocarbon and isotope analyses, which have produced some surprising results that shed new light on long distance contacts, mobility and mortuary rites during later prehistory. This volume presents the results of the investigations together with the scientific analyses, human bone, artefact and environmental reports.

Assembling Past Worlds
Assembling Past Worlds

Author: Oliver J.T. Harris

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-06-08

Total Pages: 283

ISBN-13: 1000393089

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Assembling Past Worlds draws on new materialism and the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze to explore the potential for a posthumanist archaeology. Through specific empirical study, this book provides a detailed analysis of Neolithic Britain, a critical moment in the emergence of new ways of living, as well as new relationships between materials, people and new forms of architecture. It achieves two things. First, it identifies the major challenges that archaeology faces in the light of current theoretical shifts. New ideas place new demands on how we write and think about the past, sometimes in ways that can seem contradictory. This volume identifies seven major challenges that have emerged and sets out why they matter, why archaeology needs to engage with them and how they can be dealt with through an innovative theoretical approach. Second, it explores how this approach meets these challenges through an in-depth study of Neolithic Britain. It provides an insightful diagnosis of the issues posed by current archaeological thought and is the first volume to apply the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze to the extended analysis of a single period. Assembling Past Worlds shows how new approaches are transforming our understandings of past worlds and, in so doing, how we can meet the challenges facing archaeology today. It will be of interest to both students and researchers in archaeological theory and the Neolithic of Europe.

Revisiting Grooved Ware
Revisiting Grooved Ware

Author: Mike Copper

Publisher: Oxbow Books

Published: 2023-11-23

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13:

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Following its appearance, arguably in Orkney in the 32nd century cal BC, Grooved Ware soon became widespread across Britain and Ireland, seemingly replacing earlier pottery styles and being deposited in contexts as varied as simple pits, passage tombs, ceremonial timber circles and henge monuments. As a result, Grooved Ware lies at the heart of many ongoing debates concerning social and economic developments at the end of the 4th and during the first half of the 3rd millennia cal BC. Stemming from the 2022 Neolithic Studies Group autumn conference, and following on from Cleal and MacSween’s 1999 NSG volume on Grooved Ware, this book presents a series of papers from researchers specializing in Grooved Ware pottery and the British and Irish Neolithic, offering both regional and thematic perspectives on this important ceramic tradition. Chapters cover the development of Grooved Ware in Orkney as well as the timing and nature of its appearance, development, and subsequent demise in different regions of Britain and Ireland. In addition, thematic papers consider what Grooved Ware can contribute to understandings of inter-regional interactions during the earlier 3rd millennium cal BC, the possible meaning of Grooved Ware’s decorative motifs, and the thorny issue of the validity and significance of the various Grooved Ware sub-styles. The book will be of great value not only to archaeologists and students with a specific interest in Grooved Ware pottery but also to those with a more general interest in the development of the Neolithic of Britain and Ireland.

Marking Place
Marking Place

Author: Jonathan Last

Publisher: Oxbow Books

Published: 2022-01-11

Total Pages: 366

ISBN-13: 1789257107

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Much archaeological work is concerned with identifying gaps in our knowledge and developing strategies for addressing them; we perhaps spend less time thinking about how research should proceed when we already know, relatively speaking, quite a lot. The program of dating causewayed enclosures in southern Britain that was published in 2011 as Gathering Time (Oxbow Books) gave us a new, more precise chronology for many individual sites as well as for enclosures as a whole, and as a consequence a far better sense of their significance and place in the story of the British Early Neolithic. Arguably, causewayed enclosures are now the best understood type of Neolithic monument. Yet work continues, and in the last few years new discoveries have been made, older excavations published and further work undertaken on well-known sites. Viewing this research within the new framework for these monuments allows us to assess where our understanding of enclosures has got to and where the focus of future research should lie. This volume originates from a Neolithic Studies Group meeting held in November 2019, which aimed firstly to showcase and explore the wide range of current work on causewayed enclosures and related sites, and secondly to assess what we still want to know about these sites in light of the monumental achievement of Gathering Time. The papers collected here comprise reports on recent development-led fieldwork, academic research and community projects, and the volume concludes with a reflection by the authors of Gathering Time.

Later Prehistoric Settlement in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly: Evidence from Five Excavations
Later Prehistoric Settlement in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly: Evidence from Five Excavations

Author: Andy M Jones

Publisher: Archaeopress Publishing Ltd

Published: 2021-10-07

Total Pages: 380

ISBN-13: 1789699584

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Later prehistoric settlement in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly reports on the excavation between 1996 and 2014 of five later prehistoric and Roman period settlements. All the sites were multi-phased, revealing similar and contrasting occupational patterns stretching from the Bronze Age into the Iron Age and beyond.