Living Mesolithic Time: Narratives, Chronologies and Organic Material Culture

AbstractBritish and Irish Mesolithic studies have long been characterized by a reliance on broad-scale lithic typologies, both to provide chronologies, and in discussion of ‘cultural’ groups. More recently, traditional narrative structures—period definitions of ‘Early’ and ‘Late’, or culture typologies—have been complemented by a host of other evidence. This has included new studies of site stratigraphy, evidence for seasonality, and material culture chaîne opératoire chronologies, which place a greater emphasis on both temporal precision and the lived experiences of Mesolithic peoples. This paper will consider how the study of organic artefacts forces these narrative scales into acute focus, and presents an opportunity to explore the challenges in synthesizing different forms of data. We discuss how the evidence from sites in Ireland and Britain allows for new approaches, and highlight some of the challenges that this evidence presents, not least the perennial issue of moving from site-specific data to broader narratives. While the nature of earlier prehistoric evidence makes this an especially obvious issue for Mesolithic studies, it is one which generally besets archaeology. We suggest that in order to move beyond this in earlier prehistoric studies specifically, we need to make better use of all evidence sources, however seemingly prosaic, including antiquarian collections in museums, and chance and casual finds. Only by including the raft of available data, and recognizing its utility beyond the sum of individual apparently uninspiring parts, can we begin to move from generalizing narratives to more nuanced archaeological understandings of past material worlds

Events, narrative and data: why new chronologies or ethically Bayesian approaches should change how we write archaeology

In this paper, we discuss how the history of our discipline continues to shape how we think with material culture to produce narratives. We argue that recent developments in scientific dating — in combination with New Materialist and Big Data approaches — offer the potential to produce radical new interpretations. However, we can only achieve this if we adopt ‘ethically Bayesian’ approaches which recognise that some of the most fundamental aspects of our epistemological structures are highly situated, reflecting a Eurocentric, colonial legacy. This legacy is especially important when we study societies that did/do not produce texts — so-called ‘prehistoric’ societies. We suggest that the revolutionary potential of radiocarbon dating on archaeology has not been fully achieved, precisely because chronometric data have not yet been made sufficiently independent from materials-determined narrative structures. We outline the importance of ethically Bayesian approaches as means to challenge this disciplinary inheritance. We argue that we need to describe the richness and specificity of the pasts we bring into being in ways that take better account of the historical processes through which heterogeneous assemblages emerge, rather than to search for preconfigured entities (like ‘the Bronze Age’). Times have changed; we need our approaches to time to catch up

Public Archaeology: sharing best practice. Case studies from Wales

In 2013, Cadw published the 'Cadw Community Archaeology Framework'. This defined community archaeology practice in Wales, and outlined: a range of aims; a definition and context for community archaeology; a background to community archaeology; a vision for community archaeology; and a commitment to working with partners and communities. In 2018, five years after the publication of this document, the authors undertook a survey of the state of public archaeology practice in Wales in response to this document in order to identify best practice case studies, and from these to draw together, and share, consistent themes. Data collection took the form of a series of structured interviews with the Welsh Archaeological Trusts, as well as drawing on the authors' own experiences of public archaeology practice. We also include observations from our own practice at the Bryn Celli Ddu public archaeology landscape project. We aim to produce an inclusive, outward-facing series of research recommendations, designed to build on the Cadw/Welsh Government Framework in order to identify and support best practice, and to facilitate its dissemination

Public Archaeology: sharing best practice. Case studies from Wales

In 2013, Cadw published the 'Cadw Community Archaeology Framework'. This defined community archaeology practice in Wales, and outlined: a range of aims; a definition and context for community archaeology; a background to community archaeology; a vision for community archaeology; and a commitment to working with partners and communities. In 2018, five years after the publication of this document, the authors undertook a survey of the state of public archaeology practice in Wales in response to this document in order to identify best practice case studies, and from these to draw together, and share, consistent themes. Data collection took the form of a series of structured interviews with the Welsh Archaeological Trusts, as well as drawing on the authors' own experiences of public archaeology practice. We also include observations from our own practice at the Bryn Celli Ddu public archaeology landscape project. We aim to produce an inclusive, outward-facing series of research recommendations, designed to build on the Cadw/Welsh Government Framework in order to identify and support best practice, and to facilitate its dissemination

Stepping stones to the Neolithic? Radiocarbon dating the Early Neolithic on islands within the ‘western seaways’ of Britain

The western seaways – an arc of sea stretching from the Channel Islands in the south, up through the Isles of Scilly, the Isle of Man and the Outer Hebrides to Orkney in the north – have long been seen as crucial to our understanding of the processes which led to the arrival of the Neolithic in Britain and Ireland in the centuries around 4000 BC. The western seaways have not, however, been considered in detail within any of the recent studies addressing the radiocarbon chronology of the Earliest Neolithic in that wider region. This paper presents a synthesis of all existing 5th and 4th millennia cal BC radiocarbon dates from islands within the western seaways, including 50 new results obtained specifically for this study. While the focus here is insular in a literal sense, the project’s results have far reaching implications for our understanding of the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition across Britain and Ireland and beyond. The findings broadly fit well with Whittle et al.’s (2011) Gathering Time model, suggesting that the earliest dated Neolithic in this zone falls into the c. 3900-3700 cal BC bracket. However, it is also noted that our current chronological understanding is based on comparatively few dates spread across a large area. Consequently, it is suggested that both further targeted work and an approach that incorporates an element of typo-chronology (as well as absolute dating) is necessary if we are to move our understanding of the process of transition in this key region forward

The 8.2 ka BP Holocene climate change event and human population resilience in northwest Atlantic Europe

The 8.2 ka BP event may represent the largest, most abrupt Holocene climate event. This paper examines the impact of this event on human activity in the middle Mesolithic. It produces Bayesian statistical models for the chronology of anthropogenic sites in northwest Atlantic Europe for a 1000 year time window around the event to explore evidence for human responses to climate change or resilience in the face of this climate change event. By approaching evidence for activity at sites in Denmark, Belgium, France, Ireland and Britain we explore evidence for differential temporally- and spatially-transgressive local responses to climate change in this period to move to sub-continental scales of activity

OK computer? Digital community archaeologies in practice

The articles in this section of Internet Archaeology came out of a Theoretical Archaeology Group session at Manchester University in 2014. The session was motivated to explore issues associated with 'digital public archaeology' (DPA). The articles presented here deal with a number of themes which arise when doing digital public archaeology

The excavation of an Early Neolithic Enclosed Farmstead at Threefords North, Milfield, Northumberland

This article reports on the excavation at Threefords, Milfield, Northumberland, of an early fourth millennium Neolithic building and midden, possibly within a ditched enclosure. Associated with these remains were a large deposit of Carinated Bowl pottery, a Group VI axehead of Langdale Tuff, and environmental material that included evidence for cereal cultivation and timber species. Later activity included shallow linear ditches, representing agricultural land division, and rig and furrow ploughing