This book brings together papers from MetalAges2024 – Chronological Methods and their Correlation in the Metal Ages, which was held in Florence in 2024, co-organised by the UISPP Scientific Commission ‘Metal Ages in Europe and the Mediterranean’ and the Istituto Italiano di preistoria e Protostoria. Through these proceedings, the editors hope to provide a strong chronological framework for the Bronze and Iron Ages in Europe that will serve as a backbone for future work.
While most focus on continental Europe, one paper, by Cherie Edwards from Queen’s University Belfast, examines Bronze Age upland settlements in Ireland and northern Britain. She reassesses the idea, using previously recorded radiocarbon and palaeoenvironmental data, along with newly excavated material, that these communities were periodically abandoned in response to climate shifts. The results show little evidence of climate change directly driving widespread upland abandonment, and that instead settlement and land-use persisted locally regardless of environmental conditions.
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