Neolithic balls
The balls may have indicated prestige, or have been used as ceremonial objects
Neolithic
Neolithic artistry from the Stonehenge landscape
Cutting-edge photographic techniques have shed illuminating light on a series of carved chalk plaques excavated close to Stonehenge. What have they revealed about artistic endeavour in Neolithic Britain? CA explores a new study by Bob Davis, Phil Harding, and Matt Leivers.
Carving camels
‘Neolithic communities repeatedly returned to the Camel Site, meaning its symbolism and function was maintained over many generations’
Neolithic stone balls found in Orkney tomb
The purpose of the balls remains obscure, but they could have been used as weapons to inflict head injuries, or as ritual objects.
Restoring Stonehenge: securing a Neolithic monument over 120 years
This autumn, specialists have been working to conserve some of the Stonehenge sarsens, the latest in a series of initiatives stretching back to the dawn of the 20th century. CA Editor Carly Hilts spoke to Heather Sebire to find out more.
Trellyffaint: how excavating a Pembrokeshire portal dolmen illuminated Neolithic dairy farming in Wales
A project that initially set out to study rock art on a c.5,000-year-old monument has uncovered what could be the earliest direct evidence of dairy farming in Wales. George Nash, Carol James, and Thomas Wellicome from the Welsh Rock Art Organisation (WRAO), and Julie Dunne and Emmanuelle Casanova from the University of Bristol, explain more.
Minerva Magazine 191
• Megalithic Malta
• Nefertiti
• Rome’s hidden mosaics
• The Battle of Salamis: a clash that shaped the Western world
• St Francis of Assisi: examining an unusual maiolica plate
• History of Egyptology, from 1822 to 1922
Wooden snake figurine
Snakes are rarely depicted in rock art in northern Europe, and are known to have had symbolic significance in the later world views of the Finno-Ugric and Sámi peoples
John Pull: Worthing’s hero archaeologist
Self-taught archaeologist John Pull made discoveries of national significance in the South Downs around Worthing, but his humble origins saw him sidelined by more privileged professional peers. With a recently extended exhibition at Worthing Museum and Art Gallery bringing his story back into the spotlight almost 100 years after his investigations began, Current Archaeology's Carly Hilts visited to find out more.
Digging returns to the Ness of Brodgar
These are the first examples of wood surviving in situ to be found at the Ness.
Early origins of Arthur’s Stone uncovered
Arthur’s Stone is protected as a scheduled monument – it is famous for being the possible inspiration for C S Lewis’s ‘stone table’ in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
This week: Malta
Fifty miles south of Sicily, the tiny, densely populated island of Malta sits at the epicentre of Mediterranean history. Perched midway between Europe and Africa, it has long been a cultural crossroads, and its strategic importance has been recognised by a complicated succession of foreign rulers – including the Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Greeks, Romans, Vandals, Ostrogoths, Arabs, Normans, Aragonese, Knights of the Order of Saint John, French, and British.
Megalithic Malta
There is much we don’t know about the people who lived in Neolithic Malta, but they left their mark on the islands through vast temples and tombs. Luc Amkreutz and Sharon Sultana explore what these impressive structures and the figurines found in them can tell us about a vanished civilisation.
A shaman’s snake staff?
In Finno-Ugric and Sámi cosmology, snakes are associated with various symbolic meanings, and shamans had the ability to transform into these creatures.
Prehistoric structures in Saudi Arabia
At the excavated mustatil, archaeologists uncovered an assemblage of cattle horns and skull fragments interpreted as an offering, perhaps related to a ‘cattle cult’, further supporting the ‘ritual’ interpretation of these sites.
Pre and Protohistoric Stone Architectures: comparisons of the social and technical contexts associated to their building
Generically, monuments are organised using four recognised architectural elements: the mound, the entrance or façade, the passage, and the chamber. I suppose a fifth element could be landscape. These clear building traits are repeated across much of Atlantic Europe. However, there…
Neolithic hunter-gatherer identified as the oldest plague victim
The high bacterial load of plague bacterium in their bloodstream indicates it was likely transmitted through the bite of an infected rodent, resulting in septicemia plague.
Neolithic Britain Quiz
The Neolithic period was the final part of the Stone Age. Which years did it span in Britain?
Further fingerprints found at the Ness of Brodgar
'The analysis has much wider implications in the study of Neolithic ceramics, but we will need many more fingerprint examples before any firm conclusions can be drawn.’
Prehistoric animal carvings discovered in Kilmartin Glen
What makes this discovery particularly exciting is that, even though animal carvings from this period are known from continental Europe, such realistic prehistoric depictions were not thought to exist in Scotland before now.
Arabia’s monumental landscape
In the largest study of north-western Arabia’s mustatil to date, archaeologists have recorded more than 1,000 of the enigmatic rectangular structures across 200,000km2 of land, shedding light on one of the oldest widespread monument-building traditions. These prehistoric structures take their…
Current Archaeology 375
• Butser Ancient Farm’s Neolithic new dawn
• The origins of two fortifications in the March of Ewyas
• Iron Age bog bodies
• Life and death in the Sculptor’s Cave
• Time Team returns
Carmarthenshire’s missing monument: how one of the biggest excavations in Wales uncovered a long-lost henge
The installation of the South Wales Gas Pipeline allowed archaeologists to investigate a 317km corridor stretching from the Pembrokeshire Coast to Gloucestershire. Their finds have illuminated more than 10,000 years of human history, including the previously unknown remains of Britain’s most south-westerly Neolithic henge. Current Archaeology's Carly Hilts reports.
Neolithic fingerprint found at the Ness of Brodgar
Further analysis of the print will contribute to ongoing research into the identification of archaeological fingerprints, and may reveal more details of the anonymous potter thanks to known variations in fingerprint patterns based on sex and age.
University of Glasgow project to shed light on modern-day burial mounds
They will investigate the recent trend in constructing burial mounds as a columbarium – a place for housing the cremated remains of the deceased.
Megaliths and Geology
One of the essentials of building a megalithic chambered burial monument is the choice of materials used to construct it. It is now considered that stone (boulders, stone erratics and fragments, and quarried stone) used in the construction of megaliths was…
Back at Butser Ancient Farm: reconstructing the past and safeguarding its future
In mid-April, CA travelled to Butser Ancient Farm in Hampshire – our first site visit of 2021! – to catch up with what’s new at the recently reopened experimental archaeology centre. The site has just unveiled an immersive reconstructed Neolithic house, as well as an innovative new online offering to share the team’s research more widely. Current Archaeology's Carly Hilts reports.
Neolithic salt production at Street House?
Many of these characteristics bear a close resemblance to other salt-production sites in Britain from the Bronze and Iron Ages, and are features in common with known Neolithic salterns from the Continent.
Arabia’s mustatils identified as the earliest monumental landscape
The discovery of cattle horns and skull fragments during the excavation has been interpreted as an apparent offering, and as confirmation that the structures were built for a ritual, cultic, or religious purpose.
Huge quernstone unearthed in Orkney reveals Early Neolithic site
The settlement is centuries older than the Stone Age site of Skara Brae.
Ness of Brodgar project finds 5,000-year-old fingerprint
‘Working on such a high-status site as the Ness of Brodgar, with its beautiful buildings and stunning range of artefacts, it can be all too easy to forget about the people behind this incredible complex.'
Dig finds 6,000-year-old salt production site in Yorkshire
The discovery includes a trench containing three hearths and hundreds of pottery fragments, as well as stone tools and a storage pit – all evidence of salt production.
Eroding evidence of prehistoric Orkney
A massive incised rock has recently been discovered at the northern end of the Bay of Skaill in Orkney.
New Light on the Neolithic of Northern England
The Neolithic is that pivotal point in prehistory where community changes, from dependence on hunting, fishing, gathering strategies based on seasonal availability to seasonal harvesting, animal husbandry, food procurement, and storage. Until recently, archaeologists took a broad-brush approach, sometimes ignoring…
The Tale of the Axe: how the Neolithic revolution transformed Britain
Around 12,000 years ago, the course of human history changed forever when hunter-gatherer communities in western Asia made a dramatic lifestyle change, switching from foraging to farming. It was the beginning of the Neolithic revolution: a cultural phenomenon that swept…
Stonehenge: a recycled Welsh monument
Recent research has potentially identified an intriguing new connection between Stonehenge and a partially dismantled stone circle in south-west Wales – furthering the connection between these two areas during the Neolithic period. Previous work on the origins of Stonehenge’s smaller…