Late Stone Age Hunters of the British IslesFor 7,000 years after the last ice age, the people of the British Isles subsisted by hunting wild game and gathering fruits of the forest and foreshore. Belonging to the late Upper Palaelithic and Mesolithic periods, these hunter-gatherers have hitherto been viewed mainly in terms of stone tool typologies. late Stone Age Hunters of the British Isles departs from this conventional approach, reassessing the archaeological evidence and placing it within a wider ecological and geographical context. This well illustrated study, which includes case studies, maps and photographs, provides a balanced approach to the study of a period that demands multi-disciplinary treatment. It outlines a range of considerations that have a bearing on the study of early societies in the British Isles, and also forms a useful guide to communiites themselves as represented by known archaeological sites. |
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accumulation activity archaeological record archaeologists band birch birds boreal forests Britain British Isles burins butchery Campbell Campbell’s cent chapter Cnoc Coig Creswell Crags deciduous deciduous woodland Deepcar deposits distribution early Postglacial ecological environment evidence example excavations faunal assemblage Figure fish flint Gough’s Cave groups hearth Hengistbury Head home base hunter-gatherers hunting and gathering ice sheets identified important indicate Inner Hebrides Ireland Kent’s Cavern lake Late Stone Age late Upper Palaeolithic Lateglacial and early Lateglacial Interstadial mainly mammals Mellars Mesolithic microliths millennium BP Mother Grundy’s Parlour Mount Sandel northern occupation Oronsay pattern period plants plate pollen population density prey radiocarbon dates range red deer reindeer remains Robin Hood’s Cave scrapers sea levels season settlement shell middens shelter shrubs species Star Carr Stone Age hunters stone tools studies suggest survive temperature Thatcham traces trees tundra Upper Palaeolithic wild cattle wild pig zone