[00:59.65]Good morning everyone.
[01:01.93] Last week we were looking at the hunter-gatherers in Ireland, across the Irish Sea from England.
[01:07.83] Today, we're going to move on to the period between four and six thousand years ago, known as the Neolithic period, which is when a total farming economy was introduced in Ireland.
[01:20.73]Now, there are several hypotheses about the origins of the first Neolithic settlers in Ireland, but most of these contain problems.
[01:29.66] For instance, there are considerable archaeological difficulties about the theory that they came from England.
[01:36.22] The evidence doesn't really add up.
[01:38.61] But there are even greater practical problems about the theory that they came directly from continental Europe.
[01:45.41] For one thing, it's not clear just how sufficient numbers of men and women could have been transported to Ireland to establish a viable population.
[01:56.10] As you know, the hunter-gatherer economy which existed beforehand was based on small scattered groups.
[02:03.79] The farming economy would almost certainly have required much larger communities to do all the work needed to plant and tend sufficient crops to sustain them through the year.
[02:14.42]The early farmers kept various animals, including cattle and sheep.
[02:20.25] There's also evidence of pigs, but it is possible that these could have been descended from the native wild species.
[02:27.13] Now, we know from modem fanning that if the level of breeding stock falls below about three hundred females, the future of the species locally is at risk.
[02:38.72] So we must assume that from the beginnings of Neolithic farming the number of breeding sheep would have considerably exceeded three hundred, and the national cattle herd must have been similar size.
[02:51.30] The question is how these were brought to the area and where they came from.
[02:56.25]It’s usually suggested that the Neolithic settlers used skin-covered boats to transport livestock.
[03:03.30] But this method would have severely restricted the range of the colonising fleets.
[03:08.00] The sheer volume of animal transport necessary means it’s unlikely that this livestock could have been brought from anywhere further than England.
[03:17.21]What about crops?
[03:19.47] Well, two main cereal crops were introduced to Ireland during this time: wheat and barley, both in several varieties.
[03:28.22] The main evidence for their presence consists of impressions on pottery, where a cereal grain accidentally became enbedded in the surface of a pot before it was fired.
[03:39.96]The grain itself was destroyed by the firing, but it left an impression on the pot which could be studied and identified by botanists.
[03:53.21]Let's turn our attention now to the farming technology available at that time.
[03:58.30] Before the cereal crops could be planted, it would have been necessary to clear the forest and to break the ground by ploughing.
[04:06.90] The stone blade of a plough has beeiscovered during excavation in County Mayo in western Ireland.
[04:13.70] The body of the plough would have been of wood and could have been drawn by people, but it’s also likely that cattle were used.
[04:20.99]Now, the cultivation of crops and the husbandry of livestock brought about changes in people's lifestyle such as the type of shelters they made.
[04:31.36] For one thing, instead of moving from place to place they needed permanent dwellings.
[04:37.57]The stone axes used to chop down trees to make these dwellings were far superior to any that the Stone Age hunter-gatherers used.
[04:46.43]To make the axes, sources of suitable stone had to be found and systematically exploited.
[04:53.92] These so-called ‘axe factories’ were really quarries rather than factories, as the manufacture of the axes wasn't regularly performed on the quarry site.
[05:03.92] However, after the axe had been chipped into shape, they needed water and sand for grinding and polishing, so a high mountainside wouldn't have been an appropriate place for this.
[05:15.81] So this final stage of the manufacture must have been carried out close to water and sure enough, there's ample evidence of this at coastal sites.
[05:25.87]Now it’s clear that these Neolithic axes were transported all over Ireland, as well as to Scotland and the south of England.
[05:34.39] It's not really surprising that axes from ‘axe factories’ in England have also been found in Ireland.
[05:40.77]At the very least, this indicates that there was a link between the two islands during that period.
[05:46.78]One of the most useful innovations of the colonisers was pottery making, which was quite unknown to Irish hunter-gatherers.
[05:54.77] The pottery was probably made by shaping day into a ball with the hand, and then hollowing it until the walls were the right thickness.
[06:02.64] After firing, the outside was often polished.
[06:06.13] This would have helped the pots to retain water, as they weren't glazed.
[06:10.15] Now we know that the clay used usually came from local sources, which suggests that manufacture was on a fairly small scale, even though thousands of fragments are usually found at Neolithic sites.
[06:23.43]In the course of time decoration began to appear.
[06:27.24] At first this looked like a series of stitches and was just around the tops of the pots.
[06:32.59] This could have been an imitation of earlier vessels which were made of leather sewn onto wood.
[06:37.96] Then eventually pots with decoration all over…
