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Radiocarbon Dating the Early Neolithic on Islands Within the ‘Western Seaways’ of Britain

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Radiocarbon Dating the Early Neolithic on Islands Within the ‘Western Seaways’ of Britain Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 83, 2017, pp. 97–135 © The Prehistoric Society. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. doi:10.1017/ppr.2017.4 First published online 19 September 2017 Stepping Stones to the Neolithic? Radiocarbon Dating the Early Neolithic on Islands Within the ‘Western Seaways’ of Britain By DUNCAN GARROW1, SEREN GRIFFITHS2, HUGO ANDERSON-WHYMARK3 and FRASER STURT4 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 cal 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 in Britain and Ireland and beyond. The findings broadly fitwellwiththeGathering Time model of Whittle et al., 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 forward our understanding of the processes associated with the appearance of the first Neolithic material culture and practices in this key region. Keywords: Mesolithic, Neolithic, Mesolithic–Neolithic transition, radiocarbon dating, islands, maritime archaeology, western seaways INTRODUCTION focused on the processes by which Neolithic practices The manner in which ‘the Neolithic’ arrived in Britain arrived in Britain and Ireland from continental and Ireland was a topic of debate throughout the Europe. The main issue under consideration has been 20th century (eg, Case 1969; Kinnes 1988; see Thomas the relationship between, and relative roles played by, 2013 and Anderson-Whymark & Garrow 2015 for incoming ‘Neolithic’ migrants/colonists from the recent reviews). In the early 21st century, there has continent and the indigenous ‘Mesolithic’ populations been a significant resurgence of interest in the issue (eg, of Britain and Ireland. For a long while, this debate Sheridan 2010; Whittle et al. 2011; Thomas 2013). could be characterised as one between those arguing Most discussions since the early 20th century have for substantial colonisation from the continent (eg, Sheridan 2010) versus those arguing that the 1Department of Archaeology, University of Reading, indigenous population had been almost exclusively Reading RG6 6AB Email: [email protected] responsible for the transition (eg, Thomas 2008). 2 School of Forensic and Applied Sciences, University of More recently, however, it has become increasingly Central Lancashire, Preston PR1 2HE common for interpretations to stress a combination of 3Department of Archaeology, University of York, York Y01 7EP the two (eg, Garrow & Sturt 2011; Whittle et al. 2011, 4Archaeology, University of Southampton, Southampton 861; Cummings & Harris 2011; Thomas 2013, SO17 1BF 423–4; Anderson-Whymark & Garrow 2015). 97 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.33.22, on 01 Oct 2021 at 15:35:32, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/ppr.2017.4 THE PREHISTORIC SOCIETY RECENT CHRONOLOGIES OF THE One year later, Whittle et al. (2011) published their MESOLITHIC–NEOLITHIC TRANSITION study of the radiocarbon evidence for causewayed Over the past few years, in addition to these long- enclosures in Britain and Ireland, and radiocarbon standing discussions of process, the chronology of the dates associated with Early Neolithic material culture Mesolithic–Neolithic transition in Britain and Ireland in selected regions, in their substantial Gathering Time has received a great deal of attention – primarily as a volume. While the primary focus of this project was result of new syntheses and different interpretations causewayed enclosures, work by Whittle et al. on the of the radiocarbon evidence. Discussions of chrono- wider context within which these monuments were logical data, both in terms of approaches to the first constructed enabled them to consider the arrival evidence and the interpretation of chronologically of ‘Neolithic things and practices’ (as they put it) diagnostic material culture from key sites, have been in Britain and Ireland more generally (Fig. 1). Their central. Different readings of these evidence sets have study – involving a corpus of 2350 heavily scrutinised led to sometimes radically different interpretations. radiocarbon dates – ensured that Gathering Time Critical to all of these discussions are not just their introduced a new quality of understanding in relation uses of chronological evidence, but also the way in to the timing and tempo of change. Whittle et al. which they draw the evidence from different regions suggested that the earliest signs of the Neolithic in into wider models in an attempt to understand the Britain and Ireland arrived in south-east England processes of transition. probably in the 41st century cal BC; ‘the Neolithic’ In 2010, Sheridan presented a four-strand ‘Neo- then spread across central southern England over the lithisation’ model drawing on previous work (eg, next two centuries, followed by an especially rapid Sheridan 2000; 2003; 2004; 2007; see Fig. 1). The first and extensive phase of expansion right across two phases involved a ‘false start’ of contact between Britain and Ireland in the decades around 3800 cal BC west and north-west France and south-west Ireland (Whittle et al. 2011, 836). c. 4500–4250 and a Breton/‘Atlantic’ strand of contact Subsequent to the publication of Gathering Time, between western France and western Britain/northern new evidence from Ireland, examining indicators for Ireland c. 4300–4000 BC (Sheridan 2010, 91–101). early farming practices and for the construction of Sheridan’s model included only a small number of Neolithic houses, also suggests a distinct disjuncture radiocarbon dates, foregrounding the monument and in terms of practices in the 38th century cal BC ceramic typo-chronologies of France, Britain, and (McClatchie et al. 2014). Evidence from other regions Ireland to develop a spatio-temporal narrative of of Britain (the Midlands, the north of England, and Neolithic introductions. north Wales), studied in parallel with Whittle et al., In the same year, Collard et al. (2010) published indicates that this period was also a time of significant their review of radiocarbon evidence, incorporating change elsewhere (Griffiths 2014a; 2014b), including 4246 dates from 1762 ‘site phases’ across Britain for the first time evidence for people using charac- (Fig. 1). In ‘an effort to move the [indigenous adoption teristic Mesolithic microlith technology at the same versus migration] debate forward’ they employed time as people were constructing Neolithic monu- ‘changes in summed probability distributions of cali- ments and pottery in different parts of the landscape in brated 14C dates derived from different site phases Yorkshire. [to] serve as a proxy for changes in population size’ (Collard et al. 2010, 867). The inferred popula- Critiques of these approaches tion growth rate subsequently identified was viewed as The three key approaches outlined above have been the result of ‘incoming farmers’. As a result, Collard critically scrutinised since their publication. Sheridan’s et al. (2010, 867–9) suggested that south-west (2010) model has been questioned in various ways, England (ie Wessex) was the first area to witness popu- not least for the fairly direct relationship she saw lation increase, inferred to have been brought on by the between the movement of objects/object styles and the arrival of the Neolithic through incoming migration movement of people (Thomas 2013, 159–73). With from c. 4100 cal BC.Since2010,theCollardet al. team specific reference to chronology, Sheridan has been have updated, but not substantially altered the results criticised for using selective ‘visual inspection’ (rather or conclusions of, their earlier work in various papers than detailed chronological modelling) of radiocarbon (eg, Shennan et al. 2013; Timpson et al. 2014). dates and for employing a ‘loose’ chronology relating 98 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.33.22, on 01 Oct 2021 at 15:35:32, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/ppr.2017.4 D. Garrow et al. RADIOCARBON DATING ON ISLANDS WITHIN THE ‘WESTERN SEAWAYS’ OF BRITAIN Fig. 1. The arrival of the Neolithic in Britain and Ireland, as depicted
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