North of Here: Imagining the Human and Other-Than-Human in Late-Upper Palaeolithic Britain Richard Edward Skelton North of Here: Imagining the Human and Other-Than-Human in Late-Upper Palaeolithic Britain Richard Edward Skelton A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Manchester Metropolitan University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of English Centre for Place Writing Manchester Metropolitan University 2020 5/443 Abstract What were the cosmogonies, mythologies, rituals and ontological beliefs of the Late- Upper Palaeolithic peoples who returned to the ‘British’ peninsula when the ice sheets began to retreat, some 15,000 years ago? More specifically, can we come to understand how they conceived of place, landscape and the natural world? Those working within the field of archaeology are rightly circumspect, but artistic practitioners, I suggest, are not bound in the same way by material evidence, and can consequently venture more freely. What, therefore, can speculative creative writing say about the deep past, and how can it bridge the gulf of time between us and our ancestral selves? North of Here is a ‘Creative Geographies: Writing Place’ project in the form of a long poem; a dialogic and visionary narrative that imbricates both ancient and contemporary ways of being. Drawing on environmental science, archaeology and the anthropology of circumpolar Indigenous cultures, it explores the human and other-than- human in terms of shared personhood, and the values of respect and reciprocity that govern non-hierarchical ‘social universes’. In particular, it examines consent-seeking and transgression in hunting, and the role of ‘special’ animals such as the bear in cosmogonic beliefs. This thesis will document the evolution of my interest in landscape and other- than-human studies leading up to this PhD project. It will primarily contextualise the poem itself within anthropological and mythological literature, and therefore argue that the creative writer can meaningfully engage with cross-disciplinary subject matter. Moreover, in light of the so-called ‘creative turn’ in the humanities, it will suggest ways in which creative writers can contribute to interdisciplinary knowledge exchange. 7/443 Acknowledgements I would like to thank Dr Paul Evans and Dr Ben Edwards for their excellent supervision during this programme of PhD research, and to extend especial thanks to my Director of Studies, Dr David Cooper, whose insight, guidance and unflagging positivity has made this experience so memorable and rewarding. 9/443 Contents Abstract..............................................................................................................................5 Acknowledgements........................................................................................................... 7 1. Introduction................................................................................................................. 13 1.1. North of Here....................................................................................................... 21 1.2. Literary Contexts................................................................................................. 23 1.3. Summary..............................................................................................................30 2. Preliminary Research (Digest).....................................................................................33 3. North of Here...............................................................................................................41 3.1. Notes.................................................................................................................. 123 4. Landscape.................................................................................................................. 127 4.1. The Living Land................................................................................................ 127 4.2. The Seeing Land................................................................................................ 134 4.3. The Land in Memory......................................................................................... 136 4.4. The Mythic Land/Body .....................................................................................140 4.5. Earth-Diver........................................................................................................ 156 4.6. The Earth Within the Hill...................................................................................160 4.7. Here....................................................................................................................164 5. The Other-Than-Human............................................................................................ 169 5.1. Land as Other-Than-Human.............................................................................. 169 5.2. Animal................................................................................................................174 5.3. Likeness............................................................................................................. 178 5.4. The Hunter......................................................................................................... 183 5.5. Dream Communication......................................................................................191 5.6. Consent.............................................................................................................. 196 5.7. Reincarnation..................................................................................................... 201 10/443 5.8. Otherness............................................................................................................205 6. Time........................................................................................................................... 213 6.1. Beginnings......................................................................................................... 213 6.2. Primordiality...................................................................................................... 215 6.3. Transcending the Individual...............................................................................218 6.4. Time-Depth........................................................................................................ 220 6.5. Before.................................................................................................................225 6.6 The Right Time................................................................................................... 230 6.7. Longevity........................................................................................................... 233 6.8. Palaeolithic Art...................................................................................................236 6.9. Darkness.............................................................................................................252 7. Reflection...................................................................................................................259 7.1. Process............................................................................................................... 259 7.2. Literary Contexts............................................................................................... 274 7.3. Dream-Recall..................................................................................................... 283 7.4. Shamanic Elements............................................................................................289 7.5. The Function of Poetry...................................................................................... 292 7.6. Evaluation: Research......................................................................................... 297 7.7. Evaluation: Poetry..............................................................................................302 Appendices.................................................................................................................... 319 A1. Preliminary Research (Verbose).........................................................................321 A1.1. Questions of Scale...........................................................................................321 A1.2. Last Glacial Maximum and Vegetative Recolonisation..................................323 A1.3. The Return of Animals and Humans...............................................................325 A1.4. Archaeological Sites........................................................................................327 A1.5. The North West............................................................................................... 332 11/443 A1.6. Ethnographic Analogy.....................................................................................335 A1.7. Ojibwa Ontology and Personhood.................................................................. 338 A1.8. Animals As Agents..........................................................................................351 A1.9. The Alive World of the Koyukon....................................................................362 A1.10. Animal Mastery.............................................................................................368 A1.11. Animic Ontology...........................................................................................373 A1.12. Bear Ceremonialism......................................................................................374