English History (Part 3): Neolithic
Neolithic Period (4000 – 2500 BC)
The first evidence of a field in England is under a burial mound in Wiltshire, near Avebury. There is a surface layer of soil from 3500 BC, preserved by the barrow's construction. It has tiny grooves running at right angles, forming a criss-cross pattern. These grooves were cut by a plough – a forked tree branch with a stone tip, pulled by an ox. This represents the beginning of farming.
This small patch of land was cleared by the destruction of dense woodland, cultivated with the plough, and became pasture for sheep or cattle, with a boundary fence or hedge set up for it. The barrow was built on top of the field about 1,500yrs later.
The transition from hunting to farming was, of course, very gradual. Flint tools were replaced by sickles and polished axes; pottery was introduced to England; new forms of communal ritual developed.
The slow expansion of farming began around 4000 BC. The woods and forests were cleared sporadically, then extensively – the moors of northern & south-western England, and the heaths of East Anglia, were partially created by humans. Wheat and barley were grown in this new ground.
Domesticated pigs and cattle were kept, and so were sheep and goats. All these animals were brought over in ships, as they weren't native to England.
During the Neolithic Period, the temperature rose and the population expanded. From around 4700 – 2000 BC, the population trebled to perhaps 300,000 people. This increased cultivation. By 3000 BC, the available countryside was marked out in small rectangular fields. There were fences, ditches and stone walls for the fields. Fences have been found beneath prehistoric burial mounds.
These burial mounds, or barrows, are more evidence of a settled society with its own forms of ritual & worship. Houses were built, and so were scattered farmsteads with settlement pits – these pits were enclosures were cattle could be herded, or fairs & meetings held. One enclosure in Cornwall, built sometime before 3000 BC, was enclosed & guarded by a great stone wall. Within it, the remains of houses have been found, enough to house about 200 people. The beginning of the English village or town can be found in the Neolithic Period.
The Neolithic people built roads and trackways between settlements, and lanes between farmsteads. Between Buckinghamshire and Norfolk was the Icknield Way; between Canterbury and Winchester was the Pilgrim's Way. Part of Ermine Street is now known as the Old North Road. Between Oxfordshire and Lincolnshire was the Jurassic Way; between Canterbury and St. Albans was Watling Street, passing through what may have been prehistoric London.
Long causeways were built across the soft fens of Somerset, using wood that was cut down around 3800 BC. Trees may have been built specifically for this purpose, as can be seen in the varieties of wood used, including ash, hazel, holly and lime. However, the specific properties of the wood that the Neolithic speople used are not known to us.
Many “Roman roads” are far older – the Romans built on top of the prehistoric roads. Modern roads were subsequently built upon the Roman roads. There was a network of communication that extended throughout England, evidence of a populous, busy civilization, much more sophisticated than was once believed.
Axe-blades for farmers and house-builders were transported along these roads; so were all kinds of pottery, and leather goods. Flint was mined in underground galleries, entered by hundreds of shafts up to 15.2m deep, then sent all over the country.
Meanwhile, regional differences were becoming greater. On the western (Atlantic) side of England, people were building megalithic portal tombs and passage tombs, but not in East Anglia, the mid-lands, or south-east England. These great stone tombs were built for a period of around 600yrs, beginning in around 3800 BC. The culture that built them had its origins in south-western Europe. These tombs are also found in Portugal, Brittany (western France), Scotland and the Orkneys, which suggests that there was once a shared European religion that created these monuments.
Entrance to the Wayland's Smithy long barrow in Oxfordshire.
In the same period, causewayed enclosures were built mainly in southern and eastern Britain. These causewayed enclosures were oval or circular spaces, surrounded by a ditch cut into segments. They were used for ritual purposes, but the belief system & how it was practised was different from in the south-west. The open spaces suggest a more egalitarian, or at least more communal, faith.
Causewayed enclosure at Burham (Kent).
Cursus monuments were also built during this time. They are long parallel lines of ditches, crossing what must have been cleared countryside, extending as far as 9.6km. They are part of a ritual landscape, but we do not understand it. At this time, the ground, earth and stones of England were sacred.
Stonehenge, of course, is the greatest of all sacred sites. It was originally a circle of 56 wooden posts, built around 2800 BC, situated in a ritual landscape that had already existed for the last 500yrs. A 2.4km-long cursus runs just to the north. Pieces of rock crystal that must have been carried here from Alpine regions have been found.
Concrete posts marking the original wooden pillars.
Salisbury Plain, where Stonehenge is located, was the spiritual centre of England at this time. The chalk and limestone ranges of lowland Britain radiate out from here, and a network of ridgeways & trading routes converged on it. It was the largest area of habitable land, and was accessible by rivers.
