Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-5xszh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-27T15:28:28.546Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Mesolithic and Neolithic Activity and Environmental Impact on the South-east Fen-edge in Cambridgeshire

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 June 2014

Alan G. Smith
Affiliation:
aSchool of Pure and Applied Biology, University of Wales College of Cardiff, Cardiff CF1 3TL
Alasdair Whittle
Affiliation:
School of History and Archaeology, University of Wales College of Cardiff, Cardiff CF1 3XU
Edward W. Cloutman
Affiliation:
aSchool of Pure and Applied Biology, University of Wales College of Cardiff, Cardiff CF1 3TL
Lorraine A. Morgan
Affiliation:
aSchool of Pure and Applied Biology, University of Wales College of Cardiff, Cardiff CF1 3TL

Abstract

Investigations into Mesolithic and Neolithic activity and environmental impact on the Cambridgeshire fen-edge are described, consisting of stratigraphic and pollen analytical research at Peacock's Farm, and trial excavations at Peacock's Farm and Letter F Farm. At Peacock's Farm, the bulk of archaeological occupation was found to be of Mesolithic date, around 8000 BP uncalibrated; minimal signs of Earlier Neolithic activity were recovered. At Letter F Farm there was mainly Earlier Neolithic occupation, around 5000 BP, but there had also been Mesolithic activity. Radiocarbon dating at Peacock's Farm shows that the Mesolithic black band within the peats flanking the sand ridge, first described by Clark et al. (1935), covers a surprisingly long period: over 1700 years, mainly between approximately 8500 and 6800 BP. Dates from Mesolithic occupation areas on the sand ridge coincide with the first half of this period. Consideration of the stratigraphic results, radiocarbon dates and two pollen diagrams suggests that a channel was eroded through the Mesolithic black band at an early stage of its formation, probably not long before 7500 BP. In one area infilling of the channel apparently took place in a number of stages; in another it filled progressively with shell muds. A tentative reconstruction of the sedimentary, environmental and archaeological sequence is made. Before the Mesolithic occupation the landscape appears to have been densely forested both on the wetland and the elevated sands. Minor damage to this cover took place around 8500 BP, coinciding with the beginning of the Mesolithic occupation. This was followed, at about 8250 BP, by a substantial opening of the forest cover, when the site may have been more actively used than before, possibly as part of a new settlement pattern. Relatively open local conditions persisted for some 700–1500 years before the forest cover was re-established. Regeneration may have involved alder as a colonist, coinciding with the classical Boreal-Atlantic transition of Godwin. The relative importance of human impact and the occurrence of a period of dry climate are discussed. The balance of evidence, some admittedly circumstantial, points to a pronounced human impact on the local environment in the Mesolithic period. Burning may have been connected with short-stay visits in a settlement pattern spanning both wetland and dry areas; the context for this apparent lowland change might be sought in the insulation of the British Isles in the 9th millennium BP and increased territoriality from that date as reflected in microlith styles. By contrast in the Neolithic period there is very little pollen evidence of local environmental damage at Peacock's Farm. The Neolithic archaeological evidence from Peacock's and Letter F Farms suggests small short-stay visits only, as part of a regionally now more differentiated settlement pattern.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1989

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bennett, K. D. 1983. Devensian Late-glacial and Flandrian vegetational history at Hockham Mere, Norfolk, England. I. Pollen percentages and concentrations. New Phytologist 95, 457–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berglund, B. E. 1985. Early agriculture in Scandinavia: research problems related to pollen-analytical studies. Norwegian Archaeological Review 18, 7790.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, A. P. 1977. Late-Devensian and Flandrian vegetational history of Bodmin Moor, Cornwall. Philosophica Transactions of the Royal Society of London B, 276, 251320.Google Scholar
Caulfield, S. 1983. The Neolithic settlement of north Connaught. In Hamond, F. and Reeves-Smyth, T. (eds), Landscape Archaeology in Ireland, 195215. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports 116.Google Scholar
Chambers, F. M. and Price, S. M. 1985. Palaeoecology of Alnus (alder): early post-glacial rise in a valley mire, north-west Wales. New Phytologist 101, 333–44.Google Scholar
Clark, J. G. D. 1933. Report on an Early Bronze Age site in the south-eastern fens. Antiquaries Journal 13, 166–96.Google Scholar
Clark, J. G. D. 1955. A microlithic industry from the Cambridgeshire fenland and other industries of Sauveterrian affinities from Britain. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 21, 320.Google Scholar
Clark, J. G. D. and Godwin, H. 1956. A Maglemosean site at Brandesburton, Holderness, Yorkshire. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 22, 622.Google Scholar
Clark, J. G. D. and Godwin, H. 1962. The Neolithic in the Cambridgeshire fens. Antiquity 36, 1023.10.1017/S0003598X00029513CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, J. G. D., Godwin, H. and M. E., and Clifford, M. H. 1935. Report on recent excavations at Peacock's Farm, Shippea Hill, Cambridgeshire. Antiquaries Journal 15, 284319.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, J. G. D., Higgs, E. S. and Longworth, I. H. 1960. Excavations at the Neolithic site at Hurst Fen, Mildenhall Suffolk (1954, 1957 and 1958). Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 26, 202–45.Google Scholar
Cloutman, E. W. 1987. A mini-monolith cutter for absolute pollen analysis and fine sectioning of peats and sediments. New Phytologist 107, 245–48.Google Scholar
Cloutman, E. W. 1988a. Palaeoenvironments in the Vale of Pickering. Part 1: stratigraphy and palaeogeography of Seamer Carr, Star Carr and Flixton Carr. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 54, 119.10.1017/S0079497X00005727Google Scholar
Cloutman, E. W. 1988b. Palaeoenvironments in the Vale of Pickering. Part 2: environmental history at Seamer Carr. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 54, 2136.Google Scholar
Edwards, K. J. and Hirons, K. R. 1984. Cereal pollen grains in pre-elm decline deposits: implications for the earliest agriculture in Britain and Ireland. Journal of Archaeological Science 11, 7181.10.1016/0305-4403(84)90042-6CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Evans, C. 1988. Excavations at Haddenham, Cambridgeshire: a ‘planned’ enclosure and its regional affinities. In Burgess, C., Topping, P., Mordant, C. and Maddison, M. (eds), Enclosures and Defences in the Neolithic of Western Europe, 127–48. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports, International Series 403.Google Scholar
Godwin, H. 1940a. Pollen analysis and forest history of England and Wales. New Phytologist 39, 370400.10.1111/j.1469-8137.1940.tb07149.xGoogle Scholar
Godwin, H. 1940b. Studies of the post-glacial history of British vegetation. III. Fenland pollen diagrams. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B, 230, 239–85.Google Scholar
Godwin, H. 1975. History of the British Flora. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Godwin, H. and Tallentire, P. A. 1951. Studies of the postglacial history of British vegetation. XII. Hockham Mere, Norfolk. Journal of Ecology 39, 285307.Google Scholar
Gordon, A. D. and Birks, H. J. B. 1972. Numerical methods in palaeoecology. 1. Zonation of pollen diagrams. New Phytologist 71, 961–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Göransson, H. 1988. Pollen analytical investigations at Skateholm, southern Sweden. In Larsson, L., The Skateholm Project. 1. Man and Environment, 2733. Lund: Acta Societatis Humaniorum Litterarum Lundensis 79.Google Scholar
Gowlett, J. A. J., Hedges, R. E. M., Law, I. A. and Perry, C. 1987. Radiocarbon dates from the Oxford AMS system: Archaeometry datelist 5. Archaeometry 29, 125–55.Google Scholar
Greig, J. 1982. Past and present limewoods of Europe. In Bell, M. and Limbrey, S. (eds), Archaeological Aspects of Woodland Ecology, 2356. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports, International Series 146.Google Scholar
Hall, D. 1988. Survey results in the Cambridgeshire fenland. Antiquity 62, 311–14.Google Scholar
Huntley, B. and Birks, H. J. B. 1983. An Atlas of Past and Present Pollen Maps for Europe: 0–13000 years ago. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jacobi, R. 1980. The Mesolithic of Essex. In Buckley, D. G. (ed.), Archaeology in Essex to AD 1500, 1425. London: CBA Research Report 34.Google Scholar
Jacobi, R. 1984. The Mesolithic of northern East Anglia and contemporary territories. In Barringer, C. (ed.), Aspects of East Anglian Prehistory, 4376. Norwich: Geo Books.Google Scholar
Martin, E. and Murphy, P. 1988. West Row Fen, Suffolk: a Bronze Age fen-edge settlement site. Antiquity 62, 353–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mellars, P. A. 1976a. Fire, ecology, animal populations, and man: a study of some ecological relationships in prehistory. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 42, 1545.Google Scholar
Mellars, P. A. 1976b. Settlement patterns and industrial variability in the British Mesolithic. In Sieveking, G. de G., Longworth, I. H., and Wilson, K. E. (eds), Problems in Economic and Social Archaeology, 375–99. London: Duckworth.Google Scholar
Newell, R. R. 1973. The post-glacial adaptations of the indigenous population of the northwest European plain. In Koslowski, S. (ed.), The Mesolithic in Europe, 399440. Warsaw: University Press.Google Scholar
Palmer, R. 1976. Interrupted ditch enclosures in Britain: the use of aerial photography for comparative studies. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 42, 161–86.Google Scholar
Pigott, C. D. and Huntley, J. P. 1981. Factors controlling the distribution of Tilia cordata at the northern limits of its geographical range. III. Nature and causes of seed sterility. New Phytologist 87, 817–39.Google Scholar
Preece, R. C., Coxon, P. and Robinson, J. E. 1986. New biostratigraphic evidence of the post-glacial colonisation of Ireland and for Mesolithic forest disturbance. Journal of Biogeography 13, 487509.Google Scholar
Pryor, F. 1974. Excavation at Fengate, Peterborough, England. The First Report. Ontario: Royal Ontario Museum monograph 3.Google Scholar
Pryor, F. 1987. Etton 1986: neolithic metamorphoses. Antiquity 61, 98102.Google Scholar
Rackham, O. 1980. Ancient Woodland: Its History, Vegetation and Uses in England. London: Edward Arnold.Google Scholar
Radley, J., Tallis, J. H. and Switsur, V. R. 1974. The excavation of three ‘narrow blade’ Mesolithic sites in the southern Pennines, England. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 40, 119.Google Scholar
Saville, A. 1981. Mesolithic industries in central England: an explanatory investigation using microlith typology. Archaeological Journal 138, 4971.Google Scholar
Seale, R. S. 1979. Ancient courses of the Great and Little Ouse in Fenland. Proceedings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society 69, 119.Google Scholar
Simmons, I. G. and Innes, J. B. 1987. Mid-Holocene adaptations and Later Mesolithic forest disturbance in northern England. Journal of Archaeological Science 14, 385403.Google Scholar
Smith, A. G. 1970. The influence of Mesolithic and Neolithic man on British vegetation: a discussion. In Walker, D. and West, R. G. (eds), Studies in the Vegetational History of the British Isles, 8196. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Smith, A. G. 1984. Newferry and the Boreal-Atlantic transition. New Phytologist 98, 3555.Google Scholar
Smith, A. G. and Cloutman, E. W. 1988. Reconstruction of Holocene vegetation history in three dimensions at Waun-Fignen-Felen, an upland site in Wales. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B, 322, 159219.Google Scholar
Smith, A. G. and Pilcher, J. R. 1973. Radiocarbon dates and vegetational history of the British Isles. New Phytologist 72, 903–14.Google Scholar
Tilley, C. Y. 1979. Post-Glacial Communities in the Cambridge Region: Some Theoretical Approaches to Settlement and Subsistence. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports, British Series 66.Google Scholar
Walker, D. and Godwin, H. 1954. Lake stratigraphy, pollen analysis and vegetational history. In Clark, J. G. D., Excavations at Star Carr, 2569. London: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Willis, E. H. 1961. Marine transgression sequences in the English fenlands. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 95, 368–76.Google Scholar