Ancient and ArchaeologyΒ permalink
Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
This discussion has been closed.
-
Message 1.Β
Posted by jenny (U14149730) on Tuesday, 7th June 2011
Hi - just watching a repeat of the Neil Oliver (chap with long hair and Scots accent)(I think that's him) programme on Ancient Britain talking about the arrival of farming in the Neolithic, replacing the Mesolithic hunter-gathering.
He seems to be saying (I think!) that new peoples arrived from Europe who were farmers, and moved into Britain and started farming, to the bemusement of the indigenous hunter-gatherers.
But why should we think it was new peoples bringing farming, rather than just the indigenous population learning to farm (possibly from some visitors, but not a replacement novel population).
Just because habits change doesn't mean peoples change.....Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 2
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Tuesday, 7th June 2011
Jenny,
that's always the question with each change in each period. Is the change coming by "peer example" (don't know if it exists in English, but it is the adoption of a higher culture by a population due to trade, cultural interchange and all that), or by conquest and war or something in between?
Perhaps some people more knowledgeable than I can explain it better and more in detail? Nordmann? lol beeble? Others (Don't be afraid to expose yourself as erudite on these messageboards
)?
Kind regards,
Paul.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 3
Posted by ShaneONeal (U14303502) on Tuesday, 7th June 2011
Hi - just watching a repeat of the Neil Oliver (chap with long hair and Scots accent)(I think that's him) programme on Ancient Britain talking about the arrival of farming in the Neolithic, replacing the Mesolithic hunter-gathering.
He seems to be saying (I think!) that new peoples arrived from Europe who were farmers, and moved into Britain and started farming, to the bemusement of the indigenous hunter-gatherers.
But why should we think it was new peoples bringing farming, rather than just the indigenous population learning to farm (possibly from some visitors, but not a replacement novel population).
Just because habits change doesn't mean peoples change.....Β
DNA evidence either way would give a good idea as to whether there was a population influx or not at this time...Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 4
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Wednesday, 8th June 2011
Hi jenny
As Paul says this dilemma occurs time and time again in archaeology. The concept that changes in cultural practice were brought about by substantial population replacement was very popular in the first half of the 20th century. Archaeologists are now more wedded to the idea of one group learning from another, the posh word for which is acculturation.
As far as the Neolithic is concerned we can't ignore the fact that none of the domesticated species: cereals, sheep, goats, domestic cattle are native to Britain. There must have been a sea crossing involved and at least a small group of immigrant farmers. Maintaining soil fertility in the face of regular cropping is not easy and in Britain (but not everywhere in Europe) the Neolithic is also associated with the first pottery. I would guess that these two skills had to be brought here. The first Neolithic pots are good which suggests that pottery was a fully developed technology when it arrived.
There are a couple of other things to consider. It is possible that Britain gained its first farmers from Ireland not from Europe. Also the Mesolithic people may have been gatherers with a capital 'G'. Sedentary Mesolithic people probably had permanent houses, planted edible species of nuts and berries, and cleared areas of forest to encourage animals such as deer. They might also have had permanent fish traps, deliberated kept herds of wild pigs and domesticated dogs. It was certainly not a question of chaps disappearing into the forest and loosing off an arrow at the occasional stag.
Evidence from DNA might be helpful as Shane suggests, but it is quite possible that immigrants to Britain came from populations of similar genetic heritage. Another way of studying this are to look for stable isotopes of elements such as oxygen and strontium in the teeth of Neolithic human remains. The tooth enamel is laid down in childhood and the elements concerned vary throughout Europe in a known way. I don't know early Neolithic data well enough to judge but this technology demonstrated that the late Neolithic, or EBA, Amesbury Archer was born in Central Europe.
TPLink to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 5
Posted by henvell (U1781664) on Wednesday, 8th June 2011
The Neolithic farmers from NW France and the Low Countries began to arrive in SE England and SE Scotland a few decades prior to 4000BCE.They brought farming technology and cattle to Britain.Over the space of two centuries this new life style was adopted throughout a significant portion of the UK and about 3800
BCE was introduced to Ireland from western England.However there is archaeological evidence that some aspects of agriculture and definitely cattle arrived in Ireland directly from the continent prior to that date.
The newcomers contributed about 20% to gene pool of Britain.There is a diminishing cline from the east to west coast.The percentage drops to less than 12% in Ireland.Agriculture and animal husbandry were disseminated through the UK by the combination of the new arrivals and the ready acceptance of the indigenous population.A sud-clade of mtDNA hapogroup J is one of the Neolithic
genetic markers.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 6
Posted by henvell (U1781664) on Wednesday, 8th June 2011
Reference:Gathering Time:Dating of the Early Neolithic Enclosures of Southern Britain and Ireland by Alasdair Whittle et al,2011,Oxbow books.[It costs a few quid!!].
Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 7
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Wednesday, 8th June 2011
Thank you ShaneO Neal, Twinprobe and Henvell for your erudite comments.
Kind regards and with esteem,
Paul.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 8
Posted by lolbeeble (U1662865) on Friday, 10th June 2011
Jenny, I think the programme was trying to suggest that the incoming farming groups would have had a different attitude to the landscape and their place within it than the populations reliant on hunting and gathering. You might note the distinction between wild and domestic that he makes about the material assemblages associated with the fully Neolithicised community of Crickley Hill that stands in contrast to the idea of hunters and gatherers being more part of nature, if not necessarily in sync with it.
As it stands the debate about whether the introduction of farming into new territories was through migration or acculturation has been ongoing for the last thirty years. In the last couple of years the pendulum has certainly swung towards migrating populations setting up separate farming communities in fresh territories as opposed to hunter-gatherers adopting aspects of the food producing package such as cultivation or animal husbandry to assist their hunting and gathering lifestyle. Despite much theoretical speculation about how one would recognise the adoption of elements of the farming package into an existing hunter gatherer society there has been precious little in the way of evidence for gradual acculturation of food production as a means of subsistence. Indeed stable isotope analysis of bones from the period of the late Mesolithic to the Early Neolithic, examining their chemical composition in order to assess an individual's diet, suggests that there is an abrupt break between exclusive exploitation of wild resources and near total reliance on domesticated varieties. That is not to say that there was not a process of interaction and exchange between hunter gatherer and farming communities. Other aspects of material culture such as styles of flint or the finished results of food production, joints of meat or grains, have been found in association with hunter gatherer communities but that does not stretch to adoption of the actual methods of food production themselves.
The Neolithic cultural package found in the British isles is sufficiently distinct from any where else in Europe that many have ruled out the direct introduction from a single source on the continent. It has been suggested that there were multiple migration events from different areas along the Atlantic seaboard. The βTrans Marche Westβ connection points to links between the funerary traditions of Northwest France and Southern England around 5900 years ago. Similar styles of pottery, carinated bowls, found in Northern France and the Low countries and Eastern Scotland from the same period highlight other links to the continent and suggests that some of the domesticates were derived from those that spread as package from Central Europe. It is believed that the early Megalith traditions of Northern Ireland and Western Scotland are derived from Brittany around 6000 years ago while the Orkney voles mentioned in the documentary that were descended from a species native to the Bay of Biscay region may well link the North of Scotland with the water borne spread of the Neolithic across the Mediterranean and up the Atlantic seaboard. The early radio carbon dates from both Carrowmore and nearby Marghaboy, if reliable, suggest that the Neolithic arrived in Ireland before it showed up in England and Scotland.
Although the programme may suggest that the Mesolithic population could not understand the incoming way of life, I do not think it was their intention to imply this must mean that the introduction of farming resulted in a total population replacement through migration. Genetics certainly have been used to suggest the spread of farming across Europe saw the arrival of migrants descended from the Near East, most notably Cavelli Sforza's wave of advance hypothesis. The proportion of genetic material present in modern populations that appeared to be derived from the Near East decreases as one travels westwards from Greece and the Balkans to Northwest Europe. Mitochondrial DNA also suggests that upwards of three quarters of modern British female lines can trace their roots back to the resettlement of the Northern latitudes in the wake of the last glacial retreat. In spite of the apparently sharp delineation between communities that practiced hunting and gathering and those that practiced farming, a substantial number of indigenous hunter gatherer women must therefore have joined communities of farmers and in doing so taken up their dietary habits. Finding the remains of such an individual is unlikely given how few generations it took for farming to become the dominant form of subsistence but it would be possible to potentially recognise this process by comparing the stable isotopes found in teeth which are set in childhood and their bones which continue to form throughout their life.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 9
Posted by lolbeeble (U1662865) on Friday, 10th June 2011
Henvell, it may well cost a few quid but so far as I was aware it is not actually released until 15th June and all I've seen are articles that lift their quotes directly from the English heritage press release like this one from the ΒιΆΉΤΌΕΔ. It does seem to continue the long tradition of terrible quality mainstream media science journalism as it does not even bother linking directly to the online edition of the press release.
It appears to be concerned with the consolidation of the Neolithic in the British Isles and the subsequent spread of the Causeway enclosure style monumental tradition. While mentioning the dates associated with the arrival of domesticates is an important consideration for the development of the subsequent tradition it does not appear to go into great detail about the mechanisms for the arrival of food production. In fact if anything it is more concerned with refining techniques for constructing the chronology of the prehistoric sites, reiterating work published in Cambridge Archaeological Journal 18 in 2008.
Do you know whether the genetic evidence mentioned was based on ancient DNA samples or was an extrapolation from modern population genetics? The findings of Haak et al regarding the genetic make up of LBK groups that suggested that the a fair degree of discontinuity between both the population of the Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic as well as modern populations points to a much more complex picture than the simple idea that modern genetic lineages continue unbroken from their initial introduction into a region to the present day that underpins much of the modern theories derived from modern extrapolations.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 10
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Friday, 10th June 2011
Hi Lolbeeble
An account of the Neolithic dating evidence is included in the current edition (July August) of 'British Archaeology'. Although this is interesting it doesn't really address the question in the o.p.
TPLink to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 11
Posted by lolbeeble (U1662865) on Friday, 10th June 2011
TP, I didn't think it it did either but was still interested in the methodology. Cheers for the pointer.
Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 12
Posted by henvell (U1781664) on Friday, 10th June 2011
Acquired a pre-print copy.
Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 13
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Sunday, 12th June 2011
lol,
thank you very much for these erudite comments. I read them (it) with great interest.
As for the "GΓΆbekli Tepe" comments I didn't found yet time to "digest" it all, especially while it on the French history messageboard extends every day.
Kind regards and with high esteem,
Paul.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 14
Posted by lolbeeble (U1662865) on Monday, 13th June 2011
Henvell, that being the case, could you summarise the possible reasons they suggest for the abandonment of many of the Causewayed enclosures after little more than a generations worth of occupation. I heard an interview with Alex Bayliss in which she suggested that the end of their use coincides with evidence for violent confrontations such as large numbers of arrow heads and bodies that have been subject to trauma disposed of in mass graves. She seemed to intimate that this might have been caused by hunter gatherers reacting to the increasing encroachment of farming communities but as such it was right at the end of the interview so they did not go into more detail. I think it is certainly relevant to Jenny's initial question.
Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 15
Posted by somewhatsilly (U14315357) on Monday, 13th June 2011
Can I presume to add a supplementary question Henvell? Do they draw any parallels with the high incidence of violence on the LBK frontier?
I can't help but be struck by the way demic explanations and conflict are reappearing as respectable theoretical interpretations in this time of general increasing pessimism and uncertainty. We really do create the past in or own image.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 16
Posted by Priscilla (U14315550) on Monday, 13th June 2011
An interesting point, ferv which made me think. Academics trying to understand transition really ought spend time with tribal people to see how quickly they adapt - and what they decide to adapt to.
In matters of custom, faith and tribal tradition that comes slowly but it appears different in the act of acquiring knowledge and new techniques. I know of many people unable to dial on a telephone 20 years ago - infact rather scare dof it now having mobilesjst as they exchanged their donkey for a motorbike and took TV ino their huts without a qualm. If the neighbour - or local feudal lord seems to be doin better with irrigation ditches then they want one too. I know of families who went from a wood fire outside to using a micro without the rite of passage of using coal or wood stoves and gas or electric cookers. That is the skip jump process of learning and absorbing knowledge.
Surely the same could apply to settled farming. Have we been influenced in our thinking by all those Western films about farmers and the hunter gather Indians enough to assume warfare? Or was that actually the pattern of what happened then too?
Or again, does it all really boil down to the old cliche that ownership is nine tenths of the law. The men of the hunter gathers having defended and lost their lives defending their right to land, so that their women were taken - possily to be used as land slaves by the farmers.
An interesting debate above anyway and thank you all for your learning. My observations are just idle thoughts of a lazy woman on a sunny afternoon.
Regards, P.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 17
Posted by somewhatsilly (U14315357) on Monday, 13th June 2011
P, you might like this
You're right of course about the importance of anthropological data to archaeology, as promoted by Lewis Binford and others, but it also needs to be handled with care given the temptation to apply the information gained in the present directly onto the remains of the past. What it does do is make us reconsider our assumptions and offer a glimpse of the width of possible interpretations and allow some of these to be tested against the evidence.Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
-
Message 18
Posted by jenny (U14149730) on Saturday, 18th June 2011
Very many (belated) thanks to all of you who have addressed this issue - your erudite knowledge is highly impressive!!
It's a fascinating issue overall, that of immigration/replacement vs acculturation, throughout history, and also the point about how we interpret the past in the light of our current politics/present day concerns, is very, very pertinant, perhaps never more so in this age of global mass migration.
It's something of an obsession of mine that current concerns (or lack of concern!) over global mass migration, especially inward migration into Europe/North America, reversing the trend of the last several hundred years of outward migration from Europe/across North America, never seem to draw any lessons or understanding from what has happened (or may have happened - or may not have!) in previous mass human migrations.
In particular, we do not seem to pay any attention to the issue of timescale, and seem incredibly short sighted (ie, 'horizon limited') about these massive historical demographic changes going on right now. We never seem to think, or say outright, 'hmm, I don't suppose the Amerindians imagined in the l6th C that they would be reduced to 'ghost cultures/populations' a few hundred years later, almost 100% replaced by incomers.
If Europeans don't learn from what we did to other peoples, we won't have the faintest idea what is being done to us until it's far, far too late.
But then, of course, that rather begs the question whether mass human migration is EVER 'resistable' by the host peoples.
(As you can tell, I'm very much a 'statist' rather than a 'progressist', and would have definitely been on the side of the hunter-gatherers, resisting all that new-fangled agriculture nonsense to the bitter end!!!!!)Link to this forum: Ancient Britain - did farmers replace hunters, or did farming replace hunting??
About this Board
The History message boards are now closed. They remain visible as a matter of record but the opportunity to add new comments or open new threads is no longer available. Thank you all for your valued contributions over many years.
or Β to take part in a discussion.
The message board is currently closed for posting.
The message board is closed for posting.
This messageboard is .
Find out more about this board's
Search this Board
ΒιΆΉΤΌΕΔ iD
ΒιΆΉΤΌΕΔ navigation
ΒιΆΉΤΌΕΔ links
ΒιΆΉΤΌΕΔ Β© 2014 The ΒιΆΉΤΌΕΔ is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read more.
This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets (CSS) enabled. While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets (CSS) if you are able to do so.