by Chris Fowler
The Mesolithic of southern Scandinavia also provides clear evidence for contacts with farmers to the south. This can be seen most clearly in the importation of copper objects originating in the Balkans and of stone axes, the most well known being the shoe-last axes from the LBK and jadeite axes from the Alps (Klassen 2004). Pottery is also found, in the form of pointed-base vessels and ‘blubber lamps’, although its origin is not so clear.
This reminds us that presence of the LBK, with its fully agricultural economy, on the North European plain from c. 5400 BC means that for the Mesolithic inhabitants of southern Scandinavia this was definitely what Zvelebil and Rowley-Conwy (1986) would term an ‘availability phase’ when Neolithic ways of life could potentially have been adopted. Although there is a range of evidence for contacts between the LBK and the Ertebølle culture in Denmark and Sweden, there are virtually no cases of small-scale experimentation with agriculture before 4000 BC, as one might expect in a gradual transformation. Indeed, the radiocarbon and stratigraphic evidence conclusively demonstrates the swift adoption in southern Scandinavia of a Neolithic economy with (some exploitation of) domesticated species and monumental burial under mounds around 3900 BC (Persson 1999, Chapter 4). This process seems to take about a century and shows no clear trend from east to west or north to south. Although this has sometimes been argued to favour immigration theories (e.g. Skak-Nielsen 2004), any explanation of change being imposed from the outside has to deal with the question of why there was a vast chronological gap between the appearance of the Neolithic at c. 5400 BC within a few days travel of Scandinavian Mesolithic groups and the eventual adoption of Neolithic practices and products.
Rowley-Conwy’s (1984; updated 2011) theory of a severe resource shortage has proved popular. He argued that the post-glacial rise in sea level created a rich marine habitat; communities became sedentary, thus requiring local resources year-round; although resources were plentiful overall, there was a shortfall in food in late winter and early spring; this gap was filled by gathering shellfish; after 4000 BC falling relative sea levels in western Denmark triggered a decline in oysters, producing a food supply crisis, and finally; the only alternative was to take up the domesticated plants and animals familiar from contacts with agricultural communities to the south. Objections to Rowley-Conwy’s explanation have been on a number of grounds (summarized in Thorpe 1996, 90–91). First, it is difficult to see why a shortfall in the oyster supply could not have been replaced by increased fishing, perhaps with storage of fish, rather than necessitating a complete social and economic transformation. Second, the oysters were limited to Atlantic coasts, so the impact on inland areas and the Baltic coast is unclear (Milner and Laurie 2009). Although Rowley-Conwy specifically considered western Denmark, the common background, common speed of transition, and common outcome for the whole of the area suggest that any explanation needs to encompass the entire region.
Stable isotope evidence from human bones of both Mesolithic and Neolithic date has been used to argue that there was a dramatic change in diet away from marine resources and towards domesticates at the Mesolithic–Neolithic transition, and thus significant discontinuity (Schulting 1999a). Although the results do seem clear-cut they do not fit with the archaeological evidence of continued use of marine resources in the diet, most obviously the presence of lipids from processing marine and freshwater foods in Neolithic pottery (Craig et al. 2011). At the site level there are discontinuities of practice, but the overall pattern is certainly one of continuity. Also, as Andersen (2008) notes, there is a significant degree of continuity at coastal (mostly shell midden) sites from the Mesolithic to Neolithic and relatively little sign of the new domesticates: whilst the earliest domesticated animal remains have been claimed in some such contexts (Sørensen 2009) questions have been raised concerning the accuracy of identification (Rowley-Conwy 2011). A continuation of hunting is shown by the reuse of many Mesolithic sites primarily for hunting and the distribution of offerings in wet places. Many major deposits were built up in locations overlooked by prominent hills (probably long-standing significant points in the landscape) near to Neolithic hunting, rather than farming, sites. The general verdict on early Neolithic agriculture in most of southern Scandinavia is that it was real, and that changes in the subsistence regime did take place, but that the shift to a fully food-producing economy did not happen until the end of the early Neolithic. However, Oslo fjord in Norway is an exception, as it is agreed that economic changes here were minimal (Glørstad 2009; Solheim 2012), and followed by a reversion to gathering–hunting with the Pitted Ware communities of the late fourth millennium.
One new development in the Neolithic has traditionally been seen as the appearance of monuments in the form of earthen long barrows. There are approximately 40 probable long barrows reported from Denmark, mostly in Jutland (Kristensen 1989), and a few from Scania, concentrated in the Malmö area on the west coast (L. Larsson 2002). Although long barrows are more widely known in northern Europe, possible influences from shell midden burials may nonetheless be significant given the placing of the dead in long shell middens. Unlike Britain, where causewayed enclosures were once thought to have been constructed early in the Neolithic and thus to have formed a significant part of how becoming Neolithic was worked through in practice, in southern Scandinavia they have always been recognized since their discovery as a phenomenon of the middle Neolithic. They appear only around 3400 BC, several centuries after the beginning of the Neolithic (Thorpe 2001) and centuries later than in Britain, and may point to significant social change in southern Scandinavia at this point.
Together, these observations suggest that processes of both gradual transformation and dramatic change operated during the Mesolithic and early Neolithic in southern Scandinavia, but in different areas of social life. Overall, however, there is clear evidence for continuity, which is the primary reason why those archaeologists who favour a migration model for the origin of agriculture here are in a distinct minority.
Instead, most recent interpretations may be situated within a model which stresses internal social competition (Thorpe 1996; Tilley 1996; Fischer 2002). During a lengthy period of social competition—which the material culture, settlement and economic evidence, burials, and traces of violent conflict during the Ertebølle period all suggest—there were many occasions on which domesticates could have been introduced, but social rules kept them at bay. However, a long period of social competition would itself undermine traditional structures of power and authority. As clearings were established in the forests to encourage animals or plant growth this dealt a blow to existing notions concerning the proper relationship between the community and the landscape and also increased notions of territoriality which were already developing through economic specialization, the permanence of settlements, and the development on the coast of cumulative monumental constructions in the form of shell middens. A conceptual shift may have taken place in the relationship between human action and the environment. The degree of intervention required by agriculture and the construction of Neolithic communal monuments would not then have seemed so alien. If marriage exchanges existed with Neolithic communities to the south (perhaps cementing the exchanges of goods noted above), then incoming marriage partners would have brought with them knowledge of agricultural practices.
THE LOW COUNTRIES
In Holland and Belgium the situation is rather different, with Linearbandkeramik (LBK) farming communities appearing on loess soils in the Scheldt basin in Belgium and Limburg in the Netherlands c. 5300 BC. This is generally argued to be an influx of farmers due to the lack of continuity in lithic production (e.g. Louwe Kooijmans 2007). The border region thus created has been proposed by Keeley (1992) to be characterized by warfare, with farmers protected by frontier forts, but the evidence from the sites themselves, such as Darion with its incomplete ditch and palisade circuit and the general lack of evidence of conflict in the surrounding region argues strongly against this. Moreover, there is a
considerable body of material, in the form of arrowheads, axes, pottery and domesticates, pointing to exchanges between farmers and gatherer-hunters (Vanmortfort 2008).
As in northern Germany, this initial expansion of a farming economy was then followed by a long hiatus, in this case of nearly two millennia, during the Michelsburg period. In both Belgium and the Netherlands the wetlands and sandy lowlands saw the emergence of pottery use in later phases of the Swifterbant culture (Raemaekers and De Roever 2010). From about 4600 BC the subsistence economy was a roughly equal mix of wild and domesticated resources, some of the latter perhaps being imported. Although this may appear a temporary situation on the way to a full agricultural economy, this mixed economy lasted for a further 1,000 years. The difficulties this poses for traditional terminology are indicated by the description of the Swifterbant culture as both Mesolithic and Neolithic by various authors.
Swifterbant burial practice is well established (Raemaekers et al. 2007), with small cemeteries on sand dunes next to settlements with single and multiple burials of adults and children, with relatively small numbers of grave goods. There are also single bones in the settlements and nearby streams, which do not seem to come from disturbed graves, but represent a different type of treatment of some of the dead.
In the southern part of the Swifterbant area the Hazendonk group develops after 3700 BC, which has been interpreted as a hybrid Mesolithic–Neolithic culture. The Hazendonk group saw the development of a new pottery style, new lithic styles, and changes in the details of burial practice all of which suggest Michelsburg influence. In economic terms, however, they continued the mixed economy of the earlier period, rather than adopting an entirely agricultural economy.
Given the long, drawn-out nature of the transition, the majority opinion is that there was a significant degree of continuity from the Mesolithic to the Neolithic (e.g. Crombé and Vanmontfort 2007), with a piecemeal adoption of the Neolithic (e.g. Louwe Kooijmans 2007). The length of time taken is attributed to a perceived lack of attractiveness of the Neolithic economy, which must have been quite familiar, given the clear evidence of exchange across the frontier of lithics, pottery, and domesticates.
ATLANTIC FRANCE
The knowledge base for Brittany and Normandy is rather different again, with excavated settlements for both the Mesolithic and Neolithic being relatively rare, but burials and monuments far better known and thus the focus of debate. The famous shell midden sites of Téviec and Hoëdic are on small islands off the southern Breton coast, with animal bone remains which may be debris from feasting, which were probably permanently occupied. There may have been other sites on the coast, but sea-level rise has drowned these. The perception of a dependence on coastal resources has led to the suggestion that rising sea levels could have caused a crisis (Dupont et al. 2009). However, numerous other Mesolithic sites inland are known through fieldwalking (Marchand 2007), but not yet excavated. Recent excavations at Pen Haut Salaün (Nicolas et al. 2013) point to the reuse of some inland Mesolithic sites in the Neolithic, even if the evidence cannot yet demonstrate continuity of occupation.
There is great debate over the origin of megaliths and burial in stone chambered tombs, which emerge during the fifth millennium BC (Scarre 2007). The oldest theory of the origin of megaliths was that they represented the spread of a religious cult by megalithic missionaries. This was, however, ruled out by the impact of radiocarbon dating, which showed the Atlantic megaliths to be much older than their supposed Mediterranean forebears. This rejection of a Mediterranean inspiration for megaliths led to suggestions of a local origin, pointing to the presence of burials in late Mesolithic Brittany. At Téviec and Hoëdic these occur in shell middens: 23 burials at Téviec and 14 at Hoëdic. Men, women, and children were interred together in stone-lined pits, in the most elaborate examples covered by small heaps of stone (cairns) and in one case marked by a small upright stone. The burials date to the period 5500–5000 BC (Schulting 1999b). Ideas of multiple burial therefore already existed among gatherer-hunters of Brittany before the emergence of monuments, and with them the possibility of a purely local development of megaliths, which would require much better chronological control than currently available to assess properly.
Megalithic burial monuments placed the living community’s ancestors visibly in the landscape, with the result that they became an important part of future social developments. Making the ancestors visible in this way could also be used by the living as a way of demonstrating their rights to the territory they controlled, perhaps fishing rights in the case of hunter-gatherers on the coast of Brittany, and presumably land and its wealth in the case of Neolithic groups. Earlier models suggested that megalithic tombs acted as territorial markers for societies under pressure because of the lack of land to the west to absorb a growing population. However, two types of evidence fail to support this. The small amount of pollen analysis undertaken suggests that the impact of early farming was relatively slight (Scarre 2001), with clearances mostly at the sites of tombs themselves, Similarly, despite the impact of recent rescue excavation, there are still only a fairly small number of early Neolithic settlements by comparison with megaliths (see Nicolas et al. 2013 for an up-to-date map). It may be that other resources such as the stone sources suitable for making axes and the ornaments found in megalithic tombs were just as desirable as farming land.
A number of passage graves contain reused standing stones (menhirs) with a different set of carvings to those found in the tombs themselves (Cassen 2000). At Gavrinis, one of the most elaborate tombs, the uncovering of the top side of the chamber capstone revealed that it was part of a substantial carved stone, which joined with the capstones from two other mounds. The carvings on this 14m high stone, and on another possible original stone, have been the subject of two contrasting interpretations: they may be domesticated cattle, sheep/goat, ‘axe-ploughs’, and axes; or they may be ungulates or ruminants (wild or domesticated), sperm whales, and axes (e.g. Whittle 2000). These motifs may either be representative of food production through the stages of clearance, cultivation, and pasturing, perhaps in a celebration of the introduction of agriculture; or they may express connections with socially important wild animals, and their inclusion in later monuments at the outset of Neolithic megalithic architecture may commemorate or conceal these connections. The uncertainty of the dating evidence for menhirs means that it is quite possible that some of the monuments date to the late Mesolithic, perhaps at the very end of the period, and potentially relate to some evidence for the presence of domesticated animals and crops within the Mesolithic.
One exceptional find was that of two complete cattle skeletons in a pit below the long mound of Er Grah (Tresset and Vigne 2007). Radiocarbon dating showed that the cattle were placed there in the late sixth millennium BC, that is in the late Mesolithic. The origin of the cattle must be Neolithic communities to the south and they can therefore be interpreted as exotic imports. A similar process could lie behind the finds of early cereals in the drowned peat bog off the Locmariaquer peninsula (Visset et al. 1996), although the dating evidence here is not entirely secure.
The general lack of evidence other than burials and monuments has made the nature of the Mesolithic–Neolithic transition difficult to assess. Current opinion favours an origin for megaliths ultimately in Iberia, where radiocarbon dates mirror those for early tombs in France, but this is believed to be a matter of diffusion of inspiration up the Atlantic coast, perhaps related to the spread of lithic technology (Marchand 2005), rather than immigration.
BRITAIN AND IRELAND
The traditional view was that agriculture, like all other changes, was introduced to Britain and Ireland from the continent. However, this interpretation of migration as prime mover was undermined by the observation that no single region of continental Europe appears to have possessed the range of material culture and site types found in the British Isles. Recent revivals of this interpretation (Sheridan 2007) still grapple with this diff
iculty, although this does not of course mean that there was no immigration. The apparent speed of the transition from the Mesolithic to Neolithic can be interpreted either as a point in favour of colonization (e.g. Rowley-Conwy 2004) or against it (e.g. Bradley 2007, 36).
Some recent thinking highlights substantial continuity in both population and life-way (summarized in Thorpe 2009). Specifically, the beginning of the Neolithic was perhaps not very Neolithic; a shifting population living in mobile camps did not invest significantly in agriculture, either in terms of crops or animals. According to this argument, Mesolithic people adopted selected material symbols (e.g. axes and the earliest monuments known locally) and ideas of the Neolithic without fully embracing an agricultural lifestyle, that is remaining Mesolithic in economic terms. New crops and animals were used primarily in particular and limited contexts, relating to feasting and other ritual activities (e.g. Thomas 2004). However, the application of soil sampling has led to the discovery of a significant volume of cereal remains on British Neolithic sites (Jones and Rowley-Conwy 2007). There is a consistent pattern of low levels of cereal grains and chaff items, comparable with LBK settlements (Bogaard and Jones 2007). This may relate to the appearance of flint mines at the beginning of the Neolithic in Britain, if the axes mainly produced were used for tree clearance. Stable carbon isotopes have been examined for indications of a marine or terrestrial diet (Schulting and Richards 2002), leading to the conclusion that there was a sudden dietary shift with the onset of the Neolithic in Britain, which has in turn been taken as evidence against a gradual uptake of domesticated plants and animals into Mesolithic society. The case is clearest for Scotland, where both Mesolithic and Neolithic human remains are available in some numbers, though this appears to conflict with the evidence for the apparent continuity of use into the Neolithic of midden sites and shellfish collecting (Milner et al. 2004).
