The Prehistoric Archaeology of Ireland

Description

On present evidence the human settlement of Ireland commenced some ten thousand years ago and the prehistoric story thus covers over eight and a half thousand years. This book provides a chronological account of this long timespan and, with numerous illustrations, charts the development of the first hunting and foraging communities, the achievements of the earliest agriculturalists with their remarkable megalithic tombs, and the technological advances of the later bronze and iron-using societies. Recent decades have seen some exceptional developments in the study of the prehistoric archaeology of Ireland. New discoveries, excavations and research, new theoretical approaches and the increasing application of radiocarbon and tree-ring dating techniques have all made an enormous contribution to the better understanding of this remote past. As well as being a comprehensive and original review of the subject, this book answers the need for a detailed introduction to a large body of archaeological evidence and it is a measure of the amount of recent work that almost half the references cited in the bibliography have been published in the last dozen years or so. Preface vi Acknowledgements vii List of illustrations ix Introduction 1 Chapter 1. Postglacial Ireland: the first colonists 8 Chapter 2. Farmers of the fourth millennium 25 Chapter 3. The cult of the dead 57 Chapter 4. Sacred circles and new technology 107 Chapter 5. Enigmatic monuments 167 Chapter 6. Bronze and gold and power: 1500-900 BC 179 Chapter 7. The consolidation of wealth and status: 900-500 BC 225 Chapter 8. From bronze to iron 279 Chapter 9. Elusive settlements and ritual sites 319 Chapter 10. Protohistory 373 Bibliography 378 Index 409