PALAEOLITHIC
AND MESOLITHIC WALES (250,000 BC – 4,000 BC)
The Palaeolithic and Mesolithic in Wales span almost 250,000
years from the first Neanderthals to the emergence of farming
communities 6,000 years ago, yet the destructive effects
of the last ice sheet mean that only sporadic evidence survives.
Throughout this period human presence was influenced by
environmental change.
The following are extracts/summaries of the key priorities
identified for the period. For the full text, click on the
All Wales Final Document link below.
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Colonisation and re-colonisation
- Greater understanding is needed of when people arrived
and disappeared, and why.
-
Settlement patterns and histories
– The distribution of settlement sites and their
interrelationships require elucidation, underpinned by
an improved chronology.
-
Social organisation and beliefs
– Interactions between people need to be better
understood, for example by applying modern approaches
to investigating raw material exploitation and early burial
and seeking evidence for cave art.
No regional seminar papers were produced in 2003 for
this theme. Instead a pan-Wales paper was presented at the
regional seminars.
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Excavation on Burry
Holms, Gower, Swansea, investigating an early Mesolithic
settlement site beneath a later prehistoric roundhouse.
©National Museum of Wales
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1996 research excavations
to investigate the findspot of the skeleton of the
"Red Lady" of Paviland Cave, Gower, Swansea.
©National Museum of Wales |
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Reconstruction
of an early Mesolithic settlement, based on finds
from The Nab Head, Pembrokeshire.
©National Museum of Wales |
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