Transcript Ancient Ireland – Mesolithic Period

1st Yr
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Large periods of time divided into ages
Stone age, Bronze Age, Iron Age
Describe the new objects used by people
The stone age is divided into 3 periods
Early, Middle, New Stone Age
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Writing not clearly invented so…
Artefacts – weapons, houses, etc.
Archaeological sites
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Middle Stone Age
Used weapons made of stone
Flint – a lot of flint in North
No permanent homes so…
Info. From Midden
Remains found at Mount Sandel, North
Ireland
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7000 BC (9000 years ago)
Moved from place to place
Ate berries and nuts
Hunted deer, wild boar
Fished
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7000 BC (9000 years ago)
Moved from place to place
Ate berries and nuts
Hunted deer, wild boar
Fished
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Cleared woods for land
Planted barley and wheat
Raised domestic animals
Regular supply of food
So had to settle in permanent homes
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Round or rectangular – wooden
Post-holes – for frame
Branches weaved in – for wall
Mud plastered on
Called wattle and daub
Thatched roof over
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Archaeological remains tell us this
Lough Gur in Limerick
Ceide Fields in Mayo – Farms
Covered over by bog
Provided primary sources
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Woolen clothes from sheep
Began to spin and weave
Dye from berries
Fashionable
Wore bone necklaces
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First made during Neolithic Period
Made from clay
Used for cooking and storing food
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Ate the animals they raised
Still hunted
Made porridge from the crops
Rotary querns – round stones rubbed off each
other
Ground the grain for porridge
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Believed in after-life
Objects found buried with people
Megalithic tombs
3 types
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2 areas – court = open area
Used for religious ceremony and cremations
Cairn = the chamber
Covered with stones and slabs
Remains put in there with other objects
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Resemble huge stone tables
Aka Portal Tombs
2 standing stones = portals
Capstone on top
Cremated remains underneath
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Like huge court cairns
A passage leads to a chamber
Walls of slabs
Mound of earth on top
Most famous – Newgrange, Knowth, Dowth
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Oldest building in Europe – 4500 years old
Older than Stonehenge or the pyramids
Excavated in 1960’s
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Very advanced
Overlapping slabs going closer and closer
together for roof
No rain has gotten through
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Beautiful spirals carved on the stones
Famous one on the entrance stone
Why?
Enjoyment of the dead inside?
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Hole over entrance
Winter solstice
Light floods the chamber
Very carefully planned
Knowledgeable…
about astronomy
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Remains a mystery
So few bodies
Perhaps only for Kings?
Perhaps a temple in honour of sun god?
The cremated bones a sacrifice?
Perhaps an ancient calendar?
Telling farmers shortest day of the year
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First farmers
First Pottery
Dyed clothes
Wattle and daub
Lough Gur and Ceide Fields
Believed in after-life
Portal dolmens
Passage tombs