Ancient British Bake Off? Cauldrons Fit for Feasting Found at Iron Age Settlement

Ancient Origins

The wealth of evidence found suggests there were many mouths being fed at an Iron Age settlement in the UK that looks to have developed into a regional center for ceremonies and feasting.

 A Unique and Unprecedented Collection of Iron Age Artifacts
 A team of archaeologists from the University of Leicester has announced the discovery of a unique collection of Iron Age metal artifacts found during an excavation at Glenfield Park, Leicestershire. The nationally significant hoard includes one-off finds for the region and reveals previously unknown information about feasting rituals among prehistoric communities.

As EurekAlert reports, the researchers came across a store of valuable and delightful ancient treasures at the site, including eleven complete, or almost complete, Iron Age cauldrons, fine ring-headed dress pins, an abstruse brooch and a cast copper alloy object known as a 'horn-cap', which they speculate was part of an official staff, highlighting the uncommon nature of the metalwork collection.

Iron involuted brooch ULAS. (Image: University of Leicester)

The conglomeration is considered to be exceptional and unequalled, as never before has an archaeological mission uncovered a treasure trove that includes such a great variety of findings in England.

"Glenfield Park is an exceptional archaeological site, with a fantastic array of finds that highlight this as one of the more important discoveries of recent years,”

John Thomas, director of the excavation and Project Officer from the University of Leicester Archaeological Services commented. He added,

“It is the metalwork assemblage that really sets this settlement apart. The quantity and quality of the finds far outshines most of the other contemporary assemblages from the area, and its composition is almost unparalleled.”

Copper alloy horn-cap ULAS. (Image: University of Leicester)

  Character of the Site in Constant Progress
The excavation works at Glenfield Park, Leicestershire, were launched back in the winter of 2013, and since then archaeologists have found enough evidence to believe that the area was inhabited throughout most of the Iron Age and Roman periods. The remains of the settlement consist of several roundhouses, enclosures, 4-post structures and pits that occupied the southern slopes of a low spur of slightly higher ground at the northern end of the development area.

“Early occupation of the site during the earlier middle Iron Age (5th - 4th centuries BC) was relatively modest, consisting of a small open settlement that occupied the south-facing, lower slopes of the spur. Slightly later in the middle Iron Age, indicated to be in the 4th or 3rd centuries BC by radiocarbon dating, the settlement underwent striking changes in character. Individual roundhouses were now enclosed, there was far more evidence for material culture, and rituals associated with the settlement involved apparently deliberate burial of a striking assemblage of metalwork,” Thomas stated in a University of Leicester report.

The interior of one of the Iron Age cauldrons (Image: University of Leicester)

Cauldrons Indicate that the Settlement Was Used as a Host Site for Feasting
Of course, archaeologists were flabbergasted by the many cauldrons found at the site, which, according to the experts, emphasize the important role of the settlement as a possible host site for feasting, with associated traditions of ritual deposition of significant artifacts. “The cauldron assemblage in particular makes this a nationally important discovery. They represent the most northerly discovery of such objects on mainland Britain and the only find of this type of cauldron in the East Midlands,” an impressed Thomas said.

The cauldron enclosure where found to be deliberately buried. (Image: University of Leicester)

The majority of the cauldrons seem to have been purposely positioned in a vast circular enclosure ditch that surrounded a building. They had been laid in either upright or upside down positions, before the ditch was filled in, a fact that indicates that they were buried to commemorate the termination of activities associated with this part of the site. Other cauldrons were discovered buried across the site, indicating that important events were being marked over a long period of time as the settlement developed. "Due to their large capacity it is thought that Iron Age cauldrons were reserved for special occasions and would have been important social objects, forming the centerpiece of major feasts, perhaps in association with large gatherings and events,” Thomas explains as EurekAlert reports.

The cauldrons are made from several separate parts, comprising iron rims and upper bands, hemispherical copper alloy bowls and two iron ring handles attached to the upper band.

They appear to have been a variety of sizes, with rims ranging between 36cm (14.1 inch) and 56cm (22 inch) in diameter, with the total capacity of all cauldrons being approximately 550 liters, which illustrates their potential to provide for large groups of people that may have gathered at the settlement from the wider Iron Age community of the area.

Iron bands were attached to some of the cauldrons. (Image: University of Leicester)

CT Scanning of the Cauldrons Provides Valuable Information
Soon after the important discovery took place, the extremely fragile cauldrons were lifted very carefully from the site in soil blocks for transportation in order to be examined. After an initial analysis by Dr. Andrew Gogbashian, Consultant Radiologist at Paul Strickland Scanner Centre, scientists could finally estimate the original dimensions and profiles of the cauldrons, as well as figure out how they were created. Most importantly, the scans unlocked extraordinarily rare evidence of the beautiful decoration from the period, further complimenting the immense cultural and historical significance of the site.

Color rendered image of a cauldron showing possible decoration on top right of the iron band. (Image: University of Leicester)

Archaeologists noted that with the help of modern technology, they were able to recreate digitally an example of a complete cauldron, which has raised stem and leaf motifs on the vessels iron band, similar to the handle locations, which are similar to the so-called “Vegetal Style” of Celtic art (4th century BC). Ultimately, they mentioned that more detail and information from the cauldrons will only be possible through excavation and conservation, which is being undertaken by MOLA (Museum of London Archaeology).

An optimistic Liz Barham, Senior Conservator at MOLA, told EurekAlert, "Already we have been able to uncover glimpses of the detailed histories of these cauldrons through CT scanning, including evidence of their manufacture and repair, and have identified sooty residues still clinging to the base of one of the cauldrons from the last time it was suspended over a fire. During the upcoming conservation we hope to discover much more about the entire assemblage. If we're lucky, we may even find food residues from the last time they were used - over 2000 years ago." The results of the project to date are published in the current issue of British Archaeology magazine, which will be available from 6 December.

 Top image: L-R: An iron cauldron that was found at the site. (Images: University of Leicester)

By Theodoros Karasavvas

Archaeologists Uncover 9,000-Year-Old Underwater Stone Age Settlement

Ancient Origins

Six years ago, divers discovered the oldest known stationary fish traps in northern Europe off the coast of southern Sweden. Since then, researchers at Lund University in Sweden have uncovered an exceptionally well-preserved Stone Age site. They now believe the location was a lagoon environment where Mesolithic humans lived during parts of the year.

Stone Age fish straps. Source: Video screenshot / Lund University Other spectacular finds include a 9,000-year-old pick axe made out of elk antlers. The discoveries indicate mass fishing and therefore a semi-permanent settlement. "As geologists, we want to recreate this area and understand how it looked. Was it warm or cold? How did the environment change over time?" says Anton Hansson, PhD student in Quaternary geology at Lund University.

9,000-year-old Elk antler pick axe. Source: Video screenshot / Lund University Changes in the sea level have allowed the findings to be preserved deep below the surface of Hanö Bay in the Baltic Sea. The researchers have drilled into the seabed and radiocarbon dated the core, as well as examined pollen and diatoms. They have also produced a bathymetrical map that reveals depth variations. "These sites have been known, but only through scattered finds. We now have the technology for more detailed interpretations of the landscape," says Anton Hansson. "If you want to fully understand how humans dispersed from Africa, and their way of life, we also have to find all their settlements. Quite a few of these are currently underwater, since the sea level is higher today than during the last glaciation. Humans have always prefered coastal sites," concludes Hansson.

Publication: A submerged Mesolithic lagoonal landscape in the Baltic Sea, south-eastern Sweden – Early Holocene environmental reconstruction and shore-level displacement based on a multiproxy approach

Top image: Discoveries indicate mass fishing and therefore a semi-permanent settlement. Credit: Arne Sjöström

This article, originally titled ‘ Underwater Stone Age settlement mapped out’ , was published by Lund University.

Prehistoric village people

History Extra

Houses of the Neolithic settlement of Skara Brae. (Photo by Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert/Getty Images)

Packed with historic sites of all ages from prehistoric remains to World War II wrecks in Scapa Flow, there’s more than enough history on mainland Orkney and the outer islands to hold your interest for weeks.

It’s the prehistoric remains for which Orkney is most remarkable, particularly those of the Neolithic period (around 4000–2000BC). This was when agriculture first became established in Britain, and people began to start living in permanent settlements based around farms. This was a change from the mobile lifestyle of the Mesolithic period (10000–4000BC), when they moved following the seasonal round of hunting and gathering.

The Mesolithic people have left little evidence of their passing in these islands. Their settlements weren’t built to last, so the ephemeral remains of their homes can only be traced by careful archaeological excavation. With the onset of the Neolithic and the move from hunting to agriculture as the way of life, however, our ancestors began to make more of a dent on the landscape: their settlements, their monuments, and sometimes even their trackways and field systems survive.

It’s generally easier to see the remains of death, burial and ritual of our Neolithic forebears than it is to see their settlements. These were the people who built long barrows, such as the well-preserved example at West Kennet in Wiltshire, as tombs for their ancestors. They are also responsible for henges and stone circles, Stonehenge being the most obvious example, and even more enigmatic ritual monuments like the massive man-made mound of Silbury Hill, again in Wiltshire.

Large earthwork and stone monuments like these are easy to spot in the landscape, but it’s harder to find evidence of the places where the Neolithic people who built them lived. And that’s where Orkney comes into its own – here you can see both settlements and monuments in one place; that’s why much of the mainland island has been designated a World Heritage Site. Our voyage of discovery takes in the heart of Neolithic Orkney: Maeshowe is one of the finest examples of a prehistoric burial mound in Britain, the Stones of Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar are impressive examples of the ritual monuments of the time, whilst the villages of Skara Brae and Barnhouse are amongst the best-preserved Neolithic settlement sites in Britain. With this astonishing combination of archaeological sites, the area is one of the only places in the country where you can get a real feel for the way of life of Britain’s first farmers.

Orkney archaeologist Julie Gibson knows more than most about the islands’ heritage. She sums up what you can see; “If you go to Barnhouse, you are actually in a village lived in by the people who put up the Stones of Stenness next door.”

The reason you can still see Barnhouse and Skara Brae boils down to the availability of natural resources. High winds have been battering the islands for thousands of years, so trees have struggled to survive. On mainland Britain, excavations have shown that Neolithic settlements were of wood, which has since rotted away. The Orcadians lacked timber but did have a ready supply of a more permanent material: stone. Their villages survive because they are constructed of sandstone slabs, which lie ready-quarried by the sea all around the coast.

“Because they built in stone, so it leaves everything in 3D,” explains Julie. “In the rest of the country you’re dealing with wooden structures in prehistory, so archaeologists are left with negative evidence and have to play the game of join-the-dots. Here you’ve got positive evidence so the past is that much clearer.”

There aren’t many places in the world that can boast a practically intact 5,000-year-old village. Skara Brae was occupied from around 3100BC to 2500BC, and after that it was hidden under a sand dune until a wild storm revealed it in the winter of 1850. The village is unlike any you’ll see today. It’s a semi-subterranean place, built inside a huge mound of decomposed vegetable matter, dung, animal bones, stone and shell. The midden was built on the site first and then roundhouses and connecting passageways were dug into the massive compost heap. The homes were therefore cocooned from the excesses of Atlantic weather by a layer of insulating matter.

Ten houses are visible at Skara Brae (though they were not all built and occupied at the same time). They are single-room affairs revetted with dry stone walling and each one would have had a roof supported either by timber, if it was available, or whalebone. The roofs are gone now so you look down into the houses from above, and what you see inside is amazing. All the furniture was of stone, so beds, cupboards, dressers, stone boxes, hearths and doors all survive.

_{The interior of a Neolithic house at Skara Brae, Orkney. (Photo by Werner Forman/Universal Images Group/Getty Images)}

Each house has about 36 square metres of floor space, more than half the average floor space of a modern two-bed house (61.5 square metres), so an estate agent would probably describe them as spacious studio apartments. Their low doorways and the winding passages prevented the wind rushing in, and with a fire in the central hearth, you can imagine a picture of cosy domesticity you wouldn’t normally associate with prehistory. As all the houses are similar in size and fittings without anything that looks like a chief’s dwelling, Skara Brae is generally thought to have been an egalitarian society where all members were roughly equal in status.

Life wasn’t idyllic for the people of Skara Brae, however, as Julie explains. “If you look at the skeletal material, you became very aware of the humanity of the people you’re dealing with. Terrible arthritis, heads grooved by carrying baskets round their heads. These were people only marginally shorter than us, people who are clearly us – only a long time ago – whose thought processes you have to reach through analogy – that’s what makes it difficult to understand them.”

We may not know what they thought  but we do have a fair idea of what they did during the day. Archaeologists have concluded the villagers were fishermen and farmers who grew barley and wheat, kept cattle, sheep and pigs, and supplemented their diet with seafood and sea-birds. The 20 or so families that lived in the village seem to have had peaceful relations with their neighbours around the islands as Skara Brae wasn’t built for defence and no weaponry has been found. Several similar villages have been discovered in the Orkneys, including the nearby one at Barnhouse.

Instead of fighting one another, the villagers appear to have devoted their spare time to building tombs and monuments. And they must have had a fair bit of time to spare; it’s estimated that it would have taken 150,000 hours to build the two stone circles of Stenness and Brodgar. The Stones of Stenness are thought to have been in existence by 3000BC, so it was contemporary with the occupation of Skara Brae (3100–2500BC). Brodgar is thought to be a little later, probably dating to the middle of the third millennium BC. The huge circular tomb of Maeshowe is also thought to be roughly contemporary – built some time after 3000BC and possibly used for centuries thereafter.

The two stone circles sit on narrow promontories of land looking out over the lochs of Harray and Stenness. Brodgar is the bigger, but both occupy dramatically scenic locations. The sheer scale of Brodgar can’t fail to impress and bring home the amount of work that went into it.

Maeshowe is an entirely different sort of monument. You can see its mound from the Stones of Stenness, and though it’s not much to look at on the outside, when you get inside you know you’re in a very special place.

You have to shuffle through a low narrow slab-lined passage to get inside. Consider as you do that your shoulders are rubbing on the same stones that the Neolithic builders touched 5,000 years ago. Once inside, you’re standing in one of the best examples of a chambered tomb in Britain.

These sorts of tombs are numerous in the Orkneys and archaeologists conjecture, from what’s been found in the others, that each of the side cells at Maeshowe would have held the bones of many members of the local population. In similar monuments, the bones of many people have been discovered, jumbled together in a pattern not comprehensible to modern eyes.

We don’t know for sure what was in Maeshowe because the tomb was raided by Vikings 1,000 years ago (you can see their runic graffiti on the walls) and the place contained only a single skull fragment when excavated in the 19th century. Nevertheless, it’s a uniquely atmospheric place to visit and a supreme example of the Neolithic stonemason’s skill.

Given that all these mighty monuments were built at around the same time as Skara Brae was occupied, and lie only a few miles from the settlement, it’s an obvious conclusion to make that the villagers were involved in the construction and use of the stones and tomb. To add weight to the argument, a specific type of pottery, grooved ware, has been found in excavations at all these places.

 As you wander round the stones at Stenness and Brodgar, or crouch down at the entrance of Maeshowe, there’s one question that springs to mind: ‘Why did the villagers of Skara Brae go to all the trouble of constructing these places?’ We’ll never know for certain. Without written records, all we can do is theorise. It is likely some ritual was carried out inside the circles, perhaps based on astronomical calculations, or on some sort of religion, but that’s as much as we can say without delving into mere conjecture.

Archaeologists suggest that monuments like Maeshowe were required in the Neolithic period, because people needed, in a way they’d never felt before, to associate themselves with the land they had started to farm so others couldn’t take it away. One way to create a sense of ownership was to develop an ancestor cult, burying their forefathers’ bones near the land they considered theirs and performing ceremonies to strengthen their age-old claim to their territory.

One thing is certain; it took a massive community effort to build these structures. It was certainly more than a job that just the small population of Skara Brae could have managed, and this has led to another theory; that the building of Maeshowe suggests a move from self-governing villages to a regional authority which organised people throughout the Orkneys to build the tomb.

The social bonds of close-knit settlements like Skara Brae would have broken down as people began to associate more with the regional power than the old independent village structure, perhaps leaving the village to live in smaller farmsteads. It’s a reasonable explanation for why Skara Brae was abandoned; another more prosaic possibility is that the place was overwhelmed by a huge sandstorm.

Either way, the magnificent remains are there to see today. If you want to get a first-hand impression of the way of life, and death, of the first farmers in the British Isles, Orkney is the closest place you’ll get to experiencing it.

Burned 3,000-Year-Old Settlement Frozen in Time May Have Been Torched by Raiding Party

Ancient Origins

Archaeologists speculate that a raiding party torched a Bronze Age settlement on stilts that was well-preserved in the silt of the river it fell into about 3,000 years ago. A number of hints at the site, which is just east of Petersborough, England, including palisades made of new wood, indicate the people had lived there just a short time before it burned.

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The site is at a quarry about 120 km (74.5 miles) north of London called Must Farm. An archaeologist discovered it in 1999 when he saw wooden stakes or palisades sticking out of the mud and silt, which preserved them and many other artifacts as well. Scorching and charring of the wood also helped to preserve some of the material.

Preserved wood at Must Farm by Dr Colleen Morgan (public domain)

A website about the site and excavations there states: “At some point after the palisade was created a fire tore through the settlement, causing the platform to drop into the river below where the flames were immediately quenched. As the material lay on the riverbed it was covered with layers of non-porous silt which helped to preserve everything from wooden utensils to clothing. It is this degree of preservation which makes the site fascinating and gives us hundreds of insights into life during the Bronze Age.”

The ancient people built the roundhouses over the water and encircled them with a possibly defensive palisade. Drawing by Vicki Herring for Cambridge Archaeological Unit

While the entire site is fantastic, with its nine log boats found nearby, nine roundhouses and many important artifacts, two of the most important finds were textiles and vitrified foods. Also, beads, likely from the Balkans and the Middle East, showed there was long-distance trade in Britain, where the Bronze Age began about 4,000 to 4,500 years ago

The purpose of the textiles has not been discovered because there are no telltale clues such as cuffs to say whether it was used for clothing or other purposes. However, one of the team members, Susanna Harris of Glasgow University, said they have found fine linen with thread counts of 30 per centimeter, as fine as any cloth known from Europe of the time. “I counted them several times, thinking ‘This can’t be right,’” Harris told ScienceMag.org. The team has also found hanks of yarn and balls of thread.

This photo may not look like much, but it is a fantastically preserved specimen of a 3,000-year-old textile piece from the Must Farm site. An expert says some of the textiles at the site are as fine as any of Europe at that time. Photo by Cambridge Archaeological Unit

Archaeologists working on Must Farm revealed some of their findings to the media this week. Now they intend to retreat into the laboratory to more closely examine and analyze the many artifacts they have discovered at this site.
It’s the best Bronze Age settlement ever found in the United Kingdom,” said Mark Knight, project manager with the Cambridge Archaeological Unit, a private company that is in charge of the excavations. “We may have to wait a hundred years before we find an equivalent.”
The archaeologists say the roundhouses were about 8 meters (26.25 feet) in diameter. They were built above the water as a defense and to facilitate trade on the river, which led to the North Sea and other farms in the area.
Each house had woodworking tools, including chisels, axes and gouges. They also had sickles to reap grain, spears for hunting and perhaps fighting, and sets of ceramics that contained tiny cups, fine bowls and storage jars.
In the northeast sector of each house were butchered lambs. Dumped into the river were parts of deer and wild pigs. The archaeologists speculate the inhabitants may have had a taboo against butchering wild game indoors.

A bowl with a woodchip. Photo by Cambridge Archaeological Unit

Several food vessels contain charred, wheat, barley and residues of food that had already been cooked. One bowl of stew had a spoon in its burned crust. Experts hope to get Bronze Age recipes from the prehistoric smorgasbord.
Tree rings from wood used to construct the roundhouses and palisade were from about 1290 to 1250 BC and were all green and undisturbed by insects. That, plus wood chips found there, tell archaeologists it was a new settlement when it burned.
Archaeologist Karl Harrison of Cranfield University has been analyzing the fire damage and scorch marks to determine if the fire started in a house or outside. If it started inside, it may have been from a cook fire. If the blaze started outside, it might have been a case of arson. “It was rapid, smoke-filled, and incredibly destructive,” he told ScienceMag.org. “You’d have a couple of minutes to scrabble around.”
The people never returned to the site, which ensured it was well-preserved for modern archaeologists to discover and analyze.
Top image: A bronze socketed ax was one of many Bronze Age tools found at Must Farm, a site that dates back about 3,000 years and is the finest site of that era ever found in Britain and one of the finest in Europe. Photo by Cambridge Archaeological Unit.
By Mark Miller