Stone Axes Highlight 10,000 Years Of Commuting In Stockbroker Belt (UK)

London Times ^ | 8-25-2005 | Dalya Alberge

[blam]

August 25, 2005

The Times

Stone axes highlight 10,000 years of commuting in stockbroker belt

By Dalya Alberge, Arts Correspondent

ARCHAEOLOGISTS have uncovered an important Stone Age site in the heart of Surrey. An excavation has turned up flint tools and cooking pots from about 10,000 years ago at the site on the North Downs. The area, which bears the remains of cooked meals, campfires and flints shaped into tools by people who visited the North Downs around 8,000BC, is believed to contain one of the most important Mesolithic excavations in Britain.

Andrew Josephs, an archaeologist and the project’s consultant, said: “The most extraordinary thing is that people gathered here for 4,000 years. It’s over a period of time that is very hard to comprehend. We think of the Romans as a long time ago, at 2,000 years. Mesolithic man was coming here for 4,000 years, which is 200 generations of people. It suggests a tradition passed down from generation to generation.”

Within hours of starting to dig yesterday, archaeologists had unearthed an adze, an implement used for shaping wood. The buried land surface is littered with evidence of communities that came to the area from around 8,000BC to 4,300BC.

So little is known about Mesolithic man’s way of life that the artefacts will greatly improve archaeologists’ understanding. The site is at North Park Farm, Bletchingley, a medieval village in East Surrey. It emerged when WBB Minerals, a mineral supply company, applied for planning permission to quarry in the area and an archaeological investigation was undertaken as part of the process.

WBB Minerals and English Heritage are funding a full excavation at a cost of £350,000. A series of public open days has been planned.

Jonathan Last, English Heritage’s head of prehistory research policy, said: “This excavation provides an invaluable opportunity to enhance our understanding of Mesolithic chronology and settlement. What’s really interesting about this site is the potential to have undisturbed remains of activities from this period.

“We find quite a lot of Mesolithic flints across England, but they usually turn up in plough soils on the surface. It is unusual to have undisturbed remains of occupation, where we can refit pieces of flint and find them in relation to hearths and cooking places.”

The Mesolithic period, also called the Middle Stone Age, began about 8,000BC and lasted until about 4,000BC. Across England there were only 10,000 people, who led a mobile existence, hunter-gathering in woodland. They would have followed herds of animals or moved to riverside or coastal locations to catch fish.

Archaeologists are working side-by-side under the guidance of Surrey County Archaeological Unit and ArchaeoScape, at Royal Holloway College.

[blam]

GGG Ping.

[cake_crumb]

"The most extraordinary thing is that people gathered here for 4,000 years. It’s over a period of time that is very hard to comprehend."

It's called society. Forgetting my Semitic background, I still believe the heart of human civilization will eventualy be rediscovered in Europe. PC-ism aside, of course.

[orionblamblam]

Wasn't Britain under an ice sheet 10,000 years ago?

[cake_crumb]

It had ice 10,000 years ago, not an ice sheet. There were hippopatomi in the Thames 10,000 years ago, for what it's worth. The environment was just radically different.

[Clemenza]

But, but, according to the proponents of Creationism, there were no people 10,000 years ago!

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Blam.

To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. Thanks.

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[Darkchylde]

Being a stockbroker was difficult even then. *sigh*

[cake_crumb]

"But, but, according to the proponents of Creationism, there were no people 10,000 years ago!"

Err...or was it that they were but they were giants who lived hundreds of years? I get so confused...

[Old Student]

"But, but, according to the proponents of Creationism, there were no people 10,000 years ago!"

Only the ones who believe in Bishop Usher. Some of us don't place such limits on God.

[Darksheare]

LOL!

"Unngh.. you lost me two cattle and a squirrel, you bad trader. UNNNGH!"

[Dustbunny]

But, but, according to the proponents of Creationism, there were no people 10,000 years ago!

We call a day a 24 hour period. Who knows how long a 'day' is to God, could be 24 million of our years.

[Drammach]

An excavation has turned up flint tools and cooking pots from about 10,000 years ago at the site on the North Downs.

Cooking pots? Made from what?
Are we talking hollowed out stones here?
Wooden bowls of some sort?

[Drammach]

Never mind.. Pottery is the (an) answer..

Buffalo modeled in clay from a French Upper Palaeolithic cave site as well as fired and unfired figures from Dolni Vestanici in central Europe, hint to the fact that clay may have already been skillfully formed into objects at least fifteen thousand years ago (Rice 1984:3).
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