West Kennet Long Barrow

• West Kennet is an early neolithic long barrow.
• 50 bodies were found here, all but one of them were disarticulated. This means that the bodies must have been excarnated.
• The area between the inside and the outside of the long barrow could be a liminal zone between the world of the living and the world of the dead.
• The long barrow would have been very visible and would have been seen from far away because it was covered in chalk. This is significant as the people that made it wanted it to be seen, showing that it may have had some religious aspect much like a cathedral.
• There has been a recent discovery of a link between the bones found at west Kennet and windmill hill, this means it was likely that bodies were excarnated at windmill hill then buried at west Kennet. The journey to west Kennet could have been symbolising the journey to the world of the spirits/ancestors.
• There were 5 chambers which the remains were spread across this could mean that the bodies were split into family groups however there is evidence that the bones had been moved around so this theory is uncertain. It is also possible that the bodies were in hierarchy and were split into different chambers according to status.
• Gave goods/votive offerings were found at west Kennet these included bones tools, flint tools and shell pendants. These would have been very precious at the time as shells would have been rare due to west kennet's distance from the sea.
• These objects could have been an offering to the ancestors as the people here had a belief in ancestor worship
• It is clear that this long barrow was used to worship the dead however it appears that there wasn't much disturbance of the chambers and as they were so small at just 1m and the large end chamber 2m very few people would have been able to fit inside the chamber at one time.
• This means that ceremonies must have taken place outside of the long barrow in the forecourt, here large amounts of people could gather for special ceremonies for the dead or rites of passage ceremonies such as marriage. This tells us that there must have been a religious leader possibly more than one to carry out the rituals inside or in front of the people in the forecourt.

What is the religious and ritual significance of Windmill Hill?

Windmill hill was found in Wiltshire is an early Neolithic causewayed enclosure which is close to another early Neolithic site, West Kennet long barrow. The causeway enclosure is located onto of a hill so is therefore very visible from a distance, this tells us that it is a focal point in the landscape and large groups of people may have come to gather here for rites of passage ceremonies. More evidence of possible rites of passage ceremonies is monuments use of circles; these could have some sort of spiritual meaning of life through death, showing that funerary rituals and other rites of passage may have happened here. Archaeologists also found a large number of animal bones including cattle, pigs, sheep and goats which indicates that there was large scale ritual feasting. Clearly shows us that large groups would visit the monument.

There is lots evidence to suggest that there was ritual activities associated with death at the site. The wooden structure founds in the centre of the site shows that there could have been bodies excarnated here and then moved close by to West Kennet Long barrow to be buried, this could mark the transition from the world of the living to the world of the dead. There were also human remains found in the ditches surrounding the causewayed enclosure. Most of these were children which could show sacrifice or that children were very valuable within the community. However we can not be sure of this as we have no evidence for the cause of death.

Why is pollen analysis useful to Archaeologists?

Pollen analysis (also know as Palynology) is used to show the range and type of past vegetations at archaeological sites, this analysis is most effective on bogs and lakes as the moisture preserves the pollen in the soil. A microscope is used on the soil to look for pollen grains and spores in the archaeological layers, this is useful as it can tell us what the land would have been like. From this we are able to infer what the climate would have been like. This helps use to discover what the lives of people from the past would have been like as from pollen samples we are able to tell if they were able to farm and what the weather would have been like, telling us what kind of clothes and shelter they would have needed.

Aerial Photography Questions

A)    The photograph would have been taken during the spring or summer time, as this is when the soil will be driest making the marks show much more clearly. It is also likely that the photo would have been taken in the early morning or late afternoon as this makes the crop cast a large shadow revealing archaeological sites beneath the soil.

B)     This type of photograph is a monochrome oblique photo, as it was taken from an angle which is need to show crop marks and is in black an white which some archaeologists feel is a better and easier way to discover sites.

C)    The marks show up clearly because the picture was probably taken in a particularly dry summer, droughts usually make it easier to see crop marks as it makes under nourished crops very light in colour. The walls beneath the soil may be very deep therefore giving the crops very little moisture to grow therefore they are much smaller than other crops so they show up as very

     light compared to the surrounding crops.

D)    It is important for sites like this one to be recorded from the air at regular intervals as the time of year and day can change the appearance of the crop. This means that each photograph might reveal something different. Taking aerial photographs all year round will show crop marks during spring and summer, soil marks during autumn and shadow marks can be enhanced by a dusting of snow in winter. This gives archaeologists a wide range of evidence to consider when deciding to excavate the site and may make the excavation more accurate due to the vast amount of evidence.

E)     To some extent the photograph does support the plan as they have similar shape making them possible matches. However the two pieces of evidence do not match as the porches are not shown on the photograph as the crop marks show a straight wall rather than the porches on the plan. Although the plan and the photograph are not the same the plan does give us some indication of what the structure underneath the soil may have been there. Despite the fact that they don’t appear to be matches there is a small chance that Source A (ii) could be the plan of the building shown in the photograph because aerial photographs do not always clearly show the crop marks which have the right outline of the walls under the crops.

Can we use modern day hunter gathers to help us understand our human ancestors?

To some extent we can use hunter gathers to help us find out what our human ancestors were like, due to us knowing about the similarities between them. However we have no evidence to suggest that these people live in the same or similar way as out ancestors, therefore we could say that they are not useful in helping us understand what our ancestor were like.

Modern day hunter gathers could help us understand our human ancestors as there is some evidence to suggest they were similar as they used similar weapons to hunter with. Such as the spear which was found to be used in Boxgrove, where animal bones were found with a spear shaped hole in. This shows that they could be alike, because they hunt in the same way.

Although the modern hunter gathers and our ancestors hunted in the same way we do not know other things about the way they lived. This is because of the lack of archaeological evidence that we have to give us clues to way they might have lived. We do not know whether our ancestors gathered their foods in the same or if they wore clothing and had shelter as all of this evidence has been lost, because they lived such al long time ago.

Even though we do not know that our ancestor lived in the same way as modern hunter gathers, there is some things to suggest this, for example there’s evidence to show the use of fire due to cold whether in Boxgrove. This also means that they probably wore clothes made from similar materials as modern hunter gathers such as animal skin and fur. This all helps us see that the lives of the hunter gathers could be similar to human ancestors.

In conclusion I feel that we can use hunter gathers to help us understand our human ancestors purely because of the similarities between them. This could give us a picture of how the human ancestors lived, but this does not give us any actually evidence due to there not being evidence of it.

Aerial Photographs

Aerial photographs are photos taken by either low flying air craft, balloons and in some cases kites. There are two kinds of aerial photographs these are vertical photos which are taken directly above the ground these are not the preferred type of photo as they do not show all archaeological evidence that oblique photos do. However they are very available as there are lots of records them which can be found at The National Monument of Records and satellite photos can now be found on Google maps and other websites. Archaeologists prefer to use oblique photos as evidence even though these are much more difficult to obtain than the vertical photographs.

Crop marks

These are marks that show features that may be beneath the crops. Positive crop marks are darker marks which show that there could be a ditch below the surface of the ground, as ditches contain lots of moisture which marks the crops grow to a larger size, therefore making a darker mark on an aerial photograph. Whereas negative marks show lighter marks when see on an aerial photograph, this is because there is a wall underneath the crops. The wall makes it difficult to for crops to grow therefore they are smaller and the soil is lighter so a light crop mark would be shown on an aerial photograph. Although crop marks can be very useful to archaeologists as they reveal things that archaeologist would not be able to see from the ground there are several negatives in using crop marks. One of the negatives is that the marks can only be seen on  a few days a year, this means that an aircraft would have to continuously fly over the area just to record the crop marks, this is very time consuming and very costly. Crop marks are often only visible when there is a drought this means that it is difficult to take aerial photographs which show the crop marks. This figure shows an aerial photograph of the Damerham area in Hampshire. This photograph shows negative crop marks this tells us that there is possible evidence of circular walls being buried beneath these crops.

Shadow site

Shadow sites are sites which have survived as low earth works, this are buildings that are made of earth e.g. Banks or ditches. The shadows can be recorded by using earth craft to take oblique photographs of  an area. Shadow sites can not be seen using vertical photographs, which means archaeologist may have to carry out there own aerial photographs as they may not be able to use the photos that have been recorded making the process very expensive. The best time of year to take these is during the winter when the sun is low either in the early morning or late afternoon. This is the best time as the low lighting helps to accentuate the shadows, winter is also a good time to take the photos as snow fall and flooding make it easier to see the shadows.