The Neolithic Period

OThe Neolithic Period (New Stone Age)

The First Farmers

The Neolithic people were Ireland’s first farmers.

OThey cleared the forest to create small farms.

OThey ploughed the fields with wooden ploughs.

OThey grew crops such as wheat and barley.

OThey domesticated animals such as cattle, sheep, goats and dogs.

OThey made permanent settlements.

OHow did they build their houses?

1.They built rectangular or circular-shaped houses.

2.They built the walls of timber planks or wattle and daub.

3.They thatched the roof with straw from wheat or barley.

4.They had a hearth in the middle of the floor, with a cooking spit.

What was Wattle and daub?

Wattle was interwoven sticks; the sticks were covered by daub (mud).

OWork, weapons and tools

1.Neolithic people used stone tools and weapons similar to the Mesolithic people.

2.They were farmers so they worked the land, ploughing the small fields, cutting corn, ground the corn on a saddle stone (or saddle quern) and used the straw for thatch. They also minded cattle and sheep.

3.They engaged in spinning and weaving to make cloth from the wool of the sheep.

4.They also hunted and gathered.

 

OHow did Neolithic people bury their dead?

1.They buried them in megalithic or great stone tombs;

OCourt Cairns

OPortal dolmens

OPassage graves

 

OWhat was a portal dolmen?

3.This was a tomb with three large upright standing stones with a capstone on top. The tomb was covered with a mound of stones.

OExample: Poulnabrone portal dolmen, Co Clare

OWhat was a court Cairn?

OA court cairn had a semi-circular court (or open space) in front of the entrance leading into a passage and a burial chamber. The tomb was covered with a large mound of stones. Bodies were cremated (burned) in the court and the ashes were placed in pots in the burial chamber.

OExample: Creevykeel court cairn, Co Sligo

OWhat was a passage grave?

4. Passage graves had a long passage leading into burial chamber. Passage graves were sometimes built together in a ‘cemetery’. In Newgrange passage grave, the rays of the rising sun on 21 December shine through a roof box over the front entrance and reach the burial chamber inside.

OExample: Newgrange, Dowth and Knowth passage graves, in the Boyne Valley, Co Meath

 

Overview of Newgrange

 

OPottery

Neolithic people made pottery from clay.

OThe pottery was used for storing food, for cooking and for burials.
 

Cist Grave

Portal Dolmen

Passage Grave

Court Cairns

 

Review Questions
1. What do the letters B.C. and A.D. mean?
2. Explain what a Secondary source is.
3. What is a Primary source?
4. List two examples of pictorial sources.
5. Give some examples of written sources.
6. What exactly is an artefact?
7. What is an Archaeologist?
8. What happens during an excavation?
9. How do archaeologists find places to excavate?
10. Name a famous archaeological site.
11. What method is used to find the age of a bone fragment?
12. Describe the life of a hunter-gatherer.
13. What does the term Neolithic mean?
14. How do we know about the very first Neolithic people in Ireland
15. What types of houses did they have?
16. What tools did they use?
17. How did Neolithic people make pottery?
18. What does the word megalithic mean?
19. What was a court cairn?
20. What was a dolmen?
21. Where in Ireland would you find the most famous passage-graves?
22. What can we say about these people who built the great passage-graves?

Answers

1. Before Christ and Anno Domini.
2. A source such as a history book written by someone who has not had first-hand experience of the material in question. An example would be a book written in the year 2001 about the First World War
3. A piece of evidence that comes directly from the people we are studying.
4. Old photos and cave paintings
5. Old census returns and old newspapers
6. Artefacts are the things left behind by people in the past e.g. houses, boats, knives, cloth, tools etc….
7. Archaeologists are the people who search for and then study artefacts to help build up a picture of the lives of people long ago.
8. A large plan drawn, area divided into grids, top soil removed, digs begins using trowels and brushes
9. Sometimes with aerial photos but often by accident – e.g. when new motorways are being built as for example in the case of the M50 at Carrickmines in Dublin.
10. Wood Quay on the banks of the river Liffey – Dublin Corporation HQ was then built on the site
11. Carbon 14 dating measures the age by finding out how much carbon is left in bones etc.
12. Travelled from place to place in search of food – hunted wild animals – gathered wild berries – lived in temporary houses made of animal skin.
13. New stone age
14. Because of the excavations that have taken place at Ceide fields in Co. Mayo
15. Wooden houses with wattle and daub walls.
16. Stone axes and stone ploughs.
17. Made rolls of clay, which were then put into a large fire.
18. Large stone
19. Court cairns are megalithic monuments which were built as burial places
20. Dolmens marked burial sites and comprised of three large stones with a large capstone on top.
21. In Co. Meath at Newgrange and Knowth.
22. Many of them were skilled craftsmen and excellent builders. They must have studied the movement of the sun and stars and they certainly must have believed in an after-life.