| Good morning everyone. |
| Last week we were looking at the hunter-gatherers in Ireland, |
| across the Irish Sea from England. |
| Today, we're going to move on to the period between 4 and 6000 years ago, |
| known as the Neolithic period, |
| which is when a total farming economy was introduced in Ireland. |
| Now, there are several hypotheses about the origins of the first Neolithic settlers in Ireland, |
| but most of these contain problems. |
| For instance, there are considerable archaeological difficulties about the theory that they came from England. |
| The evidence doesn't really add up. |
| But there are even greater practical problems about the theory that they came directly from continental Europe. |
| For one thing, it's not clear just how sufficient numbers of men and women could have been transported to Ireland |
| to establish a viable population. |
| As you know, the hunter-gatherer economy which existed beforehand was based on small scattered groups. |
| The farming economy would almost certainly have required much larger communities |
| to do all the work needed to plant and tend sufficient crops to sustain them through the year. |
| The early farmers kept various animals, including cattle and sheep. |
| There's also evidence of pigs, |
| but it is possible that these could have been descended from the native wild species. |
| Now, we know from modern farming that if the level of breeding stock falls below about 300 females, |
| the future of the species locally is at risk. |
| So we must assume that from the beginnings of Neolithic farming, |
| the number of breeding sheep would have considerably exceeded 300, |
| and the national cattle herd must have been of a similar size. |
| The question is how these were brought to the area and where they came from. |
| It's usually suggested that the Neolithic settlers used skin-covered boats to transport livestock. |
| But this method would have severely restricted the range of the colonising fleets. |
| The sheer volume of animal transport necessary |
| means it's unlikely that this livestock could have been brought from anywhere further than England. |
| What about crops? |
| Well, two main cereal crops were introduced to Ireland during this time: |
| wheat and barley, both in several varieties. |
| The main evidence for their presence consists of impressions on pottery, |
| where a cereal grain accidentally became embedded in the surface of a pot before it was fired. |
| The grain itself was destroyed by the firing, |
| but it left an impression on the pot |
| which could be studied and identified by botanists. |
| Let's turn our attention now to the farming technology available at that time. |
| Before the cereal crops could be planted, |
| it would have been necessary to clear the forest and to break the ground by ploughing. |
| The stone blade of a plough has been discovered during excavation in County Mayo in western Ireland. |
| The body of the plough would have been of wood |
| and could have been drawn by people, |
| but it's also likely that cattle were used. |
| Now, the cultivation of crops and the husbandry of livestock brought about changes in people's lifestyle |
| such as the type of shelters they made. |
| For one thing, instead of moving from place to place |
| they needed permanent dwellings. |
| The stone axes used to chop down trees to make these dwellings |
| were far superior to any that the Stone Age hunter-gatherers used. |
| To make the axes, sources of suitable stone had to be found and systematically exploited. |
| These so-called 'axe factories' were really quarries rather than factories, |
| as the manufacture of the axes wasn't regularly performed on the quarry site. |
| However, after the axe had been chipped into shape, |
| they needed water and sand for grinding and polishing, |
| so a high mountainside wouldn't have been an appropriate place for this. |
| So this final stage of the manufacture must have been carried out close to water |
| and sure enough, there's ample evidence of this at coastal sites. |
| Now it's clear that these Neolithic axes were transported all over Ireland, |
| as well as to Scotland and the south of England. |
| It's not really surprising that axes from 'axe factories' in England have also been found in Ireland. |
| At the very least, this indicates that there was a link between the two islands during that period. |
| One of the most useful innovations of the colonisers was pottery making, |
| which was quite unknown to Irish hunter-gatherers. |
| The pottery was probably made by shaping clay into a ball with the hand, |
| and then hollowing it until the walls were the right thickness. |
| After firing, the outside was often polished. |
| This would have helped the pots to retain water, as they weren't glazed. |
| Now we know that the clay used usually came from local sources, |
| which suggests that manufacture was on a fairly small scale, |
| even though thousands of fragments are usually found at Neolithic sites. |
| In the course of time decoration began to appear. |
| At first this looked like a series of stitches and was just around the tops of the pots. |
| This could have been an imitation of earlier vessels which were made of leather sewn onto wood. |
| Then eventually pots with decoration... |