Issue 93

March/April 2007

Contents

news

Police station had old rifles in foundations

Why did hunter-gatherers dig row of pits in Scotland?

Child's boot and bible found in chimney

Oldest cremation burials

Demand to rebury 'Druid' child

In Brief & Phase 2

features

Let the games begin!
Dan Garner and Tony Wilmot found footprints and a sword at Chester amphitheatre

The nomads of Wessex
Andrew J Lawson finds inspiration in central Asia

Heating flint in Boston Spa
Malcolm Barnes describes an intriguing community experiment

on the web

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ISSN 1357-4442

Editor Mike Pitts

features

The nomads of ancient Wessex

What was a typical British house like 4,000 years ago? They are so rare we cannot say. Perhaps, says Andrew J Lawson reporting from travels in central Asia, that is because people were always on the move.

The chalklands of central southern England, with Stonehenge at their heart, contain the greatest concentration of prehistoric burial mounds in the country. Records of excavations since the 18th century clearly demonstrate that most of these mounds were constructed at the time when Beaker or early bronze age ceramics were in use, the period now dated to the later part of the third, and earlier second millennia BC. This time also witnessed significant social change throughout Europe, signalled in part by the introduction of metals and a different emphasis in funerary practice.

Round burial mounds commemorated certain special people, some of whom were buried with stunning grave goods. Amongst these, personal ornaments and novel weapons were fashioned in gold and copper, and the preponderance of knives and daggers in graves has led to the suggestion that some of the bearers of these items were warriors. The latest scientific examination of the skeletons themselves suggests that people may have travelled far during their lifetime – the "Amesbury Archer", for example, is thought to have grown up near the Alps but was buried in the Wessex chalk (feature, Sep 2004). The accumulated evidence now suggests a high degree of mobility amongst the population at this time.

There is little doubt that a society capable of building complex timber monuments and even more striking stone monuments (such as Durrington Walls and Stonehenge) and able to command the resources for all manner of personal effects was extremely sophisticated and organised. However, in trying to learn more about the way in which these people actually lived, we are hampered by a lack of evidence for their houses and dwelling places.

For decades, the systematic collection of surface evidence (through fieldwalking) has been a standard method for trying to locate settlements. Although scatters of durable remains, such as flint tools and the waste from their manufacture, have often been plotted on maps, subsequent excavation frequently proves disappointing because no houses are found. So rare are the houses known from this period that it is almost impossible to state what a "typical" house used on the chalklands of central southern England at about 2000BC really looked like.

Analysis of the soils beneath early bronze age barrows consistently offers a picture of the local environment as an open grassland. This must have been sustained by grazing animals – presumably mainly the flocks and herds of the local population. But how did these people live?

It is often suggested that later ploughing of the thin soils on the chalk has destroyed the ephemeral traces of prehistoric houses. But the absence of evidence also leads to one obvious question: did houses exist at all? The simple answer to this must be "yes", as it seems impossible to accept that such an able society had no shelter. Nonetheless, the houses may have been built in such a way as to leave little or no trace on the ground. Many appropriate designs can be found from anthropological accounts: for example, substantial timber buildings can be constructed on sill beams, thus leaving little impression on the ground.

However, if there were neither need nor desire for permanence because the people were itinerant or nomadic, then we could not expect to find evidence for solidly built houses. A highly mobile lifestyle would account for the apparent movement of goods (for example, pots made with non-local grits) and the spread of new ideas. Of course, this idea is not new (for example, 35 years ago Andrew Fleming suggested that the barrow builders of Wessex practised transhumance, the seasonal movement of livestock from low to high ground and back) but it has not been widely accepted and merits a fresh appraisal. Hence, it is worth looking at the potential archaeological evidence of living places amongst people who are still nomadic (nomadism does not denote aimless wandering: like the more specific transhumants, nomads typically move regularly between known locations). Although many different analogies are possible, I will simply reflect on my own personal observations in central Asia.

In that part of the world, a mobile lifestyle over a wide geographic area did not preclude the building of enduring monuments, the establishment of powerful kingdoms or an efficient herding economy. In the 13th century AD, Chinggis Khaan (Genghis Khan) managed to unite his previously fractious neighbours in Mongolia and to start an empire which eventually stretched from Vienna to the Pacific. At that time, the traditional way of life of his "Mongol hordes" was essentially nomadic.

As far as archaeologists can tell, the lifestyle of the Mongolian nomads evolved much earlier in time and even before the fifth century BC, when the Greek historian Herodotus first recorded the use of "felt-covered houses" in the area north of the Black Sea. The distribution of large burial mounds (or kurgens) suggests that similar funerary practices were to be found from the Caspian Sea in the west to the western part of modern China. The most famous of these burial mounds were constructed in the Pazyryk valley in the Altai mountains of modern Siberia during the sixth to fourth centuries BC, although some are undoubtedly earlier. Here, as elsewhere in Tuva and northern Mongolia, permafrost has preserved remarkable organic remains, including decorative felts not dissimilar to those still in use today.

Archaeological evidence can be used to identify various ancient groups of people who established a long-held and common way of life. The bronze age rock art of central Asia, perhaps dating back to 1500BC, shares a certain unity, its naturalistic symbolism often dominated by images of divine deer. As well as decorating natural rock faces, the art is sometimes found on megalithic pillars (the so-called deer stones). Many people shared a nomadic existence and displayed common practices, such as the art, even if the identities and beliefs of different groups were distinctive. Here, then, were prehistoric nomadic societies capable of creating large circular burial mounds and erecting decorated standing stones, fundamentally the same as those of the warriors of early bronze age Wessex.

I certainly do not wish to suggest that nomads from central Asia built the Wessex round barrows or Stonehenge, but cite this as just one example to demonstrate that people with a very mobile lifestyle can leave behind permanent monuments of the same basic form as those in Europe. I also use the example of central Asia because the nomadic way of life is still sustained today. It is possible to examine the nature of living places in the light of the absence of settlement evidence in prehistoric Wessex.

Modern Mongolians are proud of Chinggis Khaan's legacy, and most of the population who eschew the 20th century Soviet-style towns continue the traditional lifestyle of mobile herdsmen. The type of animals herded (whether camels, cattle, yaks, sheep, goats or horses) and the need to move from one area of grazing to the next are largely dictated by the terrain and its vegetation. Those herding camels on the sparse margins of the Gobi desert, for example, will be forced to move more frequently than those herding yaks in the high steppe grassland. The practice of those living in the mountainous areas could be described as transhumance because the herdsmen may move only once each season, retreating from summer camps on the steppes into the mountain valleys to escape the icy winter winds which blast the more open plains.

However, even in the suburbs of the capital, Ulaan Baatar, felt-covered round houses (gers) are the preferred form of house for the majority of the Mongolian population. Ger actually means "home": there is no separate word for the structure itself. The same style of house, usually referred to by the Turkic word yurt, can be found across much of central Asia. The vertical wall comprises a wooden lattice of several panels, while the conical roof is formed from wooden poles which rest on the walls and radiate from a central, wheel-like crown through which passes the flue from the central stove (a sign of modernity that now replaces the earlier open hearth). The wooden framework is covered by layers of insulating felt and waterproof cloth (canvas, these days). A highly painted door provides the single entrance. The floor is usually covered only with felt rugs. Such houses can be erected in a matter of hours, or similarly dismantled and mounted on pack animals or carts for the next move. They are used in both summer and winter camps because their flexible structure resists even the strongest of winds and their fabric insulates against both the heat of the day and the bite of the wind.

Adherence to tradition and shared cosmological beliefs is essential during the erection and use of the ger. For example, the ground is never broken; the door should face south; inside, men must pass to the left under the protection of the great sky god, while women must move to the right under the protection of the sun; the back of the ger is reserved for the elders, images of deities and treasured possessions; and so on. The standard layout of objects within the ger reflects this order, so that saddles and alcohol (fermented mare's milk) are always placed to the left while objects for cooking are immediately inside the door to the right.

Observance of such codes is not universal amongst all central Asian nomads. For example, I have noted in the Xinjiang province of China that the ground may be broken to provide a drainage gulley around the base of the wall, for the two central poles which supports the crown of the roof, or for the framework of the door.

Outside the ger, a typical camp may include compounds for the management of animals and occasionally a sturdy rectangular log-built structure for storage. Mongolians often consider these to be built in a Buryat tradition. The origin of this style of building is probably almost as old as that of the gers, especially when we recall the use of larch logs to form the rectangular burial vaults beneath the Pazyryk burial mounds.

More complex log-built structures are sometimes used in winter camps for the protection of animals, but the herdsmen themselves prefer to occupy gers, which are more comfortable and better insulated. Large heaps of dung, carefully saved as fuel, are also evident in the camps. Construction of neither the compounds nor the cabins breaks the ground. The uprights of the former are held between short timbers laid on the surface, while the walls of the latter stand directly on the ground. The only breaks in the ground may be caused by stakes or poles for the tethering of animals or for drying racks, or a distant latrine pit.

The relevance of these observations for the archaeology of early Wessex comes from a consideration of the evidence for a typical seasonal camp once the herdsmen have moved on. The former positions of gers and compounds are at first marked by impacts on the vegetation, notably where floors have crushed the grass or where animals have eaten every available leaf and have poached the surface. However, once the vegetation has returned, the evidence for houses and subsidiary structures is nonexistent. In short, there is no lasting trace of the camp: but importantly the absence of evidence is not evidence for absence.

Favoured locations for camps may be used year after year, gers and compounds being reerected in familiar places: if there were evidence for an earlier camp (such as the drip gullies or hearths mentioned above) traces of later structures may well overlap the earlier. The overlapping circles of eaves-drip gullies are sometimes found in later prehistoric Britain, but at earlier times inhabitation is frequently indicated only by the discarded remains of manufacturing waste, flint implements and pottery sherds. Most of the tools and cooking vessels used today are made of metal and are taken away from the camp sites with all the other possessions. Mongolian herdsmen continue to be deeply respectful of their environment and have few disposable possessions. Nothing litters an abandoned camp.

The mobile lifestyle of Mongolian herdsmen is inextricably linked with the use of animals for transport. Horses are ridden but may also be used as pack animals or for draught, as also are camels, yaks and oxen. A basic form of traditional saddle can be found throughout central Asia even as far as the ancient "horse tea route" through the Yunnan province of southern China. These saddles are entirely organic in construction, with two short, flat wooden boards (or shelves) which rest either side of the animal's spine, and two arched pieces which bridge the back and hold the shelves in place; all is held together by thin strips of leather or sinew. An additional lateral wooden bar may be inserted between the bridging pieces on each side for the suspension of stirrup straps or for the lashing of loads.

The frame is held onto the animal by a system of fabric straps which cross the girth, withers and croup, and a cushion is provided when the saddle is used for riding (more sophisticated, modern saddles are also used by those who can afford them). The horses are usually controlled with the use of a bridle but in certain regions no bit is used. Horses can, of course, be ridden bareback and without any equipment by skilful riders.

Similarly, the two-wheeled carts used to transport the belongings of the herdsman are largely of wood and normally use two composite wheels. They may be drawn by horses, oxen, yaks or camels depending upon the locality. In the absence of surfaced roads progress may be slow, but the lifestyle does not require haste.

If we now ask ourselves, what would be the evidence for these modes of transport in bronze age Wessex, the answer would be "not a lot". Occasional horse bones found on neolithic and early bronze age chalkland sites tend to be dismissed as "intrusive" (that is, mixed in from younger deposits). However, if horses were not butchered or eaten, their remains would not appear in "domestic" assemblages, even if we were lucky enough to find them. Similarly, if horses were not selected for special treatment, there is no reason why they should appear in graves or at ceremonial sites. Now that evidence is emerging from Cranborne Chase, Dorset for a postglacial landscape which was not completely covered in trees, the natural environment would provide the necessary grazing for an indigenous population of wild horses – even if domesticated horses and riding knowledge were imported.

Once discarded or buried in the dry chalk of southern Britain, any saddle similar to those of central Asia would soon disappear without trace. Is it possible therefore that more durable harness parts, such as the cheek pieces and strap unions attested after about 1000BC, do not signal the introduction of the horse but merely a change in equipment and other cultural allegiances? Though horse bones have been found in significant numbers on archaeological sites in the steppes west of the Ural mountains from the sixth millennium BC, the use of bits cannot be demonstrated much before 4000BC. Perhaps in that part of the world horses were ridden without bits long before durable harness came about.

Horse bones are associated with Beaker sites from Moravia to Spain, although there has been a reluctance to accept that those who spread the traditions associated with Beaker pottery may have done so with the aid of horses. But if the Amesbury Archer could travel across Europe, why should he have walked when he could have been carried in a wagon or ridden a horse – especially as he appears to have had a painful leg injury?

Vehicles which used wooden wheels (very similar to those still in use in Mongolia) are known from late neolithic contexts in northern Germany and in Switzerland. So when travellers reached Britain, did they forget about the wheel and the economic advantages it would undoubtedly bring, or is it more likely that our earliest wheels have merely perished in the dry soils? Durable monuments such as burial mounds and stone settings survive, but did herds, wagons and portable houses once fill the spaces between them? The nomadic herdsmen of Mongolia offer much food for thought, and inspiration for reconsidering the evidence in one of Britain's best-studied areas. It would be totally inappropriate to assume that the lifestyle of people on the northern margin of Europe 4,000 years ago was the same as that of people in central Asia today. However, houses in the British neolithic and early bronze age remain elusive. One quite reasonable explanation is that the traces of light structures have been ploughed away. However, it also possible that the houses left no lasting impression in the ground. The example I have used from Mongolia may offer one idea of the type of light structure was once used in Britain.

Such use does not preclude the need for more substantial buildings at regional centres or at ceremonial sites, like Durrington Walls and Stonehenge, or for more substantial houses associated with them (as have been discovered recently at Durrington Walls: News, Nov/Dec 2006). Nor does it preclude agriculture and the establishment of widespread political allegiances. But instead of viewing the spaces between ceremonial monuments as being reserved for ritual activities, one alternative would see them occupied by the temporary homes, paddocks and herds of mobile pastoralists. Reduction in mobility about 1500BC resulted in a more sedentary lifestyle for some members of the population: only then do the traces of earthfast round houses and field systems become more visible in the archaeological record, filling the void left by earlier generations who may well have occupied similarly-shaped, but portable houses.

Andrew J Lawson is a freelance archaeological consultant, traveller and author.

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