A Neolithic farmer would have lived in a wattle-and-daub house made from wood and thatched with reeds. An example of this is pictured at the start of this chapter. There would have been several such houses in a community, with perhaps 20 or 30 people living together. They would generally have confined themselves to the higher lands of Ireland, by clearing the upland forests wither by axe or by burning it. Field boundaries were created by laying out stone walls. Later in the Neolithic period, this land had begun to acidify and turn into the peat bogs that occupt these areas today. For this reason, some Neolithic farmers had to begin clearing forests in the lowlands. Each Neolithic community may have belonged to a wider group of communities that formed a tribe. These tribes may have traded with each other.

On their farms they grew wheat and other grains, and kept cattle, pigs, goats and sheep. Unlike their Mesolithic predecessors, these people cooked indoors, by lighting a fire in the centre of their house. Meat was cooked on a spit over the fire or, for smaller cuts, by placing it on a stone and placing it directly in the fire. They cut their wheat using a sycthe made from a branch with sharpened porcellanite embedded along it. This wheat was ground by hand using a rounded stone on top of a larger grindstone. This was then used to make bread which was baked on top of a flat stone placed in the fire.

There is some uncertainty as to how Neolithic people buried their dead. Scientists have found a great many human ashes in megalithic tombs, implying that cremation was common. In places where human bones have been found, these are often disjointed, raising the possibility that they were placed in the tomb some considerable time after death. Speculation is that bodies were left in the open to 'deflesh' before being placed in the tomb. They may not have remained in the tomb indefinitely, as they may have been removed to make way for later burials. There is evidence that land pressure was increasing in Neolithic Ireland as the population rose and the cleared upland areas became more populated. Some researchers have proposed that the megaliths were constructed partly as 'status symbols' to claim ownership over land.

The Neolithic Age left a great mark on Ireland. The upland forests had been cleared for farmland, and by the end of the age they were starting to clear the lower forests. Sheep, goats and cows had been imported into Ireland for the first time. Megalithic tombs peppered the landscape. By the time Bronze was introduced to Ireland around 2000BC, Neolithic culture was evident across Ireland.

Over the next 2000 years the expansion of the ice slowed, reached equilibrium and then began to retreat. By 15,000 years ago only Ulster was still buried under the dying ice sheet. Although the rising sea levels had begun to flood the lower lands, a land bridge still connected the south-eastern tip of Ireland to south-western England. Trapped between this land bridge, and the ice sheet in the north, the Irish Sea was filled forming a vast freshwater lake. It was at this time that the first plant life returned to reclaim the rocky wilderness that Britain and Ireland had been reduced to. First rugged grasses coated the land and, around 13,000 years ago, the first trees (hardy Junipers) began to grow. Many animals, including the Giant Deer, crossed into Ireland across the land bridge.

The low-lying lands around Ireland, Britain and Europe were slowly inundated as the sea rose at a maximum rate of around 6mm/year . The land bridge between Ireland and Britian was finally overwhelmed by the sea 12,000 years ago, flooding the fresh water Irish Sea with salt water (however, short-term fluctuations did cause the land bridge to reappear briefly on several more occasions). One of the most spectacular episodes of this time must surely have been the inundation of the vast Dogger Bank, which lies between Britain and Denmark. Today, the Dogger Bank lies 50 metres (165 feet) below the North Sea, but 10,000 years ago it was covered in coniferous forest inhabited by a variety of animals and possibly stone-age humans. In an indundation that is estimated to have lasted only a few decades, 200,000 km² (78,000 miles²) of forest was flooded by the rising sea. Had there been any Environmentalists around at the time, this would have been a very traumatic period of history for them.

As the ice melted, rivers and lakes formed in the new landforms left by the glaciers. The new river pattern in Ireland had no similarity with what there had been before. Of course, we cannot know what pre-Ice Age Ireland looked like, because the ice destroyed the old landscape so completely. Although all the ice was gone by 10,000 years ago, the sea levels continued to rise reaching a level 2 metres (7 feet) below their current level by 3000 years ago [3]. The weight of the ice (several hundred tonnes per square metre) had pressed the land surface down by several metres. Once gone, the north of the island began to rise again. This process is ongoing: Malin Head, county Donegal, is rising at a rate of 2 to 3mm per year relative to sea level .

For all its destruction, the beautiful landscape that the Ice Age left behind played a large part in the the unfolding human history of Ireland. As French geographer Vidal de la Blache commented "man and his environment are more intimate than a snail and his shell". The first humans are thought to have arrived in Ireland 9000 years ago (7000BC). Although, in that time, we have altered Ireland's landscape fundamentally, we have not come close to the same scale of changes that were wrought by the Ice Age.

 A note on the Paleolithic, or Old Stone Age.

The paleolithic hunter-gatherers of Europe hunted the animals of the tundra. As the ice sheet retreated northwards, so did the paleolithic tribes. However, while Britain was still attached to Europe by a land bridge, Ireland had already become an island, largely inaccessible to the hunters. So there is (currently) no evidence to suggest that there ever was a human paleolithic presence in Ireland. Elsewhere in Europe, the mesolithic way of life slowly took over from the paleolithic. During this period, Ireland's vegetation developed, although it never reached the same levels of diversity that Britian (being easier to migrate to) reached. The myriad shallow lakes that were later to become the great raised peat bogs had not yet been filled in, and the land was covered by forests and was the home to many kinds of animals.

The Mesolithic, or Middle Stone Age.

The first humans in Ireland are thought to have crossed from Scotland, in wooden boats, to what is now county Antrim around 8000BC. It is also thought that the rising land and rising sea levels may have moved at a fluctuating pace, occasionally allowing the southern land bridge to re-emerge from the Irish Sea, as well as a northern one connecting Antrim to Scotland. These would have lasted only briefly, but would have allowed the migrations of both humans and animals. There is a cultural continuity between the mesolithic remains found in north Ireland and those in southern Scotland. Ireland was one of the last parts of western Europe to have been settled by humans, and the human presence here is perhaps only about 10,000 years old.

These early hunters concentrated their activities on waterways, forraging on the shores of the sea, lakes and rivers. They rarely ventured into the forested interior, so Ireland's young ecosystem was almost totally unaffected by these early residents. The earliest concrete evidence of mesolithic activity in Ireland is to be found in county Antrim (which is Ireland's only source of flint), county Londonderry and county Sligo. Mount Sandel (county Londonderry) was excavated in the 1970s. The archaeologists found the remains of mesolithic huts and charcoal from cooking fires, and these have been dated to between 7000BC and 6500BC. 'The Curran' (near Larne in county Antrim) is a raised beach where archaeologists have found thousands of flint tools. In county Offaly, archaeologists uncovered evidence of a Mesolithic settlement at Lough Boora.

Evidence suggests that Ireland was initially populated from Scotland, although there must surely have been some migration from Wales and south-west England. Finds of Mesolithic tools (although not settlements) suggests that these hunters spread south down the east coast of Ireland and inland along rivers to the Shannon basin.

Near the end of the Mesolithic era, which ended roughly around 4000BC, the hunters were beginning to copy coiled pottery using technology that had spread from the more advanced Neolithic tribes of eastern Europe. Although Mesolithic man built huts, pottery and tools, they did not leave any earthworks such as those found in France. The earliest earthworks in Ireland are Neolithic.

The final part of the Mesolithic era is marked by a decline in the population, or at least a decline in the relics that we have found. The climate got wetter at this time and many of the lakes in western Ireland began to turn into the bogs that we know today. This may have caused a decline in the population that the land could support.

Everyday Life in Mesolithic Ireland.

The people of Mesolithic Ireland were hunters and gatherers - farming was not invented until the Neolithic period. The family groups would have lived near rivers and lakes in houses made from animal skins spread over a bowl-shaped timber frame. Some superb reconstructed Mesolithic homes can be seen at the Ulster History Park, near Omagh in county Tyrone. These homes were not permanent - the people moved around a lot from site to site and the skins from the houses were brought with them to the new site. Always the camps were set up near the coast, lakes or rivers and they rarely ventured into the forests of the interior of Ireland. There were not enough people in Ireland for there to be competition for land and there is no evidence of weapons being used against other humans.

They hunted animals and birds using arrows tipped with sharpened pieces of flint. They also used spears which, although they could not be thrown as far as an arrow, were heavier. Among the animals that these hunters would have sought were deer, duck and wild boar. These food sources would have been most important in the autumn.

They also hunted fish. A man would stand motionless in a river with a flint-barbed harpoon, and spear the unsuspecting salmon and eels as they swam past. This required great patience and skill. Some may also have fished further off shore, in lakes or the sea, using skin boats stretched over a wooden frame, or dug-out canoes made from tree trunks. Flounder and bass were favourite catches. Fish formed the biggest part of the Mesolithic diet in the summer, while eels were caught more in the Autumn.

The meat would have been carried back to their campsite where it would have been cooked over an out-door fire and eaten communally. The skins would have been removed to make clothes and to repair or add to the houses.

The women of the community would have also gathered hazelnuts, fruits and berries in the spring, summer and autumn which would have added variety and nutrients to the meat-rich diet. Winter must have been a harsh period, as few food sources were available. It seems that the hunters killed wild boar in the winter.

The key elements of a Mesolithic life were thus flint weapons, a meat-rich diet, a nomadic, hunter-gatherer lifestyle and skin huts.

The Bronze Age

The discovery of metal was a key event in human history. This was the first material that could be moulded into any desired shape. Additionally, metal was much stronger than stone and could be put to much more effective uses. The first metal that mankind widely used was bronze - an alloy of copper and tin. Although this new technology arrived in Europe around 4000BC, it did not reach Ireland for a further 2000 years. Settlers from France arrived in Ireland around 2000BC, bringing the knowledge of Bronze working with them and the existing inhabitants learned the trade from them. Slowly the culture of these bronze-working settlers merged with that of the Neolithic Irish and gave birth to the Irish Bronze Age.
 

Metal Working

Ireland was blessed with relatively rich copper deposits, allowing large quantities of bronze to be produced on the island. However, the copper-rich areas did not necessarily coincide with areas that had been important sources of material in the Neolithic era. Thus, the focal points in Ireland moved to regions that in some cases had been relatively devoid of previous activity, for example western Munster.

The copper itself was mined. At Mount Gabriel, county Cork, lies one of the few Bronze Age mines known anywhere in Europe, other than Austria. Dating from between 1500BC and 1200BC, it consists of 25 shallow mine shafts extending about 5 to 10 metres into the slope. Evidence from inside the mines indicates that the copper ore was probably extracted by lighting fires inside the mine and then, when the mine walls had become hot, water was splashed onto them, thus shattering the ore which could then be removed. Counties Cork and Kerry, on the south-west tip of the island, produced the bulk of Ireland's copper and it has been estimated [3 p114] that together the counties produced 370 tonnes of copper during this era. Given the fact that all Bronze Age artefacts so far found add up to around 0.2% of this total, and notwithstanding those that have been destroyed or lost down the years, it seems that Ireland exported a lot of copper during the Bronze Age. By contrast, there is not much tin in Ireland, and most of the tin that was needed to make the bronze seems to have been imported from what is now England.

What was the copper made into? Much of it was made into bronze axes. Although copper is quite soft, the tin that is alloyed with it to make bronze makes it stronger, and able to be used for longer periods before it requires sharpening. Some bronze was used to make awls and some to made daggers. A few of these items have been found decorated with geometric patterns. The Bronze Age saw a marked increase in the manufacture of weapons that were specifically designed to kill human beings. Towards the end of the Bronze Age, very complex items were being produced, sometimes cast and sometimes made from beaten sheet bronze. Examples include chauldrons and horns.

The technology for moulding the bronze improved through the Bronze Age. Initially, items were cast by pouring the bronze into a hollowed out stone, such as the one on the left. When removed, this axe head would have been attached to a wooden handle at its narrow end, while the wide, curved end would have become the blade. By the middle Bronze Age, people had invented two-part moulds, where two hollowed stones were put together and metal poured into a gap at the top. This allowed more complex items, such as daggers, to be produced. By the end of the Bronze Age, people were making wax or fat models of what they wanted to cast, putting clay round them and then heating the clay to melt the wax. They then poured in the metal and chipped away the clay once it had set.

The Bronze Age also saw the first use of gold, which was made in much the same way as bronze, and there are a number of beautiful examples of gold jewellery and other prestigious objects. As gold was useless for any practical purpose, and also because of its beautiful colour and rarity, it quickly became a highly desirable ornamental material. Its use may have coincided with the rise of the first 'aristocracies' in these communities. It is for this reason that the period is sometimes called Ireland's first "golden age" although this is a somewhat falsely romantic way to describe the Bronze Age.

Of course, metal was not the only material used in Bronze Age Ireland. Stone tools were still very important, and there was a large pottery industry. Beaker pottery - named for its distinctive shape - was very common in Bronze Age Ireland, as it was across much of western and central Europe at the time. Beaker pottery was shaped into more complex shapes than in the Neolithic period, and there were a variety of types of pot. Most are ornately decorated.

The land that had been used in the Neolithic period was the upland areas that had been cleared of forest cover. The lowland areas were still largely forested. However, the end of the Bronze Age seems to have coincided with a general downturn in climatic conditions, bringing wetter and colder conditions to Ireland. Many of the upland areas, already acidifying from over-use, turned into peat-bogs which are very poor agriculturally. Places such as the Ceide Fields, in Mayo, which were arable land in the Neolithic period were covered by the advancing blanket bogs. These blanket bogs had been created on the high land by deforestation and over-grazing, but the wetter weather caused them to extend further downhill.

At the same time as this, Ireland's population density was rising and this put increased pressure on the land. The only solution was to fell lowland forest, but this required better tools, and the invention of bronze axes came just in time to solve this problem. Thus the Bronze Age in Ireland marks the beginning of the end for Ireland's lowland forests which were systematically cleared over the coming centuries. Many of the myriad of lowland lakes left by the ice age also began to be choked by peat, forming the raised bogs that characterise many parts of lowland Ireland today. As the lakes turned to bog, so the Bronze Age Irish began to build wooden trackways over the bogs, some of which have been found in modern times. A large number of 'hoards' have been found dating from this period - collections of valuables deposited in bogs. The reason why so many people hid their valuables is uncertain, but it is possible that a deteriorating climate may have led to famine and an impulse to hoard valuables. Or perhaps it was simply a custom to place 'offerings' in the bogs.

The limits of the Irish Bronze Age are difficult to state precisely, but is generally accepted to have died away around 500BC when peoples from Europe, belonging to the superior Iron-Age Halstatt culture, arrived in Ireland. The people of this culture are more popularly known as the Celts.