Prehistoric Wales.

Prehistoric Wales. FRANCES LYNCH, STEPHEN ALDHOUSE-GREEN & JEFFREY L. DAVIES.Prehistoric Wales Prehistoric Wales in terms of human settlements covers the period from about 225,000 years ago, the date attributed to the earliest human remains found in what is now Wales, to the year 48 AD when the Roman army began a military campaign against one of the Welsh tribes. . x+246 pages, 76 figures, 35 plates. 2000. Stroud:Sutton; 0-7509-2165-X hardback 25 [pounds sterling] & US$44.95. FRANK OLDING. The prehistoric landscapes of the eastern BlackMountains Black Mountains:see Appalachian Mountains; Mitchell, Mount. (BAR British series 297). v+117 pages, 51 figures. 2000.Oxford: Archaeopress; 1-84171-057-1 paperback 22 [pounds sterling]. STEPHEN ALDHOUSE-GREEN. Paviland Cave and the `Red Lady': adefinitive report, xli+314 pages, 132 figures, 122 tables. 2000.Bristol: Western Academic & Specialist Press; 0-9535418-1-9 hardback40 [pounds sterling]. Prehistoric Wales is the first general work on prehistory prehistory,period of human evolution before writing was invented and records kept. The term was coined by Daniel Wilson in 1851. It is followed by protohistory, the period for which we have some records but must still rely largely on archaeological evidence to of thiscountry in nearly 40 years. One might think that in the interveningyears a good deal would have changed, not least in how the subject isapproached. Sad to say, Lynch, Aldhouse-Green & Davies deliver anaccount which in some respects could have been written 40 years ago; forwhilst they do review a lot of recent material, this book is solid and,one has to say, rather dull in its essentially dated approach to theprehistoric past. This is not to say that Welsh prehistory isintrinsically boring. Olding's study of the Black Mountains, whilstretaining t he style and limitations of the MA thesis from which itderives, gives some clear evidence that a lot was going on in theNeolithic and Bronze Age Bronze Age,period in the development of technology when metals were first used regularly in the manufacture of tools and weapons. Pure copper and bronze, an alloy of copper and tin, were used indiscriminately at first; this early period is sometimes called the , and that we still have a lot to learn aboutthe nature of these societies. Similarly, Aldhouse-Green'sexhaustive (not to say exhausting) review of the evidence from Pavilandhints that there is probably a lot more to be said about thePalaeolithic in Wales than has thus far come to light. The problem in reviewing these works, not unexpectedly, is the wayin which current cultural and political epistemes tend to colouraccounts of the past. Wales in the early 21st century is essentially amarginal zone The marginal zone is the region at the interface between the non-lymphoid red p ulp and the lymphoid white-pulp of the spleen. (Some sources consider it to be the part of red pulp which borders on the white pulp, while other sources consider it to be neither red pulp nor white pulp. . In the transition to the post-industrial era, the raisond'etre of many communities has come into question amid a generaldecline in economy and population. Hence there is an increasing tendencyto insularity which is in part represented by the relatively powerlessWelsh Assembly. Prehistoric Wales exists in this context, and it isperhaps not insignificant that the foreword to the Paviland study iswritten by Rhodri Morgan, first minister of the Welsh Assembly,celebrating `exciting new interdisciplinary work carried out partly byWelsh scientists'! In fact, the Paviland Cave volume is a comprehensive study of thisimportant site, which I personally do not find particularly interesting,but which no doubt will be of considerable use to scholars in the field.What is perhaps surpris ing, and yet not surprising in a Welsh context,is just how long it has taken for such a volume to emerge, and hereStephen Aldhouse-Green is to be congratulated. For the general reader Iwould recommend Rhys Jones' interpretive article which I foundintriguing and haunting -- there is certainly more to be said on thesignificance of the Paviland burial. By contrast, Prehistoric Wales is a conceptually backward lookingvolume. Whilst it records a lot of the basic detail of sites andartefacts, the interpretation is often dull and sometimes minimal. Inmany cases the accounts seem stubbornly old fashioned, for exampleLynch's insistence on seeing the Neolithic as a period for which `asettled life and commitment to the land is one of the essentialcharacteristics'. Rather, most recent accounts and my ownexperience of material from this period suggest that Neolithiccommunities, and probably those of the earlier Bronze Age, retained agreat deal of the settlement mobility and opportunism OpportunismArabella, Ladysquire’s wife matchmakes with money in mind. [Br. Lit.: Doctor Thorne]Ashkenazi, Simchashrewdly and unscrupulously becomes merchant prince. [Yiddish Lit. of earlierperiods. Coupled with this traditional theoretical approach is a paradoxicalattraction both to an account of prehistoric societies as conservativeand insular, and to the diffusionist version of prehistory which tendsto dog most `marginal' areas. Thus Lynch expresses the view that`the social character of Wales was perhaps more conservative than thatof many parts of Britain' (p. 138) whilst monuments and styles areinterpreted in terms of English examples. The Neolithic tombs arecharacterized as `Cotswold-Severn' when many bear littleresemblance to English counterparts. The fundamental problem here lies in conceptions of what it meansto be `marginal'. Modern Wales can rightly, I suggest, beconsidered as such. As a net recipient of government cash, under theBarnett formula, Wales is p olitically and economically a satellite ofits more prosperous neighbour. The reassertion of Welsh culture andidentity, particularly through the Welsh language, represents thereassertion of identity in the face of this economic reality. As withmany nationalist movements, the semiotics of Welsh identity tend tocelebrate tradition and to be conservative. Thus it may be fair to seethe tension between diffusionism and insularity as a product ofcontemporary socio-political realities. Is this account in any way applicable to prehistory? Two key factsseem pertinent here. Firstly, much of Wales could be described asmarginal land, especially the upland zones outside the coastal littoral littoral/lit¡¤to¡¤ral/ (lit¡äah-r'l) pertaining to the shore of a large body of water. littoralpertaining to the shore. and the Marches (although what is considered marginal today may not haveseemed such to people in the past). Secondly, Wales has very limitedsupplies of flint, which must have remaine d a key resource well into theBronze Age if not beyond. Whilst there are some Pleistocene orperiglacial ''You may be looking for paraglacial, meaning unstable conditions related to local glaciation in the recent past.Periglacial is an adjective referring to places in the edges of glacial areas, normally those related to past ice ages rather than those in the modern era. deposits that contain flint pebbles, and there are also somelimited chert chert:see flint. deposits, the majority of flint must have been importedinto Wales. To some extent, then, Wales could be seen to besocio-economically `marginal' to England in prehistory. Conversely,Wales also had its own distinctive resources. It exported polished stoneaxes (especially those of group xiii), had deposits of copper and goldwhich were extracted, often on an `industrial' scale in prehistoryand perhaps exported. It even (at the risk of being flippant flip¡¤pant?adj.1. Marked by disrespectful levity or casualness; pert.2. A rchaic Talkative; voluble.[Probably from flip. ) suppliedthe core elements to Wessex's premier attraction, Stonehenge. Looked at from the perspective of transhumant or subsistenceagriculturalists, Wales in prehistory is unlikely to have experiencedthe same sense of marginality that underpins the words of Rhodri Morgan.In this context, Lynch et al. completely fail to give the sense in whichthe prehistory of Wales had a dynamic and innovative trajectory of itsown. Indeed, having consciously used the word `Wales' so far inthis review, I must admit that in a real sense there was no Wales tohave a prehistory and that, to all intents and purposes Adv. 1. to all intents and purposes - in every practical sense; "to all intents and purposes the case is closed"; "the rest are for all practical purposes useless"for all intents and purposes, for all practical purposes , the Great Ormecopper mines were as far from the eastern Black Mountains as was Wessex.Thus, as noted above, many cham bered tombs in Wales seem to have littlein common with those in England. Indeed, those tombs that do seem toshare clear external cultural affinities are those in northwest Walesthat share characteristics with Irish passage-graves. The occurrence ofmany small, often opportunistic, chambered structures shows little or norelationship to the Cotswold-Severn tradition. Similarly, the many ringcairns in Wales, which are themselves highly diverse, seem to representa kind of ritual centre for which we need to seek no direct parallel inEngland. They need not be seen as a kind of poor person's hengemonument. Ironically, one basic problem in approaching the prehistory ofWales derives from its modern condition of agricultural marginality.Except in some of the lowlands, a great majority of the country liesunder pasture, forest or moorland moor¡¤land?n.Land consisting of moors.moorlandNounBrit an area of moorNoun 1. . Indeed, the extensive forestryplantation since 1919 has both revealed, but to a greater extentdestroyed, a considerable amount of evidence of prehistoric activity. Inthis context it has been difficult to gather evidence of prehistoricsettlement and land use except where standing monuments remain. Thus, inOlding's study, one is struck by a very familiar difference indistribution of `sites' between the Neolithic and Bronze Age,simply because, in the Bronze Age, the landscape is plastered withburial monuments. Moreover, the distributions often represent not thatof archaeology but of archaeologists -- Wales has not received as mucharchaeological attention as some other areas. In this context, I shouldperhaps add that Lynch et al. seem to have a distinct bias in theiraccount towards the north and west, perhaps reflecting their own areasof interest. All this being said, change is taking place in our understanding ofWelsh prehistory and new pictures are emerging. Indeed, Lynch correctlypoints out the extent to which aerial photography is beginning t oidentify new and interesting monument types and patterns. Gibson'swork on the enormous Hindwell enclosures and at Sam-y-Bryn Caled showsthat there is a lot more lurking in the Welsh landscape than has beenpreviously recognized. Similarly, Driver's recent discovery of whatappears to be a causewayed enclosure at Norton near Ogmore, Vale ofGlamorgan For other places, see .Ogmore (Welsh: Ogwr) is a village in the Vale of Glamorgan, Wales on the River Ogmore. It grew around the now ruined Ogmore Castle, built by the Normans. , is another interesting development (not mentioned by Lynch etal.). Olding's study is also indicative of much new research, wherea number of extensive distributions of lithic lith¡¤ic?1?adj.Consisting of or relating to stone or rock.Adj. 1. lithic - of or containing lithium2. lithic - relating to or composed of stone; "lithic sandstone" material have come tolight, often seeming to exploit the flint-bearing gravel deposits of theSevern valley littoral and th e terraces of other valleys which holdsimilar deposits. Indeed one can speculate that a more active picturecould also be painted for the Palaeolithic in south Wales. Occasionalfinds of artefacts from the Lower, Middle and Upper Paleaolithic havecome to light, as in the case of finds associated with the second Severncrossing The Second Severn Crossing (Welsh: Ail Groesfan Hafren) is a motorway crossing over the River Severn between England and Wales, inaugurated on 5 June 1996 by Charles, Prince of Wales to augment the traffic capacity of the original Severn Bridge crossing built in 1966. . Southern Wales has extensive raised beach deposits associatedwith brickearths which could be indicative of Pleistocene depositssimilar to those of southern England. In effect, the contemporary`marginality' of Wales includes the degree to which anyone has everbothered with its prehistory. There are certainly hints among the worksunder review that this picture is changing, but also disappoin ting signsof how slow this process is. Let us hope that it is not another 40 yearsuntil we see the next book on the prehistory of Wales. PAUL GRAVES-BROWN, SMC SMC Saint Mary's CollegeSMC Santa Monica CollegeSMC Solaris Management ConsoleSMC Smooth Muscle CellSMC Small Magellanic Cloud (also see LMC)SMC Safety Management Certificate (maritime shipping)Archaeology, 88 Trallwm road, Llwynhendy,Llanelli SA14 9ES, Carmarthenshire, Wales.