Archaeologia Polona Vol. 60 (2022)
Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology Polish Academy of Sciences
This paper will summarise evidence for Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age flint extraction at the Southern English mines, beginning with a brief synopsis of their chronology and followed by a summary of mine lithics. It is argued that understanding later mining is equally important as examining its beginning, because the Neolithic is framed by the pursuit of flint from deep mines with significant episodes of extraction at its beginning and end. A focus is maintained on the flint mines located in the county of Sussex because these are the best researched of the English mines. This research represents a limited study of the Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age activity at the Early Neolithic mines, because it is far from exhaustive. Nonetheless, this paper will attempt to define the Late Neolithic and Bronze Age flint working activity at the mines and will question if this activity is associated with new episodes of shaft-mining or informal methods of extraction, such as quarrying or surface collection of earlier mine waste.
Allen, M. J., Gardiner, J. and Sheridan, A. 2012. Is there a British Chalcolithic? People, place and polity in the later 3rd millennium. Oxford. Oxbow Books. Prehistoric Society Research Paper No. 4.
Ambers, J. and Bowman, S. 2003. Radiocarbon measurements from the British Museum. Archaeometry 45(3): 531–540.
Armstrong, A. L. 1934. Grime’s Graves, Norfolk: report on the excavation of Pit 12. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society East Anglia 7: 382–394.
Bąbel, J. 2008. The Krzemionki Flint Mines Latest Underground Research 2001–2004. In P. Allard, F. Bostyn, F. Giligny and J. Lech (eds), Flint Mining in Prehistoric Europe: Interpreting the Archaeological Records: European Association of Archaeologists, 12th Annual Meeting Cracow, Poland 19th–24th September 2006, 97–109. Oxford. Archaeopress. British Archaeological Reports International Series 1891.
Bączkowski, J. and Holgate, R. 2017. Breaking Chalk; The Archaeological Investigations of Early Neolithic Flint Mines at Long Down and Harrow Hill, West Sussex, 1984–86. Sussex Archaeological Collections 155: 1–30.
Bączkowski, J. and Holgate, R. 2018. Neolithic flint mining in Southern England: new radiocarbon dates for Long Down, West Sussex, and their implications. PAST: The Newsletter of the Prehistoric Society 88: 3–5.
Bączkowski, J. 2019a. Methodologies of extraction: The mining techniques in the Early Neolithic flint mines of southern England and their Continental origins. Anthropologica et Praehistorica 128/2017: 13–30.
Bączkowski, J. 2019b. Comings and goings: The wider landscape of Early Neolithic flint mining in Sussex. In A. Teather, P. Topping and J. Bączkowski (eds), Mining and Quarrying in Europe: A social perspective, 21–37. Oxford and Philadelphia. Oxbow Books. Neolithic Studies Group Seminar Papers 16.
Bączkowski, J. 2019c. Making connections: a fresh analysis of an Early Neolithic pit and its contents. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 38(4): 378–397.
Bączkowski, J. 2021. The Early Neolithic Flint Mines of Sussex and Their Wider Environs (4000–3650 BC). Unpublished PhD thesis, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Southampton.
Barber, M. 2005. Mining, Burial and Chronology. In P. Topping and M. Lynott (eds), The Cultural Landscape of Prehistoric Mines, 181–91. Oxford. Oxbow.
Barber, M. 2014. Stoke Down, West Sussex; A survey of the Neolithic flint mines and associated features. English Heritage. Research Report Series 71–2014.
Barber, M., Field, D. and Topping, P. 1999. The Neolithic Flint Mines of England. London. English Heritage.
Becker, C. J. 1959. Flint Mining in Neolithic Demark. Antiquity 33(130): 87–92.
Berggren, Å., Högberg, A., Olausson, D. and Rudebeck, E. 2016. Early Neolithic flint mining at Södra Sallerup, Scania, Sweden. Archaeologia Polona 54: 167–180.
Bishop, B. J. 2014. The Grimes Graves Environs Survey; Exploring the Social Landscapes of a Flint Source. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of York.
Booth, A. St. S. and Stone, J. F. S. 1952. A trial flint mine at Durrington. Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine 54: 381–388.
Bostyn, F. and Lanchon, Y. 1992. Jablines Le Haut-Château (Seine-et-Marne): Une Miniére de silex au Néolithique. Paris. Sciences de l’Homme. Documents d’Archéologie Francaise 35.
Bowman, S. G. E., Cambers, J. and Leese, M. M. 1990. Re-evaluation of British Museum radiocarbon dates issued between 1980 and 1984. Radiocarbon 32(1): 59–79.
Bradley, R. 1990. Perforated Stone Axe-Heads in the British Neolithic: Their Distribution and Significance. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 9(3): 299–304.
Bradley, R. 2002. The Past in Prehistoric Societies. London and New York. Routledge.
Bradley, R. and Edmonds, M. 1993. Interpreting the Axe Trade: Production and Exchange in Neolithic Britain. Cambridge University Press.
Bradley, R., Watson, A. and Style, P. 2019. After the Axes? The Rock Art at Copt Howe, North-west England, and the Neolithic Sequence at Great Langdale. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 85: 177–192.
Burleigh, R., Barker, H. and Meeks, N. 1969. British Museum Natural Radiocarbon Measurements VI. Radiocarbon 1(2): 278–294.
Burleigh, R. 1975. Radiocarbon dates for flint mines. In F. H. C. Englelen (ed.), The Second International Symposium on flint, Maastricht, Netherlands, 8–11 May 1975. Staringia 3(1): 89–91. Maastricht. NederlandseGeolVereniging.
Butler, C. 2005. Prehistoric flintwork. Stroud. The History Press.
Clark, G. and Piggott, S. 1933. The Age of the British Flint Mines. Antiquity 7(26): 166–183.
Collard, M., Edinborough, K., Shennan, S. and Thomas, M. G. 2009. Radiocarbon evidence indicates that migrants introduced farming to Britain. Journal of Archaeological Science 37: 866–870.
Collet, H., Hauzeur, A. and Lech, J. 2008. The Prehistoric Flint Mining Complex at Spiennes (Belgium) on the Occasion of its Discovery 140 Years Ago. In P. Allard, F. Bostyn, F. Giligny and J. Lech (eds), Flint Mining in Prehistoric Europe: Interpreting the Archaeological Records: European Association of Archaeologists, 12th Annual Meeting Cracow, Poland 19th–24th September 2006, 41–77. Oxford. Archaeopress. British Archaeological Reports International Series 1891.
Craddock, P. and Cowell, M. 2004. Solve an old problem. British Archaeology 79: 18–21.
Curwen, E. and Curwen, E. C. 1926. Harrow Hill Flint Mine Excavation 1914–5. Sussex Archaeology Collections 67: 103–38.
Curwen, E. C. 1934. A Late Bronze Age farm and a Neolithic pit-dwelling on New Barn Down. Sussex Archaeological Collections 75: 137–170.
De Grooth, M. E., Lauwerier, R. and TerSchegget, M. E. 2011. New C-14 dates from the Neolithic flint mines at Rijckholt-St. Geertruid, the Netherlands. In M. Capote, S. Consuegra, P. Diaz-del-Rio and X. Terradas (eds), Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference of the UISPP Commission on Flint Mining in Pre- and Protohistoric Times (Madrid, 14–17 October 2009), 77–89. Oxford. Archaeopress. British Archaeological Reports International Series 2260.
Drewett, P. 1983. A Peterborough Ware sherd from the Long Down Flint Mines, West Sussex. Sussex Archaeological Collections 95: 121.
Edinborough, K., Shennan, S., Teather, A., Bączkowski, J., Bevan, A., Bradley, R. and Schauer, P. 2019. New Radiocarbon Dates Show Early Neolithic Date of Flint-Mining and Stone Quarrying in Britain. Radiocarbon 62(1): 75–105.
Edmonds, M. 1995. Stone tools and society; working stone in Neolithic and Bronze Age Britain. London and New York. Routledge.
Edmonds, M. 1999. Ancestral geographies of the Neolithic: Landscape, monuments, and memory. London and New York. Routledge.
Felder, P. J., Rademakers, P. C. and De Grooth, M. E. 1998. Excavations of Prehistoric Flint Mines at Rijckholt-St. Geertruid (Limburg, The Netherlands) by the ‘Prehistoric Flint Mines Working Group’ of the Dutch Geological Society, Limburg Section. Bonn. Archäologische Berichte 12.
Field, D. 2011. Seamer axeheads in southern England. In A. Saville (ed.), Flint and Stone in the Neolithic Period, 153–178. Oxford. Oxbow. Neolithic Studies Group Seminar Papers 11.
Frieman, C. J. 2014. Double Edged Blades: Re-visiting the British (and Irish) Flint Daggers. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 80: 33–36.
Frieman, C. and Eriksen, B. 2015. Flint Daggers in prehistoric Europe. Oxford. Oxbow Books.
Gardiner, J. 1988. The Composition and Distribution of Neolithic Surface Flint Assemblages in Central Southern England. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Reading.
Gardiner, J. 1990. Flint procurement and Neolithic axe production on the South Downs: a re-assessment. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 9: 119–140.
Gardiner, J. 2008. On the production of discoidal flint knives and changing patterns of specialist flint procurement in the Neolithic on the South Downs. In H. Fokkens, B. Coles, A. van Gijn, J. Kleijne, H. Ponjee, S. Hedwig and C. Slappendel (eds), Between foraging and farming: an extended broad spectrum of papers presented to Leendert Louwe Kooijmans. Leiden. Leiden University Press. Analecta Praehistorica Leidensia 40: 235–246.
Gibson, A., Allen, M., Bradley, P., Carruthers, W., Challinor, D., French, C., Hamilton, D., Mainland, I., McCarthy, M., Ogden, A., Scaife, R., Sheridan, A. and Walmsley, C. 2011. ‘Report on the Excavation at the Duggleby Howe Causewayed Enclosure, North Yorkshire, May–July 2009’. Archaeological Journal 168(1): 1–63.
Gibson, A. M. and Bayliss, A. 2010. Recent work on the Neolithic round barrows of the Upper Great Wold Valley, Yorkshire. In J. Leary, T. Darvill and D. Field (eds), Round Mounds and Monumentality in the British Neolithic and Beyond. Oxford. Oxbow Books. Neolithic Study Group Seminar Papers10, 72–107.
Greenwell, W. 1870. On the opening of Grimes Graves in Norfolk. Journal of the Ethnological Society of London. New Series 2: 419–439.
Hamilton, S. and Manley, J. 2001. Hill-forts, Monumentality and Place: A Chronological and Topographic Review of First Millennium BC Hill Forts of South East England. European Journal of Archaeology 4(1): 7–42.
Healy, F. 1998. The surface of the Breckland. In N. Ashton, F. Healy and P. Pettitt (eds), Stone Age Archaeology: essays in honour of John Wymer, 227–237. Oxford. Oxbow. Monograph 102, Lithic Studies Society Occasional Paper 6.
Healy, F. 2011. Collection Review of Neolithic material held by Brighton Royal and Museums. Unpublished Report.
Healy, F. 2012. Chronology, corpses, ceramics, copper and lithics. In M. J. Allen, J. Gardiner and A. Sheridan (eds), Is There a British Chalcolithic? People, place and polity in the late 3rd Millennium, 144–163. Oxford. Oxbow Books. Prehistoric Society Research Papers 4.
Healy, F., Marshall, P., Bayliss, A., Cook, G., Bronk Ramsey, C., Van Der Plicht, J. and Dunbar, E. 2014. Grime’s Graves, Weeting-with-Broomhill, Norfolk: radiocarbon dating and chronological modelling. English Heritage Research Report No 27–2014. London. English Heritage.
Heyd, V. 2012. Growth and Expansion: social, economic, and ideological structures in the European Chalcolithic. In M. J. Allen, J. Gardiner and A. Sheridan (eds), Is There a British Chalcolithic People, place and polity in the late 3rd millennium, 98–114. Oxford. Oxbow. Prehistoric Research Paper 4.
Holgate, R. 1995. Neolithic Flint Mining in Britain. Archaeologia Polona 33: 133–161.
Holgate, R. 2019. Flint-working areas and bifacial implement production at the Neolithic flint-mining sites in southern and eastern England. In A. Teather, P. Topping and J. Bączkowski (eds), Mining and Quarrying in Europe: A social perspective, 1–20. Oxford and Philadelphia. Oxbow Books. Neolithic Studies Group Seminar Papers 16.
Kerig, T., Edinborough, K., Downey, S. and Shennan, S. 2015. A radiocarbon chronology of European flint mines suggests a link to population patterns. In T. Kerig and S. Shennan (eds), Connecting Networks: Characterising Contact by Measuring Lithic Exchange in the European Neolithic, 116–164. Archaeopress Publishing Ltd. Oxford.
Lane Fox, A. 1876. Excavations in Cissbury Camp, Sussex: Being a Report of the Exploration Committee of the Anthropological Institute for the Year 1875. The Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland 5: 357–390.
Longworth, I., Varndell, G. and Lech, J. 2012. Excavations at Grime’s Graves, Norfolk, 1972–1976, Fascicule 6: Exploration and Excavation Beyond the Deep Mines. London. British Museum Press for the Trustees of the British Museum.
Mallet, N., Richard, G., Genty, P. and Verjux, C. 2004. La diffusion des silex du Grand-Pressigny dans le Bassinpari-sien. Anthropologica et Praehistorica 115: 123–138.
McNabb, J., Felder, P. J., Kinnes. I. and Sieveking, G. 1996. An Archive Report on Recent Excavations at Harrow Hill, Sussex. Sussex Archaeological Collections 134: 21–37.
Mercer, R. 1981. Grime’s Graves, Norfolk Volume I: Excavations 1971–72. English Heritage.
Mökkönen, T., Nordqvist, K. and Ves-Pekka, H. 2017. Beneath the Surface of the World: High-Quality Quartzes, Crystal Cavities, and Neolithization in Circumpolar Europe. Arctic Anthropology 54(2): 94–110.
Pearson, M. P. 2009. The Earlier Bronze Age. In S. Driscoll, J. Hunter, and I. Ralston (eds), The Archaeology of Britain: An Introduction from Earliest Times to the Twenty-First Century (2nd edition), 103–125. London and New York. Routledge.
Pearson, M. P., Sheridan, A., Jay, M., Chamberlain, A., Richards, M. and Evans, J. A. 2019. The Beaker People: Isotopes, Mobility and Diet in Prehistoric Britain. Oxford. Oxbow.
Pétrequin, P., Sheridan, A., Cassen, S., and Errera, M. G. L. 2015. Projet JADE 2. ‘Object-signs’ and social interpretations of Alpine jade axeheads in the European Neolithic: theory and methodology. In T. Kerig and S. Shennan (eds), Connecting Networks: Characterising Contact by Measuring Lithic Exchange in the European Neolithic, 183–102. Oxford. Archaeopress Publishing Ltd.
Robins, P. 2002. A late Neolithic flint hoard at Two Mile Bottom, Near Thetford, Norfolk. Lithics 23: 29–32.
Roberts, N., Fyfe, R. M., Woodbridge, J., Gaillard, M.-J., Davis, B. A. S., Kaplan, J. O., Marquer, L., Mazier, F., Nielsen, A. B., Sugita, S., Trondman, A. K. and Leydet, M. 2018. Europe’s lost forests: a pollen-based synthesis for the last 11,000 years. Scientific Reports 8: 716.
Russell, M. 2001. Rough Quarries, Rocks and Hills: John Pull and the Neolithic Flint Mines of Sussex. Oxford. Oxbow Books. Bournemouth University Occasional Paper 6.
Salisbury, E. F. 1961. Prehistoric Flint Mines on Long Down. Sussex Archaeology Collections 99: 66–73.
Saville, A. 1981. The Flint Assemblage. In R. Mercer (ed.), Grime’s Graves, Norfolk Volume II: Excavations 1971–72. English Heritage.
Saville, A. 1995. GB 20 Den of Boddam near Peterhead, Grampian Region, Scotland and GB 21 Skelmuir Hill, Grampian Region, Scotland. Archaeologia Polona 33: 353–368.
Smith, R. 1912. VII – On the Date of Grime’s Graves and Cissbury Flint-mines. Archaeologia 6: 109–158.
Stone, J. F. S. 1931. Easton Down, Winterslow, S Wilts, Flint Mine Excavation 1930. The Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine 45: 350–365.
Stone, J. F. S. 1933. A flint mine at Martins Clump, Over Wallop. Proceedings of the Hampshire Field Club Archaeology Society 12: 177–180.
Teather, A. 2019. Radiocarbon dating on flint mining deposits at Blackpatch, Cissbury and Church Hill, Sussex. In A. Teather, P. Topping and J. Bączkowski (eds), Mining and Quarrying in Europe: A social perspective, 37–48. Oxford and Philadelphia. Oxbow Books. Neolithic Studies Group Seminar Papers 16.
Topping, P. 2019. Flint-working areas and bifacial implement production at the Neolithic flint-mining sites in southern and eastern England. In A. Teather, P. Topping and J. Bączkowski, Mining and Quarrying in Europe: A social perspective, 1–20. Oxford and Philadelphia. Oxbow Books. Neolithic Studies Group Seminar Papers 16.
Topping, P. 2021. Neolithic Stone Extraction in Britain and Europe: An Ethnoarchaeological Perspective. Oxford. Oxbow. Series: Prehistoric Society Research Papers Volume 12.
Wade, A. G. 1922. Ancient Flint Mines at Stoke Down, Sussex. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia 4(1): 82–91.
Wessex Archaeology. 2006. Blackpatch, Worthing, West Sussex: Archaeological Evaluation and Assessment of Results. Wessex Archaeology. Report reference 59565.01.
Whittle, A., Healy, F. and Bayliss, A. 2011. Gathering Time: Dating the Early Neolithic Enclosures of Southern Britain and Ireland Vol 1–2. Oxford. Oxbow Books.
Woodbridge, J., Fyfe, R. M., Roberts, N. D., Edinborough, K. and Shennan, S. 2012. The impact of the Neolithic agricultural transition in Britain: a comparison of pollen-based land-cover and archaeological 14C date-inferred population change. Journal of Archaeological Science 51: 216–224.
Woodward, A. and Hunter, J. 2011. An Examination of Prehistoric Stone Bracers from Britain. Oxford. Oxbow Books.
oai:rcin.org.pl:237119 ; 0066-5924 ; doi:10.23858/APa60.2022.3071
IAiE PAN, call no. P 357 ; IAiE PAN, call no. P 358 ; IAiE PAN, call no. P 356 ; kliknij tutaj, żeby przejść
Creative Commons Attribution BY 4.0 license
Copyright-protected material. [CC BY 4.0] May be used within the scope specified in Creative Commons Attribution BY 4.0 license, full text available at: ; -
Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology of the Polish Academy of Sciences
Library of the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology of the Polish Academy of Sciences
28 sie 2023
19 gru 2022
62
https://rcin.org.pl./publication/273263
Pelisiak, Andrzej
Tarriño, Antonio Elorrieta, Irantzu Alonso-Herrero, Diego López-Tascón, Cristina Hernández-Hernández, Hugo Castañeda, Nuria Larreina, David Aguirre, Mikel Mujika, José Antonio
Trela-Kieferling, Elżbieta Stefański, Damian
Ivanov, Mykyta
Alexandrov, Stefan Włodarczak, Piotr
Kośko, Aleksander Klochko, Viktor I. Potupchyk, Mikhailo Włodarczak, Piotr Żurkiewicz, Danuta