Postgraduate research students

Research question: What effects did developments taking place across Britain and Ireland, including the movement of people from Continental Europe, contribute to the period 3500 BC - 1500 BC in Caithness?

Networks involving the movement of people, ideas and objects on both a local and regional scale underpinned Neolithic life in the British Isles. By 3500 BC, farming had been in existence for c.500 years and the transition from the hunter-gatherer lifestyle to a largely sedentary one was realised. From c.3200-2450 BC, a web of communities across Britain and Ireland is distinguishable by the use of flat-based Grooved Ware, the construction of ceremonial monuments and shared beliefs and practices.

Around 2450 BC, another new complex from Continental Europe appeared in Britain and Ireland, the Beaker phenomenon, bringing with it the knowledge and skills of metallurgy and metal working, and thereby revolutionising the production of tools, weaponry and adornments. Opinions vary as to the extent to which the social, economic and political restructuring seen across the British Isles in the Late Neolithic are attributable to its arrival and the timing and tempo of the changes does not appear to have been consistent across all regions. 

The end of the Neolithic was, until recently, a somewhat neglected chapter of Scottish early prehistory despite the increase in data and new interpretive approaches of recent decades. Where excavation has been undertaken, it has tended to concentrate on areas of extant archaeology, such as Orkney, or as rescue work ahead of commercial development, as seen in Inverness and Aberdeenshire. Academic research on specific elements of social or economic culture has also concentrated on specific areas, leaving considerable gaps in knowledge about other regions. 

Caithness, despite being in close proximity to Orkney and sharing the same geological flagstone formations, has no impressive Neolithic megalithic structures, other than the chambered cairns, and its native monuments, such as the 'minilith' stone settings, and other potential early prehistoric sites have been overlooked. Nor has there been much commercial development except for wind farms. Our knowledge about the Neolithic in Caithness is limited to excavations of chambered cairns so is therefore both underinformed and skewed.

Having compared the Neolithic-Early Bronze Age transition in the Northern and Western Isles for my Master's dissertation, my curiosity was peeked by the lack of information on what was happening in Caithness at this time, despite it only being a boat ride across the Pentland Firth from Orkney. The early prehistory of this most northerly point of the British mainland deserves better attention and so my research will address the following issues in an attempt to fill in some of the gaps in our knowledge:

• What evidence do we have for human activity in Caithness between 3500 BC and 1500 BC?
• How did this change during the period?
• To what extent did this differ from adjacent regions, particularly Orkney?
• How has our understanding of this time (3500-1500 BC) and place (Caithness) changed in recent decades?

• Dr Kenny Brophy
• Dr James O'Driscoll

Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland

CiFA

Secretary of Edinburgh Archaeological Field Society (www.eafs.org.uk) 

Member of the Neolithic Studies Group; First Millennia Studies Group; Orkney Archaeology Society; North of Scotland Archaeological Society; The Yorkshire Archaeological & Historical Society Prehistoric Research Section.

2023: One month field work in Rarotonga, Cook Islands, undertaking excavations to investigate the front of the marae and any stratigraphic link to the adjacent ancient road, the Ara Metua.

Ref: Mathew Campbell, Jane Downes, Brendan Kneebone, Colin Richards, Deborah Russell & Kate Welham, Excavations at the Ara Metua (Ara Nui o Toi) and Arai te Tonga, Rarotonga, Preliminary Report June 2023;