Ice and Stone Digging for Britain


Ice and Stone

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We might be a small island, but we've got a big history.

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Everywhere you stand, there are worlds beneath your feet.

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And so, every year, hundreds of archaeologists across Britain

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go looking for more clues into our story.

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Who lived here, when, and how?

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So there was a blade in here, here...

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So he's being attacked from all angles.

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Archaeology is a complex jigsaw puzzle drawing everything together

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from skeletons to swords, temples to treasure.

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-He's biting his shield.

-Biting his shield, yeah.

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From Orkney to Devon, we're joining this year's quest -

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on sea, land and air.

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We share all of the questions and find some of the answers.

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As we join the teams in the field

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Digging for Britain.

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These islands we call the British Isles have been inhabited,

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on and off, for hundreds of thousands of years.

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And for most of that time, the early communities here

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were living through what we now know as the Stone Age.

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But who were these people?

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What were their lives really like?

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And when did the foundations of our modern society emerge?

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With no written records to draw on, it is only through archaeology

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that we can hope to gain an insight

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into the lives of our ancient ancestors.

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Tonight, I'll be coming come face to face

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with Stone Age people on Orkney...

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The wealth of secrets that we could learn from this is quite incredible.

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..learning some disturbing truths about Britain's Ice Age hunters...

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We have clear proof of cannibalism in this site.

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..and visiting the Channel Islands

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on the trail of some misunderstood early humans.

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Nature just doesn't allow

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a creature that isn't perfectly fitted to its environment

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to thrive and exist.

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We'll be travelling backwards in time

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on a journey spanning 100,000 years of human pre-history

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to uncover the changing story of the first inhabitants of Britain.

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Stonehenge is our biggest, and most famous, Stone Age monument

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and it dates back some 5,000 years.

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These mysterious stones have been written about

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since the time of the Anglo-Saxons, and studied by antiquarians

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since Henry VIII sat on the English throne.

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There are many theories about how it was built and why.

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As an ancient calendar, a place of the dead,

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or a temple for worshiping pagan gods.

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Every year, archaeologists conduct new digs

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and explore new theories about our most iconic landmark.

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Four years ago, two eminent archaeologists,

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Professor Tim Darvill and Geoff Wainwright,

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got permission to dig within the stone circle

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for the first time in almost 50 years.

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What they suggested sparked interest from around the world.

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They advanced the extraordinary and controversial theory

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that, at its beginning, Stonehenge had been a centre of healing.

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I'm not heading for Stonehenge. Instead, I'm going right to the very edge of West Wales,

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which is well over 100 miles away from Salisbury Plain.

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And in case that sounds odd, I can assure you, there's a very good reason that I'm here.

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The earliest phase of stone building used

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a special type of rock called Bluestone.

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These distinctive stones were erected around 2300 BC.

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Geology tells us they were mined from a hilltop here in Preseli,

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where Tim and Geoff believe that springs welling up from the ground

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may have been thought to have had healing powers.

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Just when you think it's safe to go, another cow appears!

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On a nice, sunny day, this is an absolutely spectacular bit of countryside.

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But today I cannot see a thing.

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I know the team are working up there in the hills.

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I can't see the hills at all.

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And at some point, I'm going to have to turn off this road onto a dirt tack,

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so that should be exciting.

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It's absolutely tipping it down.

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I can't believe these archaeologists are out in this weather.

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This year the Stonehenge team are at the spot these healing springs are found,

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and where the famous Bluestones were quarried.

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They're digging at the site of a 4,000 year old Neolithic tomb,

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which was built right in the shadow of the Bluestone quarry.

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They're looking for dating evidence that might tie this tomb

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to the earliest building phase at Stonehenge,

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and that may mean that whoever was buried here

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also had some direct link with Stonehenge.

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The link between the Preseli Hills and Stonehenge

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was first recognised in 1923 by geologist Herbert Thomas.

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Through geological analysis,

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he posited that the distinctive Spotted Dolerites, or Bluestone,

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could only have come from this exact spot in Wales.

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-Hello!

-Alice, hi. Great to see you.

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Walking up onto the hill here, the ground's just covered

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-with large stones. Are these the famous Preseli Bluestone?

-This is the famous Preseli Hills,

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Carn Menyn, where the Bluestones, the Spotted Dolerite come from,

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which they used for the central settings at Stonehenge.

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What you are looking at is the Spotted Dolerite. Here's a superb example right here.

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Feel the texture of it. It's really very pleasing-looking rock.

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This is a landscape where you come to take the rocks,

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You can literally just pluck them off the surface of the ground.

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I saw one a minute ago -

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here it is right behind where we're standing.

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-That looks like a prefect standing stone.

-Doesn't it? Exactly right.

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Literally, people could come here, pick it up and take it away.

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Getting it out of the ground is not a problem at all -

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some simple levers would be quite adequate for that.

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Nevertheless, it would have been a huge engineering feat,

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moving 80 massive stones

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over 150 miles from this hill in Wales to Salisbury Plain.

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Tim and Geoff think the reason these stones were so prized was because of

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their connection to this to this area's healing springs.

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And the tomb suggests that this place in Wales

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was already a sacred site.

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The archaeologist knew that the tomb had been disturbed,

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and probably looted, long ago.

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But to explore what's left,

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they've excavated a section through the tomb's outer edge.

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With this very small trench,

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you've actually made a significant discovery?

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It's a little piece of keyhole surgery into an important monument,

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but it's actually lived up to our expectations perfectly.

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Let's show you what we've got in the trench.

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Now, you can see this if you like is a platform just inside the ditch.

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They've found something intriguing - a ditch and a raised bank.

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And, importantly, it looks as though the bank

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has pairs of standing stones imbedded in it.

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They believe this means the site was originally

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a small ceremonial monument,

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which was subsequently covered over by a tomb.

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The interesting thing is that at Stonehenge there are Bluestones

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that were set in pairs of holes, OK?

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So there is an architectural link between this site and Stonehenge.

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With this tomb, with this ceremonial monument, we have

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obviously got a very important person who may have been responsible

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for the impetus that caused these stones to be transported.

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The team will also be collecting samples for radio carbon dating

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to establish when this monument was built.

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They'll have their results later this year,

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and perhaps these will provide Tim and Geoff with more evidence that

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whoever was buried here had some direct involvement

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with the birth of Stonehenge.

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See you later.

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And while the team wait for the rain to stop,

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Tim will show me more evidence they found during the dig.

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It's nice to get into a slightly more sheltered spot.

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And is this an artefact from the excavation?

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This is an artefact from the excavation.

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What it is, is a hammer stone. You can see the way that the surface is pitted

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where it's been used to bang really quite hard.

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I'm always amazed when archaeologists show me objects like this

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and I think, "Well, to me that just looks like a stone."

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So it's this kind of pecking on the surface you're looking at?

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Yes, giveaway characteristics. What are they doing with it?

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Well, here, right next to where we found these two hammer stones

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was this beautiful flake. This has come off a huge block

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and at some point somebody's used a hammer,

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probably just like the one here - in fact may even have been this hammer -

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to literally strike the side of the block and take off that flake.

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I presume it isn't always this misty and murky and rainy and foggy

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when you're digging up here?

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It does feel like we're sitting in the mists of time today.

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Upland archaeology is one of those strange fields of archaeology.

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We're working in really quite a hostile environment up here.

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It can turn nasty quite quickly, so we have to be prepared for that.

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We've already discovered from this small excavation

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that something that was thought to be a tomb is much more than that,

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it looks like it was a ceremonial site as well.

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If they can get radiocarbon dates, then that makes this even more important.

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It means that we are getting much closer to really understanding what was going on in the Neolithic.

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Stonehenge continued to be developed throughout the subsequent Bronze Age.

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But the first stones were erected towards the end of the Neolithic,

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around 4,500 years ago.

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This period saw huge changes in society...

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for the first time people began to farm the land

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and to permanently settle.

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500 miles north of Stonehenge there is some of the best surviving

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Neolithic archaeology anywhere in Europe -

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on the Islands of Orkney.

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Last summer I visited a dig at the Links of Noltland, on the small Orkney island of Westray.

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On a windswept beach, archaeologists were uncovering a Neolithic farmstead

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and what has been described as our earliest domestic goddess,

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The Westray Wifey.

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This year I'm back on Orkney, to visit another Neolithic site

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that is revealing more important clues about these early farmers, and their complex beliefs.

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This is Banks Farm on the Island of South Ronaldsay where just last year

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some construction work up by the farmhouse, revealed a previously undisturbed Neolithic tomb.

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This wasn't the first time an important Neolithic tomb had been found on Orkney.

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In 1958 a local farmer uncovered the now world famous Tomb of The Eagles.

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Inside it were 16,000 human bones as well as 725 bird bones,

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many of which were from white-tailed sea eagles.

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The unearthing of another Neolithic tomb on Orkney is enormously significant,

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a once in a generation event.

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Hamish Mowatt made a startling discovery right outside his front door.

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There was a hole the size of my fist, so I get the torch,

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shine in, you could see the rock face.

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Well, at that point you're looking in at something

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that hasn't seen the light of day for thousands of years, I expect.

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The old heart starts to pound a bit then, and you, well, you can't leave it at that point.

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Then when I shined the torch, this eerie white object with two holes,

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was sort of looking back in at me.

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So I sort of sat back and looked again, yes, that's definitely a skull.

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What a remarkable thing to find, just metres away from your house.

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-Well, yes, it's just really is basically ten metres outside the door.

-Yeah.

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The discovery by Hamish that this mysterious mound right on his doorstep contained human remains

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gave archaeologists the opportunity to excavate undisturbed chambers inside a Neolithic Tomb.

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And I'm off now to meet the archaeologist who led the excavations.

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Did you have to move in and dig it quickly because it had been opened up to the elements?

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Yeah, as soon as we realised there were human remains in the cell here,

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the whole thing's full of water.

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It became apparent we had to move quickly because

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we weren't sure how the conditions had changed within the tomb.

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Because part of the tomb had been unwittingly damaged by previous building work,

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water was now seeping in, and the team faced a race against time

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to rescue the archaeology hidden inside.

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Dan kept a unique video diary of the unfolding dig.

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Day Two of the excavations at Banks and we haven't had

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the weather on our side today. It's been pretty rainy and we've had gale force winds.

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So we're hoping to carry on tomorrow

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with the idea of removing the top slab of one of the cells,

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with the idea of excavating the human remains that may be in there.

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The team soon realised that this was a sizable tomb, consisting of a central passageway

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with five separate cells, or chambers, leading off it.

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We've been digging our section into the passage here.

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This is the east cell, with very restricted access into here,

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and there's a skull sitting just there in the top, so we're trying to get access to that through here.

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Once the team had removed the layers of mud and clay they were able to access the chambers,

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and the human remains inside them.

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Skull just straight back.

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The team's first impression was that skulls had been placed as a closing

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offering when the tomb was finally sealed.

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It's a captivating glimpse of these people's burial rituals going back some 5,000 years.

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As well as the skulls, there were hundreds of other human bones in the chambers,

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all mixed together in a jumbled mass.

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Excavating them was a slow and delicate process.

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Each precious fragment was catalogued and carefully removed, for further study.

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Can we actually get down and have a look inside the tomb itself?

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-So we can open this chamber?

-Yeah, we could have a look in.

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This is pretty similar to how it was when we first looked in here.

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Where the bits of skull were tucked in amongst these stones as a sort of final offering,

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before this doorway was sealed up and the tomb sealed off for good.

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Dan, how amazing to have the opportunity to excavate this,

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where you know it's absolutely pristine.

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Yeah, it's quite an amazing, amazing experience.

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I worked in this cell myself.

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As you remove that bone you're doing that in reverse, and you kind of get the sense of how

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that person put that bone there in the first place - 5,000 years ago.

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The wealth of secrets that we could learn from this is quite incredible.

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The construction work has completely changed the environment of this tomb.

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It's had it's entire roof taken off, so it's now exposed to the elements,

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in a way that for the last 5,000 years it never has been before.

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And this means that the archaeology is under threat.

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The human remains in here, are under threat.

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If the archaeologists don't act fast then there may be very little left to excavate.

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Having recovered the bones the team moved them to their lab in Kirkwall to begin the analysis.

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They would also be able to compare this new discover with the famous Tomb of the Eagles.

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It lies a little over a mile from Banks tomb,

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and has revealed some disturbing truths about Neolithic society.

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Recent research has shown that around a quarter of the skulls

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from the Tomb of the Eagles show clear signs of violence.

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Dan and the team want to answer two key questions.

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What can they can learn about burial rituals from these bones?

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And does comparing Banks Tomb with the Tomb of the Eagles tell us anything new?

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Have you an idea of how many individuals might be represented?

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So far it's about 14. We are looking at quite a number of bones.

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If you imagine there's five cells there you could times that very roughly by five.

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So this could be a communal burial place for a whole community.

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I'm really surprised at how well preserved the bones are.

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There's damage on this one but, you know, still the actual skull is pretty much intact.

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It is, yeah, and that's quite an interesting skull in itself,

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because that was placed as a sort of closing offering

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into the east cell before the passageway was finally sealed off.

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So this would've been one of the last people buried in the tomb.

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I think skulls are amazing cos you are looking at somebody's face, aren't you?

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It's only early days, but the team are starting to build up a picture of these communal burial rituals.

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At this stage, do you have any idea of whether these bones were placed in the grave as bones.

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Were they de-fleshed, or just a jumble of bones, or were whole bodies were placed there?

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Are we looking at bodies being taken in and perhaps,

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maybe put into the central chamber or the passage,

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and being allowed to decompose and then at some point they're moved into various cells at certain times?

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Then they become intermingled by later activity and become

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-this mass of bones, this mass of the ancestors.

-Yeah.

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Got any evidence of violence for instance?

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Tomb of the Eagles, as recent research has shown, there is a lot of evidence for this.

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There's less so here at Banks, so far, but we haven't actually got that many cranium fragments.

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That looks like it might've been a little fracture there,

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there's a definite dent in the top of that person's skull,

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but just turn it very carefully...

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Yeah, there's no evidence of it penetrating through to the inner surface of the skull there.

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Do you think the Tomb of the Eagles is an interesting comparison? Is it contemporary?

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I would say they're probably contemporary and we await radiocarbon dates.

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We are certainly looking at communities in that area over several hundreds of years,

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expressing their sort of identity in death through these monuments.

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The preliminary work here has thrown up some fascinating questions.

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Did something occur in this Neolithic society

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that made them abandon one tomb and construct a new one?

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or, were there two rival populations here,

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each with their own competing ancestor culture?

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Dan and his team are in the first year of what promises to be the most

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thorough examination of a British Neolithic tomb ever undertaken.

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We're getting an amazingly detailed picture emerging, of rituals and beliefs

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that seem very alien to us today, very strange.

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Imagine how different it was then, when you would have been laying your dead to rest in a communal tomb,

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and probably pushing aside the bones, even the rotting bodies of more distant ancestors.

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It seems very odd indeed, I think, to us today, and it's a ritual,

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it's a belief system which has disappeared from memory was never recorded in history,

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and the only chance we have of trying to understand it is through archaeological investigation.

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The community buried at Banks Tomb were amongst the first farmers in

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Britain, and they've left permanent evidence of their lives behind.

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But moving back beyond the Neolithic, our ancestors lived a more mobile, nomadic existence,

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during what's known as the Mesolithic.

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Finding evidence of the transition from the Mesolithic to the Neolithic has proved very elusive.

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But, a community archaeology group in Scotland may have discovered a site which could shed light

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on this gap in our knowledge.

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Over the past 20 years a dedicated group of volunteer archaeologists

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have been excavating sites around the Daer Valley in Scotland.

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They're looking for evidence of a missing link in archaeology.

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The Daer Valley sits in an area of land between the Rivers Clyde and Tweed.

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Hidden in this remote valley are clues about a huge leap

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in our ancestors' technology and lifestyles.

0:22:480:22:52

OK, how we doing? Everybody OK?

0:22:520:22:54

Leading the research is Tam Ward.

0:22:540:22:57

The reason that we're on this site is because the hill has been ploughed up

0:22:570:23:01

for new forest and when that happens

0:23:010:23:03

the plough exposes the archaeological sites for us,

0:23:030:23:06

so all we really need to do is walk up and down the furrows and, literally, find what's lying about.

0:23:060:23:13

Dense scatters of flint are churned up by the forestry ploughs.

0:23:150:23:20

These flints provide clues that archaeology is lurking beneath the peat.

0:23:200:23:25

If we found one of these bags in an entire site, we would think we were lucky,

0:23:250:23:30

and we are finding masses and masses of material in here. It's so exciting.

0:23:300:23:35

Just below the peat is the original ground level, which is covered in evidence of our ancestors' lives.

0:23:350:23:42

The style of tools suggests this is a Mesolithic site,

0:23:420:23:46

and so Tam and his team are the first people to touch these flints in over 6,000 years.

0:23:460:23:53

The volunteers give up their weekends to unearth fragments of their ancient ancestors' lives.

0:23:530:24:00

Been doing this for a number of years now,

0:24:000:24:03

and it sort of becomes a bit of an addiction after a while.

0:24:030:24:07

We'll dig anywhere, anything, any opportunity.

0:24:070:24:11

Well, what always strikes me is this is such an unremarkable valley.

0:24:110:24:17

You would drive past it and never give it a second thought and yet there's 10,000 years of history here,

0:24:170:24:22

that is still waiting for somebody to come along and ruin their knees and their back digging it up.

0:24:220:24:32

Tam and his team have found over 250 archaeological sites in this one valley alone,

0:24:320:24:39

and there could be many more waiting to be explored.

0:24:390:24:44

Today the team has exposed a large area and they work

0:24:440:24:49

inwards from the outer edges, digging down just a few inches.

0:24:490:24:54

The sheer volume of flint suggests this was a camp site, an incredibly rare thing to find.

0:24:540:25:01

You can just imagine ancient people expertly making their tools in their camp,

0:25:010:25:06

or perhaps re-sharpening a trusty weapon before a hunting expedition.

0:25:060:25:10

Tam has been finding typically Mesolithic, styles of tools.

0:25:100:25:16

We have a microlith, this is what they were manufacturing most of the time.

0:25:160:25:21

Microliths were part of a distinctive Mesolithic technology.

0:25:210:25:24

These tiny flint blades were imbedded into the shafts of arrows

0:25:240:25:28

and harpoons to increase their effectiveness.

0:25:280:25:31

They date to an era when people relied on hunting and gathering.

0:25:310:25:36

They hadn't yet begun to farm the land or to husband animals.

0:25:360:25:41

Here in the Daer Valley, Tam and his team think they have made a significant discovery.

0:25:410:25:46

because they've found both Mesolithic and later Neolithic technologies on the same sites.

0:25:460:25:53

We've began to find Neolithic evidence, and this is in the form of this pottery.

0:25:530:26:00

Now this is the earliest pottery to be used anywhere in Europe and these pots were quite large pots

0:26:010:26:06

and these indicate people are settled in the landscape

0:26:060:26:09

as opposed to travelling through it, because these pots do not travel.

0:26:090:26:13

That can only mean one thing, the very first farmers.

0:26:130:26:16

Now the most interesting thing about that is, are these the same people who were former hunter-gathers?

0:26:160:26:23

The use of pottery signifies a radical change

0:26:230:26:27

in people's lifestyle - it goes hand in hand with settlement

0:26:270:26:33

Tam has also found these distinctive smaller Mesolithic

0:26:330:26:37

and larger Neolithic scrapers at the same sites, in the same levels.

0:26:370:26:43

As farming became more important even simple tools like these were changing.

0:26:440:26:50

And beautiful Neolithic arrowheads, like this, begin to replace

0:26:500:26:55

the Mesolithic Microliths, the tools of the hunt were also changing.

0:26:550:27:01

We think this is a transition between the two earliest cultures...

0:27:010:27:06

the Mesolithic and the Neolithic, and if that's correct then that's a really major discovery.

0:27:060:27:14

This valley is yielding clues about a crucial transition in human history -

0:27:140:27:19

it marked the end of a nomadic culture that had been around for millennia,

0:27:190:27:24

and saw the birth of a structured society that we would recognize today.

0:27:240:27:29

But travelling backwards to the beginning of the Mesolithic another site is yielding

0:27:320:27:38

extraordinary evidence of life going back some 11,000 years.

0:27:380:27:44

At the tail end of the Ice Age, Britain was thawing out and the climate was warming up

0:27:460:27:52

and people were beginning to change the way they lived in this newly hospitable landscape.

0:27:520:27:58

They were making the transition from nomadic hunter-gatherers to becoming more settled.

0:27:580:28:03

The most important Mesolithic site in Britain was discovered

0:28:030:28:08

just after the second world war, at Star Carr in North Yorkshire.

0:28:080:28:14

This remarkable site is still re-shaping our view of people at the time.

0:28:140:28:20

Since 2004, York and Manchester universities have been digging there.

0:28:200:28:27

The new excavations have revealed that Star Carr was in fact much

0:28:270:28:31

larger than previously thought, covering at least three acres.

0:28:310:28:35

The site was sealed by peat and left undisturbed for over 10,000 years.

0:28:350:28:42

I've come to the York University to meet a team who have been working on Star Carr, for over a decade

0:28:420:28:47

and to find out why all is not well at Britain's most famous Mesolithic site.

0:28:470:28:53

Over the last 60 years, tens of thousands of artefacts

0:28:530:28:58

have been found at Star Carr.

0:28:580:29:01

And because of the lack of oxygen in the peat, the preservation was remarkable.

0:29:010:29:07

What emerged were not just stone tools, but organic remains.

0:29:070:29:12

Leading the post excavation work is Dr Nicky Milner.

0:29:120:29:17

-These are some of your most recent finds?

-That's right.

0:29:170:29:20

It's not just stone, it's not just flint. Well, what's this?

0:29:200:29:24

This is a digging stick, and it's actually made of wood.

0:29:240:29:28

And it looks a bit like a normal branch of a tree but actually

0:29:280:29:32

when you look at it, it has actually been carefully carved.

0:29:320:29:35

And you've got this amazing point at the end which would have been used for digging.

0:29:350:29:40

But it's incredible when you think that it's about 10,000 years old.

0:29:400:29:45

It's fantastic. You can build up a picture

0:29:450:29:47

of how these people survived, what they were doing.

0:29:470:29:50

We've never found anything like this before.

0:29:500:29:54

Somebody was holding this and digging for their food.

0:29:540:29:56

It's amazing to have something like this surviving,

0:29:560:30:00

but this wasn't the only remarkable thing the team discovered.

0:30:000:30:04

The really exciting thing about our recent finds is the structure that was found,

0:30:060:30:12

it had a big hollow in the ground and it had post holes around it

0:30:120:30:17

and this is the earliest kind of structure,

0:30:170:30:20

a bit like a house, I suppose, that we know of in Britain.

0:30:200:30:25

These small holes are a hugely significant discovery,

0:30:250:30:29

it's the earliest evidence that these people weren't just living in temporary camps

0:30:290:30:34

but were settling down and building more permanent structures and not just houses.

0:30:340:30:41

And then as well as that we also have evidence of

0:30:410:30:44

a platform, made out of worked planks, which goes out into lake.

0:30:440:30:50

-So a jetty?

-Like a jetty but it goes about 30 meters across the edge of the lake.

-Oh, wow!

0:30:500:30:57

Really important cos it's the earliest evidence of carpentry we have in Europe.

0:30:570:31:03

Preserved in the peat for over 10,000 years

0:31:030:31:07

is the first proof of our ancestors working in wood on a massive scale.

0:31:070:31:14

If they're building structures like that they're staying at that place for a while, aren't they?

0:31:140:31:20

It seems to be overturning all our expectations of what people were like at this time.

0:31:200:31:24

I think we have to accept that they were more sophisticated than we thought they were.

0:31:240:31:29

The unique preservation at Star Carr provides an astonishing wealth of

0:31:320:31:37

detail about our ancestors' everyday lives.

0:31:370:31:41

So what about these, these are lovely?

0:31:410:31:44

These are called barbed points and if you look at them carefully

0:31:440:31:47

they've been carved to have these little harpoon-like points.

0:31:470:31:51

What are they made of?

0:31:510:31:53

They're made of red deer antler.

0:31:530:31:55

-There're really beautifully made.

-Very delicate.

0:31:550:31:57

Quite evil looking, those little barbs.

0:31:570:32:00

It's so lovely to have a site where organic remains preserved, because you start to see more of the culture

0:32:000:32:06

and more of the technology - you're not just relying on the stone tools, you're seeing wooden tools,

0:32:060:32:11

antler, antler little harpoons, they're lovely.

0:32:110:32:16

The finds that Nicky and the team have recovered from the excavations really help to paint a picture

0:32:160:32:23

of what was happening here over 10,000 years ago.

0:32:230:32:26

There's a whole lost world trapped beneath the peat, and clear evidence of people

0:32:280:32:33

settling in their environment, in way that hasn't been seen before.

0:32:330:32:39

Ben Elliott, one of the team here at York, has been using some of finds

0:32:390:32:44

to discover more about the skills of these Mesolithic people.

0:32:440:32:49

You're not just looking at artefacts which have been dug up, are you?

0:32:490:32:53

No, as part of my kind of own research I've been conducting some experimental

0:32:530:32:56

archaeology and having a go at recreating some of the types of artefacts we find at Star Carr.

0:32:560:33:01

-So can we have a go?

-Yes, we can do.

0:33:010:33:02

Yes, the first thing that people are doing at Star Carr

0:33:020:33:06

are making these kind of longways grooves and they use their flint blades to slowly incise...

0:33:060:33:13

And you can see the material starts to come away, especially when it's wet.

0:33:130:33:18

-Oh, yeah, can I have a go?

-Yeah, of course you can.

0:33:180:33:20

-Get a feel for just how soft it is.

-Hm-hm.

0:33:200:33:24

And they say this is exactly what they would have been doing is it, using flint tools like this?

0:33:240:33:29

I have to say I am getting to the point where I just want a power tool!

0:33:310:33:34

After just a few minutes, I'm really getting a sense of how Ben's research is unlocking the skill

0:33:380:33:44

and artistry represented in the Star Carr tools.

0:33:440:33:49

It is coming off.

0:33:490:33:51

Once you have two parallel grooves defined along the length

0:33:510:33:54

of the antler you then have this kind of strip.

0:33:540:33:57

So what are they doing with these strips once they've removed them?

0:33:570:34:01

They start to carve them using flint tools.

0:34:010:34:04

And this, as you can see, is again it's quite a gradual process, but you can sort of,

0:34:040:34:09

using your flint flakes you can gradually sharpen off

0:34:090:34:12

and create quite a sharp point to the tips so a pretty formidable weapon, really.

0:34:120:34:17

Do you mind if I have a go? Is it all right? Thank you.

0:34:170:34:21

Just want to get an idea of how...

0:34:210:34:23

You have to hold the blade in a certain way. That's the stuff.

0:34:230:34:26

It makes a nice sound.

0:34:260:34:28

Yeah, so doing this experimental archaeology,

0:34:280:34:31

is that helping you to interpret the material you're finding?

0:34:310:34:35

Oh, yeah. Doing these experiments has given me a sense of

0:34:350:34:37

the experience of what life might've been like at the site.

0:34:370:34:40

Nearly 200 of these barbed antler points have been found at Star Carr,

0:34:400:34:46

97% of those found in the whole of Britain.

0:34:460:34:49

Star Carr is one of the most important Stone Age sites in Britain,

0:34:490:34:53

It's given archaeologists an amazing opportunity to try to understand

0:34:530:34:57

what was happening here in the Mesolithic.

0:34:570:34:59

But when they were excavating recently they started to make finds which were worrying,

0:34:590:35:04

not because of the deep past, but because of what might happen at Star Carr in the future.

0:35:040:35:10

Something drastic has happened and it's threatening the very existence of this important site.

0:35:120:35:20

So although things were preserved in the ground for 10,000 years

0:35:200:35:24

over the last 60 years or so it's taken a turn for the worse,

0:35:240:35:27

so this is something that was excavated in 1985.

0:35:270:35:31

And what is it? It's the skull of a large animal?

0:35:310:35:34

-Yeah.

-That's the base of the skull that's been completely almost pancaked.

0:35:340:35:38

So, this was excavated about 25 years ago,

0:35:380:35:41

but in the last few years

0:35:410:35:43

we've got some serious problems. These were excavated in 2007.

0:35:430:35:47

So, that's an antler from the original excavations on the site,

0:35:470:35:50

-so when would that have been excavated?

-1950.

0:35:500:35:53

1950.

0:35:530:35:56

So 60 years on.

0:35:560:35:58

-It's just like leather.

-Oh, my goodness.

-It has been conserved.

-But it's...

0:35:580:36:02

Isn't that strange. It's like a leathery banana skin.

0:36:020:36:06

And in fact we have very little anther and bone

0:36:060:36:08

compared with the 1950s

0:36:080:36:10

I can show you what those are like - you are going to be quite shocked.

0:36:100:36:13

Um and...

0:36:130:36:15

Oh, my goodness, it's completely soft.

0:36:150:36:18

It's like a piece of rubber.

0:36:180:36:20

That is so strange.

0:36:220:36:24

Another piece here.

0:36:240:36:26

So this is bone...

0:36:260:36:28

-that's almost jelly, isn't it?

-Yeah.

0:36:280:36:29

This is bone that's been completely demineralised.

0:36:290:36:33

It was when we found this and did all the tests

0:36:330:36:36

and realized it was extremely acidic, it's basically, it's...

0:36:360:36:39

We've been told by our specialists it's a bit like car battery acid.

0:36:390:36:43

For 10,000 years this Mesolithic world has lain perfectly preserved,

0:36:440:36:50

just waiting to be discovered.

0:36:500:36:52

But now something terrible has happened to the peat, it's no longer preserving the finds.

0:36:520:36:58

It's destroying them. So why is it so acidic? That's worse than it just being a peat bog.

0:36:580:37:03

It's basically because the water table has fallen dramatically,

0:37:030:37:08

that's let oxygen into the deposits, and that's created a chemical reaction and created sulphuric acid.

0:37:080:37:14

So what does the future hold for this site?

0:37:140:37:17

Well, luckily we have got five more years funding from

0:37:170:37:20

the European Research Council so we will be going back.

0:37:200:37:23

I was taken aback to see the state of preservation

0:37:240:37:27

of that bone and antler from the excavations at Star Carr,

0:37:270:37:31

and if that level of deterioration continues at the site

0:37:310:37:35

then much of the precious evidence there will be lost forever.

0:37:350:37:39

So that means it's fantastic news that the archaeologists have secured

0:37:390:37:43

funding to go back and excavate and rescue this archaeology

0:37:430:37:47

from one of Britain's most important Mesolithic sites.

0:37:470:37:51

Stepping back even further in time, whilst Britain was still in the grip

0:37:580:38:03

of the Ice Age, we arrive in the Palaeolithic, or Old Stone Age.

0:38:030:38:09

Around 14,000 years ago, as Britain began to thaw,

0:38:090:38:13

modern humans started to colonise this newly hospitable landscape.

0:38:130:38:19

Our Palaeolithic ancestors left only very subtle traces of their lives behind.

0:38:240:38:31

They didn't live in houses. So what we're trying to spot is evidence of their campsites,

0:38:310:38:36

imagine trying to find a camp that's thousands of years old.

0:38:360:38:40

It takes a keen eye, and a fair bit of detective work!

0:38:400:38:43

At the end of the Ice Age, the expanse of land

0:38:430:38:46

between Britain and France was a vast and rich hunting ground,

0:38:460:38:51

known as the La Manche Plain.

0:38:510:38:54

As the ice melted away and the sea level rose the English Channel swallowed up this land.

0:38:540:39:00

But there are a few areas of this lost landscape still with us,

0:39:000:39:04

and the Channel Island of Jersey is one of them.

0:39:040:39:07

I'm on my way to a site, that's so new,

0:39:100:39:13

that you won't find mention of it in archaeological textbooks or journals.

0:39:130:39:17

It's been called Les Varines after the road that leads there.

0:39:170:39:21

This discovery was made by local man Peter Bohea.

0:39:230:39:27

Peter, you found this site, how on earth did you come across it?

0:39:270:39:31

Well, it was purely an accidental find,

0:39:310:39:35

I was running through this field one evening, fortunately

0:39:350:39:38

the field had just been lifted of its Jersey new potatoes

0:39:380:39:42

and so it was lovely fresh soil, and lying on the surface I just found a flint core.

0:39:420:39:48

Did you know what it was, or did you think that looks prehistoric

0:39:480:39:51

and it looks like a perhaps a stone tool?

0:39:510:39:54

I knew it was prehistoric, I know what a piece of worked flint looks like,

0:39:540:39:58

and I got home and spoke to my wife who is a curator of archaeology,

0:39:580:40:02

she confirmed it was a flint core.

0:40:020:40:04

Very useful to have an archaeologist at home after you find things out ruining!

0:40:040:40:08

Oh, it certainly is.

0:40:080:40:10

Last year, following up on Peter's discovery, a team of archaeologists

0:40:100:40:14

excavated a few small test pits,

0:40:140:40:17

which seemed to indicate this might be an ancient, Palaeolithic, site.

0:40:170:40:23

Many other famous sites from this era have been found in caves,

0:40:230:40:27

but this is an open field, so it is an incredibly rare find.

0:40:270:40:33

These people certainly weren't the caricature cavemen of popular culture.

0:40:330:40:38

Leading the dig here at Les Varines is Dr Chantal Conneller.

0:40:400:40:45

What we've got here is a campsite that dates to about 14,000 years ago, we don't know the scale of it.

0:40:450:40:52

There seems to be huge amounts of material coming out from the plough soil, so it may be

0:40:520:40:56

people who live by hunting and gathering, who moved across quite large areas,

0:40:560:41:01

but camped here in this very spot.

0:41:010:41:04

A Palaeolithic site looks very different from later archaeology,

0:41:040:41:08

where there are walls and features to follow.

0:41:080:41:10

This means Chantal and her students need to meticulously plot every stone tool that they find.

0:41:100:41:17

And the soil here is rock hard, so the going is tough.

0:41:170:41:21

So have you found anything of interest yet, or is this very early stages?

0:41:260:41:31

We've been going for nearly two weeks now, but now we're getting quite dense scatters,

0:41:310:41:36

so all these little flags show a single bit of flint and we're also getting quite a few tools.

0:41:360:41:43

So, there's this little piece of flint here we think is part of

0:41:430:41:46

a scraping tool, probably for working hides,

0:41:460:41:48

but sometimes they're used for working wood as well.

0:41:480:41:51

So we have maybe people gearing up for hunting expeditions or repairing their weapons

0:41:510:41:57

but also other activities going on as well involving the processing of animal remains.

0:41:570:42:05

Last year, I visited a site of a similar age at Creswell Crags.

0:42:050:42:10

Here other Ice Age hunters were making beautiful art.

0:42:100:42:15

It's clear from this site that these people weren't just cavemen,

0:42:180:42:22

perhaps they're better described as tent people.

0:42:220:42:26

They might have used caves for art and ritual,

0:42:260:42:29

but above all, they were nomadic hunters ranging over large areas.

0:42:290:42:33

The tools found at Les Varines are the real treasure of the Stone Age,

0:42:330:42:38

and they're all the archaeologists have to go on.

0:42:380:42:43

From these simple bits of flint, they can build a compelling picture of life here 14,000 years ago.

0:42:430:42:50

-So shall I wash that?

-Yes.

0:42:500:42:53

Very technologically advanced washing equipment.

0:42:530:42:56

Hm, that's very nice. What is it.

0:42:560:42:59

This is a little tool called a burin, or an engraver.

0:42:590:43:03

You can see this triangular point here?

0:43:030:43:06

And these were used for working bone and antler.

0:43:060:43:09

So for kind of digging in, for making an incision into those materials?

0:43:090:43:13

Yes, there's little indentations, each of those represent an act of re-sharpening.

0:43:130:43:18

People are obviously using this tool for quite

0:43:180:43:20

a time so they used it, it became blunt and they re-sharpening it.

0:43:200:43:24

-So their taking off little slivers of flint.

-Yeah.

0:43:240:43:26

And what's this larger one that you washed?

0:43:260:43:29

This is part of a blade. That edge there is very sharp.

0:43:290:43:33

It would easily have cut through reindeer hide or reindeer skin.

0:43:330:43:38

These stone tools are different from those found at later sites like Star Carr and the Daer Valley.

0:43:380:43:43

This Palaeolithic technology was designed for the specialized hunting

0:43:430:43:47

of migrating animals like reindeer or horse.

0:43:470:43:51

I think when you start understanding how all these tiny

0:43:530:43:57

little bits of stone might have been used, we're looking at

0:43:570:44:00

quite a sophisticated technology, and you start to think these people were very much like us.

0:44:000:44:05

But they have a different world view from us -

0:44:050:44:07

the way they treat their dead at Gough's Cave,

0:44:070:44:10

the way they decorate caves and some of their tools, which obviously have

0:44:100:44:14

great meaning to them, so though in some ways they

0:44:140:44:17

seem like us, in other ways they would have seemed very alien.

0:44:170:44:20

It's amazing to be finding these little traces of them.

0:44:200:44:24

It's very exciting just because it's so old, and it's nice

0:44:240:44:26

to be the first person for 14,000 years to be touching these tools.

0:44:260:44:32

This is an incredibly exciting site because it seems that underneath the plough soil

0:44:320:44:37

we have intact archaeology and the remains of a hunter-gatherer

0:44:370:44:42

camp from the very end of the Ice Age.

0:44:420:44:45

This is such an ephemeral thing to find, something

0:44:450:44:48

that is much more likely to disappear than be preserved.

0:44:480:44:53

So we have the opportunity to gain some precious insights into the world

0:44:530:44:58

of those pioneering hunter-gathers who were re-colonising Northern Europe

0:44:580:45:03

after the ice sheets receded.

0:45:030:45:05

But as well as finding clues about these Ice Age hunters' everyday lives,

0:45:090:45:14

archaeologists have also uncovered evidence that shows these people

0:45:140:45:19

were very different from us.

0:45:190:45:20

Finds from a cave in Cheddar Gorge, are now held in London's Natural History Museum.

0:45:200:45:28

Rescue excavations at Gough's Cave between 1987 and 1992

0:45:280:45:33

revealed evidence of hunter-gatherers using the cave, and human remains.

0:45:330:45:37

Last year, a team of experts from the Natural History Museum re-examined some of those bones.

0:45:370:45:43

What they found was truly gruesome.

0:45:430:45:46

20 years ago clues emerged that seemed to be evidence for cannibalism.

0:45:510:45:57

The new analysis strengthens this theory.

0:45:570:46:00

This jaw bone has been deliberately broken to extract bone marrow

0:46:000:46:05

these people were eating their own kind.

0:46:050:46:09

And a closer inspection of the bones has revealed something new and extraordinary.

0:46:090:46:14

We had the vault of the skull, or three skulls,

0:46:140:46:18

which was absolutely perfectly preserved.

0:46:180:46:22

And there was a sort of... Why they were saving it.

0:46:220:46:25

We have clear proof of cannibalism in this site, so if they were going

0:46:250:46:30

to modify the skull it was probably to extract brain,

0:46:300:46:35

but the way they modified it is not just to extract brain

0:46:350:46:38

because they would have break it in much easier way to extract it.

0:46:380:46:41

But here we observe a very clear process of complete defleshing.

0:46:410:46:46

You can almost imagine somebody peeling off the tissues,

0:46:460:46:49

and then cutting down underneath.

0:46:490:46:51

Exactly. It's a classic example of scalping.

0:46:510:46:54

So peeling like this and cut, cut, cut, cut.

0:46:540:46:56

All across. When we analyzed the face and other parts

0:46:560:47:00

they are clear signs that they were going much more in detail,

0:47:000:47:05

so they were cutting the eyes, they were cutting the cheek,

0:47:050:47:09

they were cutting the lips.

0:47:090:47:11

Why would they want to that?

0:47:110:47:12

We think that was to produce a container and the simple movement

0:47:120:47:19

of an anatomical position to put it upside down

0:47:190:47:22

it just tells you want it was, and it was a cup.

0:47:220:47:25

Even as an anatomist, as someone who has dissected human cadavers,

0:47:270:47:31

I find it extraordinary the lengths they were going to,

0:47:310:47:35

to scrupulously clean up a skull to transform it into a cup.

0:47:350:47:41

And this new research shows us how they were doing it,

0:47:410:47:45

but why is another question entirely.

0:47:450:47:48

Were they driven by hunger, or by their beliefs,

0:47:480:47:52

was this just an elaborate funerary ritual?

0:47:520:47:55

And whom were they eating - their enemies, or their friends and relatives?

0:47:550:48:01

It seems strange to our modern sensibilities that our

0:48:030:48:06

ancient ancestors would make such macabre objects.

0:48:060:48:10

And as is so often the case, archaeology can provide us

0:48:100:48:14

with the evidence, but not with the reasons, why.

0:48:140:48:17

Before we modern humans arrived on these shores, there were other,

0:48:270:48:32

different, humans who roamed the British Isles.

0:48:320:48:36

And there is evidence of their lives here, on the Channel Island of Jersey.

0:48:360:48:40

During colder periods of the Ice Age, the sea levels

0:48:440:48:48

around Britain would have been significantly lower than today.

0:48:480:48:52

The English Channel, and much of the North Sea,

0:48:520:48:54

would have been dry land,

0:48:540:48:56

and the Channel Islands would have stood out as areas of high ground in a flat landscape.

0:48:560:49:02

I'm here to meet a team of archaeologists who are hoping

0:49:020:49:06

to shed light on a much-maligned human species - the Neanderthals.

0:49:060:49:10

Neanderthals survived and thrived in Europe

0:49:100:49:14

for hundreds of thousands of years - through periods of major climate

0:49:140:49:19

change as glaciations repeatedly brought ice sheets down over northern Europe.

0:49:190:49:24

And they were here long before we modern humans arrived on the scene.

0:49:240:49:30

The Neanderthals were a distinct and separate branch of the human evolutionary tree.

0:49:300:49:36

They evolved in Europe some time before 300,000 years ago.

0:49:360:49:41

And before modern humans emerged from Africa,

0:49:410:49:44

the lands north of the Mediterranean were the domain of the Neanderthals.

0:49:440:49:50

I've arranged to meet Dr Matt Pope, of University College London,

0:49:500:49:54

-who is one of the co-directors of the project here.

-Hello, Alice.

0:49:540:49:56

-I'm Matt, Matt, nice to meet you.

-This is Kevin, our guide.

0:49:560:50:01

So we're going to go and have a look at La Cotte from the sea?

0:50:010:50:04

We've got a beautiful bay,

0:50:040:50:06

and round the corner some archaeology.

0:50:060:50:09

What a fantastic way to do archaeology! I could get used to this.

0:50:190:50:23

La Cotte de St Brelade is of international significance because it's one of the few places

0:50:230:50:29

that Neanderthal remains have been discovered in North West Atlantic Europe.

0:50:290:50:33

This is a fantastic way to view from the sea.

0:50:330:50:38

I mean, most people when they look at La Cotte,

0:50:380:50:40

they're looking at it either from the site or from the headland above.

0:50:400:50:43

We're trying to give a different perspective here, what we're able to do here

0:50:430:50:47

looking at these stacks, the remains of an entire valley system.

0:50:470:50:52

And it's within these valley systems that the Neanderthals were almost certainly hunting

0:50:520:50:56

and moving following herds of mammoth, rhinoceros and other animals.

0:50:560:51:01

We're actually paddling over the top of a submerged Ice Age landscape,

0:51:050:51:10

and the sea is fairly calm today, but just occasionally we get hit by the bow wave of a ferry.

0:51:100:51:17

And then you have to be really careful about being close to reefs

0:51:170:51:20

as white water starts breaking over them.

0:51:200:51:23

Matt is using kayaks to map every part of the Jersey coastline,

0:51:230:51:27

looking for new caves, and with them, new archaeology.

0:51:270:51:31

So La Cotte is really just the beginning?

0:51:340:51:37

I don't think we'll equal the size and the importance of La Cotte,

0:51:370:51:41

but what we can start to do is fill in the gaps, and try and create

0:51:410:51:45

an entire history of occupation and periods of abandonment,

0:51:450:51:49

this side of the English Channel river for the past half million years.

0:51:490:51:52

Travelling round the coast by kayak is a fantastic way to survey it, you can get really close.

0:52:030:52:09

And it's great to go along with Matt and see that he's not just looking at the modern landscape

0:52:090:52:15

of today but imagining in his mind's eye the ancient coastline.

0:52:150:52:19

La Cotte is such a famous site, but there maybe other important archaeological sites

0:52:190:52:24

as yet undiscovered around this coast, but for now I want to get over there and see it up close.

0:52:240:52:30

La Cotte has provided us with a wealth of information about the lives of Neanderthals.

0:52:320:52:38

Archaeologists have been digging here for over 100 years.

0:52:410:52:47

And in the 1960s, Prince Charles even took part in the excavations.

0:52:470:52:52

Matt and his team suspected that La Cotte might have more to reveal,

0:52:570:53:02

so this year they're trying to establish if there's any untouched archaeology here.

0:53:020:53:08

They're clearing away backfill debris from previous excavations to expose the original sediments.

0:53:080:53:14

Because of the tides, they can only work here for a few hours at a time.

0:53:160:53:20

It's a dangerous environment, hence the hard hats.

0:53:200:53:24

-Hello! What an amazing site!

-Yeah, it's great.

0:53:240:53:28

Now how much of this is original archaeology,

0:53:280:53:32

and how much of it is the back fill from previous excavations?

0:53:320:53:35

Well, when we first came here,

0:53:350:53:37

we were under the impression that most of this was material left over from previous excavations.

0:53:370:53:43

The picture that we're starting to build up, and from Martin Bate's excavations here,

0:53:430:53:47

is in fact large parts of this site remain unexcavated and intact.

0:53:470:53:53

It's really exciting that there is pristine archaeology here.

0:53:530:53:57

This means the team can start to plan future excavations

0:53:570:54:01

and perhaps learn more about what the Neanderthals were doing here over a huge length of time.

0:54:010:54:06

And few tantalising fragments have even been emerging from the exploratory dig.

0:54:060:54:12

So, Becky, these are some of the finds which have been coming out today?

0:54:120:54:15

Yeah, there's a couple of bits Bully's just pulled out.

0:54:150:54:20

-Is that flint?

-Is it, they're both flint.

0:54:200:54:23

They're quite heavily damaged around these edges, here.

0:54:230:54:27

Oh, that's not something somebody's done to them?

0:54:270:54:30

No, if it was freshly struck you'd expect to see a sharp feather edge.

0:54:300:54:36

It must have been exciting to realise that you have got in situ pristine archaeology here?

0:54:360:54:41

Fantastic, especially when we had no idea that there was this much here.

0:54:410:54:45

There's never a time you walk up here where it doesn't strike you - it's always exciting.

0:54:450:54:51

This site is so iconic and famous, but I think in some ways that distracts from its real importance,

0:54:530:54:59

which is that the Neanderthals were coming back here to this cave over tens of thousands of year.

0:54:590:55:06

It holds out the promise of really understanding how

0:55:060:55:10

Neanderthals adapted to this changing climate in Europe during the Ice Age.

0:55:100:55:15

But back to the present and the tide is rising really rapidly

0:55:150:55:20

so if we don't get out of here we're going to get stuck.

0:55:200:55:23

Over 250,000 individual stone tools have been found at La Cotte -

0:55:250:55:30

more than all the other Neanderthal sites in Britain combined.

0:55:300:55:34

Becky and Matt have arranged for some of the best to be brought down to the beach.

0:55:340:55:39

They can demonstrate just how sophisticated the Neanderthals really were.

0:55:390:55:44

You've got artefacts here from a very long period of time, what do they tell us about the Neanderthals?

0:55:440:55:50

What's interesting about this collection as a whole

0:55:500:55:53

is there's a lot of flint in it, which these artefacts are here, and there's no flint on the island.

0:55:530:55:59

The nearest source is of flint is perhaps 20 kilometres away.

0:55:590:56:03

They're probably following animals here in a place where

0:56:030:56:07

there's not brilliant stone for making tools,

0:56:070:56:10

so they're bringing that in from elsewhere.

0:56:100:56:12

There is flint around here in the beaches but it's useless.

0:56:120:56:17

They know where the good raw material sources are.

0:56:170:56:19

The Neanderthals certainly weren't primitive brutes.

0:56:190:56:23

These tools show real sophistication and intelligence.

0:56:230:56:26

This one is particularly beautiful.

0:56:260:56:28

Yeah, this part of a much bigger piece, but I don't recognise

0:56:280:56:33

the raw material at all so this is something very exotic.

0:56:330:56:36

I mean, that's beautiful, it's been really carefully manufactured.

0:56:360:56:40

What's also interesting is that it comes from the very early excavations that took place

0:56:400:56:45

in the upper part of the cave,

0:56:450:56:46

and these may have been some of the last Neanderthals here.

0:56:460:56:50

That suggests somebody who is good at making something functional, and they've got an eye for beauty.

0:56:500:56:55

It doesn't look like a technology of people on the edge - we need to focus on that.

0:56:550:57:00

Neanderthals, if they, compared to humans, lacked the ability to make tools,

0:57:000:57:05

lacked the ability to think, they would have been extinct before they'd even started.

0:57:050:57:11

Nature just doesn't allow a creature that isn't perfectly fitted to its environment to thrive and exist.

0:57:110:57:17

My 100,000-year long journey ends here, with these surprising truths

0:57:170:57:22

about the sophistication, and achievements, of the Neanderthals.

0:57:220:57:27

Along the way, I've seen so much fresh evidence of ingenuity and invention.

0:57:270:57:33

From the epic building of Stonehenge

0:57:330:57:36

to the first wooden structures found in Europe.

0:57:360:57:39

I've also seen exciting new discoveries being made.

0:57:390:57:43

And tiny clues uncovered that are all adding to the complex jigsaw

0:57:430:57:48

puzzle that is ancient Britain.

0:57:480:57:51

In many ways the Stone Age seems unimaginably distant to us

0:57:510:57:56

and the voices of our ancient ancestors have long since faded into silence.

0:57:560:58:00

But archaeology helps us to piece their stories together -

0:58:000:58:04

revealing how they lived, how they viewed their world.

0:58:040:58:09

And showing us how the foundations of our modern society emerged.

0:58:090:58:13

And so with many questions still unanswered,

0:58:130:58:18

the digging continues.

0:58:180:58:20

You can get hands on with archaeology yourself

0:58:200:58:23

with BBC Hands on History.

0:58:230:58:26

Find events near you and download family activities

0:58:260:58:29

to try at home on the website.

0:58:290:58:31

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