Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Landscape and environment in prehistoric West Mainland, Shetland

Landscape and environment in prehistoric West Mainland, Shetland The archaeological landscape of Shetland's West Mainland is characterised by extensive field and settlement systems, dating back to Neolithic and Bronze Age times. Field walls, lynchets, houses, clearance and burial cairns survive as a result of burial beneath blanket peat and a lack of subsequent cultivation. The existence of peat, sub-peat soils and loch deposits has enabled pollen-analytical investigations of vegetational, environmental and land use change to take place. Evidence from two deep basins is contrasted with the spatially-precise data obtained from a large number of sub-peat soil pollen profiles closely associated with the archaeological features. Although this is part of a continuing long-term study, it is possible to say that Neolithic communities had access to birch and hazel woodlands and that clearance and probable pastoral activity led to soil erosion. Heath land and blanket peat were early vegetational elements in the landscape. Spatial patterning is evident in the soil pollen records which may portray events towards the end of the lives of the settlements; by then, soils were thin and poor, and arable activity was probably subservient to pastoralism. Apart from the spatial disposition of vegetation, the evidence raises questions of soil status and degradation, the purpose of clearance cairns, ard cultivation, the relative importance of pastoral and arable activities, and social and economic concerns at the regional scale. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Landscape History Taylor & Francis

Landscape and environment in prehistoric West Mainland, Shetland

Edwards, Kevin J.; Whittington, G.
Landscape History , Volume 20 (1): 13 – Jan 1, 1998
Download PDF
13 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/taylor-francis/landscape-and-environment-in-prehistoric-west-mainland-shetland-yjSo9sg7mT

References

References for this paper are not available at this time. We will be adding them shortly, thank you for your patience.

Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Copyright
Copyright Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN
2160-2506
eISSN
0143-3768
DOI
10.1080/01433768.1998.10594498
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

The archaeological landscape of Shetland's West Mainland is characterised by extensive field and settlement systems, dating back to Neolithic and Bronze Age times. Field walls, lynchets, houses, clearance and burial cairns survive as a result of burial beneath blanket peat and a lack of subsequent cultivation. The existence of peat, sub-peat soils and loch deposits has enabled pollen-analytical investigations of vegetational, environmental and land use change to take place. Evidence from two deep basins is contrasted with the spatially-precise data obtained from a large number of sub-peat soil pollen profiles closely associated with the archaeological features. Although this is part of a continuing long-term study, it is possible to say that Neolithic communities had access to birch and hazel woodlands and that clearance and probable pastoral activity led to soil erosion. Heath land and blanket peat were early vegetational elements in the landscape. Spatial patterning is evident in the soil pollen records which may portray events towards the end of the lives of the settlements; by then, soils were thin and poor, and arable activity was probably subservient to pastoralism. Apart from the spatial disposition of vegetation, the evidence raises questions of soil status and degradation, the purpose of clearance cairns, ard cultivation, the relative importance of pastoral and arable activities, and social and economic concerns at the regional scale.

Journal

Landscape History – Taylor & Francis

Published: Jan 1, 1998

Keywords: Shetland; Neotholic; Bronze Age; soil pollen; prehistoric agriculture

There are no references for this article.