Hi Bryan
While researching your question, I came across one of the best sites
you'll probably find and really explains it all.
This site describes the burial practices by the following periods:
Palaeolithic
Mesolithic
Neolithic
Bronze Age
Iron Age
Roman
Early Saxon
Middle Saxon
Late Saxon-Early Medieval
Medieval
Post-Medieval
I'll post a little excerpt for each of the earlier periods, however, I
advise you to read the document in its entirety for a better
explanation.
Palaeolithic (250,000-10,000 years ago)
=======================================
Burial at this time is characterized by single or multiple cave
burials, possibly because these sites have survived glaciation, or
perhaps indicating a preference for burial in such places.
Men women and children were provided with tools and weapons, usually
near the head, in the hand or close to the body where a pocket or
pouch may have been. Shell, tooth and ivory ornaments are very common,
many of which may have been sewn to garments which have not survived.
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Mesolithic (10,000-6000 years ago)
==================================
?Burial in the Mesolithic is characterized by a shift from single or
small groups of burials to larger cemeteries in the open.
No British examples of Mesolithic burials have been identified, with
one possible exception. A disarticulated burial in a partially burnt
logboat found at St. Albans has been dated to c.4,700 BC, so this
could be late Mesolithic or Early Neolithic.?
(?)
?Burial practices in this period, although in open air flat cemeteries
rather than caves, seem to continue the later Palaeolithic traditions
of burial with the apparent importance of red ochre, ornaments of
shell and teeth, and provision of tools and food.?
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Neolithic (6000-4700 years ago)
===============================
?Burial practices in this period are characterized by collective
burial in large, highly visible monuments, and by ritual practices
resulting in the scattering of human bones in non-funerary contexts.?
(?)
?Some tombs began as wooden chambers, e.g. Street House, Cleveland,
and some began as circular or oval tombs which were remodelled into
rectangular forms. Many were of multi-phase construction.
Some recently discovered long barrows have completely lost their
mounds, leaving only a pit containing disarticulated human remains,
e.g. at Fengate near Peterborough.?
(?)
?Not everyone was buried in long barrows. A few isolated flat graves
have been found of this date, for example a female with an
Abingdon-type bowl at Pangbourne, Dorset. These are sometimes marked
by a post, and as similar animal burials have also been found it may
be that the post and not the burial was the important feature,
possibly as a totem pole.?
(?)
?The human remains recovered from the Neolithic clearly do not
represent the entire population of Britain during that period. During
both the early and the later phases it is clear that there is some
selection of individuals for particular forms of burial. In the
earlier Neolithic this may be based on the appropriateness of the
individual for inclusion in communal ritual practices, or on the basis
of age and gender, with the whole community contributing to the
building of the monuments. Later, the building of megalithic tombs and
other monuments shows great advances in architectural and
technological terms, and the commemoration of great ancestors suggests
that wealth or status may have been the deciding factor. The vast
majority of the population has disappeared, perhaps as a result of
later destruction or lack of discovery, but more likely as a result of
excarnation and scattering of their bones. Perhaps the people buried
in the early tombs are merely those whose bones were able to withstand
exposure and remained to be collected for burial.?
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Bronze Age (4700-2600 years ago)
================================
?The main type of burial at this time consisted of individual
interment of firstly crouched inhumation and later cremation burials,
often richly endowed with grave goods.?
(?)
?In the Late Bronze Age the practice of cremation continued, but after
3000 years ago ashes were deposited in shallow pits without a pottery
vessel, although they may have been wrapped in perishable materials.?
(?)
?Human skulls are found in association with water deposits of weapons
in the Thames, perhaps suggesting a move towards sacred water rites
with the Thames acting as a British Ganges. Burials in peat and
fenland areas are known in East Anglia from this period, especially
around Methwold. A few intact skeletons of this period show evidence
for violent ends.?
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Iron Age (2600-1900 years ago)
==============================
?Like the Late Bronze Age, little is known about the disposal of the
dead in this period. Cremation and scattering of the ashes is one
possibility, cremation and burial in a pit or under a barrow is
another. Crouched inhumations in stone cists of Late Bronze to Late
Iron Age date seems to have been the prevalent rite in the south-west
peninsula and Wales.?
(?)
?The Arras culture of Yorkshire consists of large cemeteries with
graves under mounds surrounded by rectangular ditched enclosures.
These include men, women and children. The culture is an elite burial
tradition involving the interment of a two-wheeled vehicle with the
body.?
(?)
?Other types of burial in this period include bog bodies such as
Lindow Man, an example of the ritual deposition of bodies in water.?
(?)
?In this period, inhumations with grave goods are again found. Men
usually have swords, shields and sometimes spears, women have mirrors,
and sometimes bronze bowls or beads.?
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Source of Research:
Spoilheap: Burial Archaeology
http://www.spoilheap.co.uk/burintr.htm
Search criteria:
UK ?history of graveyards?
UK ?history of cemeteries?
UK prehistory cemeteries dead buried OR burial
UK prehistory ?burial tradition?
UK prehistoric ?burial tradition?
I hope the information provided is helpful. If you have any questions
regarding my answer please don?t hesitate to ask.
Best regards,
Rainbow |
