Ceide Fields
The Ceide Fields are located on the west coast of Ireland north of Ballycastle. Ceide means “flat topped hill fields”. It is the largest Neolithic site in Ireland and preserves the oldest known stone-walled fields in the world, dating to 3500 BC. This was a farming community where ancient farmers used wooden ploughs with a stone cutting edge for field cultivating. These were drawn by cattle (horses had not been introduced into Ireland at this time). The walls were low enough that they were intended to encompass the fields rather than for defensive purposes. After the fields were abandoned, they were covered over by a bog, preserving the walls, houses, and tombs of the ancient peoples. Archaeological evidence indicates the farmers cleared woodlands dominated by pine and birch to make pasture for grazing livestock. From Wikipedia: The discovery of the Read more…
Crops in Medieval Wales
Wales has always been known as a pastoral society, in that farming was a less common occupation than herding. Crops were grown, however, and new archaeological studies are shedding light on the nature of that form of agriculture. “In about 4,000 BC farming was introduced into Wales, although the people still used stone tools.” http://www.localhistories.org/wales.html http://www.ruralia.cz/119-123.pdf “The discovery of corn-dryers with early medieval radiocarbon dates has contributed to the growing number of early medieval examples excavated in Wales which can throw valuable light on the crops grown, their ratio to each other and how they were processed. South Hook (Herbranston) is a particularly important site since several corn-dryers were excavated together with rotary quern-stones and a significant assemblage of charred grain samples. Two types of oats (bristle oats and common oats) as well as hulled six-row barley grains were the Read more…
^