INSTRUMENTS OF CONVERSION? THE ROLE OF MEGALITHS IN THE MESOLITHIC/NEOLITHIC TRANSITION IN NORTHWEST EUROPE1

Abstract

SummaryThis paper discusses the general conditions which have given rise to megalithic construction techniques, and the specific circumstances under which megalithism became important in Neolithic Europe. It argues that the great elaboration of megalithic constructions in western and northern Europe must be related to the survival there of Mesolithic populations, and that monumentality was an essential element of the cultural rhetoric whereby these indigenous groups were converted to a Neolithic way of life.