Land-use patterns and cultural change in the Middle to Late Bronze Age in Ireland: inferences from pollen records

Abstract

In Ireland, the Middle to Late Bronze Age (1500–600 cal b.c.) is characterised by alternating phases of prolific metalwork production (the Bishopsland and Dowris Phases) and apparent recessions (the Roscommon Phase and the Late Bronze Age-Iron Age transition). In this paper, these changes in material culture are placed in a socio-economic context by examining contemporary settlement and land-use patterns reconstructed from the pollen record. The vegetation histories of six tephrochronologically linked sites are presented, which provide high-resolution and chronologically well-resolved insights into changes in landscape use over the Middle to Late Bronze Age. The records are compared with published pollen records in an attempt to discern if there are trends in woodland clearance and abandonment from which changes in settlement patterns can be inferred. The results suggest that prolific metalworking industries correlate chronologically with expansion of farming activity, which indicates that they were supported by a productive subsistence economy. Conversely, declines in metalwork production occur during periods when farming activity was generally less extensive and perhaps more centralised, and it is proposed that disparate socio-economic or political factors, rather than a collapse of the subsistence economy, lie behind the demise of metalworking industries.