Coarse ‘dwelling-place’ pottery is usually of little interest in the study of Neolithic cultures, for which reason it rarely receives the same attention as forms of ware that is of better workmanship, technically and artistically. Still, within the category ‘coarse pottery’ there may be details of no little significance to comparative archaeology. As an example, I propose in the following to discuss briefly a single type of vessel within European Corded-Ware or Battle-Axe cultures, starting out from some finds in Denmark where the type has not previously attracted attention.

A few years ago an examination was made of a Stone Age settlement at Selbjerg, on the islet of Øland in the Limfiord, Northern Jutland; traces were observed of several Neolithic settlements in conjunction with a regular culture deposit and shell mound. One important discovery was pottery of the South Scandinavian Pitted-Ware Culture. Higher up in the deposit were fragments of pottery which were determinable as of Late Single Grave Culture. At least eight vessels were represented, including a beaker of flower-pot type and one or two large, coarse vessels. It has been possible to reconstruct the form of the best preserved specimen (fig. 1). It had measured about 35 cm. in height and presumably had a flat base (some bottom sherds may perhaps be parts of this vessel, but they have been omitted from the drawing). As the sole form of decoration it has an applied clay moulding just below the rim. Both rim and moulding are formed into waves by finger pressure.

In better condition is a vessel (pl. III, a) recently excavated at Ravnholt, in the parish of Gesten, South Jutland. The upper part could be pieced together completely and the bottom was in such a state of preservation that it could be reconstructed; only a few sherds of the intermediate wall could not be fitted in. In all probability the vessel was about 40 cm. in height with a diameter of 35 cm. across the rim. It is relatively thin walled, the material is coarse and gravelly; both inside and out the surface presents a curious striation, as if the wet clay prior to kilning had been smoothed off with a whisk of straw or something else that was rough. On its outer side the edge of the rim is drawn out into small waves (pl. III, c), and about 2 cm. below it is a wavy moulding formed by finger pressure from one side. Otherwise the vessel is quite plain.

During the excavation of Rego da Murta Dolmen I, a structure belonging to a megalithic cluster in central Portugal, a number of small sub-quadrangular quartzite stones were found embedded within a layer below that of the deepest orthostat. In this paper, we report on these findings and highlight three key features of these small stones, namely their location relative to the dolmen’s plan, the distances between them, and their orientations. We suggest the quartzite stones could have been markers used in the planning of this megalithic structure. In addition, we analyse the orientations of the two main structures of the cluster (Dolmen I & Dolmen II), which are reflected by the orientation of the quartzite stones. We tentatively suggest potential landscape and skyscape alignments for their orientations, including three hypotheses for the observed differences in orientation between the two.

The Inland Niger Delta in Mali is scattered with thousands of tell-like dwelling mounds that testify to the rich archaeological heritage of this attractive occupation area. The results of archaeological research suggest an occupation history of more than two millennia in which large urban settlements such as Djenné-Djeno and Dia play a central role. Regional surveys have revealed primary information on the vast rural hinterland of these extensive cities, but little is known about the structure and evolution of this considerable settlement system. The aim of the re-examination of 128 sites in the southern part of the Niger alluvial plain was to obtain an understanding of intersite relations based on sites' chronological, functional, socio-economic, and hierarchical differentiation and their participation in different trade networks. For the research it was crucial to find a method to date the last occupation period of the sites using surface remains. The results of the study emphasise the former occupants' preference for the most elevated landscape units close to fertile pastures, good cultivation grounds, and extensive fishing potential for their settlement sites. The occupants' ability to distribute and exchange agricultural surplus for luxury goods – imported via regional, inter-regional and trans-Saharan trade networks – is impressive, showing that they were able to compete with occupants of the large urban centres. Although the rural sites were much smaller than Djenné-Djeno and Dia, they were well connected. The rural hinterland apparently played an important role in most of the great West African empires. Population densities of the Inland Niger Delta were high for a long time, until the trade routes changed in the 15th century AD and the region became socio-politically unstable. This led to the abandonment of settlements, first around the urban settlements, and later also in the rural hinterland. The present-day occupation of the region is only a poor reflection of its impressive past.

Before studying the significance of the series of implements generally known as ‘discoidal polished flint knives,’ I should like first to acknowledge printed sources of informatıon, and secondly, assistance rendered by correspondents and curators of various collections. Many years ago Sir John Evans recognised the type and described and figured several examples in his ‘Ancient Stone Implements of Great Britain,’ and later, in Volume XLIV., pages 97–100 of the Wiltshire Archæological Magazine, Dr. R. C. C. Clay collected some sixty odd records, which he classified according to their shape. The excuse for this paper is that it is an attempt to extract from as wide data as possible the significance of the forms and distribution of the type as a whole. In accumulating the necessary evidence I have received especial help from Mr. Burkitt, who has enabled me to handle the fine series in the Museum at Cambridge; from Mr. Leeds, who gave me access to the specimens of the Evans Collection now in the Ashmolean; from the Curators of London, Norwich and Ipswich Museums, who sent me interesting records; from Mr. Graham Callander, who not only checked my list for Scotland, but who also contributed new records and helpful suggestions. In addition, several private collectors have kindly let me have records of their specimens, and, in many cases, illustrations.

On the 3rd of October, 1909, I found on a stone heap in Messrs. Bolton and Laughlin's brickfield near Ipswich a large flint implement fashioned from a cylindrical nodule and flaked to a cutting edge at one end. This implement, which is obviously very massive, weight 8¾lbs., is deeply patinated on its worked surfaces a yellowish-brown colour, and has a very hard ferruginous deposit attached to portions of its crust.

Following on this discovery I commenced, searching for others, and eventually found them lying on the London Clay under a seam of decalcified crag, and associated with many bones and phosphatic nodules such as are met with at other ordinary bases of the Red Crag. This decalcified crag occurs in two basin-shaped hollows, one 56 yards wide and the other 45 yards, in the London Clay. The general arrangement of the beds (Plate I.) in the hollows is as follows:—

1. Top sand and gravel, in places up to 9 feet in thickness.

2. Middle Glacial Sands, with sarsen stones, maximum thickness 12 feet to 15 feet.

3. Decalcified crag, with casts of shells up to 3 feet. This is very hard in the eastern hollow, and rests upon an uneven floor of London Clay, containing pockets filled with pebbles, and boulders of flint and micaceous sandstone.

In discussing the points of contact between Neolithic Britain and the Continent, it is desirable from many points of view to begin at the beginning, and to conclude with the introduction of metal. I prefer this to the method adopted in our leading text-book, even though it brings us at once into an area of conflict, where nothing should be taken for granted, and general agreement is not yet in sight. In Scandinavia there seems to be a definite terminus a quo, though even there some elements of doubt can be detected. It is generally assumed that human life began in the peninsula soon after the last or Baltic glaciation came to an end; and the first question is whether the same holds good for Britain, and if so, to what extent, for an ice-free area in the south of England is recognised by most authorities even during the severe glaciation that accounted for boulder-clay at Finchley, only three miles north of the Thames.

As will be seen later, intercourse with Scandinavia was lively during two phases of the Megalithic period, but there is nothing to shew that the Neolithic civilisations east and west of the North Sea had a common origin or began at the same date.

Highly as I feel the honour of having been asked to occupy this Presidential chair, I accepted that honour with some diffidence, for I recognise that my studies in Pre-history.have not been carried very far. As, however, these studies have convinced me that the application of geology to prehistoric problems is even yet fraught with many difficulties, it appears to me desirable in this address to call special attention to some of these difficulties.

Having devoted nearly half a century to geological researches of various kinds, I can state with confidence that those geological problems with which we are concerned are among the most difficult with which the geologist is confronted, and their investigation cannot be lightly undertaken.

At present, what we above all require is the collection of facts, and I therefore hailed with pleasure the foundation of this Society, and congratulate its members upon the amount of valuable work which they have already performed. Among these members the name of Dr. Allen Sturge stands out pre-eminent. He may be regarded as the Father of the Society, and all members must deeply deplore the loss which the Society has sustained by his death.

Newly discovered and previously documented Late Neolithic chalk plaques from the Stonehenge locality have been subjected to new, non-invasive techniques which allow access to previously unseen elements of archaeological evidence. The application of these methods – involving Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI) and Polynomial Texture Mapping (PTM) – has revealed detail of the surface preparation and allowed methods and sequence of the compositions to be unpicked, clarifying their complexities. The results reveal a range of approaches to the compositions, some of which demonstrate planning, order, and intention while others include less systematic, rapidly executed sketches. Investigations of lines and surfaces have been made, supplemented by preliminary studies of replicated test pieces, to examine potential implements used in their creation and remark on plaque biographies and surface attrition following manufacture. Furthermore, detail revealed by RTI provides indications of the orientations in which some of the plaques should be viewed and – in one instance – suggests a ‘reflected’ element that may not be entirely abstract. Results from improved radiocarbon determinations place the plaques in the early part of the 3rd millennium bc which, together with identification of individual motifs, allows the plaques and the designs to be reconsidered within the corpus of Neolithic art in the British Isles.

The problem of the transition period between Palæolithic and Neolithic times has long fascinated prehistorians. Much work has been done and a good deal more is known of this elusive era than was the case formerly, though still many things remain obscure. It is proposed here to try and sketch out what has been discovered with special reference to some of the early cultures of Northern Europe and then tentatively to apply this knowledge to our own country. The problem of the surface finds in East Anglia are very intricate and although it is not the province of this paper to concentrate on them, it is hoped that a little light may be thrown on the subject by this study and that some perhaps helpful suggestion may be made.

As is well known, the difficulty that the early prehistorians had to face was the apparent catastrophic change in everything which took place at the end of Palæolithic times. Suddenly the Palæolithic industries, art and fauna cease, and their place is taken —as it then seemed—by the comparatively monotonous Neolithic industries of the so-called Western Circle with domestic animals, pottery, polished stone axes and a more or less modern fauna, showing that the climatic conditions, far from being arctic, had become reasonably genial.

The Brú na Bóinne World Heritage Site, Ireland is best known for its megalithic monuments, in particular the great developed passage tombs of Knowth, Dowth, and Newgrange, and its abundance of megalithic art. However, our understanding of the wider Brú na Bóinne landscape has changed beyond all recognition in the last decade owing to the application of modern, non-invasive survey technologies – in particular LiDAR and large-scale geophysical survey – and most recently as a result of the hot, dry summer of 2018 which revealed a series of remarkable cropmarks between Newgrange and the River Boyne. Despite a lack of excavation it can be argued, based on their morphological characteristics, that many of the structures revealed belong within the corpus of late Neolithic ritual/ceremonial structures, including earthen henges, square-in-circle monuments, palisaded enclosures, and pit/post-alignments. These display both extraordinary diversity, yet also commonality of design and architecture, both as a group and with the passage tombs that preceded them. This paper provides an up-to-date survey of the late Neolithic and presumed late Neolithic landscape of Brú na Bóinne. It provides new evidence and new insights from ongoing survey campaigns, suggesting parallels within the British Neolithic but also insular development within some monument classes.

A segment of earlier Bronze Age arable landscape incorporating isolated round barrows on the high chalk spur of Hog Cliff Hill became the chosen location for a later Bronze Age earthwork of considerable dimensions. The area excavated within the bank and ditch was densely occupied by two major phases of buildings of timber construction, lasting into the earliest Iron Age. Sometime during the early Iron Age the oval enclosure was replaced by a more substantial one which partly followed its line and contained a series of unusual structures comprising dry-stone flint banks or wall-footings. The site was subsequently abandoned, the land probably being returned to agricultural use, until the Roman period when the agger of the Roman road from Dorchester to Ilchester was constructed across the earthwork.

I am exhibiting a number of flakes and implements, which appear to be of Le Moustier date, from Acton on the Taplow Terrace, and West Drayton and Iver on the Boyn Hill Terrace.

The Acton specimens are from the immediate vicinity of the working floor discovered by the late Mr. Allen Brown some forty years ago. During recent excavations in Creffield Road, I picked out of the brick-earth, thrown up from a depth of 4 to 6½ feet, seventy humanly struck flints. Forty-six are unpatinated, fresh-looking and unabraded, twenty have a bluey-white patination, amongst which are several with slightly dulled edges, and four are light-ochreous. The freshness of the cortex on several of the unpatinated flints suggests that some of the raw material was derived directly from the chalk. The majority are simple flakes and spalls. The remainder consists of eighteen small Levallois flakes, varying in size from 2 by 1½ to 3½ by 2¼ inches, one small tortoise core, a small flattish core with flaking on one face at right angles to that on the other, a flint pebble which has been used as a hammerstone, one small point and two exceptional pieces. One of these is a fairly typical graver (bee de flûte) with bluey-white patination (Fig. 1); the other may be described as a busked graver, it is made from a thickish external flake and is unpatinated (Fig. 2). A few of the flakes shew slight signs of use.

The type of flint implement which we are investigating here was first distinguished by the late Sir John Evans in his Ancient Stone Implements of Great Britain as long ago as 1872. Out of a total of 52 specimens noted in this paper, 12 were mentioned by Evans in his 2nd edition, 12 have been published elsewhere, and 28 are here recorded for the first time. Outlines of 50 and a photograph of another are given in Figs. 1-3,7 and 8.

They consist of long narrow blades carefully flaked over both faces, which are of roughly equal convexity, to produce two cutting edges. In plan the tip and the butt are usually defined by the more tapering character of the former, while the general outline is asymmetric. The type as thus defined is quite distinct from any other, though it differs only by its asymmetry from certain leaf-shaped blades flaked over both faces. There is, however, a further characteristic, namely a varying extent and degree of concavity of one cutting edge, which further defines our type and marks it off still more from other flint forms. We mention in this paper two examples showing asymmetry of form (Nos. 28 and 29), but lacking any degree of concavity in either cutting-edge, as they may be related to the true sickle form.

The authors of these notes acknowledge the ready collaboration of the numerous excavators who have contributed information or notes concerning work carried out during the present year.

Ancient DNA studies have identified western Scotland as the only known region in Britain where inter-breeding occurred between early 4th millennium bc Neolithic migrants and the indigenous Mesolithic population. By drawing on excavations at Mesolithic and Neolithic sites on the Isle of Islay, I identify a period of population overlap and suggest three scenarios for Mesolithic–Neolithic interaction: swift succession, dual population, and biocultural merger. These scenarios are evaluated against the archaeological evidence from Islay and elsewhere in western Scotland, and with reference to patterns of Mesolithic–Neolithic interaction in continental Europe. A cautious preference is expressed for biocultural merger, occurring between the mid-4th and mid-3rd millennia bc, a period that could be termed the ‘Neomesolithic’.

It is admitted by all workers in prehistory that the human implements which are found upon the surface do not all belong to the Neolithic period, although, until recently, they have always been called Neolithic. It therefore seems better to define them clearly as a Surface Series, without prejudice to their date.

Beyond this point of general agreement, differences of opinion are strongly marked. Some workers would boldly place the majority of the Surface Series in the Later Palæolithic period, or “Cave Age,” while others are unable to accept this view.

It must be admitted that we have very little knowledge of remains belonging to a strictly-defined Neolithic period. We know that “Neolithic” implements continued to be extensively used during the Early Bronze Age, and even in later times.

The data for this paper were obtained in the course of a journey round Scandinavia made during the summer of 1947 with the aid of a Leverhulme Research Grant. Most of the evidence is housed in the Tromsö Museum, the Statens Historiska Museum, Stockholm, and the National Museum at Helsingfors, and I am thankful to the authorities of these for ready access to their great collections and for help in many ways. A certain amount of the material from the northern provinces of Norway is contained in the Universitetets Oldsaksamling at Oslo and, since at the time of my visit the stone age collection was still in store from the war, I was not able to examine it in detail and have relied upon the works of Nicolaissen and Gjessing, supplemented by information obtained by correspondence. In the case of the material housed in the small but important collections at Umeå and Skellefteå, which I was unable to visit, I have relied upon articles by Dr Gustaf Hallström, whose knowledge of Norrland antiquities is unrivalled. While it is certain that a number of finds have escaped me, the evidence summarised in the Appendix can at least be taken as a minimum statement of what has already been discovered in territories, which owing to their remoteness, vast size—Norrland contains approximately four-sevenths of the whole of Sweden—and scanty population are still, so far as the Swedish and Finnish regions are concerned, comparatively unexplored archaeologically, when judged by the standards prevailing in other parts of Scandinavia.