LANDSCAPE RECONSTRUCTION FOR THE NEOLITHIC IN WESTERN IRELAND – POSSIBLE SCENARIOS

On Achill Island, Western Ireland archaeological survey has revealed evidence for human settlement throughout prehistory and pollen analysis of a small basin site (30 x 30m) provides pollen assemblages covering the same period from which landscape modification may be determined. As a background to this approach simulations of modelled landscape structures of the surrounding area have been carried out using the POLLSCAPE programs for a series of time slices. These include a time slice for the Early Neolithic (ca 5000 14C yr B.P.) prior to the first palynological indications of human activity is described, concentrating on possible woodland structures, a time slice covering significant landscape change in the later Neolithic around 4000 14C yr B.P., and a final example from later prehistory with a more open landscape. The site has a number of advantages for testing the approach: the pollen flora is relatively poor with only a few major tree taxa (Pinus, Quercus, Ulmus, Corylus) and Poaceae and Calluna dominating the NAP; at least 40% of the area reconstructed, 1x1 km, was known to be peat covered (Calluna – Poaceae) at the time; and pollen input by prevailing winds from the west may be assumed to be minimal due to the proximity to the Atlantic.

Landscape reconstructions were run based on a range of possible landscape/vegetation structures varying from large uniform blocks of woodland and peat arranged around the site, to homogeneous mixes of species, and also including smaller circular taxa blocks within a background landscape mosaic. The predicted frequencies for the main taxa for the different reconstructions are then compared to those derived empirically from the pollen core, demonstrating the likelihood of the varying models having existed in the past.

What the preliminary results presented here demonstrate is that POLLSCAPE offers an opportunity not just to try to reconstruct what the past was like but perhaps more importantly to refute hypothesised past landscape structures. There will always be a problem of equifinality, leading to a range of landscapes providing the same fossil result, but in collaboration with archaeologists, palaeoecologists can now test and if necessary, reject ideas of openness, scale of clearance and cultural mosaics, themes that have been the subject of intense debate for many decades.