Browse

This book provides the first modern synthesis of the archaeology of Skye and Western Isles: a region with some of the finest and best-preserved archaeological monuments in Europe. Our understanding of the region has been transformed in recent years through the results of new archaeological excavations, field surveys, and reassessments of earlier work from the nineteenth century onwards. From the ritual monuments of the Neolithic period, notably the great stone circles at Calanais in Lewis, to the spectacular Iron Age brochs and wheelhouses of the Iron Age, the exceptional preservation of key monuments offers insights into the broader currents of British and European prehistory. In later periods, the arrival of the Vikings in the Outer Hebrides is marked by a series of important archaeological discoveries casting new light on the nature and extent of cultural change. As well as covering the periods before the emergence of detailed written history, the book also addresses the archaeology of later periods, exploring the history of human settlement and society from earliest prehistory to the Clearances.

In the last 12,000 years, human societies have moved through phases of forager, agricultural, industrial and ‘post-industrial’ economies. Each of these has been affected by the natural world and in turn has changed the workings of the non-human or ‘natural’ components of this planet. For each of these phases the author discusses questions of population growth and distribution together with the technologies available to the human groups of the time. Overall there is no doubt about the central role of access to energy flows and storage in making possible the life ways of many diverse groups. In addition to these basic chronicles the author is at pains to include the question of how these economies and ecologies are represented in today's cultural frameworks. The theme of scale pervades the book. A distinction is made between processes which affect many parts of the world but are not coalescent (‘worldwide’) and those which penetrate the entire biophysical entity and to which the term ‘global’ can truly be applied. Despite the current levels of anxiety about human-environmental relationships this book concentrates on environmental history and not prophecy. There is though a parting shot to the effect that history is probably not a good guide to human futures.