The early Neolithic of Northern Europe: new approaches to migration, movement and social connection

Two-day international conference with invited speakers as part of the research project Deep histories of migration: the Early Neolithic around the North Sea.

Open to the public.

Programme 

Thursday 11 May 

9.30am Deep histories of migration: introduction to the conference
Mathias Bjørnevad-Ahlqvist, Vicki Cummings, Daniela Hofmann, Rune Iversen
10am Transcultural encounters and maritime technologies along the coast of megalithic Europe (4500-2500 cal BC): the NEOSEA project
Bettina Schultz-Paulsson
10.30am Analytical approaches to deep histories of migration and mobilities in the Neolithic of Denmark, Britain and Ireland
Mathias Bjørnevad-Ahlqvist, Ziv Epstein
11am Coffee
11.30am Megalithism and monumental architecture in southwest France: contributions of recent research
Vincent Ard
12pm IVth mill. BC Neolithic monuments from Western France (megaliths, causeway camps, etc.); architectures and uses, specific trends and new perspectives at a wider scale
Luc Laporte
12.30pm Megalithic missionaries? Neolithic monuments and the Western seaways
Chris Scarre
1pm Lunch
2pm Pots, stones, bones and a grain: the recipe for a more nuanced view of Neolithisation along the Atlantic façade
Martin Hinz
2.30pm About holes and fragments: The use of tactical simulation to overcome the problems of data scarcity in the analysis of cultural transmission patterns
Alfredo Cortell-Nicolau
3pm New research on flint mines indicates shared cultural, economic and symbolic traits in the northern European Neolithic
Lasse Sørensen, Anne Teather
3.30pm Coffee
4pm The material culture of long-distance connections: the evidence from Neolithic Orkney
Hugo Anderson Whymark
4.30pm Monument in the twilight zone. The Neolithic burial of Stein (Dutch Limburg) and its European connections
Luc Amkreutz

Followed by: Speakers’ dinner

Friday 12 May 

9am A provisional model for the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in Britain
Alasdair Whittle
9.30am Migration, admixture and isolation. The archaeogenetics of ENL Britain
Tom Booth
10am Active artefacts and mutable identities
Julian Thomas
10.30am The Neolithic transition in Denmark: profound changes and local dynamics
Theis Jensen, Hannes Schroeder
11am Coffee
11.30am ‘Sligo is surprising’: Early Neolithic dates from the northwest of Ireland and the dilemma of the Magheraboy Causewayed Enclosure
Sam Moore
12pm Brú na Bóinne and the early Neolithic of the Boyne Valley, Ireland
Steve Davis
12.30pm Passage tomb people: mortuary and wider cultural practice in later 4th millennium BC Ireland
Jess Smyth
1pm Lunch
2pm Understanding the role of flint artefacts at Neolithic causewayed enclosures in Britain and Scandinavia
Peter Bye Jensen
2.30pm A comparison between the Neolithic monuments in the Sarup environs and the British Isles
Niels Andersen
3pm Coffee
3.30pm Early Neolithic of Southern Sweden, old questions and new data
Karl-Göran Sjögren
4pm The role of ritual in placemaking – dolmens in Southeast Norway give insights into social encounters in the Early Neolithic of Northern Europe
Almut Schülke
4.30pm Final discussion