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The Beaker Folk |
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Migrant or pilgrim?
The Amesbury Archer's arrow heads were in perfect condition
© Wessex Archaeology |
Archaeologists cannot, as yet, date the past precisely enough to know whether the stone circles at Stonehenge had been built when the Amesbury Archer arrived. This has thrown up many questions which remain unanswered. Was he involved in organising the building as someone who was revered, and maybe feared, because of his exotic skills? Or he was he drawn from afar to the place by the great temples that already stood there? Or was the place only important because of what it lay between? Astride continental Europe, and the gold and copper to be found in Ireland and the west, could the Amesbury Archer have been a trader?
As there are so few DNA or related studies on skeletons of this time, archaeologists cannot say just how unusual it was for people to have travelled such a distance, which amounts to over thousands of kilometres. Studies in modern Bavaria show that people often moved between settlements which were around 25 kilometres apart; could the Amesbury Archer just be an extreme example?
One man is not enough to prove the old idea of a Beaker folk and their migration. However, we also have to consider exactly what we mean by migration and immigration, and whether we should apply today's standards to peoples who existed over 4,500 years ago. Regardless of what the Amesbury Archer can prove in relation to a wider community, what he does show is the importance of Stonehege to both pre-historic Britons and pre-historic migrants.
Words: Dr Andrew P Fitzpatrick
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