Local communities in the Big World of prehistoric Northwest Europe

This volume of Analecta Praehistorica Leidensia focuses on how local communities in prehistory define themselves in relation to a bigger social world.

Communities from the deep past managed to make a living in landscapes we tend to perceive as inconvenient, build complex and elaborate monuments with relatively simple tools, and by shaping their landscape carved out a place for themselves in a much bigger social world. The contributions in this volume underscore how small worlds can be big at the same time.

Includes contribution by leading scholars such as John C. Barrett, Richard Bradley, Anthony Harding, Kristian Kristiansen, David Fontijn and Johannes Müller.

Contents:

Preface

Social memories and site biographies: construction and perception in non-literate societies

Johannes Müller

The Dutch abroad? Interpreting the distribution of the 'beaker' culture

John C. Barrett

Early Bronze Age boat graves in the British Isles

Richard Bradley

The nature of a Bronze Age World

Anthony Harding

A triangular Middle Bronze Age trade system of amber, copper and tin 1500-1300 BC

Kristian Kristiansen, Johan Ling

Wetland knowledges: resource specialization and denial

Christopher Evans

Maintaining fertility of Bronze Age arable land in the northwest Netherlands

Corrie Bakels

Bronze Age ancestral communities - new research of Middle Bronze Age burials in the barrow landscapes of Apeldoorn-Wieselseweg

David Fontijn, Arjan Louwen, Quentin Bourgeois, Liesbeth Smits, Cristian van der Linde

And the river meanders on... The intertwined habitation and vegetation history of the river area Maaskant and adjacent sand area of Oss (Netherlands) in Late Prehistory till Early Roman Period

Richard Jansen, Corrie Bakels

Metal surprises from an Iron Age cemetery in Nijmegen-Noord

Peter W. van den Broeke, Emile Eimermann