Reviews

Understanding the Neolithic.
by Julian Thomas
London, Routledge, 1999
University of Lund, Sweden, 1997
266 pp. (including figures, bibliography, index)
ISBN 0-415-20767-3
(paper)

Reviewed by Liam Kilmurray

Understanding the Neolithic is a book that explores five main areas of archaeological evidence: economic (subsistence), monuments, deposition practices, mortuary analysis and pottery. Set in Southern Britain, chiefly the areas of Avebury, Stonehenge, and the Upper Thames Valley, the analysis concentrates on the Neolithic period (ca. 4000 - 2000 B.C.). Amongst a myriad of sites and a sometimes-exhaustive array of data (much to the author’s credit) these areas are investigated in what Thomas refers to as ‘parallel narratives’. This book also addresses the reasoning behind archaeological interpretations of these central practices, both those that have led to our present understanding of the Neolithic, and the author’s reevaluation of some of these issues. The five practices are woven ‘together’ in the final sections of the book that sets up the three regional analyses. Thomas argues that these five different aspects of culture change may have had a degree of autonomy, and that as they operated on different temporal and spatial scales they should perhaps not ‘gel’ together to fit one explanatory model. In all, this produces a lively and informative book that re-examines and reasserts the importance of some of the concepts that underpin our understandings of the Neolithic. This contributes to a clearer understanding, if not of the Neolithic then certainly about the Neolithic.

Thomas’ theoretical approach (Chapter 1) is declared as genealogical, described as an analysis that searches for points in time where human practices were subject to structural change. This approach has at its base the undermining of conventional assumptions regarding the past, and to that end Thomas is also critical of the meta-narrative of continuous progress. A genealogical approach is one in which totalities are disbanded and "all common senses dissolve" (p. 5). There is no set human nature; it is, as Neitzsche is enrolled to confirm, transient and historical. Thomas’ philosophy involves aspects of Heideggerian thought and Marxist views on the social relations of production. Thomas argues that the most important contribution Marx made was the notion that being in the world precedes consciousness of the world. This is a theme close to Thomas’ heart, and the subject of much of his more recent writings (1997, 1998). In the text at hand some of these views are re-worked briefly, and the extent to which they inform his interpretations varies throughout the text but is, perhaps, best seen in the propositions that people use materials to think with and that there is no a priori meaning in the world but rather meaning exists through language and materiality. Meaning is historical, and material culture, as active and signifying, plays a crucial role in the creation of identity.

Economy and Agriculture

This section (Chapter 2) begins with an overview of some of the earlier influential interpretations of the Neolithic in Southern Britain. Thomas is critical of previous classifications of the Neolithic, specifically the economic base seen to lie at the heart of the period. Previous economic approaches which saw agriculture as a defining attribute of the British Neolithic are seen to have "slipped into orthodoxy on very shaky foundations" (p. 30). Thomas aims to demonstrate how such interpretations have hindered a fuller understanding of the diversity of the Neolithic. Such orthodox views of the Neolithic, he argues, treated pottery, cereals, sedentism and domestication as elements of a Neolithic ‘package’. This leads to the expectation that where one element of this ‘package’ is found the others will be also be discovered, leading towards a view of the Neolithic as a ‘bounded totality’ (p. 11). One reason offered for the persistence of these explanations is that they are seen as resistant to theoretical developments, and it is this that Thomas challenges, aspiring towards finally loosening the hold of such interpretations.

One of the main casualties of processualist accounts of the Neolithic is the fact that variability in regional practices has not been fully recognized or addressed precisely because of this belief that agriculture is the essence of the Neolithic. Scarce evidence is drawn together into hybrid models that propose a universal Neolithic regime. Thomas stresses mobility and the continuing use of wild resources in the early Neolithic, arguing for the variability of economic practices, well documented by an examination of numerous sites.

Monuments

‘Reading Monuments’ (Chapter 3) discusses the changing perceptions of megaliths within British archaeology. The author briefly critiques Renfrew’s original proposal that the scale and complexity of monuments could be seen as an index of the society that created them. He is also critical of circular arguments, such as the territorial model. Continuing on from his critique of early Neolithic subsistence models Thomas argues against interpretations which propose a development of monumental construction after agricultural surplus had been amassed, or those that view them as arising from tensions over access to resources. Historically he sets the erection of megaliths at a ‘conjuncture’ in time (the duration of megalithic construction, however, spans some 1500-2000 years), qualitatively different than the succeeding Bronze Age with its permanent field systems. Starting from the point of view that monuments should be considered "less as objects in themselves than as transformations of space through objects" (p. 35) he argues against any form of explanation that posits universal explanations.

Thomas offers new and sometimes startling interpretations of monuments. This, in fact, is one of the strengths of the text. One of the criticisms of such an opus would, however, contend that, in the broad sweep that the book covers, and in the many monuments visited, there is little ‘dwelling time’. Types of monument go whizzing by, whole traditions of both buildings and their interpretations are dealt with in a matter of pages. The analysis does, however, offer new and exciting insights into familiar areas. An example of the broad vision of the text may be clearly seen in the observation that causewayed enclosures, as ‘open’ monuments, can be seen to lie at the entrance to whole regions. The placement, for example, of Windmill Hill is suggestive of a role in regulating the movement of people and things in and out of the region (p. 202). Unfortunately, despite the novelty of such an approach, it is not followed up in any great detail, and indeed it could not be in such a wide - ranging examination. The analysis of monuments is a strong component of the text, yet other than novel interpretations of some of the possibilities of monument spacing and placing, and indicating the questionable nature of previous approaches, or urging a more regionally specific reading of their space, it does not offer any new paradigm for their interpretation.

Depositional Practices

An area of Neolithic archaeology that has been very rarely addressed is that of depositions, either in the form of unstructured small caches or quite large formalized pits. Thomas raises the absence of such analysis and proceeds to examine the nature and significance of these numerous depositions in southern Britain (Chapter 4). Although little changed from the earlier version of this book, this section is nonetheless pivotal as accepted accounts of deposits, or ‘dirt’, are explored. Thomas attacks Schifferian behaviorism and seeks meaningful patterns of inclusion and exclusion from which to make allowable social statements about the cultural practices of these depositions. In this approach Thomas succeeds in painting an image of human action around these deposits that rises above the processualist versions that placed people in a subsidiary capacity, there to ‘do things’ to the material (p. 62). Although Thomas thus imputes agency into these practices, the agents themselves remain obscured by the practices. We are, however, forced to reconsider earlier explanations of such deposits and Thomas succeeds in presenting these deposits as emanating from within culturally and historically specific conceptual schemes in which contingent meanings are expressed.

Throughout this analysis of depositions (which forms a large part of the book) there is little discussion of who made these depositions, who was authorised to do so and who might have been prevented from doing so? Who would return to these deposits, and over what time - frame, what were the rules for making such depositions? Such questions come down to the composition of the society, or the structures through which agency operated. These questions are not tackled explicitly, and their resolution is highly problematical within the limits of Neolithic archaeology. Yet their absence tends towards a history of the Neolithic in which past lives are objectified in material things. The author recognises that this book can be accused of representing a history of practices (p. 228), claiming that we should not, indeed, separate material culture from society. He also acknowledges that "artefacts and resources always realised their potential in the context of power relations" and strategies to promote interests (p. 228). He recognises the materialist concentration, and within those confines produces an informative account of prehistoric material practices.

Pottery

The way Thomas addresses pottery (Chapter 5) is to search for meaningful relationships and patterning in both design and placement, searching for similarities and differences. Indeed the lack of differences in pottery style and manufacture is seen as a positive exclusion, given the number of possible forms that might have emerged (p. 98). Applying current approaches that emphasise the symbolic and social significance of material culture, pottery is seen as just one among many types, yet it is one that is central to Neolithic definitions and understandings. The complex relationship between Peterborough Ware and Grooved Ware is analysed and, while examining their spatial patterns and depositional preferences, Thomas promotes a vision of pottery as a "particularly appropriate window on Neolithic materiality" (p. 225). The text devotes ample space to understanding the social significance of, for example, the absence of any vessel type other than Grooved Ware at the West Kennett palisade enclosure and its relationship with wooden structures (p. 218), and the chronological implications of the sub-divisions of Peterborough Ware. This is an enlightening section of the text, in which the exhaustive compilation of ceramic data is used in imaginative ways, probing and dissecting spatial patterns and examining ramifications such as the impact of pottery on the rhythms of social life. Thomas concludes that, like all material things, pots only gain significance in context: they have no primary functional meaning with secondary symbolic meanings added (contra Hodder 1999, who allows now for the possibility of these two levels of meaning). Finally, the increasing diversity of pottery types and decoration throughout the Neolithic is interpreted as referencing an increasing signification of differences, not in the rank of individuals but rather in specific circumstances.

Mortuary Analysis

The section on mortuary analysis (Chapter 6) deals with the wide range of tomb-types and burial methods. What emerges from the data considered is, none too surprisingly, that there is no universal scheme but rather regional preferences that change through time. One of the strengths of this diachronic analysis is indeed the ability to describe changing patterns of mortuary practice. Thomas discusses the major trends in mortuary analysis within archaeological thinking over the past 20 years or so, illustrating the necessary caveats to an understanding of what it is that burials may signify. Although the spectre of ‘masking’ and the role of ideology in burial is raised, the burials are, as in most archaeological interpretations, taken at face value for what they could tell us about Neolithic society, and there is little further discussion of issues such as burial signifying an ideal order and not, in fact, a past reality.

In consideration of the fact that in the British Neolithic the dead are more visible than the living (p. 126), Thomas decries the paucity of productive debate that might lead to clearer procedures for mortuary analysis. Despite an "extensive battery of conceptual apparatus" for interpreting funerary evidence, these are, he continues to argue, "grounded in mutually antagonistic philosophies" (p. 126). Recognising the contribution of archaeologists such as Tainter, Saxe, Chapman, and, among others, Binford, towards revealing structures in the data concerning body treatment and grave goods, Thomas argues that these do not reveal an undistorted map of social relations. Mortuary analysis, he opines, is alone not sufficient for an interpretation of Neolithic society, a view shared by most post-positivist archaeologists.

As is other Neolithic accounts, burial is virtually confined to discussions of monumental contexts. Thomas looks at the early Neolithic circulation of body parts, providing data and statistics from a host of sites and publications. As megalithic tombs were earlier described as transformations of space, the circulation of body parts within them solidifies their designation as places of transformation. This practice declined over time and was gradually replaced by a single burial tradition. Thomas interprets this as signifying a change in social formations, from bounded and inclusive social entities to fluid and overlapping groupings. The relationship of people to the dead moved from one of ‘being alongside the dead’ to one of ‘descent from the dead‘ (p. 226). He concludes that social relations now extended vertically into the past as opposed to the earlier Neolithic when they extended horizontally into the present.

At this stage in the book we can clearly see the parallel stories that Thomas is recounting, and see areas where the data, as foretold, would not exactly ‘fit’ together, due mainly to the different temporal scales involved. However, we can also appreciate the changes apparent in each of the chosen practices as the analysis moves from early to late Neolithic. This is seen in the above burial changes, and in the analysis of pottery and depositions where major changes take place in different horizons, particularly towards the latter quarter of the 3^rd Millennium B.C. It is an interesting manner in which to address the Neolithic and, despite the concentration on distinct practices such as pottery or burial, Thomas is careful not to totally isolate these areas from other social contexts. It would have been timely here, I suggest, had Thomas returned to a point he acknowledged earlier in the text: the existence of single burial in the early Neolithic, which might have enlivened the discussion on the transformation to single burials in the later Neolithic.

Regional Sequences

The regional narratives towards the end of this book present an opportunity for assembling the large volume of data studied and, while not unifying the different strands of investigation, taking the patterns and conclusions from the data and re-examining them in regional contexts: the Stonehenge environs, the Avebury region and the Upper Thames Valley. The conclusions reached and questions raised are now drawn into these regions as Thomas analyses what the developments in tomb building, mortuary practice, pottery etc. can tell us about the social changes in each region. The analysis of these patterns reinforces the view of the extent to which the material repertoire was used differently both within and between regions. These regions differed in some respects; for example in the Upper Thames Valley monuments were ‘more repetitive’, drawing on a more limited assemblage of types. Monuments here also tended to be smaller, and there were different patterns of clearance and settlement type, characterised by discontinuous activity. The Avebury region, we are told, indicated a trend towards long distance exchange, witnessed in the procurement of lithics and other items from some distance, and in the ‘open’ qualities of henge constructions. This area exhibited different, more varied, depositional practices from other areas in southern Britain, and was also set apart from these regions by the uniqueness of monument styles. The monuments and material culture of Stonehenge created defined locations for different activities and authorities.

Criticisms

An area where there appears in the text a contradiction between accepting the historical situatedness of practices and employing modern concepts is seen in Thomas’ rejection of Bradley’s idea that Hambeldon Hill may have been the residence of elites (p. 40) on the grounds that the nearest concentrations of earlier Neolithic activity are ‘several miles’ away. This seems to contradict the strategy of maintaining the ‘aliens’ of Neolithic society. Given the observation then that even palate tastes may have been different (based on different bone ‘cuts’ than today, p. 27) in the Neolithic, it appears contradictorily ‘presentist’ to then suggest that two miles or so may have been too distant for an elite residence to exist. It may well have been considered too far, but the point is that there is an imposition of modern views of distance that must surely be questioned.

Further, Thomas addresses the heuristic device of the textual analogy (p. 36-38, c.f. 92-96), seeing the landscape and its artefacts as a text. I would question the efficacy of this textual analogy and agree with Barrett & Fewster’s recent remarks that the ‘concretising of material culture as written text’ suits analyses of society which see "an underlying structure as the key to human behaviour" (1999:10). More helpful, they suggest, would be to view material culture as a spoken discourse in which meaning is not as distanciated as it is in written text (1999:10). This is an important aspect of material culture interpretation as it enables archaeologists to impute subsequent actions and different methods of delivery such as innuendo and tone in the discourse of material culture.

Conclusion

Understanding the Neolithic concludes with what is perhaps its most potent chapter (10). Here Thomas reiterates his genealogical approach to prehistory and drives home one of his main contentions: that such an approach is opposed to totalising accounts of the Neolithic in particular and history in general. Such totalising seeks to "impose a premature finality" (p. 221) (implying that there may be a finality at some point in time?). Contrary to the homogenising totalities, this is a Neolithic in which various societies are seen to have been internally differentiated and heterogeneous, where "differentially situated persons exercised power and access to cultural resources in different ways" (p. 163). The Neolithic made new ways of being human possible, in which the principles of exchange, ‘performed transaction’, and circulation were of cardinal importance. The late Neolithic is characterised by multiple social contexts and different sources of identity, different ‘flows of substance’. Thomas argues that through artefacts, animal and human bones, pits and mortuary constructions, people gained their sense of (Neolithic?) humanity.

This account began by addressing the economic classifications of the British Neolithic, raising doubts as to the validity of such constructions and suggesting that the Neolithic is best conceived of as a change in social relations. The Neolithic of central Europe and the Linearbandkeramic were primarily economic phenomena, but by the time the Neolithic ‘reached’ Britain it existed largely in the realm of ideas. Understanding the Neolithic concludes with the ‘realisation’ that there was "no single pattern of economic change through the British Neolithic, but more a general trend towards diversification" (p. 223).

Overall my opinion of this book is that it is good value for money and time. Though perhaps in content not vastly different from the 1991 edition, there are noteworthy differences that make the book highly topical and render it very readable in today’s archaeological climate. It may well be better aimed at a post-graduate audience rather than undergraduates due to the fact that, despite the inclusive examination of the Neolithic, a fair deal of familiarity with the history of archaeological interpretation of the Neolithic and of the various sites mentioned is required. Finally, it is encouraging to read Thomas’ admittance that despite our ever - increasing armoury of theoretical constructs, we recognise that we cannot get at the ‘real’ past, and at some point we must simply write a story, which is, in effect, what Thomas has done.

Works Cited

Barrett, J. & Fewster, K. 1999 Intimacy and Structural Transformation: Giddens and Archaelogy. Sheffield: Departmental Paper. Back to Text

Hodder, I. 1999 The Archaeological Process Oxford: Blackwell. Back to Text

Thomas, J. 1997 Materiality of the Mesolithic-Neolithic. Analecta Praehistoria Leidensia 29: 57 - 64. Back to Text

Thomas, J. 1998 ‘Some Problems with the Notion of External Symbolic Storage, and the Case of Neolithic Material Culture in Britain’. In Renfrew, C. & Scarre, C. (eds.) Cognition and Material Culture: the Archaeology of Symbolic Storage. Cambridge: McDonald Institute Monographs pp.149 - 156. Back to Text

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Liam Kilmurray, Department of Archaeology, Sheffield