Antiquity 74 (286)

Aerial survey and photography in 1999 revealed a second bank at the Neolithic chambered cairn site.

Models attributing the origins of the British Neolithic to developing Mesolithic complexity are said to founder on the paucity of evidence for activity during the fifth millennium cal BC. The Scottish transition is examined and it is argued that the onset of the Neolithic was primarily a cognitive and cultural event rather than an economic transformation. It is suggested that knowledge of the existence of complex Neolithic societies in northern Europe may have inhibited Late Mesolithic self-confidence, resulting in suppression of identity, thus creating the impression of hiatus that precedes Neolithicization.

Considers the apparent conflict inherent in Gimbutas' early environment (notably the Lithuanian-Polish conflict of the 1920s and 1930s and the Soviet Union invasion of her native Lithuania in 1940) and her conception of a peaceful `Goddess-orientated Old Europe'.

Article commissioned by Antiquity, inviting Professor Wainwright to review the changes and developments in professional archaeology in England over the past forty years. The period has seen archaeology move from a predominantly amateur pursuit to a fully professional activity. The author is seen as peculiarly well-placed to explain how and why many of the changes that underlie archaeology today have come about.