Animals, people and places: the continuity of hunting and gathering practices across the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in Britain

Abstract

This article considers the long-debated and thorny issue of the transition from the Mesolithic to the Neolithic in Britain. The apparently polarised debate that has dominated this discussion is, we suggest, unhelpful, and rather than positing either total colonisation from abroad, or simple indigenous continuity, we propose a model where both incomers and autochthons had their part to play. To explore this further we trace continuities across the divide in practices of hunting and gathering, and place these alongside the demonstrable evidence for change.