@maninayton - The 10,500-Year-Old 'Hat'
Star Carr - A Mesolithic Site
Star Carr** is an archaeological site near my home town of Scarborough that ranks alongside Stonehenge or the Viking remains at York as one of the most important in the UK. It is remarkable for rare finds of preserved Mesolithic organic material such as bone, wood and antler. These account for 93% of all such material found in the UK. Also at this site, the earliest evidence for carpentry in Europe was discovered in 1985 and later excavations uncovered remains of Britains earliest house.
The site lies in the Vale of Pickering which 10,500 years ago was a flat wetland area with post-glacial lakes and marshes. At that time the site would have been on a lake shore. The waterlogged and peaty location is the reason for the well-preserved finds.
Looking across the Vale of Pickering - once a wetland and now a mainly agricultural area.
The 10,500-Year-Old 'Hat'
One of the more unusual finds has been the 21 skull caps or headdresses. By far the largest find of its type in Europe. This 'caps' have piercings and are clearly intended to be worn on the head. A number of interpretations regarding their use have been made including being worn by shamans or during stag hunts.
One of the 21 Red Deer skull caps.
By Jonathan Cardy (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Antler and bone worked into tools have also been found. These barbed points were probably used as spear points for hunting game or fish.
By Jonathan Cardy (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Sites like this give us a fascinating glimpse of what life was like for people living in our area thousands of years ago and the way the landscape has changed over time.
There will be years of work remaining on what has been found so far and no doubt further excavations will be done in the future.
Information for this post was obtained from the website starcarr.com
** The word Carr means a fen woodland or scrub typically dominated by alder or willow and has its origin in the old Norse word Kjarr {brushwood}. Source
I hope you have enjoyed this post and would consider following me (I will reciprocate). Some of my posts are about mental health issues while others cover a wide range of subjects. For a taster of my musings please follow these links:-
The Harrogate Spring Flower Show - Part 1 of 2
The Harrogate Spring Flower Show - Part 2 of 2
My descent into depression - Part 1 of 2
Descent into depression - Part 2 of 2
Until next time - take care of yourselves....