Grave Goods: Objects and Death in Later Prehistoric Britain

Anwen Cooper · Duncan Garrow · Catriona Gibson · Melanie Giles · Neil Wilkin

Dec 2021 · Oxbow Books

About this ebook

Britain is internationally renowned for the high quality and exquisite crafting of its later prehistoric grave goods (c. 4000 BC to AD 43). Many of prehistoric Britain's most impressive artefacts have come from graves. Interred with both inhumations and cremations, they provide some of the most durable and well-preserved insights into personal identity and the prehistoric life-course, yet they also speak of the care shown to the dead by the living, and of people’s relationships with 'things'. Objects matter.

This book's title is an intentional play on words. These are objects in burials; but they are also goods, material culture, that must be taken seriously. Within it, we outline the results of the first long-term, large-scale investigation into grave goods during this period, which enables a new level of understanding of mortuary practice and material culture throughout this major period of technological innovation and social transformation. Analysis is structured at a series of different scales, ranging from macro-scale patterning across Britain, to regional explorations of continuity and change, to site-specific histories of practice, to micro-scale analysis of specific graves and the individual objects (and people) within them. We bring these different scales of analysis together in the first ever book focusing specifically on objects and death in later prehistoric Britain.

Focusing on six key case study regions, the book innovatively synthesises antiquarian reports, research projects and developer funded excavations. At the same time, it also engages with, and develops, a number of recent theoretical trends within archaeology, including personhood, object biography and materiality, ensuring that it will be of relevance right across the discipline. Its subject matter will also resonate with those working in anthropology, sociology, museology and other areas where death, burial and the role of material culture in people’s lives are key contemporary issues.

About the author

Duncan Garrow is a lecturer in the Department of Archaeology at the University of Reading. He specializes in European prehistory (with a particular focus on Britain) and archaeological theory.

Catriona Gibson has worked extensively in both commercial and academic archaeology. Her research interests include exploring evidence for connectivity and mobility during later prehistory, the Beaker/EBA periods in western Europe, and forging stronger bridges between developer-led and academic archaeology.

Neil Wilkin is curator of Early Europe (Neolithic and Bronze Age collections) at the British Museum. His research focuses on grave goods, hoards, and the relationships between different strands of archaeological knowledge.