Early Neolithic Dates on Human Bone from Fox Hole Cave, Derbyshire

A.T. Chamberlain. Department of Archaeology and Prehistory, University of Sheffield, Northgate House, West Street, Sheffield, S1 4ET, U.K. email: a.chamberlain@shef.ac.uk

Introduction
This preliminary note summarises the results of radiocarbon determinations on human bones from Fox Hole Cave in Derbyshire. The dating was undertaken as part of a wider project on the use of caves as prehistoric burial sites in Britain (Chamberlain, 1996; Chamberlain and Williams, 1999). The results are discussed in the light of a recent review of dating evidence for the Early Neolithic in Britain. An earlier version of this contribution has appeared in Past, The Newsletter of the Prehistoric Society (Chamberlain, 2001).

Background to the Dating Project
The entrance to Fox Hole Cave is situated at an altitude of 400 m on High Wheeldon Hill in Derbyshire (NGR SK 0997 6618).

Fig 1. View across to Fox Hole Cave, at the top of the hill (M. Edmonds)

The cave was discovered and partly explored in 1928 (Jackson & Piggott, 1951), and more extensive investigations were carried out during controlled excavations by the Peakland Archaeological Society between 1961 and 1981 (Bramwell, 1962-1981; Bramwell, 1971). The Peakland Archaeological Society excavations concentrated on archaeological deposits in the floor of the Entrance Chamber, the Main Passage and the First Chamber, where a sequence of deposits up to 2 metres deep was recorded. Apart from two human jaw fragments found in disturbed surface deposits in the Entrance Chamber, the human remains were confined to Layer C1, a clay deposit that also contained remains of wild and domestic fauna, charcoal, a Group VI polished stone axe, worked animal bone and teeth, and fragments of Peterborough ware pottery with limestone and chert temper. This layer was sealed by Layer B, described as a cobbled occupation floor containing sherds of Beaker pottery, occasional sherds of Peterborough and Grooved Wear pottery and some bone and flint artefacts of Neolithic and Bronze Age type.

Fig 2. Composite section of Foxhole Cave, illustration by J. Williams and A. Chamberlain, after Bramwell (1971)

Samples and Results

The human bones were selected in order to provide controlled dates for the deposition of layer C1 in the main passage of Fox Hole Cave. Specimen 1 is a fragment of the distal part of the shaft of a right humerus, probably of an adult individual. It is recorded on p. 54 of Bramwell’s Notebook 4 as having been recovered on 7/7/1962 from section VII of the Main Passage excavation at a level 1 to10 inches above the Neolithic polished stone axe. Specimen 2 is a distal fragment of an adult right tibia. It is recorded on p. 40 of Bramwell’s Notebook 4, and was excavated in June 1962 from section VII and is associated with the location of the stone axe. Both the notebooks and the bones are curated by Buxton Museum.

The new radiocarbon determinations are summarised in the table below

The dates, which are statistically indistinguishable from each other, indicate that the human bone in layer C1 dates to the early Neolithic, between 4500 and 3800 BC. The dates are surprisingly early, and they confirm that these are the oldest dated human bones to have been recovered from a Derbyshire cave. The material is very similar in date to another early Neolithic mortuary site in Derbyshire, the Whitwell Quarry Long Cairn, which has provided radiocarbon dates on human bone of between 5115 and 5380 BP, calibrated to between 4500 and 3700 BC (Hedges et al., 1994).

The Prehistoric pottery recovered from Fox Hole Cave (Peterborough ware, Beaker pottery and a single sherd of possible Grooved ware) is of Middle or Later Neolithic and Early Bronze Age character and there were no finds of undecorated pottery characteristic of the Early Neolithic. The pottery in Fox Hole Cave may therefore represent a later phase of usage of the cave than the initial deposition of human skeletal remains. The human bones from layer C1 are described as being ‘usually broken’ (Bramwell, 1971: 8) and it is therefore possible that the human bones derive from a primary Early Neolithic mortuary deposit which was subjected to deliberate or accidental disturbance, with the resulting bone fragments being re-deposited during Late Neolithic activity inside the cave.

Discussion
The dates from Fox Hole Cave are consistent with the pattern established from other cave sites in Britain which shows that natural caves and fissures were used as sites for the deposition of human remains from the Early Neolithic (Chamberlain, 1996). There is little evidence that caves were used for this purpose in the late Mesolithic in Britain, but the large number of cave sites with human bone dating to the Early and Middle Neolithic, points to cave burial being an innovative funerary practice at this time.

In a recent review of radiometric dating results for the Early Neolithic in Britain, Schulting (2000) conjectured that the Mesolithic/Neolithic transition might have been compressed into a narrow time interval around 5200-5100 BP (c. 4000 cal. BC). The bulk of the evidence considered by Schulting came from mortuary and settlement sites in southern England, but he noted that the human bones excavated from a secure context at Whitwell long cairn in Derbyshire provided some of the earliest evidence for the Neolithic in Britain. Further dating of the Whitwell human bone assemblage is in progress, but the initial dates from Whitwell (Hedges et al., 1994), taken together with the dates from Fox Hole Cave, suggest a Neolithic presence in the South Pennine region shortly before the start of the 4th millennium BC.

Acknowledgements
The radiocarbon dating was funded by The Natural Environment Research Council and was carried out at the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit. The cooperation and assistance of Ros Westwood of Buxton Museum is much appreciated, as are useful comments from James Williams. Thanks also to Mark Edmonds for the image used in Figure 1.

References
Bramwell, D. 1962-1981. Peakland Archaeological Society Newsletter issues 17-30 & 32.

Bramwell, D. 1971. Excavations at Fox Hole Cave, High Wheeldon, 1961-1970. Derbyshire Archaeological Journal 91: 1-19.

Chamberlain, A.T. 1996. More dating evidence for human remains in British caves. Antiquity 70: 950-953.

Chamberlain, A.T. 2001. Fox Hole Cave, Derbyshire, and the earliest Neolithic in Britain. PAST 38: 7-9.

Chamberlain, A.T. & Williams, J.P. 1999 A Gazetteer of English Caves, Fissures and Rock Shelters Containing Human Remains. Capra 1 available at - http://capra.group.shef.ac.uk/1/caves.html

Hedges, R.E.M. et al. 1989. Radiocarbon dates from the Oxford AMS system: Archaeometry datelist 9. Archaeometry 31: 207-234.

Hedges, R.E.M. et al. 1994. Radiocarbon dates from the Oxford AMS system: Archaeometry datelist 18. Archaeometry 36: 337-374.

Jackson, J.W. & Piggott, S. 1951. Peterborough (Neolithic B) pottery from High Wheeldon Cave, Earl Sterndale. Derbyshire Archaeological Journal 24: 72-77.

Schulting, R.J. 2000. New AMS dates from the Lambourn long barrow and the question of the earliest Neolithic in Southern England: repacking the Neolithic package? Oxford Journal of Archaeology 19: 25-35.