All change around 2500/2400 BC? End of the ‘Scottish Neolithic’ and the future of Neolithic studies

All change around 2500/2400 BC? The end of the ‘Scottish Neolithic’ and the future of Scottish Neolithic studies
The ‘boom’ period in Late Neolithic Orkney seems to have come to a fairly dramatic end, although the timing and tempo of this collapse continue to be debated.
From the 25th century BC, signs of new people, new objects and new practices appeared in parts of Scotland from the Continent, and thanks to isotopic and DNA analysis we can say quite a lot about these so-called ‘Beaker people’. But was their appearance linked to the collapse in the Late Neolithic Orcadian social order? And what was happening elsewhere in Scotland?
This lecture will explore the complexities of developments between c. 3000-2400 BC. It will also highlight the many questions that remain to be answered about this period, and about the rest of the Neolithic, and will suggest where future research needs to be concentrated.
If you have any questions about this lecture, feel free to email us at [e-mail]
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Join the conversation on social media with #Rhinds2020
The Rhind Lectures 2020, “Neolithic Scotland: the Big Picture and Detailed Narratives in 2020”, are presented by Dr Alison Sheridan FSA FRSE FSAScot MDAI FBA ACIfA. Recorded in the National Museums Scotland auditorium by Mallard Productions Ltd. Sponsored by AOC Archaeology Group.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Rhind Lectures 2020:
The Scottish Neolithic clearly fascinated Alexander Henry Rhind and he made important, and very early, contributions to its understanding. In the 170 years since Rhind’s prehistoric exploits, our understanding and perception of this fascinating period in Scotland’s past have been utterly transformed. This series of six lectures will offer an in-depth assessment of the current state of our knowledge about the period c.4000-2500 BC, when new ways of living and of making sense of the world appeared and developed in Scotland.
The Lecturer:
Dr Alison Sheridan FSA FRSE FSAScot MDAI FBA ACIfA recently retired as Principal Archaeological Research Curator in National Museums Scotland, having worked there since 1987 after obtaining her doctorate from the University of Cambridge. Her research focuses on the Scottish Neolithic, Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age in their wider European context, specialising in pottery, stone axeheads, and jewellery of jet, faience and gold. Past President of the Prehistoric Society and Vice-President of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, she became a Fellow of the British Academy in 2019.