Vicki Cummings is a Reader in Archaeology at the University of Central Lancashire, UK, where she has worked since 2004. She specialises in the Mesolithic and Neolithic of Britain and Ireland, with a particular focus on the transition period, monuments and landscape. She has a broader interest in hunting and gathering populations and stone tools. She has excavated a series of Neolithic monuments including Clyde cairns, Bargrennan monuments and dolmens.

Acknowledgements

List of figures

Chapter one: Introducing the Neolithic of Britain and Ireland

Chapter two: Island life: Britain and Ireland in the late Mesolithic

Chapter three: All change? The Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in Britain and Ireland and its north-west European background

Chapter four: A brave new world: life in the early Neolithic of Britain and Ireland

Chapter five: Of earth, bone, timber and stone: mortuary practice and monumentality in the early Neolithic of Britain and Ireland

Chapter six: Circles and lines: the middle Neolithic of Britain and Ireland

Chapter seven: Lines and landscapes of descent: life in the late Neolithic of Britain and Ireland

Chapter eight: Constructing theatres in the round: mortuary practice and monumentality in late Neolithic of Britain and Ireland

Chapter nine: Beakers, copper and bronze: life and death at the end of the Neolithic and into the early Bronze Age

Chapter ten: The Neolithic of Britain and Ireland: a summary and future directions

Index