Mesolithic cave use in south western Britain: From dynamic cosmologies to folk taxonomies (UBSS Proceedings v.28(3))

Abstract: The karst landscapes of south western Britain are home to many caves, some of which contain Mesolithic archaeology. This comprises human remains, faunal remains, lithics and other artefacts. However, the nature of many of the original (early) excavations and the patchy archive that exists for some of the sites can make interpreting past practices at these sites challenging. Rather than "write-off" those caves with poor or incomplete records, we suggest here that much can be gained by including them in a broader, landscape-scale of analysis. In this paper, based on PhD research by Rosen (2017), we consider caves in southern Wales, the Forest of Dean and the Mendip Hills containing Mesolithic material. We propose that a multi-scalar approach, from the individual cave to the regional landscape, allows for the identification of particular practices in particular places at particular points in the Mesolithic. Such observations allow us to move beyond purely functional interpretations and consider the rich and dynamic cosmologies of this period. We suggest that such an approach may be helpful in identifying folk taxonomies – how Mesolithic communities organised and understood their world – and the central role that caves may have played in this.