Adaptive Pastoralism and Climate Change in the Irish Chalcolithic – Early Bronze Age: Adding Evidence from Termon, Co. Clare

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The Burren, a karstic region located in Western Ireland, has seen intensive farming practices since the Neolithic. Local proxies throughout the west coast of Ireland have indicated periods where the environment shifted to colder and wetter conditions in two key phases during the late 3rd and early 2nd millennia BC. A comparison of the archaeological record at Burren site Roughan Hill to proxy signals has shown probable evidence that the prehistoric occupants of the Burren were impacted by climate change. This paper seeks to explore and compare evidence of climate change and adaptive pastoralism at the Chalcolithic – Bronze Age site of Termon, located at the center of the Burren. The archaeological record of Termon will be explored in relation to local proxy signals in effort to understand how its occupants were responding to the shifting environment. Further, a comparison to the archaeological evidence at Roughan Hill will be given in relation to Termon in effort to support the notion of social adaptation over collapse during the Bronze Age.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25492