New research reveals cooking techniques of Neolithic Britons

Neolithic Britons made early forms of gruel and stew by cooking wheat and cereals in pots, new research has suggested.

Chemical analysis of well-preserved pottery found in the waters surrounding small artificial islands called crannogs in Scotland revealed traces of cereals mixed with dairy products and occasionally meat.

Smaller pots were used to cook with milk and larger pots were used for meat-based dishes.

Dr Lucy Cramp, of the University of Bristol’s archaeology department which led the research, said: “This research gives us a window into the culinary traditions of early farmers living at the north-western edge of Europe, whose lifeways are little understood.

“It gives us the first glimpse of the sorts of practices that were associated with these enigmatic islet locations.”

The Neolithic period lasted from around 4000 to 2500 BC in Scotland. Researchers said they had revealed evidence of cereals in Neolithic pottery dating to around 3600 to 3300 BC.

Cereal cultivation in Britain dates back to around 4000 BC and was probably introduced by migrant farmers from continental Europe.

Pottery was also introduced into Britain at this time and there is widespread evidence for domesticated products such as milk in the molecular residue of lipids, fatty substances, extracted from the fabric of these pots.

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Earlier published analysis of Roman pottery from Vindolanda, a fort along Hadrian’s Wall, demonstrated that specific lipid markers for cereals can survive absorbed in archaeological pottery preserved in water and be detectable through a high-sensitivity approach.

However, this was only 2,000 years old and from contexts where cereals were well-known to have been present.

The new findings show that cereal biomarkers can be preserved for thousands of years longer under favourable conditions.

Researchers also found that many of the pots analysed were intact and decorated, which could suggest they may have had some sort of ceremonial purpose.

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Dr Simon Hammann, previously of the University of Bristol, said: “It’s very exciting to see that cereal biomarkers in pots can actually survive under favourable conditions in samples from the time when cereals and pottery were introduced in Britain.

“Our lipid-based molecular method can complement archaeobotanical methods to investigate the introduction and spread of cereal agriculture.”

Dr Hammann is now based at the Friedrich-Alexander-Universitat Erlangen-Nurnberg in Erlangen, Germany.

Crannog sites in the Outer Hebrides are the focus of a four-year Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded Islands of Stone project.

The research is published in the journal Nature Communications.