#english_history
## The Ice Age
Britain has not always been an [[Characteristics of the British Isles|island]]. It became one only after the end of the last Ice Age, when the ice caps melted and flooded the lowland that is now the English Channel.

The first evidence of human presense on the British Isles dates to the last Ice Age, from one of the "warmer periods". These items are stone tools, dating around 250000 BC. There were, however, two types of such tools:
- those that were made out of from flakes of flint
- those that were made out of a central core of flint.

Hand axes made in this way have been found widely, as far north as Yorkshire and as far west as Wales.

Soon, however, the ice advanced again and Britain became hardly habitable until **50000 BC**.

## The Ice Age: The Sequel
Around 10000 BC, when the Ice Age drew to a close, Britain was peopled by small groups of *hunters, gatherers and fishers*, few of whom had settled homes.
By about 5000 BC, Britain had finally become an island and heavily forested, which was a disaster for the [[Wanderer-hunter culture|wanderer-hunter culture]], for the cold-loving deer they relied on died out.

## The Neolithic Stage
By about 3000 BC Neolithic people crossed the narrow sea from mainland Europe in small boats. These people, as most people from the Neolithic, *kept animals and grew corn crops*, as well as knew how to make *pottery*. They probably came either from the Iberian peninsula or even the North African coast and settled in the western parts of Britain and Ireland.

## [[Changing pattern of Britain's prehistory]]

## Culture
In the chalk uplands of south Britain, several burial mounds have been found. Before 1400 BC, this area had been a prosperous region for farming, but as a result of climate change and overfarming, the land could no longer support many people.

After 3000 BC the chalkland people started building **"henges"** - centres of social, economic and political power. One of them, the Stonehenge, is now thought to once have possessed the status of a capital, for the stone blocks for its' construction had been transported all the way from Wales. 

## The Beaker people
After 2400 BC new groups of people arrived in southeast Britain from Europe. They were *round-headed and strongly built*, taller than Neolithic Britons, possessing fascinating *craftmanship and military power*, so it is *unclear* whether they were invited or invaded themselves. Their arrival is marked by the first appearance of individual graves, often containing pottery, such as beakers, hence the name ^bfc9c9

### Explanation of the mass spread of invidiual graves
It is now thought that the massive burial mounds were being constructed to appease the gods of soil, but the Beakers brought with them **barley**, thus ending the food crisis.

## The end of the henge culture
From 1300 BC onwards the henge civilisation seems to have become less important. There are several reasons for this:
1. Farmers in the southeast created a new settled society, which was at first focused on feeding the people at the henges, but then became richer and richer. Family villages and fortified enclosures appeared across the landscape
2. People in the Thames valley had better metalworking skills