Power Pulses Across a Cultural Divide: Cosmologically Driven Acquisition Between Armorica and Wessex

Abstract

Understanding of the nature and significance of connections between Armorica and southern Britain in the Early Bronze Age has been inhibited by poorly refined chronologies. The Armorican grave series is now believed to span seven to eight centuries (c. 2300/2200–1500 BC) and association patterns are used to suggest five assemblages (series 1–5). In the absence of many skeletal remains, structural and organisational evidence is gleaned to suggest that some tombs were not immutably sealed and were used more than once. It is suggested that the accumulation of successive grave groups, primarily in series 2 and 4, is one factor blurring signs of chronological progression, whilst added complexity derives from regional shifts.A review of specific artefact types and burial rites on the two sides of the western Channel gives little credence to the migration of more than occasional individuals. On the contrary, an essential autonomy in the way that materials and artefacts are employed by elites comes through, yet this is set against some important material connections. The conundrum is resolved by suggesting that inter-dependence was actually limited and that the procurement of exotic materials/goods was driven by ‘cosmological acquisition’ needs which, if anything, maintained real differences between distant participating societies. In Wessex, however, the growth of this mode of extracting ideological capital from long-range contacts was to have profound consequences for superordinate centres based around Late Neolithic ceremonial complexes – their ultimate transformation and eclipse.