Megalithic shipping and trade routes

[Mick Harper]

First of all, what 'exotic goodies'? Please list as I know of none. Secondly. 'Condor' ie Weymouth, Poole, Portsmouth to St Malo, is not accurate. The main route was Burgh Island (ie the tin from Dartmoor) to Mont St Michel.

[Boreades]

Burgh Island (ie the tin from Dartmoor) to Mont St Michel was one route. It was not the only route. Poole was a major port from pre-Roman times. We've talked about this before.

Based on the available evidence scattered all over Dorset and Hampshire, (broken pottery from France and beyond) the volume of agricultural trade may well have been higher than the volume of the metallurgical trade further west. The wholesale extraction of metal was in the west, but the best evidence of metal refining into retail goods is at Hengistbury Head in Dorset. We've talked about this before as well.

Not only that, if the hilltop enclosures were mainly for trade (and only very rarely for military) purposes, then the size of these hilltop enclosures is surely a measure of their importance for trade? The largest enclosures seem to be on the Wiltshire-Dorset route. I propose this is no coincidence, as they were staging points for trade to and from Channel ports in Dorset and Hampshire, for trade by sea on the Dorset/Hampshire, Guernsey/Jersey, St.Malo/Mont St Michel routes.

[Boreades]

This
http://www.writer2001.com/cihoards2.htm
gives us some very useful pointers.

"Hoards of coins found in Jersey include coins from the Durotriges (= Dorset and SW Hampshire)... An important Durotriges site, Hengistbury Head, is where the largest concentrations of Coriosolite coins in England were found. "

So both sides of the Channel have coins from the other side, and were trading with each other.

"Hengistbury had been an important port of entry for products from the Roman world, particularly wine. From the dates of amphorae found in that region, we see that Caesar's invasions put an end to Hengistbury's wine trade, and subsequent importation of wine and other goods are primarily found north of the Thames. Cassivelaunos, leader of the British forces and whose stronghold was north of the Thames, surrendered to Caesar in 54 B.C. Whether Cassivelaunos or one of his successors negotiated future trade benefits is difficult to say, but the losers were the Durotriges. "

"The old trade route from Alet (St.Malo) in Brittany via the Channel Islands to Hengistbury, although ceasing to provide Britain with wine, still had its uses. Alet had storage facilities for grain - a plentiful commodity in southern Britain, but less so in Brittany, where much of the land was unsuitable. "

Wine going north, and grain going south, until the Romans took over.

"The fortunes of the Durotriges seem to have declined at an alarming rate: their coinage started in gold of a slightly lower standard than British A, and then deteriorated in quality from base gold through silver to billion and finally ending in bronze "

Collapse of the ME in this part of the world.

The pre-war trade route from Alet to Hengistbury included Jersey. Alet came to a violent end in about 15 to 20 AD: the reasons are unclear. The end of Alet possibly signified the end of trade with the Durotriges, which could have forced the final debasement of their currency to that of bronze.

[Mick Harper]

Sorry, but you still haven't come up with anything France-to-Britain in the Bronze Age. Or even in the Iron Age before the Roman period in Gaul.

[Boreades]

Do I have to do all the digging for you?

"... numerous finds of imported Armorican axes..."
http://www1.somerset.gov.uk/archives/he ... warf_6.pdf

Plus:
- http://www.wessexarch.co.uk/book/export/html/170
- http://www.dorset-archaeology.org.uk/ex ... th_baa.pdf
- https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=4NA ... an&f=false

[Mick Harper]

Sorry, Borry, but there is nothing here to support your contention. The only reference to French fancies is the Armorican axes, which are themselves a minute part of the total metal finished goods found in southern Bronze Age Britain. And even these are doubtful a) because they appear to be currency (which is hardly a return cargo) and b) their Armorican credentials are extremely doubtful -- from my reading just one bunch of archaeos going along with the previous bunch. Remember, that a Continental origin for all British sophistication used to be axiomatic. Still is, it would seem.

[Boreades]

"Hoards of coins found in Jersey include coins from the Durotriges (= Dorset and SW Hampshire)... An important Durotriges site, Hengistbury Head, is where the largest concentrations of Coriosolite coins in England were found. "

They didn't just take the coins for a sea voyage to see if they would float! If coins were changing hands, then goods must have been changing hands as well.

[Mick Harper]

Sigh.

"Hoards of coins found in Jersey include coins from the Durotriges (= Dorset and SW Hampshire)... An important Durotriges site, Hengistbury Head, is where the largest concentrations of Coriosolite coins in England were found. "

This is going the other way, Borry. I am not denying that intensive trade was conducted between the West of Britain and Western France (I gave a whole lecture on the subject). I am simply saying that we don't know what was taken on the north-bound half of the trip. I have suggested that granite might have featured. However, your (and orthodoxy's) assumption that French manufactured goods were involved is simply not supported by the evidence. Unless you wish to provide some.

[Boreades]

Sigh

I am simply saying that we don't know what was taken on the north-bound half of the trip.

You take a very roundabout route to agree with me.

If Cornish gold and tin were being traded to Ireland, in small volumes compared to the volume of copper they were going to collect in Ireland, then something else must have been filling the spare space. But what?

Our picture of what they were trading is incomplete. But at least it's "known unknown".

[Mick Harper]

Our picture of what they were trading is incomplete. But at least it's "known unknown".

Quite untrue. We have no idea what they were trading, even circumstantially, south-to-north. My own discovery of granite is the only contribution that has the merit of being evidenced, however circumstantially.