This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: New research led by University College Dublin has rewritten a key chapter in Irish prehistory, revealing that bones long thought to mark the beginning of farming in Ireland belong to bear and wild boar, not cattle. For more than 30 years, animal remains discovered during excavations at Ferriter's Cove, a small bay on the Dingle Peninsula in County Kerry, and dated to the end of the Mesolithic period (8000–4000 BC) have been cited as proof that, before agriculture became established in Ireland, there was contact between its Mesolithic hunter-gatherers and Europe's Neolithic farming communities.
Believed to be bone fragments belonging to cattle, the find is considered the earliest evidence for the presence of domesticated farm animals on the islands of Ireland and Britain. Now, UCD researchers have shown the famous bones were never cattle at all but belonged to a bear and wild boar. Detailed in the latest edition of PAST, the newsletter of the Prehistoric Society, the discovery removes one of the most significant pieces of evidence for when agriculture developed in Ireland or Great Britain and likely forces a rethink of when and how their communities moved from Mesolithic hunter-gatherer lifestyles to Neolithic farming societies.
The new findings are part of a postdoctoral project at the UCD School of Archaeology, led by Dr. Martin Moucheron under the mentorship of Professor Graeme Warren, which is re-examining important Mesolithic archaeological sites using modern scientific techniques. "For at least four millennia, hunting and gathering people lived on the island, and there is a common conception that they left little trace and that we know very little about them—unlike the megaliths of Neolithic farmers, who are portrayed in ways that feel very familiar in Ireland," said Dr.
"But there is much we can understand about Mesolithic people just by going back to the sites and material we have, and by looking at them with new eyes and new techniques—and an open mind." Ferriter's Cove has occupied a central place in debates about Ireland's prehistoric past since excavations in the 1980s and 1990s uncovered several bone fragments initially identified as domesticated cattle. The presence of such remains, the so-called "Kerry Cow," contradicted existing theories of the Mesolithic–Neolithic transition in Ireland and, ever since, has been cited as evidence that its Mesolithic communities had established links with early farmers arriving from continental Europe. In collaboration with Drs.
Benjamin Gearey, Barra Ó Donnabháin and Margaret McCarthy, from University College Cork, and Kate Kanne (UCD), the original archaeological material from Ferriter's Cove, which is now stored at UCC, was sent to the CNRS lab in Lille, France, to undergo biomolecular analysis. Using a technique known as ZooMS, which identifies species through proteins preserved in ancient bone collagen, the results showed the fragments were not from domesticated cattle as originally thought but instead came from a bear and a wild boar. As a result, there is currently no archaeological evidence to support the idea that domesticated cattle, and by extension, early farming communities, had reached or influenced Ireland before 4000 BC.
Discover the latest in science, tech, and space with over 100,000 subscribers who rely on Phys.org for daily insights. d research that matter—daily or weekly. "Ferriter's Cove is an iconic archaeological site, originally excavated by the late Professor Peter Woodman, Department of Archaeology, UCC; this new collaboration with colleagues at UCD marks an exciting new phase of research, and these remarkable results are set to change our understanding of the earliest evidence for agriculture in Ireland," Gearey said. Warren added, "These exciting results show the real value in going back to key sites with new analytical techniques—which can change the stories we tell about our past." Beyond rewriting one of Ireland's best-known archaeological narratives, the study highlights the value of revisiting important archaeological collections with modern scientific methods, demonstrating how advances can challenge long-held assumptions and reshape the understanding of the past.
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