Skateholm (Sweden)
The Skateholm site is a Late Mesolithic settlement site in the Scania region of Sweden, dated between 5250-3700 BC. The site is located on a lagoon in southern coastal Scania and was occupied for about 1000 years. Several huts arranged in a village community and at least 90 burials have been excavated to date, most recently by Lars Larsson of the University of Lund. The most famous burial investigated is that of an adult male cradling a small child; Larsson's investigations of late have been on the interment of grave goods ... About Archaeology
When the 3-year-old died, her parents placed her favorite toys in her arms, wrapped her in fabric woven from fibers of native plants, and buried her body in the soft, muck bottom of a small pond. Some 7,000 years later, when a young archaeologist uncovered her tiny remains, the toys - a wooden pestle-shaped object and the carapace of a small turtle - were still cradled in her arms.
Mesolithic Britain was thought to have been inhabited by hunter-gatherers, constantly on the move in search of food; however, the recent excavation of a dwelling in Northumbria reveals our Stone Age ancestors to have been ingenious and elaborate house builders. Julian Richards re-assesses a distant past ...