There is evidence of combat in earlier periods – the Neolithic, for example, saw attacks on Crickley Hill in Gloucestershire, and Hambledon Hill in Dorset (Mercer, 1999). But it was the European Bronze Age that saw the Continent’s first arms race: the rise of a panoply of deadly arms, prestigious pieces of armour and competition surrounding the movements of goods. It is from this point that I began looking at the archaeology of combat, and for that reason, and to illustrate the long history of warfare in Britain, I have included this chapter on part of the prehistoric sequence of the development of the British Isles. It also serves as an introduction to the elements we shall look at from the historic periods in later chapters. Traces of the Bronze Age arms race can be seen alongside the burials of those who, in death, wished to be portrayed as warriors, and also those who had suffered from this weapon technology in life. Fortified centres, the precursors of many of the well-known Iron Age hill forts, were created, and the archaeological record also shows the possible modes of transport of the infantry.
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