Home > Prehistoric Scotland
Archaeology and Geology continue to reveal the secrets of Prehistoric Scotland, uncovering a complex and dramatic past before the Romans brought Scotland into the scope of recorded history. Obviously, throughout this period there was no such thing as Scotland or a national identity. Successive human cultures tended to be spread across Europe or further afield, but focussing on this particular geographical area helps to find out about the origin of the remains and monuments that are still widespread, and to understand the background to the History of Scotland.The extent of open countryside untouched by intensive farming, together with past availability of stone rather than timber, has given Scotland a wealth of accessible sites where the ancient past can be seen.
1 The deep prehistory of Scotland
Scotland is geologically alien to Europe, comprising a lost sliver of the ancient continent of Laurentia (which later formed the bulk of North America). During the Cambrian period the crustal region which became Scotland formed part of the continental shelf of Laurentia, then still south of the equator. Laurentia was separated from the continent of Baltica (which later became Scandinavia and the Baltic region) by the diminishing Iapetus Ocean. The two ancient continents moved toward one another through the Cambrian and Ordovician periods, with tectonic folding during the Silurian pushing the first Scottish land above water. The final collision occurred during the Devonian period, with the Scottish segment of the Laurentian plate smashing into AvaloniaAvalonia was a palaeo microcontinent also known as a Terrane. The name is derived from the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland. In the early Cambrian, Pannotia broke up and Avalonia broke off of Gondwana. Avalonia collided with Baltica in the Ordovician. (which contained what is now most of EnglandEngland is the largest, the most populous, and the most densely populated of the four " Home Nations" which make up the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK). Occupying the south-eastern portion of the island of Great Britain, England and WalesFor alternate meanings, see Wales (disambiguation Wales ( Welsh: Cymru pronounced /"k@mrI/ SAMPA, km IPA, 'Kumree' approximate pronunciation) is one of the four nations comprising the United Kingdom (the other three being England, Scotland and Northern Ir), a motile subcontinent which had previously joined with Baltica. This impact threw up a massive chain of mountains (at least as tall as the present-day AlpsThe Alps is the collective name for one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria in the east, Slovenia, Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany, through to France in the west. The highest mountain in the Alps is the Mon) and saw the formation of the granitic West Highland and GrampianGrampian was a local government region of Scotland from 1975 to 1996. It is now divided into the council areas of Moray, Aberdeenshire, and the City of Aberdeen. Whilst it existed it had several districts under it Aberdeen, Banff and Buchan, Gordon, Kinca mountain chains and (through the CarboniferousThe Carboniferous is a major division of the geologic timescale that extends from the end of the Devonian period (about 280 million years before the present (BP)) to the beginning of the Permian period (about 340 million Years BP). As with most older geol) a period of volcanic activity in central and eastern Scotland. During the PermianThe Permian is a geologic period that extends from about 280 to 248 million years before the present ( mya). As with most older geologic periods, the strata that define the Permian are well identified, but the exact date of the period's start is uncertain and TriassicThe Triassic is a Geologic period that extends from about 248 to 202 million years (My or 'megayears') before the present. The extinction event that closed the Triassic period has recently been more accurately dated, but as with most older geologic period periods, with the Iapetus Ocean entirely closed, Scotland lay near the centre of the Pangean supercontinent. With the advent of the Tertiary, a constructive plate boundary became active between Laurentia and Eurasia, pushing the two apart (and parting Scotland from Laurentia forever). This recession opened the Atlantic Ocean for the first time, and the consequent subduction zone at the western plate margin led to a renewed period of vulcanism, this time on Scotland's west coast, producing fresh mountains on Skye, Jura, Mull, Rum, and Arran.
This tectonic activity produced the basis of Scotland's topography: ancient mountains in the North and South of the country, partially eroded by 400 million years of water and ice with a wide fertile valley between them, and a newer, wilder western terrain. With Scotland now in the northern temperate zone, it was subjected to numerous glaciations in the Neogene and Quaternary periods, the ice sheets and their attendant glaciers carving the landscape into a typical postglacial one, overdeeping river valleys into the characteristic U-shape and leaving the upland areas covered with glacial corries and dramatic pyramidal peaks. In lowland areas the ice deposited rich fields of fertile glacial till and eroded the softer material surrounding the extinct volcanoes (particularly the older Carboniferous ones), leaving many crags.
