Ancient man has left modern man a basket full of mysteries. He has left us objects that we don't understand, structures that defy even our modern building techniques and earth works, just to mention a few. Some of the earth works that were built have had their purposes lost in the mists of time. One type of these became very popular and we even think that we might have figured out its purpose. This type was called Long barrows. So what exactly is a long barrow and what does it serve as? Ah the 64,000 dollar question! A long barrow dates back to early Neolithic times. It was a mound that could have had a few different shapes. These seem to have been very popular for thousands of years. They were found in many different places all over the world. It was as if the word was spread that this was a respected way to bury the dead. Not only were the dead buried in them, but sometimes entire buildings were also covered.

In places like Britain, barrows can be found that date anywhere from 4,000 B.C. to 2,400 B.C. It some places in Europe, they are much newer. In some of the barrows you will find a wooden wall on top. Some contain a formal burial chamber. Some of these barrows had a grand entrance made of large timbers and even a wooden walkway that led to the burial chamber. Science has found that some of the bones that have been found in these barrows show that they had been buried previously and then moved. One might find up to 50 bodies in a burial chamber inside a barrow, but there are scant burial goods in the group chambers. Usually the chamber was sealed with a large stone. Some of the mounds showed that they had fences placed in them. It seems that they were only separators and not necessary to the construction of the mound.

Some long barrows have been found that contain stone burial chambers inside the mounds. Long barrows are visible in the British countryside and some are from approximately 50 feet long to over 400 feet long and run from 13 feet to 15 feet high. Some mounds that have been found in England, do not seem to be burial mounds. What were they constructed for, if not to bury the dead? Perhaps the people who built them decided to abandon the mound or they moved on, no one knows for sure and will probably never know. I don't know how many people out there believe in coincidence? Even if they do, could they possibly think that all these mounds that appear everywhere were built the same by accident? Doesn't it seem that somehow there was knowledge spread from one area to the next? We have no way to know the answer to that, but if we examine the world's mounds, we begin to notice that they are similar no matter where they are found. Even the mounds in the American west are similar. So if they were built by people with knowledge they acquired from other peoples, why aren't there pyramids everywhere? They are grander than mounds after all. I think that maybe building pyramids was impractical in some areas. You would have needed a large population to move the rocks and cut them out and get them somehow up the pyramid. The peoples of the mid west might not have had the manpower. This doesn't mean that they didn't know that there were pyramids in other lands.

It is quite possible that some people traveled from Mexico to the northern plains of the North American continent. They might have know about the pyramids down south and imparted this knowledge. After all, we have found things that were quite unexpected that show a mixing of ancient peoples from other parts of the world. An ancient Greek statue was found in a South American pyramid. How could it have gotten there? Contrary to some current thought, the ancient Greeks could have sailed here in one of their fine ships. If they didn't get caught in a severe storm, they might have made it. There is a story that states that some ancient Egyptians made it to Death Valley, where there tomb was found and kept a secret.

One scientist has stated that he has proof that the Britons are descended form Celts who came from Spain in about 5,000 B.C. Here is the funny part of that. An ancient Scottish tale states that the Scots came from Spain. Most people dismissed this as a myth, but the new evidence may prove this to be the truth. Were the Neolithic people peaceful? According to some scientists, there were anything but. For those of you that think there is a lot of violence in the world today, it was said that in the Neolithic world, you had a 1 in 20 chance of dying from a skull fracture. This would have been caused by someone attacking you. Can you imagine what the chances of being attacked were? It must have been something like 1 in 7 or 8, or even worse.

The stone age was a period of time that took up about 2,000,000 years. It stretched up to about 5,000 years ago and was divided into three parts. There was the Paleolithic, which went from 2,000,000 years ago to about 10,000 B.C. Then there was the Mesolithic period that only lasted a short time, but saw things like cave paintings and different artistic works. Lastly there was the Neolithic era, the one we are talking about here. It started about 8,000 years ago and ended in the bronze era. The Egyptian pyramids were built at the extreme beginning of the bronze age and relied mostly on stone age technology. This is hard to believe, isn't it? I wonder how the Egyptians became so advanced at building these huge structures, when most of the world was using mounds? Someone once said that the building of the pyramids was like the stone age being moved into the current time. I think I understand what he meant. He was saying that those Neolithic builders were so good at what they were doing, that it was like modern man building them using ancient tools.

What kind of people were they that lived in Neolithic times? They weren't backward or stupid as many think. Going back even further we find that in ancient Mesopotamia at about 8,000 B.C., civil engineers built a system that channeled and stored water. About 3,500 B.C. the wheel was invented. In 4,000 B.C., the English engineers quarried huge stones for Stonehenge and Avebury. They used the principle of expanding heated water along with hammers, levers, wedges and ropes in conjunction with rollers to carve and move the stones. No there was certainly nothing slow about these people. When you consider what they had to work with, they performed miracles.

Here are some Neolithic era or older objects:

This Pendant Was Found In Scotland And Is Believed To Date Back To The Neolithic Era, It Is Two Men Fishing In A Boat

The Above Pottery Is From Japan And Could Be As Much As 10,000 Years Old

These Spearheads Are Made From Slate

This Object Is Believed To Be Neolithic, But The Symbols Have An Unknown Meaning