Throughout its history, British agriculture has been shaped by a combination of technological advancements, economic pressures, social changes, and government policies. Farming was first introduced onto the British Isles over 6,000 years ago, with early Neolithic communities cultivating crops and domesticating animals around settlements. Precisely where and when agriculture was introduced into Britain and how it expanded is still a highly debated topic. Lake sediments from Mere Tarn (Cumbria, UK) have revealed a compelling and insightful pollen record, with clear evidence of human activity and land use changes around the site over the past 6,000 years, including strong evidence of Neolithic agriculture indicated by an early Elm decline, and presence of anthropogenic indicator cereal-type (>37µm) pollen grains. The advent of DNA sequencing and its application to lake sediments has revolutionised palaeoenvironmental reconstructions and has enabled unique insights into past environmental and anthropogenic change. By coupling targeted DNA sequencing methods with conventional palaeoenvironmental methodologies in sediments spanning the last 12,000 years, agricultural expansion in Britain can be better characterised and chronologically constrained, enabling the development of a novel framework for tracing the agricultural transitions across the British Isles.
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