Creating the Hunting Tools Used in the Stone Age | Ancient Britain With Ray Mears
12,000 years ago, Britain entered a new chapter in its long history. By this point, hunting tools had evolved, from hefty spears to the slick and stealthy bow and arrow. This revolution in technology would change the way humans hunted forever.
In a period in which Britain was also thawing and exiting from an Ice Age, the warm and moist forest environments became home to the last of the hunter gatherers in Britain. They ate a diverse range of food, including wild meat, fish and fresh fruit from plants.
This would nonetheless change as the Britain entered the New Stone Age in circa 4000 BC and an agricultural revolution swathed the British Isles.
Join bushcraft and survival expert Ray Mears in Episode 2 of our Ancient Britain series, as he exits the Palaeolithic era and enters the Mesolithic and Neolithic era in Britain. On his journey, Ray will explore the evolution of hunting methods and equipment, and the eventual transformation of the hunter-gatherer culture and the adoption of agriculture and sedentary living.
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#historyhit #raymears #stoneage #bowandarrow
When Ray Mears goes into a room, he doesn’t turn the light on, he turns the dark off….
He also sells carbon steel knives for £600 a pop. Love the guy and all of his teachings though
@@tbrowniscool sorry you’re point is ?
"Your" @@vikingbushcraft1911
p
@@tbrowniscool I own one, learned the hard way that it's only for people who know what they're doing with a whetstone (which I didn't) less edge retention than with stainless, but worth it if you put the effort in to maintenance etc... beautiful knife.
Don’t see enough of Ray these days! We need more Ray!
Ray Mears is a true story teller, his passion always shines through.
Ray is a truly inspirational character, modest and consistently entertaining in the very best way. Wonderful to see him back.
Nothing quite a lovely as some Ray Mears.
When Ray speaks, I listen
Complete Genius of a Man.
We need more Ray Mears.
I grew up watching Ray Mears on tv and reading all the books, he taught me a thing or two about building forts and camps and shelters as a kid 😂 he's my spirit animal 🤌🏻
😂😂😂
I allways prefer him to bear grylls, les stroud and the others, becourse he chooses to socialize and learn from the locals of the area in which he is visiting, not many survival/bushcraft program presenters do that.
@@marcusfridh8489 yes Ray always had a profound respect for nature, the natives and our British culture and history when he was doing a programme in the UK. So much better. I do like grills too tho
And to think, he beat Lupins twice, keeping his career going the whole time! Or maybe I mean Lyme's disease, need to refresh the old grey matter on that one, but you get the drift.
My son would bring mates home from primary school to light fires with a fero sparker. He has changed so many peoples lives.
"there's no such thing as bad weather, only poor clothing" - Ray Mears.
Bad weather is just an illusion. The sun always shines (at some place on earth, not necessarily nearby) rain is actually disguised sun rays and the only one who controls all that needles banta, used to be my NCO before i went on to work on the same magic.
Actually that is originally i Swedish expression " det finns inget dåligt väder, bara dåliga kläder. He probably heard it from his old friend Lars Fält, who is the survival instructor for the Swedish Army.
I think you mean there IS bad weather AND poor clothing. Lars never had to deal with a British summer!
@@kevinroche3334 actually Lars is from Scania, and we got most of our bad weather from the British Isles
I think if Ray was on a trawler in the middle of the north sea and a bad storm starts blowing, he might change his mind
Every time I click on this channel I see content I have already seen. It’s compiled of bits of previously shown films.
It's fantastic rediscovering Ray Mears. I used to watch him with my brother when I was much much younger! Extremely interesting and a great story teller.
As a child growing up I sort of appreciated history and found it interesting. Now I'm a lot older I have a fascination about history, what can be learned from what was good and that was not and move on. But life isn't like that now. at times we learned nothing, if anything went backwards at stages. Ultimately we should embrace the positives of our ancestors and add the positives of today without forgetting or destroying the old ones. Sometimes I think we are loosing touch of how to survive without the tech that we have today. Other times I think we already have.
I really like this series with Ray Mears.
Love Uncle Ray, a drop of golden sun.
Ray Mears, best by far of what he does, could watch his work all day. Should be on TV more !
Thanks Ray and team! This is wonderful. ⭐👍
Footprints from a million years ago and we can study today is amazing!
If I had to choose someone to survive with, it would be this man. Ray Mears! Nobody comes close to his down to earth delivery. He states the facts, and he doesn't show off. He just quietly imparts his knowledge. ❤.
Thanks Ray and History Hit brilliant 2nd episode. All the work done with Tod Cutler and so many others it's wonderful to be able to watch these amazing historical documentaries. 😊
Thank you, Ray Mears.
It’s an interesting observation one of my archaeology professors made during an introductory seminar on the transition from Meso- to Neolithic: for some reason the bundling of risk for a higher reward paid off (to overly simplify: if the crop succeeds you’re set for the year, if it fails you’re done for vs. if this hunt fails there’s still the next one tomorrow).
That was great, learnt stuff, seen those roses locally and we have flint, I feel a hobby coming on for the winter .
Great to see ya back, Ray !! And big up to HH !!
We were all the same back then... No matter what country... Fires and the stars... It feels great to back to it a fire under the stars on warm nights
Enjoyed this
It’s hard to consider the life of a man 1’000’s of years ago. How did he look? His clothes and tools all hand made. Cooking equipment and shelters. Surely they weren’t shaving as we do, or even interested in personal hygiene as we are. They would live in groups I would think, in order to help each other in difficult times. They’re family lives, without medicines of any sort, would have been fairly short and often tragic? Dieing even of simple tooth decay, childbirth would have been fraught with danger. The ologists who study these things must be fascinated with their subject ? As always Ray Mears is able to re create an atmosphere of wonder and respect for our ancestors in the way they lived and progressed, their incredibly difficult passage through time compared to ours today. I have enjoyed this vid. Thank you Ray Mears (and team, of course!)
Gotta love a bit of Ray Mears!
It was a wonderful documentary shared by an excellent ( History Hit) channel
Been to West Kennet Long Barrow. Pretty cool. I had to go inside.
20:47 The sheep "What you doing in my field?" :)
One definitely started sniffing his butt as well lol
If Ray is presenting, I’m watching.
Absolutely brilliant stuff. Thanks Ray and the HH team. 🙂 Loving the new series.
Thank you
Ray, brilliant as always in sharing knowledge of a subject. With some personalities its all about them, with Ray its all about the subject.
so good Ray always delivers
This is awesome.
It's a shame so many people are heads down in their tech and out of touch with our distant past I don't mean we have to live in caves but having an appreciation of the seasons and how important local / regional knowledge was back then Thanks for educating us just a little bit more, Ray
I wish people would remember that babies don't know about civilisation til they're at least 6 months old. So cruel to leave.a baby lying down, terrified it's going to be eaten by wolves. That's what they know
babies dont inherently know what a wolf is lol@@fion1flatout
When ray mears doesn’t do push ups, he pushes the world down
Wow thank u so so interesting . How our ansestors lived
Thank u history group an ray
I am amazed to find out that there is a flint quarry on this scale, but as a knapper I know there is a market for knapping rock, very well done , we neanderthals are still relevant
The ancient caledonian forest remnants in Scotland ARE ancient Ray...as far as I have been informed, and I have been there..a magical place..
Brilliant stuff
hmm, the link if your description didn't work for me but pulling up Historyhit directly did! Love Ray Mears content
like the great philosopher karl pilkington said, "You're dead longer than you're alive"
More please!
Love the sheeps at 20:00
Who else is watching this to survive in a time travel situation? I want to be prepared. 😁
Try to watch Rays earlier TV series as well, especially his 2 season 2004 series "Bushcraft" 👍
I’m watching for after ww3 breaks out
@@edwardfletcher7790I will. Thank you for the suggestion.
@@gerardharris4217could happen sooner than we think 😔
@@natalieeis9284 They might be hard to find, but he's like a young David Attenborough, who's a Bushcraft genius. The videos are so relaxing and ASMR, the learning becomes almost subconscious.....
Ray just casually sauntering round, eating the forest.
Thanks!
Its True the older he gets the more hes mistaken for Adrian Chiles , its uncanny both legends
I have a theory as to why early Farmers farmed despite getting less nutrients than hunter gatherers. Once you settle down and grow crops you can also brew Alcohol...
That burial mound is in the game Assassin Creed Valhalla which is set in 750 AD at the time of the arrival of the Danes and Norse in what is now modern England.
Wow
Didn’t you already release these episodes a while ago! I have definitely watched them before. Either way it’s great to watch again, sorry if it seems like I’m complaining, I’m not, just confused.
The bit with him making an arrow is old footage
@@moochersways8595 Thought so, thanks for your comment.
@@wildrose2748 aww did someone wake up on the wrong side of the bed? Well you clearly can’t understand English because I said “I’m not complaining” and in English that means “I am not complaining” I also said “just confused” which in English means “just confused”. I know you must find it hard to read but practice makes perfect.
It's hard to believe that we managed to survive back then when you look at us now in our cosseted world where humans have become so soft .
Ha, yeah. Makes you wonder how many people could actually survive a month without their phones and the internet. I was brought up learning how to forage for wild fruit and hazelnuts, later learning how to forage for wild mushrooms myself. That puts food on the table and keeps money in my pocket, unlike my son's all-night gaming with his strange friends.
Unreal
Mound looks like an arrow. Shot into the future.
I thought the same, very like an arrow head.
Got a bit of a mod look going Mr Mears.... :)
This is a compilation from episodes of other shows. Where can we watch full episodes?
22:20 looks like a flint arrow head.
So where did the "resin glue" used to attach the arrowhead to the arrow come from? I assume cooked down from a plant?
It's usually tree resin. The sap you see coming from a wound in a tree.
Pine resin and a crushed up coal from the fire. He shows you how on another video, Ray Mears Bushcraft Aboriginal Britain
Mix it with animal fat, it stops it from being too brittle
@@Vandal_Savage or beeswax, and add some fibre such as rabbit droppings for strength.
he is so cool
You mention part 1 of this where you teach about paleolithic tools, but there is no link to it in the description. I can't find the video. Can you please send me a link? Thank you.
Whats the fence on the beach for ??
To prevent coastal erosion, they're called groynes and they catch sediment in the water and it gets deposited at their base and builds up the beach
@@Vandal_Savage thank you for the info
@@TheSlider535 you are welcome
Mr. Mears where in the time line you explained was the atlatl developed an used.
Maybe the farmers in clearing the fields for crops had piles of rocks handy. So they arranged them neatly to bury the ones that died the winter before.
You have to dump the corpses somewhere Ray. Nomads leave them whey they drop and carry on moving. Stay in one place for a few decades or centuries and you're going to have a massive pile of rotting carcasses to deal with...
It seems the native Americans and ancient Britains were not so far off from each other. Arrowheads and the way they were made are nearly the same here in the states. The indigenous here used sinew to wrap the arrowhead in place.
Yeah i was planning three farms in my 20s one queensland victoria and Tasmania... Different food abd move with the weather Grandad said i was right
Hazel was Ishi's favourite.
The sound guy went wild with the sound for the arrow! I'm laughing so hard. It's not as he has never done knapping or arrow building or he has to shoot some food or he'll starve.
So he went from spears to bows without mentioning the atlatl which is where spears turned into darts and then darts turned into arrows
It shows faith has been forever religions and life changing so fast everything so fast last 200 years no one who is alive is at fault...
I think we don't find Mesolithic (or paleolithic) monuments for at least a couple reasons. Low population, fewer monuments, longer time in the past equals less chance of finding a Mesolithic monument. Also Neolithic monuments could be built on top of them. Another reason night be because we think more like Neolithic people than we do Mesolithic people. We might sometimes be looking straight at a Mesolithic monument and just not see it. I think though that the main reason is probably that Mesolithic people didn't intentionally alter their environment much; they certainly influenced their environment, but for the most part they used the environment as they found it. Neolithic people very intentionally altered their environment when they cleared land for farming. The idea of changing their surroundings was obvious to them in ways it would not have been to Mesolithic hunter-gathers.
Give Ray a knighthood.
Well deserved certainly, but doubt that will happen he (thankfully) has never sought celebrity or mass appeal.
@@neilfurby555I thought the same. So I was surprised to see him turn up on a couple of panel shows and having a regular spot on one of the itv morning programmes.
The evolution of Black & Decker.
That burial mound from the air looked “vulvic” maybe in death returned to the womb for rebirth?
Yes it did. If you're going to be re-born or travel somewhere after death, it would be the natural exit.
@@davidlindley6454 tho thankfully not in the literal sense 👍
Just to add it's not an inevitable path from hunter gatherer to farmer. Several native american tribes gave up part time farming after they obtained horses and became hunter gatherers again, until they lost their lands and food animals.
Also native americans discovered copper smelting, but later gave it up, perhaps when wood became scarcer
15:26 cat? cat! :3
This guy's notion that the farmer has trapped himself. Yeah, with a permanent, sturdy, comfortable home and a huge store of food. The no home guy has trapped himself out in the elements with only what he's carrying. Which one is the trap?
The trouble with being the farmer is, if a hungry band of hunters happens across his land, he can be attacked and his stores stolen anyway. Both lifestyles have their pros and cons, but I think the lifestyle of the farmer would only catch on slowly until groups of them got together and saw the sense in building defences and communities against roving bands of hungry hunter/gatherers.
rays just boss
Your the most Mesolithic Man I know. Why would You all of a Sudden want to Build a Large Monument like those Mounds. I feel that They started off as a Place to Live and Learn , then Morphed into Graves . Stone Henge is just a University for Studying the Universe and Possible Future Events . Also Mapping the World . I believe Our Earliest Ancestors were Hooked on Discovering what They could find in the Whole World for at Least 3 million Years if not More.
You'd have to walk 40 miles to go back to the extinction of the dinosaurs on this scale (and 8078 miles to go back to the Big Bang).
There's an idea that steel is stronger than stone, etc, but it's really not true. There's a story, that might be apocryphal that's passed in the anthropology community which goes like this: An archaeologist that was specialized with making stone (flake) technology knew he had to go into surgery, so decided that he was going to try to convince the surgeon to use stone flake surgery kit. And when he did, he healed faster than usual because the stone edge held for better than the steel blades. Of course this could be completely false, but it's often repeated to make a point that one technology that comes later isn't necessarily "superior" to another, but merely different and that all technology has positives and negatives. it depends on how one uses it. One can leach out tannins by boiling the acorns, which is faster and humans would have had fire because there is evidence that homo erectus has fire. And it would have to be a fast flowing stream--he's referring to indigenous tribes that used FAST flowing streams to leach out tannin, but heat and water can also be used to do the same thing. This has a good side effect that the tannin in the water can be used to tan leather and make it soft. I think he means fast, not slow. But personally using fire and water is a better solution for longer objectives. Soften up those hides for clothes. And just because Indigenous people used one technology doesn't mean it was used in GB. Bang for buck, I'd bet on the fire theory more especially in a cold environment with slow streams. Acorns come in fall, so it makes more sense. Also, I've heard the reed theory proposed as a staple depending on the region. Bell Beaker people and Long Barrow people are two separate peoples--I suppose they didn't have time to cover that part of it. The long barrow people built the long barrows and some people contend Stone Henge, etc (though there are some debates about that.) Be a bit useful if he named the migrations. I had to memorize them when I took archaeology in College. (For an Anthro degree).
Sounds apocryphal. Surgical scalpels are single use, holding an edge doesn't come into it.
“One of Britain’s only flint quarries”
The out of Africa theory is still disputed. Even more so now as it seems that outside of Africa there were a number of other humanoid species as well that could be our ancestors.
That tomb looks like a giant arrow head to me
He prefers a Blaser r8
Please make more of this, I love ancient history. I am also very interested in real bible history.
Yeah you got medicine and poisen berries ... Big difference
There is NO WAY that arrow flew "beautifully".... No way...
Ray needs to Knighted…
It’s so odd seeing him with grey hair and glasses
Absolutely love Ray Mears, always have. But even he is not enough to make me sit through that god awful, overly loud music for an hour.... FFS it's on EVERY documentary these days!
Humans have not been around for a million years....
Our nearest relative the Neanderthals weren't around that long either never mind modern humans.
Those footprints have been dated to around 800,000 years, and it's a fair bet that they didn't belong to the first humans that arrived in Britain. Far from it. So a million years is very likely.
Farmers and drovers trading life stock and humans no in breeding Time team need him
Science and spirits, nar.