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Estimage of time to construct ringfort

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Comments

  • #32
    slowburner
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 5,218 Mod ✭✭✭✭slowburner


    RDM_83 again wrote: »
    I think its going to be massively influenced by the soil type and how many rocks are in it. I've dug a few ring-forts now including one monster one and it just seems to me that these estimates are a bit on the low side. You might race through the top meter if the soil is nice but once you get towards the bottom you will be slowing down a lot particularly since its not just the 2 meters depth its also the height of the bank your throwing the spoil onto.
    I'm also not sure if 30% is enough an adjustment for the use of primitive tools, the right tools make a huge difference, even using a shovel with shorter handle is a nightmare and thats a comparatively trivial difference.
    I also suppose it would depend a lot on the physical fitness level of the men digging, are they weedy calorie deprived serfs (can't think of the word- Beaghta?) or big well fed men, having dug beside a 17 stone man before I would say he worked at twice my speed

    These are just my two cents though and not based on anything but feeling

    Thing is.
    Your seventeen stone colleague wouldn't stay seventeen stone if he did this every day.


  • #33
    slowburner
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 5,218 Mod ✭✭✭✭slowburner


    On the issue of current thinking on a militaristic versus a more benign cultural transition, especially between the Neolithic and Bronze Age.
    Take a tour of the National Museum of Ireland.
    Take notice of the artefacts from the Neolithic, with your mind's eye on how efficient they might have been for killing people.
    Then look closely at artefacts from the Bronze Age and make a comparison.
    No period shows a more dramatic or profound transition - the transition from weapons designed to kill for food to weapons designed to kill people.
    And unfashionable though it may be, it's difficult not to see the arrival of people with superior know-how and technology as an arrival that didn't meet resistance.
    After all, a complete change in the concept of society came along with that new material - metal.


  • #34
    tac foley
    Registered Users Posts: 5,504 ✭✭✭tac foley


    I agree. My home-made replica [in bronze] of the Dowris leaf-bladed sword was definitley NOT made for hunting anything with four legs.

    In history you generally find that those who fight with wooden weapons lose out badly to those who fight with weapons made of metal. The Spanish invasion and subjugation of the Americas is proof of that.

    tac


  • #35
    p___
    Registered Users Posts: 30 ✭p___


    Are there any good on line resources for reading up on ringforts- or on finding info on specific ring forts?

    All of my knowledge comes from collage, which should be about 15 years out of date at this stage (unless the lecturers are still sticking with the same sources and story)


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