NHER 11171 (Find Spot record) - Upper Palaeolithic antler harpoon, Leman and Ower Banks, Doggerland (North Sea, poorly located)

September 1931. Stray Find.
Discovered in lump of peat dredged up by trawler 'Colinda' from Leman and Ower Sands, 50 miles (25 miles?) northeast of Cromer (Chart 53 degrees 10': Longitude 2 degrees east):
1 "Maglemose" bone harpoon. Red deer antler, 5.7 inches long [14.6cm].
Donated to Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 1932.39).
Information from (S1). See photographs in file (S2).

The harpoon was exhibited by Dr H. Muir Evans at a meeting of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia on 29 February 1932 (S3). It was identified as being of "Maglemose type" and a Mesolithic, "Epi-Palaeolithic or Early Neolithic" date suggested. This object was the subject of two brief notes (S4) (S5) with a fuller account subsequently published in the Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia (S6). The harpoon was described as having been found "…halfway between the two North buoys in mid-channel between the Leman and Ower…[at a depth of] 19-20 fathoms". It was found within "a large mass of 'moorlog', a local name given to the lumps of black wood and peat which are found in this situation". The harpoon was recognised as being similar to Mesolithic examples that had recently been under peat at Holderness in Yorkshire. Although no samples were retained of the peat in which the harpoon was found, a number of samples were subsequently dredged up by the same trawler from sites on the Leman and Ower Banks. Pollen analysis of these samples provided evidence of mixed woodland; these results broadly consistent with samples that had previously been taken from Dogger Bank. These discoveries provided clear evidence that much of the North Sea had once been dry land, confirming a suggestion first made by Clement Reid in 1913 (S7).

This harpoon was one of the objects listed in (S8). This object aroused considerable interest and was noted in many subsequent publications, including (S9), (S10), (S11), (S12), (S13) and (S14). The harpoon was described and figured in (S15), which also details a number of very similar barbed points from elsewhere in eastern Britain. It is also mentioned in (S16) and (S17).

In 1988 the harpoon was sampled for radiocarbon dating by Clive Bonsall of Edinburgh University, as part of a national survey (S1). The radiocarbon determination obtained dated the harpoon to the Late Devensian Zone II (OxA-1950 11740 ± 150), revising the previous date of c. 6500 BC for the peat in which it was found. This later Upper Palaeolithic date was the first for settlement on the North Sea Plain in that era. See correspondence in file. This date was noted in (S18) and listed in (S19) and (S20).

In recent years the topography and archaeology of the 'Doggerland' region of the North Sea have been the focus of several important research projects. See for example, (S21) and (S22), the latter of which makes specific reference to the Leman and Ower Bank harpoon.

P. Watkins (HES), 27 July 2014.