ABSTRACT
Looking back from the end of the millennium to commemorate the foundation of the Group for the Study of Irish Historic Settlement in 1969, it is appropriate to review Irish prehistoric settlement studies using that year as a baseline. In many ways 1969 was a watershed which marked the beginning of a major phase of activity in Irish prehistoric studies which still continues. That year saw the publication in the Ulster Journal of Archaeology of review articles on the Neolithic1 and the Earlier Bronze Age2 in the north of Ireland, followed by Harbison’s3 review of the Earlier Bronze Age in Ireland and Woodman’s4 discussion of settlement in the Irish Mesolithic. The following decades have seen major advances in prehistoric studies, both in terms of the understanding of the pattern of settlement within major periods during Irish prehistory and the diachronic changes in settlement in particular regions.
