The Bronze Age

How was Bronze first discovered?

About 2500BC people in the Middle East discovered how to use metal.The first metal they used was Copper.But copper was too soft.Then they realised that if you added tin to copper it made a harder metal called ____ Bronze

Bronze tools and weapons are sharper than stone tools.Gradually the use of bronze spread across Europe.This led archaeologists to say the Stone Age ended and the Bronze Age began.

Why was bronze better than Stone?It was harder wearing

It could be shaped more easily.

It had a sharper edge.

The Bronze Age comes to IrelandCopper & bronze appear in Ire around 2000BC.There is plenty of copper. Archaeologists have found copper mines in a number of places.For example, Mount Gabriel, Co Cork and near Kilarney, Co Kerry

• Archaeologists have found no Tin mines in Ireland.

So how did they make Bronze?

• Archaeologists believed it was imported to Ireland from the tin mines in Cornwall, in England.

This would mean bronze age people traded.

Copper & Tin are minerals

found in rocks in the form of oreHow do you get the ore from the

rocks to make bronze objects?

Smelting

Beaker FolkAbout 2000BC a new type of pot appeared in archaeologicalsites around Europe.

These pots are shaped like a drinking glass

Archaeologists call them ‘beakers’ and they called the people who made them ‘Beaker Folk’

In sites where the Beaker Folk appear, there are usually copper and bronze tools too.

Archaeologists think the Beaker Folk brought the Bronze Age to Ireland.

Complete the table of information on life in the

Bronze Age.Houses

Food & Family

Work

Tools & Weapons

Arts & crafts

Fulachta Fiadh

Drombeg

Burial CustomsHow did Bronze Age people bury their

dead?

Cist Graves

Wedge Tomb

Glantane East Wedge Tomb, County Cork, Ireland

Stone Circle Drombeg, Co Cork

Thank you