Ielts! CAM19-listening-Test1-Part4 – YouTube Dictation Transcript & Vocabulary

1.part four you will hear an archaeology student giving a presentation on an important site in Ireland called the K Fields first you have some time to look at questions 31 to 40 e now listen carefully and answer questions 31 to 40 for my presentation today I'm going to talk about the Ki fields in the northwest of Ireland one of the largest Neolithic sites in the world I recently visited this site and observed the work that is currently being done by a team of archaeologists there the site was first discovered in the 1930s by a local teacher Patrick callfield he noticed that when local people were digging in the Bog they were constantly hitting against what seemed to be rows of stones he realized that these must be walls and that they must be thousands of years old for them to predate the bog which subsequently grew over them he wrote to the national museum in Dublin to ask them to investigate but no one took him seriously it wasn't until 40 years later when Patrick coalfields son Sheamus who had be become an archaeologist by then began to explore further he inserted iron probes into the bog to map the formation of the stones a traditional method which local people had always used for finding fuel buried in the Bog for thousands of years carbon dating later proved that the site was over 5,000 years old and was the largest Neolithic site in Ireland thanks to the bog which covered covers the area the remains of the settlement at kg fields which is over 5,000 years old are extremely well preserved a bog is 90% water it's soil so saturated that when the grasses and Heathers that grow on its surface die they don't fully Decay but accumulate in layers objects remain so well preserved in these conditions because of the acidity of the Pete and the deficiency of ox oxygen at least 175 days of rain a year are required for this to happen this part of irland gets an average of 225 days the Neolithic farmers at KI would have enjoyed several centuries of relative peace and stability Neolithic Farmers generally lived in larger communities than their predecessors with a number of houses built around a community building as they lived in permanent settlements Neolithic farmers were able to build bigger houses these weren't round as people often assume but rectangular with a small hole in the roof that allowed smoke to escape this is one of many Innovations and indicates that the Neolithic farmers were the first people to cook indoors another new technology that Neolithic settlers brought to Ireland was Pottery fragments of Neolithic pots have been found in ki and elsewhere in Ireland the pots were used for many things as well as for storing food pots were filled with a small amount of fat and when this was set a light they served as lamps it's thought that the Ki Fields were mainly used as paddocks for animals to graze in evidence from the kg Fields suggests that each plot of land was of a suitable size to sustain an extended family uh they may have used a system of rotational Grazing In order to prevent overg grazing and to allow for plant recovery and regrowth this must have been a year round activity as no structures have been found which would have been used to shelter animals in the winter however archeologists believe that this way of life at KI ceased abruptly why was this well several factors may have contributed to the changing circumstances the soil would have become less productive and led to the abandonment of farming the crop rotation system was partly responsible for this as it would have been very intensive and was not sustainable but there were also climatic pressures too the farmers at KI would have enjoyed a relatively dry period but this began to change and the conditions became wet better as there was a lot more rain it was these conditions that encouraged the bog to form over the area which survives today so now I'd like to show you some that is the end of part four you now have one minute to check your answers to part four