East Riding of Yorkshire (district): History
=== Prehistoric ===
When the last glacial period ended, the hunter gatherers of the Palaeolithic period followed the animal herds across the land between continental Europe and Britain. Then, as conditions continued to improve and vegetation could support a greater diversity of animals, the annual range of seasonal movement by Mesolithic communities decreased, and people became more fixed to particular localities. Until about 6000 BC, Mesolithic people appear to have exploited their environment as they found it. As communities came to rely on a smaller territorial range and as population levels increased, they started to try to modify or control the natural world. In the Great Wold Valley, pollen samples of Mesolithic date indicate that the forest cover in the area was being disturbed and altered by man, and that open grasslands were being created. The Yorkshire Wolds became a major focus for human settlement during the Neolithic period as they had a wide range of natural resources. The oldest monuments found on the Wolds are the Neolithic long barrows and round barrows. Two earthen long barrows in the region are found at Fordon, on Willerby Wold, and at Kilham, near Driffield, both of which have radiocarbon dates of around 3700 BC.
From around 2000 to 800 BC, the people of the Bronze Age built the 1,400 Bronze Age round barrows that are known to exist on the Yorkshire Wolds. These are found both in isolation and grouped together to form cemeteries. Many of these sites can still be seen as prominent features in the present-day landscape. By the later Bronze Age, an open, cleared, landscape predominated on the Wolds. It was used for grazing and also for arable cultivation. The wetlands on either side of the Wolds in the River Hull valley, Holderness and the Vale of York were also being used for animal rearing at this time. In the Iron Age there were further cultural changes in the area. There emerged a distinctive local tradition known as the Arras Culture, named after a site at Arras, near Market Weighton. There are similarities between the chariot burials of the Arras Culture and groups of La Tène burials in northern Europe, where the burial of carts was also practiced. …