Ritual

Ritual refers to religious practice and past people's world view. The term ritual, often used in prehistory, is disliked by some archaeologists as they feel that it is impossible to work out prehistoric people's religious beliefs from archaeological evidence alone. Others don't agree and many have made inroads into working out prehistoric beliefs.

Some monuments that are considered to be ritual are often related to death, such as long and round barrows. Other monuments appear to meeting places for certain ceremonies to be performed, such as causewayed enclosures and henges. Cursuses and avenues appear to be processional routes. The functions of all these monuments may well have overlapped.

It is likely that activities that we would see as purely economic, such as farming, trade and production, would also be controlled or influenced by religious beliefs. There would not be a dichotomy between the domestic sphere of houses and fields and the ritual landscape of large monuments. Recently some archaeologists have been looking at the ritual aspect of house plans and rubbish disposal that seems to support this view.