Prehistoric People! New Learning Workshop

Image: A range of prehistoric tools, including hand axes.

From September 2019, The Beaney House of Art and Knowledge will be offering a brand new learning workshop, ‘Prehistoric People’! 

After the success of the ‘Meet you Fossil Ancestors’ drop in session, held in The Beaney’s Garden Room from May to June 2019, engaging 4601 people; the museum has developed this new workshop with the support of the School of Anthropology and Conservation at the University of Kent. 

Image: ‘Meet Your Fossil Ancestors’ exhibition in partnership with the University of Kent.

In the workshop, students will get up close and personal to our prehistoric collection, including a range of our hand axes!  A Hand Axe is a prehistoric stone tool with two faces that is the longest-used tool in human history– made for over 1.5 million years! It is usually made from flint. The most common hand axes have a pointed end and rounded base, so they can be held easily. It is believed they had a few uses. They were possibly used to butcher animals; to dig for food that grows in the ground like parsnips, animals and water; to chop wood and remove tree bark; and to throw at prey. They are found all over Kent, including in Canterbury.

The workshop will allow students to look at the development of Stone Age to Iron Age settlements, get a chance to make their own cave art, and even act as hunter-gatherers, exploring the galleries and the museum’s collection to learn about prehistoric technology and life! 

Image: Artist’s impression of the Iron Age hill fort settlement at Bigbury Hill, nr. Canterbury.

For more information, go to canterburymuseums.co.uk/the-beaney/learning-at-the-beaney/ or email learning@canterbury.gov.uk. To book any of our workshops, please visit canterburymuseums.co.uk/schools/book/.