It has long been thought that Stone Age man abandoned their dead with little thought or respect . But the discovery of cremated bone , thought to be the earliest ever identified in Britain , could re-write the history of Mesolithic , or Middle Stone Age burial practices . The deposit containing the bone was discovered during excavations ahead of a new pipeline in Landford , Essex and is thought to date to 5,600 BC . The discovery of cremated bone ( pictured ) , thought to be the earliest ever identified in Britain , could re-write the history of Mesolithic , or Middle Stone Age burial practices . The burnt material , which includes approximately just over four ounces ( 118g ) of cremated bone , was uncovered by Oxford Archaeology . It was placed into a pit with a diameter of about three feet ( one metre ) and then backfilled with soil . Three radiocarbon dates , two from bone fragments and one from charcoal , have confirmed the remains are around 7,614 years old and fall within the the late Mesolithic , between 6,000 BC and 4,000 BC . Nick Gilmour , who lead the excavation , said ‘ We were expecting this cremation to date to the Bronze Age - we were so surprised when the first radiocarbon date came back as Mesolithic that we did two more to double-check. ’ The burnt material , which includes approximately just over four ounces ( 118g ) of cremated bone , was uncovered by Oxford Archaeology . It was placed into a pit ( pictured ) with a diameter of about three feet ( one metre ) and then backfilled with soil . Little is known about Mesolithic man 's beliefs , but the pit shows that ancient people understood how to create a pyre that was hot enough at over 600 °C to completely burn a corpse and appeared to respect the dead . This image is a still from a TV show called Meet the Ancestors showing what a Mesolithic hut may have looked like . The find is significant because it sheds light on early human society in Mesolithic Britain , when people were largely nomadic hunter gatherers before the arrival of farming . While little is known about their beliefs , the pit shows that ancient people understood how to create a pyre that was hot enough - at over 600 °C - to completely burn a corpse . It hints that people respected the dead enough to cremate them and not simply abandon them , as has been previously believed . Time and resources were invested in funerary practices despite a mobile hand-to-mouth existence , the experts explained . Dr Louise Loe , head of burials at Oxford Archaeology , analysed the bone to find that it represents the remains of at least one adult , despite the total weight being around seven per cent of what would be expected from a complete individual . Taken alongside evidence of a large amount of charcoal in the pit , it ’ s thought the material represents a deposit of some of the remains from a pyre , and not all of the cremated bone from it . The find is significant because it sheds light on early human society in Mesolithic Britain , when people were largely nomadic hunter gatherers before the arrival of farming . While little is known about their beliefs , the pit shows that ancient people understood how to create a pyre that was hot enough - at over 600°C - to completely burn a corpse . It hints that people respected the dead enough to cremate them and not simply abandon them , as has been previously believed . The deposit containing the bone was discovered during excavations ahead of a new pipeline in Landford , Essex ( shown on the map ) and is thought to date to 5,600 BC . Three radiocarbon dates , two from bone fragments and one from charcoal , have confirmed the remains are around 7,614 years old . Here , the bone fragments are sorted into types . Time and resources were invested in funerary practices despite a mobile hand-to-mouth existence , the experts explained . Before the discovery , just 20 examples of human bone dating from the British Mesolithic , which spans from 10,000 to 4,000BC , were found – and none of them had been cremated . But a group of three cremations from the period have been found in Ireland , so the ‘ new ’ site seems to fit into a wider European pattern of behaviour . Three Mesolithic flints were also discivered in the pit and while none are finished tools , they are sharp enough to have been used for cutting . More flints were found nearby , as well as a Bronze Age barrow , Early Roman site , Saxon settlement and a medieval building all where the Essex and Suffolk Water pipeline is planned . The find is significant because it sheds light on early human society in Mesolithic Britain , when people were largely nomadic hunter gatherers before the arrival of farming . Here , excavator Malgorzata Kwiatowska records finds .
Bone from more than one human dates to the Late Mesolithic in 5,600 Meet the Ancestors . It was recovered from a pit with charcoal remains , in Landford , Essex . Evidence suggests ancient people respected and cremated their dead . It was previously thought that nomadic people simply abandoned them .