From Dusk to Dawn in a Stone Age Winter Camp | History for Sleep

Hey guys! We're now on Spotify 🎧 Join us here: https://open.spotify.com/show/1iLKLmP... Fall asleep on the longest night of the year, around 9000 BC, in a hide tent on a pine-covered gravel bluff above the River Kennet at Thatcham, in Berkshire. The midwinter dark lasts about 16 hours, a fire struck from flint and pyrite takes about 48 seconds, and the teeth of 6 young red deer tell us people camped here in winter. At Star Carr, 76 of 82 pieces of fungus were hoof fungus, the tinder of the age. So why does one old man carry a live coal around all day in a little pot of birch bark? Subscribe to the channel: @oldhistorynights In this video, we talk about a Stone Age family's winter night from dusk to dawn, including the sunset over the reed swamp where the Moor Brook meets the Kennet, how six young deer prove the camp was used in winter, the hunters coming home, the carried ember and the Iceman's birch bark container, the Blackfeet fire horn, striking fire with flint and pyrite, the hearth at the heart of the tent, a tent of red deer hides built from the excavated tents of Pincevent, Orp and Etiolles, supper cooked with hot stones and no pots, the first hazelnuts in the valley, the awl, the bodkin and sinew thread, winter clothes of hollow-haired hide, what warmth cost in time, the long evening by the fire, a boy learning to lift a coal, the dog by the door, frost and the high midwinter moon, a bed of bark, pine boughs and hides, who sleeps where, banking the fire for the night, the first and second sleep, and a new coal lifted into the pot at dawn. 🔔 Subscribe so the next long winter night finds you without any searching. 💬 Tell us where you're listening from tonight, and which part of the camp you'd most like to have slept in: under the red deer hide, or beside the old man at the fire. 📢 Share it with someone who loves the Stone Age, the deep past or a slow story at bedtime, in your group chat, on Facebook or on Reddit. You're the reason the fire stays lit. Chapters: 00:00 Opening 16:42 The hunters come home in the dusk 32:58 Fire struck from a stone 48:34 A house sewn from red deer 1:03:49 What the autumn put away 1:26:05 What warmth cost in time 1:41:53 The boy learns to lift a coal 1:57:06 Out into the frost and moonlight 2:12:58 Where each one lies down 2:28:42 The first sleep 2:50:46 The grandfather tends the ember 3:12:32 The coldest hour and the turning year Sources: Solent-Thames Research Framework, Late Upper Palaeolithic and Mesolithic (Oxford Archaeology): https://eprints.oxfordarchaeology.com... Prehistoric Thatcham (Thatcham Historical Society): https://www.thatchamhistoricalsociety... Otzi's equipment (South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology): https://www.iceman.it/en/oetzi/equipment The Star Carr Fungi, Robson 2018 (White Rose eprints): https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/13005... Life inside the tents at Etiolles (French Ministry of Culture): https://archeologie.culture.gouv.fr/e... How did ancient Europeans roast hazelnuts (Wessex Archaeology): https://www.wessexarch.co.uk/news/how... Natural Sleep and Its Seasonal Variations in Three Pre-industrial Societies, Yetish et al. 2015 (UCLA): https://teams.semel.ucla.edu/sites/de... DISCLAIMER: This video is based on real historical events and figures, drawn from the sources listed above alongside primary archives, biographies, court records, period press, and leading historical scholarship. While every video is heavily researched, occasional minor inaccuracies in dates, quotes, or specific details may occur — historical sources sometimes disagree, and interpretation is sometimes required where the historical record is silent. Any errors are unintentional. #OldHistoryNights #HistoryForSleep #StoneAge