A NORTH-East student is to spend his summer living as a Stone Age man as part of an ambitious academic experiment.
Jake Newport, a Durham University postgraduate student specialising in plants eaten in the Mesolithic period, has been chosen for a six-week living history trial at a Stone Age museum in northern Germany.
The 23-year-old will spend his days living as a hunter-gatherer from 6,000BC, building huts and boats, crafting weapons and ceramics and making clothes using only pre-historic technology, as well as taking part in Mesolithic art, games and rituals.
His only 21st century luxury will be a pen and paper with which to chronicle his life and lessons learned.
“I’m very excited,” he said. “At first I thought there’s no way I can give six weeks of my life, but then I thought: I might never get another chance.
“It’s so difficult to comprehend life as a hunter-gatherer, even for somebody who studies the period. You could read a hundred books about the subject but unless you’ve lived it, you can’t really understand it.
“My only worry is I’m running out of time to have everything prepared.”
He is currently preparing his animal skin clothing.
The experiment will take place across 80 hectares of Steinzeitpark Dithmarschen, in Albersdorf, 60 miles north of Hamburg, from July 27 to September 6.
A carefully selected team with expertise in prehistoric hunting, tracking, leather working and more will live together under the watchful eye of Dr Rudiger Kelm, the museum’s director.
Organisers are keen to avoid comparison with the Channel 5 reality TV show 10,000 BC, but Mr Newport conceded observers might consider the project a more realistic attempt to recreate the daily lives of our distant ancestors.
One valuable asset Mr Newport will contribute will be his homemade prehistoric-style dugout canoe, which he has spent much of the last year creating and which is being shipped out to the continent specially.
Mr Newport’s writings will be posted on his blog: chronicles-of-a-curious-person.jimdo.com/blog/living-mesolithic-blog
More information about the project can be found at exarc.net/events/living-mesolithic
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