Iron age

Agriculture
Caesar commented that Britain was a land of small farms, and this has been
proven by the archaeological evidence. Since Iron Age society was primarily
agricultural, it is safe to presume that the daily routine would have revolved
around the maintenance of the crops and livestock. Small farmsteads were
tended by, and would have supported, isolated communities of family or
extended family size, producing enough to live on and a little extra to
exchange for commodities that the farmers were unable to provide for
themselves.
Many of these small farmsteads, such as at Farley Mount in Hampshire,
delimited with a circular bank and ditch enclosure, were surrounded by linear
ditch systems that formed small rectangular fields, radiating out from the
farm itself.
It is obvious to presume that the daily routine would have revolved
around the maintenance of the crops and livestock.
Environmental evidence - in the form of carbonised grains and pollen - has
shown that new crops such as emmer wheat were introduced, in addition to
the spelt wheat, barley, rye and oats already grown in these fields.
Harvested crops were stored in either granaries that were raised from the
ground on posts, or in bell-shaped pits 2-3m (6-7ft) deep, dug into the chalk
landscape. Some 4,500 of these storage pits have been found within the
hillfort interior at Danebury in Hampshire, and if they were all used to store
crops, this would have essentially made the site one large fortified granary.
Although faunal evidence shows that cattle and sheep would have been the
most common farm animals, it is known that pigs were also kept. The
animals would have aided the family, not only with heavy farm labour, in the
case of the cattle, such as the ploughing of crop fields, but also as a valuable
form of manure, wool or hide, and food products.
Horses and dogs are also observed in the archaeological evidence from both
faunal remains and artefacts. Horses were used for pulling 2 or 4 wheeled
vehicles (carts, chariots), while dogs would have assisted in the herding of
the livestock and hunting. The classical writer Strabo actually comments that
Britain was famed for its hunting dogs, which were exported throughout the
Roman Empire.
Food
As for eating, bread would have been an important part of any meal, and
was made from wheat and barley ground down into flour using a quern-
stone. The dough would have then been baked in a simple clay-domed oven,
of which evidence has been found in Iron Age houses.
The barley and rye could also have been made into a kind of porridge,
evidence for which has been found in the stomach contents in preserved
Iron Age bodies that have been deposited in peat bogs in northern Europe.
In addition to this, the Roman writer Pliny explains that grain was also
fermented to make beer, and the surface foam that formed was scraped off
and used in the bread-making process.
Other than cereal grains, few plant materials survived. However we can
assume that Iron Age people supplemented their diet with edible berries,
leaves, flowers, nuts and roots. The animals reared as livestock, pigs, cattle
and sheep, would have been eaten as there is evidence of butchery on the
bones. Milk and dairy products would have been available in addition to fish,
birds, and the occasional wild animal. The evidence of beeswax in the
bronze-casting techniques shows that honey would also have been available
as a sweetener.
The interior of the house was an ideal place for the drying and preservation
of food. Smoke and heat from the constant fire would have smoked meat
and fish, and would have dried herbs and other plants perfectly. Salt was
another means of preserving meat for the cold winter months, but this was a
commodity that could not be made at a typical settlement and was therefore
traded.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/british_prehistory/ironage_intro_01.shtml
Neolithic period
Early Neolithic farming was limited to a narrow range of plants, both wild and
domesticated, which included einkorn wheat, millet and spelt, and the keeping of
dogs, sheep and goats. By about 8000 BC, it included domesticated cattle and pigs,
the establishment of permanently or seasonally inhabited settlements, and the use
of pottery.
A significant and far-reaching shift in human subsistence and lifestyle was to be
brought about in areas where crop farming and cultivation were first developed: the
previous reliance on an essentially nomadic hunter-gatherer subsistence technique
or pastoral transhumance was at first supplemented, and then increasingly replaced
by, a reliance upon the foods produced from cultivated lands. These developments
are also believed to have greatly encouraged the growth of settlements, since it
may be supposed that the increased need to spend more time and labor in tending
crop fields required more localized dwellings. This trend would continue into the
Bronze Age, eventually giving rise to towns, and later cities and state whose larger
populations could be sustained by the increased productivity from cultivated lands.
It was also important to figure out ways of preserving food for future months, such
as fashioning relatively airtight containers, and using substances like salt as
preservatives.

http://www.ancient.eu.com/Neolithic_Period/
The introduction of farming, when people learned how to produce rather
than acquire their food, is widely regarded as one of the biggest changes in
human history.
This change happened at various times in several different places around the
world. The concept of farming that reached Britain between about 5000 BC
and 4500 BC had spread across Europe from origins in Syria and Iraq
between about 11000 BC and 9000 BC.
It used to be believed that the introduction of farming into Britain was the result of
a huge migration or folk-movement from across the Channel.
Traditionally the arrival of farming is seen as a major and rapid change
sometimes called the 'Neolithic revolution'. Today, largely thanks to
radiocarbon dates, we can appreciate that the transition from hunter-
gatherer to farmer was relatively gradual.
We know, for example, that hunters in the Mesolithic 'managed' or tended
their quarry. They would make clearings in woodland around sources of
drinking water, and probably made efforts to see that the herds of deer and
other animals they hunted were not over-exploited.
The switch from managed hunting to pastoral farming was not a big change.
The first farmers brought the ancestors of cattle, sheep and goats with them
from the continent. Domestic pigs were bred from wild boar, which lived in
the woods of Britain.
Neolithic farmers also kept domesticated dogs, which were bred from
wolves. It is probable that the earliest domesticated livestock were allowed
to wander, maybe tended by a few herders.
Sheep, goats and cattle are fond of leaves and bark, and pigs snuffle around
roots. These domestic animals may have played a major role in clearing
away the huge areas of dense forest that covered most of lowland Britain.
Neolithic farmers also brought with them the first seed grains of wheat and
barley, which had been bred many millennia earlier from wild grasses that
grew in region of modern-day Iraq.
Initially, cereals were probably grown in garden plots near people's houses.
Once harvested, the grain needed to be stored and protected from natural
pests and from raiding parties.
This tended to encourage a more settled way of life than that of the
Mesolithic communities, who would move around the country on a seasonal
pattern, following the animals, birds and fish they hunted.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/british_prehistory/overview_british_prehistory_01.shtml