Animal remains from the Parknabinnia Neolithic court tomb in County Clare, Ireland.
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Large monuments made of stone (Megaliths), or timber and earth, appeared across much of Western Europe with the onset of the Neolithic. These monuments are often funerary in nature (tombs), but were clearly not simple burial sites, but locations to which people would regularly return to carry out ritual activities. The builders of these tombs are presumed to monuments are presumed to have been farmers, and the rituals associated with the structures appear to have been linked to spring, and possibly fertility, as many of them contain, alongside Human remains, the remains of young domestic Animals (which would have been born in spring, as well as Hares, which, due to their mating habits, are far more conspicuous in spring than at other times of year.