Bronze is a metal alloy, consisting chiefly of copper and tin, but sometimes also containing lead, arsenic and other substances. It's invention represents a significant technological achievement. Although metals (mostly copper, tin, and gold) were occasionally worked towards the end of the Neolithic, these metals are very soft and not particularly suitable for making tools. Combining copper and tin results in a much harder, but still easily worked material. Bronze was probably invented in the SouthEastern Mediterranean. The technology spread relatively quickly and reached Wessex about 2000 BC. One particularly difficulty was the procurement of raw materials: areas rich in tin mostly lacked copper deposits and vice versa. The 'invention' of  trade was a pre-requisite for the advent of the Bronze Age.

Bronze Age societies, in many respects, were highly sophisticated. They knew, not only how to exploit natural resources, but had also learned to manage woodland, farm animals, weave cloth and grow crops. Far from living at the bare existence minimum, these people had surplus time, which allowed them to develop a rich culture. New tools, such as bronze axes, made the construction of more complex objects possible.By the middle of the Bronze Age (c. 1500 BC) fairly permanent, albeit small, settlements were built. Round structures, each housing an extended family, were preferred because these were able to resist even fierce winter storms.  Around the same time more and more agricultural land was enclosed. Whilst barrows are the defining characteristic of the Early Bronze Age, fieldsystems are their Middle Bronze Age counterpart.

The enclosure of land implies a system of ownership. Although archaeology will never be able to be certain about social and cultural aspects of the past, it seems reasonable to assume that society had acquired a hierarchical structure by the Bronze Age (if not earlier). Many of the structures built in the Neolithic and Bronze Age required co-operation on a large scale, and probably also someone to initiate and be responsible for this co-operative effort. On the left is an illustration of what one of those chiefs might have looked like. The ornaments he is wearing were found in the primary (main) burial of a barrow near Stonehenge.