[10] The Bell Beaker artefacts (at least in their early phase) are not distributed across a contiguous area, as is usual for archaeological cultures, but are found in insular concentrations scattered across Europe.

[13] Turek sees late Neolithic precursors in northern Africa, arguing the Maritime style emerged as a result of seaborne contacts between Iberia and Morocco in the first half of the third millennium BC.

[3][27] The evidence is sufficient to support the suggestion that the initial spread of Maritime Bell Beakers along the Atlantic and into the Mediterranean, using sea routes that had long been in operation, was directly associated with the quest for copper and other rare raw materials.

Gordon Childe interpreted the presence of its characteristic artefact as the intrusion of "missionaries" expanding from Iberia along the Atlantic coast, spreading knowledge of copper metallurgy.

An example might be as part of a prestige cult related to the production and consumption of beer, or trading links such as those demonstrated by finds made along the seaways of Atlantic Europe.

[citation needed] AOO and AOC Beakers appear to have evolved continually from a pre-Beaker period in the lower Rhine and North Sea regions, at least for Northern and Central Europe.

Margaret Cox and Simon Mays sum up the position: "Although it can hardly be said that craniometric data provide an unequivocal answer to the problem of the Beaker folk, the balance of the evidence would at present seem to favour a migration hypothesis.

"[61] Furtwängler et al. (2020) analysed 96 ancient genomes from Switzerland, Southern Germany, and the Alsace region in France, covering the Middle/Late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age.

Overall, the Etruscan samples showed ~75% frequency of the Y-haplogroup R1b, mostly represented by R1b-P312 and its derived R1b-L2 lineage "that diffused across Europe alongside steppe-related ancestry in association with the Bell Beaker complex."

"[69] Yediay et al. (2024, Preprint) found that the arrival of steppe ancestry in Italy was mediated by "Bell Beaker populations of Western Europe", likely contributing to the emergence of the Italic and Celtic languages and consistent with the Italo-Celtic linguistic hypothesis.

[78][79][80][81][82] Bell Beaker people took advantage of transport by sea and rivers, creating a cultural spread extending from Ireland to the Carpathian Basin and south along the Atlantic coast and along the Rhône valley to Portugal, North Africa, and Sicily, even penetrating northern and central Italy.

[83] Its remains have been found in what is now Portugal, Spain, France (excluding the central massif), Ireland and Great Britain, the Low Countries and Germany between the Elbe and Rhine, with an extension along the upper Danube into the Vienna Basin (Austria), Hungary and the Czech Republic, with Mediterranean outposts on Sardinia and Sicily; there is less certain evidence for direct penetration in the east.

In the Iberian Peninsula, this AOC type was traditionally restricted to half a dozen scattered sites in the western Pyrenees, the lower Ebro, and the Spanish east coast; especially a vessel at Filomena at Villarreal, Castellón (Spain), has parallels with the decoration.

In its latest phase (c.1750–1300 cal BC) the local Beaker context became associated with the distinctive ornamented Boquique pottery[97] demonstrating clear maritime links with the (megalithic) coastal regions of Catalonia, also assessed to be directly related to the late Cogotas complex.

The presence of perforated Beaker pottery, traditionally considered to be used for making cheese, at Son Ferrandell-Oleza [99] and at Coval Simó [100] confirms the introduction of production and conservation of dairy.

According to archaeology, the populational groups of the Bell-beakers also took part in the formation of the Gáta-Wieselburg culture on the western fringes of the Carpathian Basin, which could be confirmed with the anthropological Bell Beaker series in Moravia and Germany.

[117] The Pömmelte and Schönebeck enclosures formed parts of a 'sacral landscape' with origins in an early 3rd millennium BC sanctuary and elite burial of the Corded Ware culture.

[137] The Wessex/Middle Rhine gold discs bearing "wheel and cross" motifs that were probably sewn to garments, presumably to indicate status and reminiscent of racquet headed pins found in Eastern Europe,[138] enjoy a general distribution throughout the country, however, never in direct association with beakers.

[139] The flat, triangular-shaped copper blade was 171 mm (6.73 in) long, with bevelled edges and a pointed tip, and featured an integral tang that accepted a riveted handle.

However, indications of their use of stream sediment copper, low in traces of lead and arsenic, and Beaker finds connected to mining and metalworking at Ross Island, County Kerry, provide an escape to such doubts.

[141] The featured "food vessels" and cinerary urns (encrusted, collared and cordoned) of the Irish Earlier Bronze Age have strong roots in the western European Beaker tradition.

The bowl tradition occurs over the whole country except the south-west and feature a majority of pit graves, both in flat cemeteries and mounds, and a high incidence of uncremated skeletons, often in crouched position.

The flexed skeleton of a man 1.88 meters tall in a cist in a slightly oval round cairn with "food vessel" at Cornaclery, County Londonderry, was described in the 1942 excavation report as "typifying the race of Beaker Folk",[145] although the differences between Irish finds and e.g. the British combination of "round barrows with crouched, unburnt burials" make it difficult to establishes the exact nature of the Beaker People's colonization of Ireland.

[130] In a tumulus the find of the extended skeleton of a woman accompanied by the remains of a red deer and a small seven-year-old stallion is noteworthy, including the hint to a Diana-like religion.

[168] Gold used to make discs from western Asturias (northern Spain) dating from the Bell Beaker period, was similarly found to be of non-local origin and possibly from southern Britain.

[181][182] According to Bayliss (2007), the "aggrandisement" of both Stonehenge and Silbury Hill occurred "in close relation to the appearance of novel material culture and practices" introduced by Beaker people.

[208] Graves with Beaker artefacts have been discovered in the Brescia area, like that of Ca' di Marco (Fiesse), while in central Italy, bell-shaped glasses were found in the tomb of Fosso Conicchio (Viterbo).

There is virtually no evidence in Sardinia of external contacts in the early second millennia, apart from late Beakers and close parallels between Bonnannaro pottery and that of the North Italian Polada culture.

Like elsewhere in Europe and in the Mediterranean area, the Bell Beaker culture in Sardinia (2100–1800 BC) is characterised by the typical ceramics decorated with overlaid horizontal bands and associated finds: brassards, V-pierced buttons, etc.

Debbie Olausson's (1997) examinations indicate that flint knapping activities, particularly the manufacture of daggers, reflect a relatively low degree of craft specialisation, probably in the form of a division of labour between households.