Beadlow has yielded the earliest evidence of human settlement and activity so far discovered in the modern civil parish of Clophill. During road widening immediately east of Beadlow Manor in 1972 a number of Mesolithic tools were found [HER 2595].

These comprised: four cores; a flake; a microburin; two microliths; a point and three scraper tools. It is thought that this is evidence of site where such tools were manufactured. Microburins are small, vaguely circular pieces of flint and were probably waste productsfrom the production of microliths. Microliths were used as points for spears or arrows, for example, or perhaps for punching a hole through leather or similar materials.