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1
Horvat, Kristina. "Early Neolithic Settlement Patterns in Northern Dalmatia." Open Archaeology 7, no. 1 (January 1, 2021): 736–46. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/opar-2020-0159.
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Abstract This article focuses on the early Neolithic settlement patterns in northern Dalmatia, located in the middle of the eastern Adriatic. At the present state of research, a total of 35 Neolithic sites have been known in this region, 26 of which belong to the Early Neolithic. Observing the type and character of the early Neolithic sites, their micro-topographic features, proximity and availability of resources, organization of life in relation to environment requirements, continuity of life at a particular location, and economic strategies, we come to the conclusion that the early Neolithic settlement patterns in northern Dalmatia were determined by natural landscape and its resources. They are the postulate and basis for the development of different aspects of social life and economy, as well as the starting point for the interpretation of the character and dynamics of the development of the early Neolithic communities in this area. The site locations, stratigraphic relations, and radiocarbon dating also suggest movements of the early Neolithic communities. The movements seem to have taken place exclusively within the fields. Discussion whether it was one or several simultaneous communities/settlements remains limited, since the state of research does not allow precise attribution of the site to certain chronological segments of the Early Neolithic.
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Holgate, Robin. "Neolithic settlement patterns at Avebury, Wiltshire." Antiquity 61, no. 232 (July 1987): 259–63. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0003598x0005208x.
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Mlekuž Vrhovnik, Dimitrij. "Neolithic and Copper Age settlement dynamics in the Western Carpathian Basin and Eastern Alps." Documenta Praehistorica 46 (December 9, 2019): 268–82. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.46-16.
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The paper tackles the spatio-temporal patterns of Neolithic and Copper Age settlement dynamics in the Western Carpathian Basin and Eastern Alps with spatially explicit use of radiocarbon dates. It focuses on the spatial process of spread, movement, aggregation and segregation in the time frame between 8500 and 5000 cal BP. The distribution of Neolithic and Copper Age sites in the study area is clustered and patchy. The first Neolithic settlements appear as isolated islands or enclaves which then slowly expand to fill neighbouring regions. After 6300 cal BP the study area experienced a significant reduction in the extent of settlement systems, associated with the Late Neolithic to Copper Age transition.
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Mlekuž Vrhovnik, Dimitrij. "Neolithic and Copper Age settlement dynamics in the Western Carpathian Basin and Eastern Alps." Documenta Praehistorica 46 (December 9, 2019): 268–82. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.46.16.
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The paper tackles the spatio-temporal patterns of Neolithic and Copper Age settlement dynamics in the Western Carpathian Basin and Eastern Alps with spatially explicit use of radiocarbon dates. It focuses on the spatial process of spread, movement, aggregation and segregation in the time frame between 8500 and 5000 cal BP. The distribution of Neolithic and Copper Age sites in the study area is clustered and patchy. The first Neolithic settlements appear as isolated islands or enclaves which then slowly expand to fill neighbouring regions. After 6300 cal BP the study area experienced a significant reduction in the extent of settlement systems, associated with the Late Neolithic to Copper Age transition.
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Květina, Petr, and Markéta Končelová. "Neolithic LBK Intrasite Settlement Patterns: A Case Study from Bylany (Czech Republic)." Journal of Archaeology 2013 (February 27, 2013): 1–7. http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/581607.
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This paper could also be a contribution to a new concept for understanding space and time in Neolithic settlements. We abandoned the methodological concept of construction complexes of houses and used individual archaeological features as the basic analytical unit. The analysis of quantitative correlations of decorative style conducted on this basis produced five style groups; four of these belonged to a LBK style, and it was these that were spatially distinct at the Bylany settlement. The discovered spatial patterns of style correspond in general to the existing chronology of the site. This means that chronological horizons understood both as intervals on the time axis and as geographic units are not dependent on “construction complexes” or even on individual houses. The value of this study does not lie in a more detailed chronological division of the Neolithic settlement at Bylany, but in a confirmation of the robustness of its existing form; the study also draws attention to a possible problem in the concept of construction complexes.
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Starling, N. J. "Colonization and Succession: The Earlier Neolithic of Central Europe." Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 51, no. 1 (December 1985): 41–57. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0079497x00007027.
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Models of population and resource pressure to explain developments such as technological innovation, increasing cultural complexity and competition and warfare, have been commonly used in studies of the earlier neolithic (Bandkeramikand early TRB) of Central Europe, in the fifth and fourth millennia bc. The usefulness of such models is questioned for this period, with reference in particular to Central Germany. After initial colonization, there was no simple pattern of continuous settlement expansion; rather, initially widespread settlement developed generally into a more aggregated pattern, with a contraction of the settlement area and virtually no internal or external expansion of settlement. Models of environmental change or resource exhaustion to explain these developments are also challenged, and emphasis placed on social and subsistence changes which provided the impetus for the dynamics of the settlement pattern. Changes in settlement, with the emergence of larger villages and enclosures, culminating in the appearance of major enclosure sites and a break in settlement continuity in the early TRB, are linked with other developments; the regionalization of culture, changes in material culture and burial types, and social organization. The origins of the settlement and social patterns in this period can be seen, not in the changes forced by external factors, but in the internal developments of the neolithic groups themselves.
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Manen, Claire, Thomas Perrin, Laurent Bouby, Stéphanie Bréhard, Elsa Defranould, Solange Rigaud, and Sylvie Philibert. "Territoriality and Settlement in Southern France in the Early Neolithic: Diversity as a Strategy?" Open Archaeology 7, no. 1 (January 1, 2021): 923–38. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/opar-2020-0179.
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Abstract In the western Mediterranean, the question of the settlement patterns of the first farming communities remains a much debated issue. Frequently compared with the LBK model, based on hundreds of well-documented villages, the settlement organization of the Impressed Ware complex is still poorly characterized and highly diversified. New data obtained in Southern France (Languedoc) may shed light on this matter, based on new excavations, revised data, and a multi-proxy perspective (site type, domestic area, food supply strategies, activities, spheres of acquisition of raw material, and so forth). Rather than reproducing a pattern of site locations and settlement structuring, it seems that these Early Neolithic groups sought to optimize the location and structuring of their settlements in relation to the specific characteristics of the surrounding environment and available resources. We therefore propose that the diversity observed in the settlement organization of these first farming communities is a reflection of a social organization well-adapted to the diversity of the ecosystem.
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Brigand, Robin, and Olivier Weller. "Neolithic and Chalcolithic settlement patterns in central Moldavia (Romania)." Documenta Praehistorica 40 (2013): 195–207. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.40.15.
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Whittle, Alasdair. "Neolithic settlement patterns in temperate Europe: Progress and problems." Journal of World Prehistory 1, no. 1 (March 1987): 5–52. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/bf00974816.
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Yerkes, Richard W., Attila Gyucha, and William Parkinson. "A Multiscalar Approach to Modeling the End of the Neolithic on the Great Hungarian Plain Using Calibrated Radiocarbon Dates." Radiocarbon 51, no. 3 (2009): 1071–109. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0033822200034123.
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This article presents the results of a multiscalar analysis of 168 radiocarbon dates from Neolithic and Copper Age sites on the Great Hungarian Plain. We examined chronological patterns at different geographic scales to explore socioeconomic changes that occurred during the transition from the Neolithic to the Copper Age. The beginning and end of the Late Neolithic (5000–4500 cal BC) and Early Copper Age (4500–4000 cal BC) were modeled with 14C dates calibrated with the CALIB 5.01 program and IntCal04 calibration curve. Our attempts to identify chronological subphases within these 500-yr-long periods were confounded by multiple intercepts in the calibration curve. The analysis indicated that terminal Late Neolithic (4700–4300 cal BC) and “transitional” Proto-Tiszapolgár occupations (4600–4250 cal BC) at tell sites were contemporary with initial Early Copper Age habitations (4450–4250 cal BC). Calibrated dates from small Early Copper Age settlements at Vészto-Bikeri and Körösladány-Bikeri document changes in community and household organization that took place over several decades during the transition to the Copper Age. Bayesian analysis indicated that the small fortified sites were occupied contiguously in phases of 30–50 yr. The younger Körösladány-Bikeri site was established before the older Vészto-Bikeri site was abandoned. When large nucleated Late Neolithic communities dispersed and established small Early Copper Age settlements, the pattern of vertical accretion that had created the Late Neolithic tells gave way to a pattern of horizontal settlement accretion at the smaller settlements.
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Chemyakin, Yury P. "Neolithic Complex of the Settlement of Barsova Gora II/9." Archaeology and Ethnography 19, no. 7 (2020): 191–202. http://dx.doi.org/10.25205/1818-7919-2020-19-7-191-202.
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Purpose. Materials published here describe findings on the ancient settlement Barsova Gora II/9b (located 7 km to the west of Surgut city on the right bank of the Ob river). Over the 5 years of excavations, the remains of structures from different time periods were uncovered and studied, among which 5 seated below grade square and rectangular dwellings stand out. Results. Original flat-bottomed pottery, clay ornamented bars and a spherical pommel have been found inside these dwellings. Clay bars were probably used as spatulas for smoothing dishes, skin scrapers. Among stone tools, polished ones predominate: chopping tools (axes, adzes, chisels, including grooved ones), lancet-shaped arrowheads and knives, as well as abrasives. Flint tool findings were less common: a few leaf-shaped arrowheads, scrapers and one lithic core. A fragment of a quartz lithic core and about ten quartz flakes were found as well. Among the pottery next to flat-bottomed vessels, there are round-bottomed vessels. Generally pottery is decorated in a variety of ways – drawn, impaled, using a walking comb stamp, with pits. Among the patterns there appears straight, broken or wavy lines, areas of a walking stamp. Clear geometric shapes are rare. On some pots horizontal compositions are replaced by vertical ones in the lower half of the vessels. Flat bottoms are ornamented with crossed, wavy and other patterns. Conclusion. Incorrect functional identification of the clay bars during first excavations led to initial incorrect dating of the settlement as belonging to the Early Bronze Age. The stratigraphy and radiocarbon dating during the new excavations revealed earlier settlement dates going back to early Neolithic. Some similarities to these structures and settlement type can be found in the ancient settlements of Boborykino and Bystrinsky cultures, Petrovoborsky and Kayukovsky types, settlements of Amnya I and others within the Eneolithic Period as well. However, the settlement of Barsova Gora II/9b is a unique cultural type dating from 6th – early 5th millennium BC.
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Kokkinidou, Dimitra, and Katerina Trantalidou. "Neolithic and Bronze Age Settlement in Western Macedonia." Annual of the British School at Athens 86 (November 1991): 93–106. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0068245400014921.
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The aim of this paper is to provide an account of neolithic and bronze age settlement in one part of Macedonia: the geographical unit which is defined by the rivers Aliakmon and Axios. The choice of the area as the focus of investigation has been suggested by the hypothesis that geographical zones may form a historical basis for human activity, and cultural zones be identified accordingly with distinct physiographic units. The area selected for research is one such unit forming consecutive basins which are divided into valley systems by means of mountain ranges.The existing archaeological data combined with the results of personal research and original fieldwork are assembled in order to outline the development of human settlement in this part of Macedonia. The catalogue contains ninety six sites. The study involves an attempt to evaluate the nature of prehistoric habitation in a regional context, a study which presupposed some examination of all reported sites, and some study of the history of the landscape. The main issues discussed are the character of habitation patterns and settlement distribution and continuity by period. Finally the specific settlement patterns of the area are compared with patterns observed in neighbouring regions.
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Rathbone, Stuart. "A Consideration of Villages in Neolithic and Bronze Age Britain and Ireland." Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 79 (May 3, 2013): 39–60. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/ppr.2013.2.
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Neolithic and Bronze Age settlements in Britain and Ireland have, on occasion, been referred to as being prehistoric villages but there is little agreement as to what a settlement from these periods should consist of for it to be confidently identified as such. A particular problem is that the development of villages in Britain and Ireland is commonly seen as being a medieval phenomenon and most discussions regarding the essential characteristics of villages are centred on medieval evidence. This paper examines which features of a prehistoric settlement can be used to determine if the use of the term ‘village’ is appropriate, ultimately finding the number of contemporary households to be the primary concern. Sites which have been identified specifically as being Neolithic or Bronze Age villages are critically reviewed, as are a selection of sites where the designation may be appropriate but where the term has so far been avoided. The number of sites from both periods that could justify being identified as being villages is found to be low, and in all cases it seems that moves toward larger nucleated settlements are geographically and chronologically restricted and are followed by a return to dispersed settlement patterns. This curious pattern of the rapid creation and decline of villages at a regional level is contrasted with different explanations for the development of nucleated settlements from other areas and during other time periods, which revolve around economic and agricultural intensification, the development of more hierarchical societies and the increase in structured trading networks. They do not fit well with either our current perceptions of Neolithic and Bronze Age societies, or with the strictly localised moves towards nucleation that were observed. New explanations with a more local focus are found to be required
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Reingruber, Agathe. "Early Neolithic settlement patterns and exchange networks in the Aegean." Documenta Praehistorica 38 (December 1, 2011): 291. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.38.23.
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Mazurowski, Ryszard F., Danuta J. Michczyńska, Anna Pazdur, and Natalia Piotrowska. "Chronology of the Early Pre-Pottery Neolithic Settlement Tell Qaramel, Northern Syria, in the Light of Radiocarbon Dating." Radiocarbon 51, no. 2 (2009): 771–81. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0033822200056083.
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Archaeological excavations at the Syrian settlement of Tell Qaramel have been conducted since 1999. They are concentrated on remnants of the Protoneolithic and early stages of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic period. The settlement has revealed an extremely rich collection of everyday use of flint, bone, and mostly stone objects, such as decorated chlorite or limestone vessels; shaft straighteners used to stretch wooden arrow shafts, richly decorated in geometrical, zoomorphic, and anthropomorphic patterns; as well as different kinds of stones, querns, mortars, pestles, grinders, polishing plates, celts, and adzes.Excavations brought the discovery of 5 circular towers. Some 57 charcoal samples were collected during the excavations and dated in the GADAM Centre in Gliwice, Poland. The stratigraphy of the settlement and results of radiocarbon dating testify that these are the oldest such constructions in the world, older than the famous and unique tower in Jericho. They confirm that the Neolithic culture was formed simultaneously in many regions of the Near East, creating a farming culture and establishing settlements with mud and stone architecture and creating the first stages of a proto-urban being.
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Allcock, Samantha Lee, and Neil Roberts. "Changes in regional settlement patterns in Cappadocia (central Turkey) since the Neolithic: a combined site survey perspective." Anatolian Studies 64 (2014): 33–57. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0066154614000040.
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AbstractMore than 50 years of archaeological survey work carried out in Cappadocia in central Turkey has produced a number of important contributions to the understanding of long-term settlement histories. This article synthesises and critically evaluates the results of three field surveys conducted in Cappadocia which recorded material remains dating from the Early Holocene through to the establishment of the Republic of Turkey. Results from the combined Cappadocia surveys reveal temporal patterns over the longue durée that include a lack of detectable pre-Neolithic occupation and important exploitation of obsidian as a raw material during the Neolithic. There was growth and expansion of settlement during the later Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age, a steady continuation of settlement during the Middle and Late Bronze Ages, followed by rupture in settlement at the end of the Bronze Age. A new phase of settlement expansion began during the Iron Age and continued through Hellenistic and Roman times. This in turn was disrupted during the Byzantine period, which is associated with increased numbers of fortified sites. The succeeding long cycle of settlement began in Seljuk times and continued through to the end of the Ottoman period. Comparison with systematic archaeological site surveys in the adjacent regions of Paphlagonia and Konya shows some differences in settlement patterns, but overall broad sim¬ilarities indicate a coherent trajectory of settlement across central Anatolia over the last ten millennia.
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Rubaka, Charles C. "Pastoral Neolithic Settlement and Subsistence Patterns in the Mang'ola Graben, Tanzania." Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa 35, no. 1 (January 2000): 198–203. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00672700009511603.
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Phillipps, Rebecca, Simon Holdaway, Joshua Emmitt, and Willeke Wendrich. "Variability in the Neolithic Settlement Patterns of the Egyptian Nile Valley." African Archaeological Review 33, no. 3 (July 5, 2016): 277–95. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10437-016-9224-0.
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Mwitondi, Musa S., Albert S. Mjandwa, and Pastory M. Bushozi. "Mollusc Shells from Neolithic Contexts in the Lake Eyasi Basin, Northern Tanzania." Tanzania Journal of Science 47, no. 3 (August 14, 2021): 1086–101. http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/tjs.v47i3.19.
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The study of the Neolithic period in the Lake Eyasi Basin was dominated by attempts to formulate the area’s chronology, mobility, settlement patterns, subsistence, and cultural capabilities of Neolithic people as attested by domesticated animals, pottery, and lithic artefacts. Occasionally, studies on molluscs were mentioned, but rarely described in detail. Neolithic sites across the Lake Eyasi Basin have yielded remains of both terrestrial (gastropods) and freshwater mollusc shells (mussels). The abundance of mollusc shell remains in the archaeological records of the Lake Eyasi Basin have played a great role in chronological settings, mobility and community integrations, studies of settlement patterns, and other analyses. Mollusc remains have often been widely interpreted as a food supplement to other reliable food resources such as meat, vegetables and fish. Archaeological excavations and detailed analysis of the shells from Mumba rock shelter, Jangwani 3 and Laghangasimjega 2 have shown that molluscs played different roles. They were effectively used in tool manufacturing, as practical implements for handling objects, as scraping tools, as harpoons for fishing weapons, and sometimes for symbolism and in rituals. Terrestrial and freshwater molluscs coexisted in the Lake Eyasi Basin and were utilised equally by the Neolithic people during the Mid-Holocene period.
Keywords: Mollusc shells; Neolithic; Lake Eyasi Basin; Northern Tanzania
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Hofmann, Daniela, Renate Ebersbach, Thomas Doppler, and Alasdair Whittle. "The Life and Times of the House: Multi-Scalar Perspectives on Settlement from the Neolithic of the Northern Alpine Foreland." European Journal of Archaeology 19, no. 4 (2016): 596–630. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14619571.2016.1147317.
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The settlement record of the Neolithic of the northern Alpine foreland is used to address the question of what difference having high-resolution chronology — in this case principally provided by dendrochronology — makes to the kinds of narrative we seek to write about the Neolithic. In a search for detailed histories, three kinds of scale are examined. The longer-term development of cultural patterns and boundaries is found to correlate very imprecisely with the character and architecture of settlements. Individual houses and settlements were generally short-lived, suggesting considerable fluidity in social relations at the local level. Greater continuity can be found in the landscape, perhaps involving more than individual communities. We argue that the particular history of the northern Alpine foreland is best understood by interweaving multiple temporal scales, an approach that will need to be extended to other case studies.
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Gurova, Maria, and Clive Bonsall. "‘Pre-Neolithic’ in Southeast Europe: a Bulgarian perspective." Documenta Praehistorica 41 (December 30, 2014): 95–109. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.41.5.
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This paper discusses why large areas of the central and northern Balkans lack evidence of Mesolithic settlement and what implications this holds for future research into the Neolithization of the region. A marked shift in site distribution patterns between Upper Palaeolithic and Mesolithic is interpreted as a response to changing environmental conditions and resource availability. It is suggested that some important questions of the pattern, processes and timing of the transition to farming across the Balkan Peninsula may only be answered through new archaeological surveys of the Lower Danube valley and exploration of submerged landscapes along the Black Sea, Aegean and Adriatic coasts.
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Stavitsky, V. V. "DISCUSSION OF THE «NEW ENEOLITHIC» CENTURY IN THE FOREST-STEPPE DON REGION." Izvestiya of Samara Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences. History Sciences 2, no. 3 (2020): 96–102. http://dx.doi.org/10.37313/2658-4816-2020-2-3-96-102.
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The article is devoted to the discussion of the processes of interaction between the population of Neolithic and Eneolithic cultures in the Upper and Middle Don basin. A.T. Sinyuk considered these processes within the framework of «Neolithic survival», A.M. Skorobogatov and A.V. Surkov propose to single them out into a special Neo-Eneolithic stage. The use of the new term does not solve the problem and does not contribute to a better understanding of the situation. There are no metal finds on the settlements of Don forest-steppe area, and the studied burials are few. The topography of the Sredny Stog settlements does not differ from the location of local Neolithic sites. The osteological materials from the Upper Don settlements named Vasilyevsky cordon 17 and 27 indicate that the leading place in the Eneolithic economy was occupied by hunting and fishing. And at the Middle Don settlement of Cherkasskaya 5 domestic animals were known already in the Neolithic Age. The layers with Sredny Stog`s pottery are usually found on the same monuments as Neolithic materials. A prerequisite for the conflict-free coexistence of different groups within a limited area is their orientation towards different sources of food, connected with the development of different natural and economic resources. There were no conditions for the parallel development of the population with different economic and social patterns in the Don region. Migrants and aborigines came into close contact with each other, which was reflected in the emergence of hybrid ceramic materials. The processes described above represent a particular case of transition from the stone age to the metal age, the content of which fully corresponds to the definition of Eneolithic.
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Matthews, Roger. "An arena for cultural contact: Paphlagonia (north-central Turkey) through prehistory." Anatolian Studies 57 (December 2007): 25–34. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0066154600008474.
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AbstractThe results from five seasons of extensive and intensive survey in north-central Turkey, Project Paphlagonia, are here considered in relation to the prehistory of the region and the broader geographical scene. While the evidence remains limited and patchy it is possible to discern some clear patterns through these long time-periods, which in some respects match those of other regions of Turkey and beyond. They include: a strong Middle Palaeolithic presence; no detectable Upper Palaeolithic or Epi-Palaeolithic sites; an apparent absence of Neolithic settlement; a Chalcolithic settlement pattern that appears to be related to exploitation of raw materials of the region, and; a massive increase in settlement through the centuries of the Early Bronze Age, with evidence for fortification, cemeteries and strong connections to regions well beyond north-central Turkey.
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Marciniak, Arkadiusz, and Lech Czerniak. "Social transformations in the Late Neolithic and the Early Chalcolithic periods in central Anatolia." Anatolian Studies 57 (December 2007): 115–30. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0066154600008541.
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AbstractThis article explores the character of social transformations within Late Neolithic and Early Chalcolithic communities of central Anatolia. This comprises the demise of neighbourhood communities that formed the social basis of the Early Neolithic period and the emergence of the household as a well-defined and autonomous entity. These changes are examined by focusing mainly on settlement patterns, the organisation of space and changes in architecture. The transformations are examined on the microscale, using Çatalhöyük as a case study, and on a regional scale focused on three areas of central Anatolia: the Beyşehir-Seydişehir area, the Konya plain and the Cappadocian region.
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Yanes, Yurena, Rainer Hutterer, and Jörg Linstädter. "On the transition from hunting-gathering to food production in NE Morocco as inferred from archeological Phorcus turbinatus shells." Holocene 28, no. 8 (June 7, 2018): 1301–12. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0959683618771474.
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Processes behind the shift from hunting-gathering to food production lifestyle are multifaceted and not yet completely understood. The Mediterranean coast of NW Africa provides an eclectic transitional pattern, namely, a very hesitant transition to food production. The distribution and abundance of early Neolithic domesticated species is disparate and region specific. Climate and environmental change have been often considered as an important influencing factor for this transition. This hypothesis was tested using archeological shells of the rocky intertidal gastropod Phorcus turbinatus recovered from the Ifri Oudadane site in NE Morocco. The oxygen isotope composition (δ18O) of the shell was used to examine whether the hesitant transition to food production was linked to a local climate shift in the Mediterranean Maghreb. Intrashell δ18O values suggest a marked temperature increase from >7.6 to ~7.0 cal. ka BP, the time when Neolithic innovations first appear on site. An additional increase in temperature from ~7.0 to <6.8 cal. ka BP matches with the beginning of the main occupation phase and the doubtless breakthrough of cultivation at Ifri Oudadane. This apparent warming trend, although considered preliminary, seems to match well with warming tendency observed in several published regional climate proxies. Therefore, a temperature shift may have played a role in the timing and implementation of food production in the area. Last growth episode δ18O values suggest that shellfish were harvested throughout most of the year, with noticeable intensification during the cooler half of the year. This preliminary pattern was fairly consistent throughout the Epipaleolithic and early Neolithic phases, pointing to a probable near year-round site occupation rather than a single season settlement. Future research on Ifri Oudadane and other NW African archeological records are much needed to assess whether these patterns persist in Morocco and other Epipaleolithic and early Neolithic settlements in the western Mediterranean Maghreb.
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Mason, Phil, and Maja Andrič. "Neolithic\Eneolithic settlement patterns and Holocene environmental changes in Bela Krajina (south-eastern Slovenia)." Documenta Praehistorica 36 (December 1, 2009): 327. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.36.21.
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Clay, Patrick, Clive R. Jones, Elaine L. Jones, Gary Haley, Elizabeth Healey, Alex Gibson, Ann Stirland, Anthony J. Gouldwell, and Angela Monckton. "Neolithic/Early Bronze Age Pit Circles and their Environs at Oakham, Rutland." Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 64 (January 1998): 293–330. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0079497x00002255.
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Fieldwork east of Oakham, Rutland has located evidence of prehistoric settlement, land use patterns, and ceremonial monuments. Part of this included the excavation of a cropmark site which has revealed an unusual sequence of Neolithic/Early Bronze Age pit circles and a burial area. This is complemented by a fieldwalking survey of the surrounding areas, allowing consideration of the relationship of juxtaposed flint scatters and the excavated ceremonial area.
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Pyzel, Joanna. "Early Neolithic Settlement Patterns in the Polish Lowlands – A Case Study of Selected Micro-Regions in Eastern Kuyavia." Open Archaeology 7, no. 1 (January 1, 2021): 1091–104. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/opar-2020-0173.
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Abstract The purpose of this paper is the presentation of the settlement of the first farming communities of the Linear Pottery culture in the Polish lowlands. A case study of three neighboring micro-regions excavated on a large scale in eastern Kuyavia was conducted, which offered the possibility of analyzing various levels of the settlement. Based on the results obtained a local model of the LBK occupation in Kuyavia could be reconstructed. I argue that despite some regional variability a very general common settlement pattern existed for the whole LBK consisting of an iconic longhouse as the basic unit, the presence of micro-regional clusters of more or less contemporary sites, and the preference for regions with optimal environmental conditions. However, a detailed comparison within and between separate sites in the study area revealed some degree of variability inside this supposedly homogeneous pattern which can indicate the existence of different social units among small regional communities and their changes over time.
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Gassiot-Ballbè, Ermengol, Niccolò Mazzucco, Sara Díaz-Bonilla, Laura Obea-Gómez, Javier Rey-Lanaspa, Marcos Barba-Pérez, David Garcia-Casas, et al. "Mountains, Herds and Crops: Notes on New Evidence from the Early Neolithic in the Southern Central Pyrenees." Open Archaeology 7, no. 1 (January 1, 2021): 1015–34. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/opar-2020-0193.
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Abstract After years of intense fieldwork, our knowledge about the Neolithisation of the Pyrenees has considerably increased. In the southern central Pyrenees, some previously unknown Neolithic sites have been discovered at subalpine and alpine altitudes (1,000–1,500 m a.s.l.). One of them is Cueva Lóbrica, 1,170 m a.s.l., which has an occupation phase with impressed pottery dated ca. 5400 cal BCE. Another is Coro Trasito, 1,558 m a.s.l., a large rock shelter that preserves evidence of continuous occupations in the Early Neolithic, 5300–4600 cal BCE. Evidence of human occupation at higher altitudes has also been documented. In the Axial Pyrenees, at the Obagues de Ratera rock shelter, 2,345 m a.s.l., an occupation has been dated to around 5730–5600 cal BCE. At Cova del Sardo, in the Sant Nicolau Valley, at 1,780 m a.s.l., a series of occupations have been excavated, dated to ca. 5600–4500 cal BCE. These sites allow us to discuss patterns of occupation of the mountainous areas between the Late Mesolithic and Early Neolithic. Recent data suggest that the last hunter–gatherer occupied all altitudinal stages of the Pyrenees, both in the outer and inner ranges. A change in the settlement pattern seems to have occurred in the Early Neolithic, which consisted of a concentration of occupations in the valley bottom and mid-slopes, in biotopes favourable to both herding and agriculture.
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Abell, J. T., J. Quade, G. Duru, S. M. Mentzer, M. C. Stiner, M. Uzdurum, and M. Özbaşaran. "Urine salts elucidate Early Neolithic animal management at Aşıklı Höyük, Turkey." Science Advances 5, no. 4 (April 2019): eaaw0038. http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aaw0038.
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The process of sheep and goat (caprine) domestication began by 9000 to 8000 BCE in Southwest Asia. The early Neolithic site at Aşıklı Höyük in central Turkey preserves early archaeological evidence of this transformation, such as culling by age and sex and use of enclosures inside the settlement. People’s strategies for managing caprines evolved at this site over a period of 1000 years, but changes in the scale of the practices are difficult to measure. Dung and midden layers at Aşıklı Höyük are highly enriched in soluble sodium, chlorine, nitrate, and nitrate-nitrogen isotope values, a pattern we attribute largely to urination by humans and animals onto the site. Here, we present an innovative mass balance approach to interpreting these unusual geochemical patterns that allows us to quantify the increase in caprine management over a ~1000-year period, an approach that should be applicable to other arid land tells.
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Eren, Şirin Gülcen. "Pre-pottery Neolithic age spatial planning: The typo-morphology of the first urbanisation with reference to three Akarçay Tepe plaques." Proceedings of the ICA 2 (July 10, 2019): 1–12. http://dx.doi.org/10.5194/ica-proc-2-27-2019.
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<p><strong>Abstract.</strong> Every civilisation, based on its socioeconomic relations, designs its land regime by using a cadastral system, plans the ways in which its land will be used, and present these through maps or spatial plans. Akarçay Tepe Lined and Marked Limestone Plaques, the use reasons of which are unknown by the archaeology discipline, were originally found during excavations and are on exhibition in Şanlıurfa Museum in Turkey. The plaques have been dated back to the Pre-Pottery Neolithic Age.</p><p>This paper aims to present what Plaques from Akarçay Tepe actually refer to and the methodology of determination. It originates from a research study which was commenced in 2017 on the basis of the propositions that these Plaques are in fact, maps and spatial plans showing the land regime and topography at the time they were made. Spatial dimensions of three Akarçay Tepe plaques with reference to technical features are examined on the foundation of the urban planning discipline. The objective here is to make it possible to adjust the findings of an archaeological excavation and to make a contribution as a proposed alternative method for the evaluation of these findings.</p><p>The three plaques for which research permission was granted were not related to the cadastral arrangements of Akarçay Tepe, but provide indications of the patterns of other settlements: Birecik, Yeşilözen, and Nizip. The plaques are spatial plans drawn to 1&thinsp;:&thinsp;1000 scale displayed in the form of a 3-D model map. The plaques show the settlement topography, land regime, land use decisions, boundaries of control and settlement and agricultural support systems. Plaques, besides agricultural land pattern display the first typo-morphology of urbanisation of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic Age.</p>
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Sánchez-Polo, Alejandra, and Antonio Blanco-González. "Death, Relics, and the Demise of Huts: Patterns of Planned Abandonment in Middle BA Central Iberia." European Journal of Archaeology 17, no. 1 (2014): 4–26. http://dx.doi.org/10.1179/1461957113y.0000000048.
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This paper addresses the formation processes at an unparalleled Bronze Age settlement in the Iberian Meseta. The site of El Cerro (Burgos, Spain) presents a series of challenging features: the simultaneous inhumation of three subadults alongside a dwelling quarter and adjacent pits, some of them filled with apparent formality, including such anachronistic elements as Neolithic and Beaker items and several placed deposits, such as a leg of a cow. A critical evaluation of the contextual dataset, a re-fitting operation, and an assessment of the abrasion and size of a ceramic sample were carried out. The archaeological peculiarities of the site are explained as a contextually specific cultural response to a grievous and traumatic episode: the death of three young siblings, which entailed the abandonment of the settlement through prescribed practices. Some depositions are a product of recognizable intentionality, while others are regarded as unintended cumulative outcomes.
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Nowak, Marek. "Middle and Late Holocene hunter-gatherers in East Central Europe: changing paradigms of the ‘non-Neolithic’ way of life." Documenta Praehistorica 34 (December 31, 2007): 89–103. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.34.7.
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According to traditional views, the main reason for ‘demesolithisation’ in East Central Europe was the spread of the Neolithic oecumene, particularly from c. 4000 BC. Simultaneously, the disintegrated Late Mesolithic world gradually underwent typological unification, and finally reached the stage that is sometimes described as pre-Neolithic. However, we definitely have to bear in mind that as a matter of fact we deal only with the ‘history’ of archaeological artefacts that are treated as typical attributes of hunter-gatherers. The analyses of chronological, technological, settlement, economic, and social data referring to foragers of East Central Europe demonstrate that the quantitative decrease and changes of their archaeological attributes in the fifth, fourth, and third millennia were not connected with a profound reorientation of their spatial and ideological existence. It was rather a continuation of previous patterns, even though territories settled by farming societies were steadily growing in size. The final disappearance of Central European hunter-gatherers – but only in a strictly typological dimension – took place in the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age.
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Vitezović, Selena. "Neolithisation of technology: innovation and tradition in the Starčevo culture osseous industry." Documenta Praehistorica 43 (December 30, 2016): 123–38. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.43.5.
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The earliest Neolithic cultures in Southeast Europe brought significant changes in many aspects of everyday life, in subsistence, settlement patterns, architecture, and also ritual aspects. Technological changes are also very important – the introduction of completely new technologies, such as clay working, or new techniques in existing industries, e.g., lithic, osseous, etc. The osseous industry is especially informative for questions on innovations and traditions, since it was well developed in both the Mesolithic and Neolithic periods. In Starčevo culture, certain Mesolithic traditions may be observed, such as techniques for antler manufacture; however, numerous innovations are also visible, particularly techno-types of Near Eastern origin such as spatula-spoons, the most characteristic bone techno-type of the Early Neolithic in South-east Europe, as well as diverse decorative items. Furthermore, new raw materials (bones from domestic animals) are introduced, and new techniques for manufacture and new tools. It is also interesting to observe that, although osseous materials remain the dominant raw material for personal ornaments, they are no longer used for artistic expression.
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Çevik, Özlem. "The emergence of different social systems in Early Bronze Age Anatolia: urbanisation versus centralisation." Anatolian Studies 57 (December 2007): 131–40. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0066154600008553.
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AbstractThe second half of the third millennium BC has generally been accepted as the period in which urbanisation took place in Anatolia. Prominent sites of this period are described by scholars as ‘towns’, ‘town-like settlements’, ‘city-states’ and ‘proto-city-states’. The use of a variety of terms for the same type of site implies that there is no clear consensus on the conceptualisation of this transformational process. It is generally accepted that, from the Neolithic period onwards, Anatolia did not display a great degree of cultural homogeneity, both in terms of material culture and social systems. The topography of Anatolia is divided by deep river valleys and high mountain chains, and this may well have been a crucial factor in stimulating cultural regionalism. This article suggests that Early Bronze Age populations in Anatolia did not just experience the process of urbanisation, but also centralisation. Furthermore, it has been argued that certain areas of Anatolia at this time experienced neither urbanisation nor centralisation, but remained rural. This paper utilises archaeological evidence, such as settlement patterns, settlement layouts and types of material culture that have social implications, to explain these phenomena.
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Avner, Uzi, and Israel Carmi. "Settlement Patterns in the Southern Levant Deserts During the 6th–3rd Millennia BC: a Revision Based on 14C Dating." Radiocarbon 43, no. 3 (2001): 1203–16. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0033822200038492.
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Archaeological surveys conducted in the Negev and Sinai during the 20th century were commonly interpreted as representing short settlement periods interrupted by long gaps. The time factor was usually based on archaeological estimates rather than comprehensive physical dating. For example, the perceived age and time duration of “hole-mouth” pottery sherds and tabular flint scrapers became a source of circular reasoning to “date” sites and their “duration.” Thus, desert sites became to be perceived as temporary, seasonal, short-lived, while the cultures of desert populations were somehow undervalued. However, radiocarbon dating of desert sites from the Late Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age IV presents a very different scenario. The deserts of the Southern Levant exhibit a full sequence of settlement, a longer life span of individual sites, and a higher level of activity and creativity of the desert people. This paper describes the controversy and presents the 14C data that form the basis for the revised view.
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Dolfini, Andrea. "From the Neolithic to the Bronze Age in Central Italy: Settlement, Burial, and Social Change at the Dawn of Metal Production." Journal of Archaeological Research 28, no. 4 (December 20, 2019): 503–56. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10814-019-09141-w.
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AbstractThe Late Neolithic and Copper Age were a time of change in most of Europe. Technological innovations including animal traction, the wheel, and plow agriculture transformed the prehistoric economy. The discovery of copper metallurgy expanded the spectrum of socially significant materials and realigned exchange networks away from Neolithic “greenstone,” obsidian, and Spondylus shells. New funerary practices also emerged, signifying the growing importance of lineage ancestors, as well as new ideas of personal identity. These phenomena have long attracted researchers’ attention in continental Europe and the British Isles, but comparatively little has been done in the Italian peninsula. Building on recent discoveries and interdisciplinary research on settlement patterns, the subsistence economy, the exchange of socially valuable materials, the emergence of metallurgy, funerary practices, and notions of the body, I critically appraise current models of the Neolithic-Bronze Age transition in light of the Italian regional evidence, focusing on central Italy. In contrast to prior interpretations of this period as the cradle of Bronze Age social inequality and the prestige goods economy, I argue that, at this juncture, prehistoric society reconfigured burial practices into powerful new media for cultural communication and employed new materials and objects as novel identity markers. Stratified political elites may not be among the new identities that emerged at this time in the social landscape of prehistoric Italy.
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Marder, O., A. Nigel Goring-Morris, H. Khalaily, Ianir Milevski, Rivka Rabinovich, and V. Zbenovich. "Tzur Natan, a Pre-Pottery Neolithic A Site in Central Israel and Observations on Regional Settlement Patterns." Paléorient 33, no. 2 (2007): 79–100. http://dx.doi.org/10.3406/paleo.2007.5222.
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Billamboz, André. "Regional patterns of settlement and woodland developments: Dendroarchaeology in the Neolithic pile-dwellings on Lake Constance (Germany)." Holocene 24, no. 10 (August 2014): 1278–87. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0959683614540956.
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JOHNSON, MATS. "WATER, ANIMALS AND AGRICULTURAL TECHNOLOGY: A STUDY OF SETTLEMENT PATTERNS AND ECONOMIC CHANGE IN NEOLITHIC SOUTHERN GREECE." Oxford Journal of Archaeology 15, no. 3 (November 1996): 267–95. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0092.1996.tb00086.x.
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Larsen, Clark Spencer, Christopher J. Knüsel, Scott D. Haddow, Marin A. Pilloud, Marco Milella, Joshua W. Sadvari, Jessica Pearson, et al. "Bioarchaeology of Neolithic Çatalhöyük reveals fundamental transitions in health, mobility, and lifestyle in early farmers." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 116, no. 26 (June 17, 2019): 12615–23. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1904345116.
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The transition from a human diet based exclusively on wild plants and animals to one involving dependence on domesticated plants and animals beginning 10,000 to 11,000 y ago in Southwest Asia set into motion a series of profound health, lifestyle, social, and economic changes affecting human populations throughout most of the world. However, the social, cultural, behavioral, and other factors surrounding health and lifestyle associated with the foraging-to-farming transition are vague, owing to an incomplete or poorly understood contextual archaeological record of living conditions. Bioarchaeological investigation of the extraordinary record of human remains and their context from Neolithic Çatalhöyük (7100–5950 cal BCE), a massive archaeological site in south-central Anatolia (Turkey), provides important perspectives on population dynamics, health outcomes, behavioral adaptations, interpersonal conflict, and a record of community resilience over the life of this single early farming settlement having the attributes of a protocity. Study of Çatalhöyük human biology reveals increasing costs to members of the settlement, including elevated exposure to disease and labor demands in response to community dependence on and production of domesticated plant carbohydrates, growing population size and density fueled by elevated fertility, and increasing stresses due to heightened workload and greater mobility required for caprine herding and other resource acquisition activities over the nearly 12 centuries of settlement occupation. These changes in life conditions foreshadow developments that would take place worldwide over the millennia following the abandonment of Neolithic Çatalhöyük, including health challenges, adaptive patterns, physical activity, and emerging social behaviors involving interpersonal violence.
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Dubovtseva, Ekaterina Nikolaevna, Lubov Lvovna Kosinskaya, and Henny Piezonka. "Analysis of the material culture and new radiocarbon dating of the Early Neolithic site of Amnya I." Samara Journal of Science 8, no. 2 (April 1, 2019): 149–59. http://dx.doi.org/10.17816/snv201982210.
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The ancient fortified settlement of Amnya I is a unique Early Neolithic site in the northern taiga zone of Western Siberia (Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug, the Amnya river). It is located on a promontory and has three lines of defense and ten dwelling depressions. The structures of the excavated dwellings are very similar, though the artifact assemblage appears rather heterogeneous. We carried out a technical and technological analysis of ceramics, which showed no correlation between the texture, on the one hand, and the morphology and ornamentation of pots on the other one. Planiographic analysis of ceramics showed that vessels with comb and incising patterns are found in different dwellings, although there are objects in which both groups lie together. Various categories of stone implements (bladelets and polished arrowheads) also appear on different parts of the settlement. Most likely, the observed differences in the artefact complexes of objects are associated with the stages of the functioning of the settlement. The absolute chronology does not yet clarify the sequence of erection and existence of objects. New AMS date is probably vulnerable to a significant reservoir effect. The abundance of unsolved issues of absolute and relative chronology makes the resumption of research on this unique site urgent.
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Zimmermann, A., K. P. Wendt, T. Frank, and J. Hilpert. "Landscape Archaeology in Central Europe." Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 75 (2009): 1–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0079497x00000281.
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Estimations of population density, which consider regional variability, are an important key variable in archaeology as they have consequences not only for the environmental but also for the economical and social domains. In this paper, a ten-step procedure of a consistent group of methods is described which deals with the data required for estimations of population density at different scale levels (from excavation to large-scale distribution maps). For distribution maps, a method is presented by which densities of sites are displayed using optimal isolines. These demarcate so called ‘settlement areas’ at scales of between 1:25,000 and 1:2.5 million. Our knowledge of the density of households from key areas with the most complete archaeological records is upscaled for the regions within these isolines. The results of this procedure are estimations of population density for the early Neolithic (Bandkeramik, 51st century BC) and the Roman period (2nd century AD) for regions with some 10,000 km2.A simple statistical/graphical method is developed to analyse the relationship between settlement areas, soils, and precipitation. Taking into account the aspects of preservation of sites and the intensity of archaeological observations, an analysis of patterns of land use shows that in prehistory not all areas suitable for use were in fact incorporated into settlement areas. For prehistory, the idea of a most optimised use of land up to its carrying capacity (as it has been proposed for at least 50 years) can be falsified for specific areas. A large number of empty regions with good ecological conditions but lacking in settlement activity can be discussed as resulting from culture historical processes. As an example, the separation of areas inhabited by groups of different identities is discussed. The amount of used space (in terms of ‘settlement area’) however, increases from the early Neolithic to the 4th century BC from 5% to more than 40%. The increase between the Neolithic and the Iron Age is understood in terms of technological developments in farming systems. The percentage of areas with suitable conditions actually utilised between the Bandkeramik and Iron Age increases from 31.1% to 67.5% in the area covered by the Geschichtlicher Atlas der Rheinlande, and is much higher still in the Roman period (84.3%). State societies seem to use the land more efficiently compared to non-state systems. This is becoming even clearer on consideration of the intensity of human impact.Large-scale distribution maps dividing the Neolithic in five periods were analysed. In each of the periods large settlement areas seem to be characterised either by the development of specific cultural innovations or by exchange of a specific raw material. In the course of time, the size of settlement areas in a specific region fluctuates markedly. It is most plausible to assume that this is due to a remarkable mobility of seemingly sedentary populations. Individual families recombine to new socio-cultural units every few hundred years.The relationship between size of settlement areas and the number of households can be used to develop ideas relating to the flow of exchange goods. An example for the Bandkeramik considering the Rijckholt-Flint is presented. The combination of the number of households and the percentage of this raw material in the specific settlement areas visualises the amount needed and the amount transferred to other settlement areas in the neighbourhood. A future economical archaeology could use this information to develop ideas relating to the importance of the economic sector, ie, ‘procurement of flint’ in relation to the ‘production of foodstuffs’ according to the time required for each group of activities.In the last section, the relationship between settlement areas and human impact is discussed. For the periods of subsistence economy, it is argued that the size of the population and its farming system are the two most important factors. For example, in Bandkeramik settlement areas, approximately 2% of the forest covering the landscape was cut down; in Roman times, and depending on the intensity of farming, this reaches magnitudes of between 20% and 50%. Although some of the methods and arguments used in this paper may be exchanged for better ones in the future, it is already apparent that a consistent system of methods is essential to transfer results of analyses on a lower scale level as input on a higher level and vice versa.
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Mattingly, David J., Mohammed al-Mashai, Phil Balcombe, Nick Drake, Stephanie Knight, Sue McLaren, Ruth Pelling, et al. "The Fezzan Project 1999: preliminary report on the third season of work." Libyan Studies 30 (1999): 129–45. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0263718900002831.
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AbstractThis report summarises the work of the third season of the Fezzan project which took place in January 1999. The main environmental findings of the project team of specialist geographers are providing confirmation of dramatic climatic and environmental change over the last 100,000 years and give more precise dates for some of these changes. The excavations in Old Germa (ancient Garama) have continued through Islamic levels, with elements of five main phases of buildings now having been recorded. Additional standing structures, including one of Germa's main mosques, have been surveyed. Field survey around Germa has revealed further new settlement sites of prehistoric, Garamantian and Islamic date. Of particular importance is a series of lithic and pottery scatters relating to neolithic occupation along the edge of the Ubari Sand Sea, to the north of Germa. Further investigation of the irrigation channels (foggaras) has revealed significant new information about their size, construction and probable date. The report concludes with a brief preliminary analysis of changing settlement patterns over time.
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Chapman, John, and Robert Shiel. "Social Change and Land Use in Prehistoric Dalmatia." Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 59 (1993): 61–104. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0079497x00003753.
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The Neothermal Dalmatia Project is an Anglo-Yugoslav collaborative project whose aims are to define and explain changes in physical environment, settlement pattern and social structure in north Dalmatia over the last 12 millennia. The Project's fieldwork included archaeological field survey, analytical survey, trial excavation of Neolithic, Copper Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age and Roman sites, soil and land use mapping, ethnographic survey of modern villages and hamlets and palaeoenvironmental reconstructions (pollen, sediments, sea-level change, etc.). Within the long-term constraints of a limestone-dominated study region, the short-term events and medium-term agrarian and demographic cycles of the Dalmatian social groups have been studied in an inter-disciplinary manner. In this article, an attempt is made to examine the environmental and archaeological data within the frameworks of four explanatory models: the Land Use Capability (LUC) Model, the Cyclic Intensification–Deintensification (CID) Model, the Communal Ownership of Property (COP) Model and the Arenas of Social Power (ASP) Model. In the LUC model, reconstructions of past land use capabilities are used to derive postdictions of the most likely settlement patterns for successive periods (Neolithic–Roman); a high degree of postdictive success is met. In the CID model, Bintliff's model of cyclic variations in agricultural intensification and private land-holding is refined and tested against survey and excavation data. In the COP model, Fleming's model of communal land ownership is tested against similar data, with contrasting results. Finally, the ASP model is used to explain the expanded range of arenas of social power which develops from a place-based worldview in the early farming period. The conjoint use of these four explanatory models, which operate at different scales of duration, provides a broader basis for understanding changes in the prehistory of north Dalmatia in the Neothermal period than had previously been constructed.
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Götherström, Anders, Niklas Stenbäck, and Jan Storå. "The Jettböle middle Neolithic site on the Åland Islands – human remains, ancient DNA and pottery." European Journal of Archaeology 5, no. 1 (2002): 42–69. http://dx.doi.org/10.1179/eja.2002.5.1.42.
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The article focuses on problems in making generalizations about the character of Stone Age sites and the difficulties of separating sacred and secular remains. Like many other Pitted Ware sites, the middle Neolithic site of Jettböle on the Åland Islands has been characterized as a settlement site despite finds of a ritual character. This study investigates the spatial relationships and depositional patterns of different find categories, with a special focus on human remains, including DNA analysis and the ornamentation of pottery from one of the larger excavation units from the site. The character and meaning of the site seem to be more complex than previously considered. The results of the study stress the need for careful investigation of the contextual circumstances of finds before making general interpretations.
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Roffet-Salque, Mélanie, Arkadiusz Marciniak, Paul J. Valdes, Kamilla Pawłowska, Joanna Pyzel, Lech Czerniak, Marta Krüger, C. Neil Roberts, Sharmini Pitter, and Richard P. Evershed. "Evidence for the impact of the 8.2-kyBP climate event on Near Eastern early farmers." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 115, no. 35 (August 13, 2018): 8705–9. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1803607115.
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The 8.2-thousand years B.P. event is evident in multiple proxy records across the globe, showing generally dry and cold conditions for ca. 160 years. Environmental changes around the event are mainly detected using geochemical or palynological analyses of ice cores, lacustrine, marine, and other sediments often distant from human settlements. The Late Neolithic excavated area of the archaeological site of Çatalhöyük East [Team Poznań (TP) area] was occupied for four centuries in the ninth and eighth millennia B.P., thus encompassing the 8.2-thousand years B.P. climatic event. A Bayesian analysis of 56 radiocarbon dates yielded a high-resolution chronological model comprising six building phases, with dates ranging from before 8325–8205 to 7925–7815 calibrated years (cal) B.P. Here, we correlate an onsite paleoclimate record constructed from δ2H values of lipid biomarkers preserved in pottery vessels recovered from these buildings with changes in architectural, archaeozoological, and consumption records from well-documented archaeological contexts. The overall sequence shows major changes in husbandry and consumption practices at ca. 8.2 thousand years B.P., synchronous with variations in the δ2H values of the animal fat residues. Changes in paleoclimate and archaeological records seem connected with the patterns of atmospheric precipitation during the occupation of the TP area predicted by climate modeling. Our multiproxy approach uses records derived directly from documented archaeological contexts. Through this, we provide compelling evidence for the specific impacts of the 8.2-thousand years B.P. climatic event on the economic and domestic activities of pioneer Neolithic farmers, influencing decisions relating to settlement planning and food procurement strategies.
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Enshin, Dmitry N. "The Chronological Positions of the Boborykino and Koshkino Complexes in the Lower Ishim River Region (Based on Materials of the Mergen-6 Settlement)." Archaeology and Ethnography 19, no. 7 (2020): 203–15. http://dx.doi.org/10.25205/1818-7919-2020-19-7-203-215.
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Purpose. The article is devoted to one of the most debatable problems for the Trans-Ural Neolithic – the chronological correlation of the Boborykino and Koshkino complexes. From the excavations of the settlement Mergen-6 (Lower Ishim River Region), groups of these ceramic vessels from the ditches of dwellings were obtained. This allowed a spatial and chronological comparison. Results. Planographic, stratigraphic analysis of the location of the dwellings and the application of the “ties” method in assessing the spatial distribution of vascular fragments revealed a number of patterns. Morphological features of the in-depth part of buildings, interior details and the general relative position of structures (13 objects) indicate a unified architectural strategy and the presence of signs of the spatial organization of the settlement in antiquity – a layout loosely resembling a circular shape. This indicates the synchronization of the functioning of the dwellings. Ceramic vessels of both types lay in the same structures, at the same depths. Also, parts from the same vessels were found in different dwellings (fragments of 40 items). This is another confirmation of the synchronism of buildings and ceramic complexes in them. A comparison of the information with the dates (21 units) obtained from these structures on bone, horn, ceramics, and сharred crust on pottery confirmed these findings. Conclusion. The presented materials testify to the coexistence of the bearers of the Boborykino and Koshkino cultural traditions on the territory of the Lower Ishim River Region in the early Neolithic (the last quarter of the 7th millennium BC).
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Pringle, Ginny. "Settlement and Social and Economic Patterns at Old Basing, Hampshire: The Results of a Community Archaeology Project." Hampshire Studies 75, no. 1 (November 1, 2020): 273–322. http://dx.doi.org/10.24202/hs2020017.
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A community archaeology project (Dig Basing) was carried out by the Basingstoke Archaeological and Historical Society within the village of Old Basing, Hampshire during 2014–17 to discover more about settlement and social and economic patterns pre-1900 and to simultaneously engage the local community with archaeology. A total of 48 test pits of 1 × 1m were excavated across the village and over 16,000 artefacts recovered. The project provided a wealth of information that adds to and amplifies existing data, particularly medieval and later. Evidence for prehistoric and Roman occupation was slight but it implied a late Mesolithic/early Neolithic focus along the River Loddon. A lack of early medieval artefacts meant that it was not until the 11th century that the archaeological record became increasingly visible. Post- Norman conquest settlement was initially focussed along The Street, where settlement at the northern junction of Milkingpen Lane appeared largely discrete from that further south in the vicinity of St Mary's Church, before later expansion joined the two areas. Important evidence for post-Conquest metalworking, probably smelting, was found to the south-west of Oliver's Battery. A decline in amounts of medieval pottery, mid-period, may be attributable to the ravages of the Black Death, but from c. 1550 the situation had reversed, coinciding with increased occupation at Basing House. Subsequent rebuilding of village properties after the destructions of the Civil War saw Tudor brick robbed from the ruins of Basing House. Thereafter new pottery types and other goods reflected the new opportunities that arrived with the construction of the canal through the village in the 18th century and the railway in the 19th century. Artefacts recovered suggest a low to middling status, with infrequent indicators for greater wealth despite the existence of, at various times, the Norman ringwork, Basing House and the hunting lodge at the Grange.
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Val-Peón, Cristina, Juan I. Santisteban, José A. López-Sáez, Gerd-Christian Weniger, and Klaus Reicherter. "Environmental Changes and Cultural Transitions in SW Iberia during the Early-Mid Holocene." Applied Sciences 11, no. 8 (April 16, 2021): 3580. http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/app11083580.
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The SW coast of the Iberian Peninsula experiences a lack of palaeoenvironmental and archaeological data. With the aim to fill this gap, we contribute with a new palynological and geochemical dataset obtained from a sediment core drilled in the continental shelf of the Algarve coast. Archaeological data have been correlated with our multi-proxy dataset to understand how human groups adapted to environmental changes during the Early-Mid Holocene, with special focus on the Mesolithic to Neolithic transition. Vegetation trends indicate warm conditions at the onset of the Holocene followed by increased moisture and forest development ca. 10–7 ka BP, after which woodlands are progressively replaced by heaths. Peaks of aridity were identified at 8.2 and 7. 5 ka BP. Compositional, textural, redox state, and weathering of source area geochemical proxies indicates abrupt palaeoceanographic modifications and gradual terrestrial changes at 8.2 ka BP, while the 7.5 ka BP event mirrors a decrease in land moisture availability. Mesolithic sites are mainly composed of seasonal camps with direct access to the coast for the exploitation of local resources. This pattern extends into the Early Neolithic, when these sites coexist with seasonal and permanent occupations located in inland areas near rivers. Changes in settlement patterns and dietary habits may be influenced by changes in coastal environments caused by the sea-level rise and the impact of the 8.2 and 7.5 ka BP climate events.