Relations of Mesolithic hunter-gatherers of Pomerania (Poland) with Neolithic cultures of central Europe

Abstract La Hoguette and Limburg pottery and the role their producers played in the Neolithization of western Central Europe are still a matter of debate. These styles exist in parallel to Linearbandkeramik (LBK) but are different from LBK pottery and here called Non-LBK wares. The various Non-LBK styles are mainly defined based on decoration, but this does not coincide with important technological features. Therefore, an technological approach including the parameters of temper, vessel morphology, and firing methods was used for an alternative classification and to trace knowledge transmission networks. It is suggested that several technologically distinguishable Non-LBK pottery traditions of different geographical origins existed contemporaneously in western Central Europe. While the early mineral- and organic-tempered ware shows some similarities with the Earliest and Early LBK, the widespread early bone-tempered pottery with its uniform design cannot be traced back to either Cardial or LBK pottery. This is probably the oldest pottery in western Central Europe. This means that here pottery emerged first as a tradition outside both the LBK and Cardial cultures. Increasing interaction between producers of various Non-LBK wares and LBK pottery makers can then be traced over several centuries. All styles are shown to be diverse and dynamic and to be undergoing substantial internal development. The persistent mutual influencing is a key for understanding the development of Non-LBK pottery, as well as for innovations within LBK ceramic production. Here, a hypothesis is proposed that the makers of Non-LBK wares may be hunter-gatherers, although this cannot currently be proven.

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Interactions between earliest Linearbandkeramik farmers and central European hunter gatherers at the dawn of European Neolithization

Scientific Reports ◽

10.1038/s41598-019-56029-2 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Alexey G. Nikitin ◽

Peter Stadler ◽

Nadezhda Kotova ◽

Maria Teschler-Nicola ◽

T. Douglas Price ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Central Europe ◽

Isotope Analysis ◽

Nitrogen Isotope ◽

Western Anatolia ◽

Hunter Gatherers ◽

Central European ◽

Carbon And Nitrogen ◽

Farming Communities ◽

Non Local ◽

Range Of Variation

AbstractArchaeogenetic research over the last decade has demonstrated that European Neolithic farmers (ENFs) were descended primarily from Anatolian Neolithic farmers (ANFs). ENFs, including early Neolithic central European Linearbandkeramik (LBK) farming communities, also harbored ancestry from European Mesolithic hunter gatherers (WHGs) to varying extents, reflecting admixture between ENFs and WHGs. However, the timing and other details of this process are still imperfectly understood. In this report, we provide a bioarchaeological analysis of three individuals interred at the Brunn 2 site of the Brunn am Gebirge-Wolfholz archeological complex, one of the oldest LBK sites in central Europe. Two of the individuals had a mixture of WHG-related and ANF-related ancestry, one of them with approximately 50% of each, while the third individual had approximately all ANF-related ancestry. Stable carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios for all three individuals were within the range of variation reflecting diets of other Neolithic agrarian populations. Strontium isotope analysis revealed that the ~50% WHG-ANF individual was non-local to the Brunn 2 area. Overall, our data indicate interbreeding between incoming farmers, whose ancestors ultimately came from western Anatolia, and local HGs, starting within the first few generations of the arrival of the former in central Europe, as well as highlighting the integrative nature and composition of the early LBK communities.

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Interactions between earliest Linearbandkeramik farmers and central European hunter gatherers at the dawn of European Neolithization

10.1101/741900 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Alexey G. Nikitin ◽

Peter Stadler ◽

Nadezhda Kotova ◽

Maria Teschler-Nicola ◽

T. Douglas Price ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Central Europe ◽

Isotope Analysis ◽

Nitrogen Isotope ◽

Western Anatolia ◽

Hunter Gatherers ◽

Central European ◽

Carbon And Nitrogen ◽

Farming Communities ◽

Non Local ◽

Range Of Variation

ABSTRACTArchaeogenetic research over the last decade has demonstrated that European Neolithic farmers (ENFs) were descended primarily from Anatolian Neolithic farmers (ANFs). ENFs, including early Neolithic central European Linearbandkeramik (LBK) farming communities, also harbored ancestry from European Mesolithic hunter gatherers (WHGs) to varying extents, reflecting admixture between ENFs and WHGs. However, the timing and other details of this process are still imperfectly understood. In this report, we provide a bioarchaeological analysis of three individuals interred at the Brunn 2 site of the Brunn am Gebirge-Wolfholz archeological complex, one of the oldest LBK sites in central Europe. Two of the individuals had a mixture of WHG-related and ANF-related ancestry, one of them with approximately 50% of each, while the third individual had approximately all ANF-related ancestry. Stable carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios for all three individuals were within the range of variation reflecting diets of other Neolithic agrarian populations. Strontium isotope analysis revealed that the ~50% WHG-ANF individual was non-local to the Brunn 2 area. Overall, our data indicate interbreeding between incoming farmers, whose ancestors ultimately came from western Anatolia, and local HGs, starting within the first few generations of the arrival of the former in central Europe, as well as highlighting the integrative nature and composition of the early LBK communities.

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The Neolithic Cultures of South-East Italy

Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society ◽

10.1017/s0079497x00019642 ◽

1947 ◽

Vol 13 ◽

pp. 85-100 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Robert B. K. Stevenson

Keyword(s):

Central Europe ◽

Single Site ◽

The West ◽

Complete Replacement ◽

Positive Evidence ◽

The Balkans ◽

Differences Of Opinion ◽

Important Study ◽

Time Reading ◽

Neolithic Cultures

South-east Italy, from the spur to the heel of Italy's boot, forms a natural geographic and cultural unit, separated from the Balkans by the Adriatic yet joined to them by the same sea. It is an area of plain and plateau bounded to the west and north by the Apennines, which come down to the sea at the Gulf of Taranto and again north of the Gargano peninsula.Considerably more material for the study of the neolithic cultures in this area has been found since T. E. Peet drew attention to their interest nearly forty years ago (II). Yet while the main kinds of pottery are recognised, positive evidence for their succession is still scarce. This is chiefly due to the lack of fully stratigraphic digging, as well as to a tendency to regard the objects found on any single site as ipso facto contemporary with one another or at least as due to a continuous occupation. Some confusion is probably also caused by the number of separate stations all usually called ‘Matera.’ Even so the main phases are now distinguishable, and the chief differences of opinion are regarding the extent to which the characteristic range of pottery of each of these, with all that that implies, continued alongside of the innovations.The following account based on war-time reading, and brief visits to Matera museum and a number of sites, will stress the view that there was fairly complete replacement: in this and the resulting division into three distinct periods, tentatively indicated by Rellini in 1929 (14c), it goes beyond the views of most Italian archaeologists, as well as previous English resumes. In particular Laviosa-Zambotti in her recent important study of Italian cultures and their relations with Central Europe and the Balkans (8b), while admitting that the various wares are due to a series of influences from outside, concludes that they are truly associated and therefore largely synchronous. This may be due in part to her leaning toward ‘short’ chronologies elsewhere. However, particularly in view of J. S. P. Bradford's remarkable crop-site discoveries (2), it seems worthwhile to set out the existing evidence for a more elaborate scheme, to be tested by future excavations.

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What Have Genetics Ever Done for Us? The Implications of aDNA Data for Interpreting Identity in Early Neolithic Central Europe

European Journal of Archaeology ◽

10.1179/1461957114y.0000000083 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 18 (3) ◽

pp. 454-476 ◽

Cited By ~ 26

Author(s):

Daniela Hofmann

Keyword(s):

Central Europe ◽

Genetic Data ◽

Fundamental Change ◽

Early Neolithic ◽

Migration Process ◽

Hunter Gatherers ◽

Neolithic Transition ◽

Transition Models ◽

New Research ◽

The Impact

This paper is concerned with the impact of ancient DNA data on our models of the Mesolithic–Neolithic transition in central Europe. Beginning with a brief overview of how genetic data have been received by archaeologists working in this area, it outlines the potential and remaining problems of this kind of evidence. As a migration around the beginning of the Neolithic now seems certain, new research foci are then suggested. One is renewed attention to the motivations and modalities of the migration process. The second is a fundamental change in attitude towards the capabilities of immigrant Neolithic populations to behave in novel and creative ways, abilities which in our transition models were long exclusively associated with hunter-gatherers.

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The second stage of Neolithisation and para-Neolithic in the southern Baltic

Samara Journal of Science ◽

10.17816/snv201764202 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 6 (4) ◽

pp. 116-124

Author(s):

Marek Nowak

Keyword(s):

Central Europe ◽

Territorial Development ◽

Hunter Gatherers ◽

Territorial Expansion ◽

East Central Europe ◽

East Central ◽

Archaeological Data ◽

Linear Band ◽

Funnel Beaker Culture ◽

Food Economy

The origins of the Neolithic, understood as a phenomenon with food economy dependent on agriculture, in east-central Europe are associated with the appearance of communities reflected by the Linear Band Pottery culture (LBK) in ca . 5500 BC. These communities settled only small enclaves, distinguished by ecological conditions favourable to farming. Situation of this kind persisted in the 5th millennium BC, when territories under discussion were inhabited by post-Linear groups. Consequently, at that time, hunter-gatherers still occupied ca. 70% of these territories. Such situation changed from 4200/4100 BC onwards, due to the formation and spectacular territorial expansion of the Funnel Beaker culture (TRB). This expansion covered both the areas previously inhabited by hunter-gatherers and farmers. Around 3500 BC Neolithic formation encompassed virtually the whole of this part of Central Europe. Parallel to the first and second Neolithisations, independent processes of ceramisation of the Late Mesolithic communities proceeded. While in the 5th millennium BC they were fairly selective, in the 4th millennium BC they were quite intensive. A new cultural model formed here which might be called para-Neolithic. Archaeological data indicate contacts between TRB and para-Neolithic communities. The latter phenomena (mainly the Neman culture) show also a significant territorial development.

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Introduction

Early Farmers ◽

10.5871/bacad/9780197265758.003.0001 ◽

2014 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Penny Bickle ◽

Alasdair Whittle

Keyword(s):

Cultural Diversity ◽

Central Europe ◽

The Other ◽

Neolithic Period ◽

Human History ◽

Hunter Gatherers ◽

Archaeological Science ◽

Long Term Consequences ◽

Recent Project

The Neolithic period worldwide can readily be identified as one of the great transformations in human history—in Europe, there were no farmers at c.7000 cal BC, but very few hunter-gatherers after c.4000 cal BC—with long-term consequences still felt today. However, it remains difficult to capture both the detail of everyday lives during the Neolithic, and the flow of long-term transformations. This introduction asks how we are to combine all our expanding data, and at what scales we should interpret them. The challenges facing integrated and multi-scalar approaches are illustrated by a recent project on Linearbandkeramik (LBK) lifeways in central Europe, which united isotopic, osteological and archaeological analyses in an investigation of cultural diversity. The other chapters that follow are introduced. The chapter ends by looking to how we better integrate archaeological science, through a shared focus on debating what questions we should ask.

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On the importance of spatio-temporal differences in the intensity of Palaeolithic and Mesolithic settlement in Central Europe

Antiquity ◽

10.1017/s0003598x00079813 ◽

1991 ◽

Vol 65 (247) ◽

pp. 308-317 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Slavomil Vencl

Keyword(s):

Central Europe ◽

Source Material ◽

Neolithic Period ◽

Historical Interpretation ◽

Temporal Differences ◽

Spatio Temporal ◽

Mesolithic Period ◽

Neolithic Cultures

IntroductionThe well-known fact that the sources of evidence concerning the pre-Neolithic period are seriously incomplete has not yet been analysed sufficiently, being concealed by the intensive interaction of very complex and variable factors. It is obvious, though, that even an imperfect attempt to quantify this problem could contribute to an explanation of the causes for the striking differences between the volume of archaeological source material from adjacent territories, or show the limits of attempts at a historical interpretation of the interrelationships between pre-Neolithic cultures. Unlike the post-Mesolithic period, the sources of the pre-Neolithic foraging societies suffer from reduced field visibility:1 first of all, they are not usually indicated by colour contrasts in the feature fillings;2 as a rule, they are reduced only to residues made of the most resistant materials;3 because of the mobility of small hunter-gatherer groups, only limited accumulations of finds occur in temporary camps, both in extent and in volume, easily escaping attention;4 Palaeolithic finds lie deeper under the present-day surface and are discovered less frequently than the remains of later periods;5 the Palaeolithic record was, over tens of thousands of years – this partly under the extreme Pleistocene conditions – subjected to destruction more frequently than the post-Palaeolithic romains;6 the intensity of the sedimentary and denu-datory processes differs regionally, and in other ways.

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Ceramics among Eurasian hunter-gatherers: 32 000 years of ceramic technology use and the perception of containment

Documenta Praehistorica ◽

10.4312/dp.43.2 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 43 ◽

pp. 61-86

Author(s):

Mihael Budja

Keyword(s):

Central Europe ◽

Technology Use ◽

Private Property ◽

Ceramic Technology ◽

Eastern Asia ◽

Women's Agency ◽

Hunter Gatherers ◽

Women’S Agency ◽

Western European

We present two parallel and 32 000 years long trajectories of episodic ceramic technology use in Eurasian pre-Neolithic hunter-gatherer societies. In eastern, Asian trajectory the pottery was produced from the beginning. Ceramic figurines mark the western, European trajectory. The western predates the eastern for about eleven millennia. While ceramic cones and figurines first appeared in Central Europe at c. 31 000 cal BC the earliest vessels in eastern Asia was dated at c. 20 000 cal BC. We discuss women’s agency, perception of containment, ‘cross-craft interactions’, and evolution of private property that that may influenced the inventions of ceramic (pyro)technology.

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Late Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers in Central Europe: new data from eastern Poland

Antiquity ◽

10.15184/aqy.2020.184 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-8

Author(s):

Tadeusz Wiśniewski ◽

Barbara Niezabitowska-Wiśniewska

Keyword(s):

Central Europe ◽

Hunter Gatherers ◽

Late Palaeolithic

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