THE MESOLITHIC CEMETERY OF GROß FREDENWALDE (NORTH-EASTERN GERMANY) AND ITS CULTURAL AFFILIATIONS

The site of Groß Fredenwalde was discovered in 1962 and has been known as a Mesolithic multiple burial since 14C-dates verified an early Atlantic age in the early 1990s. New research since 2012 reconstructed the situation of the poorly documented rescue excavation in 1962 and identified six individuals from at least two separate burials. The new excavations uncovered more burials and Groß Fredenwalde stands out as the largest Mesolithic cemetery in North Central Europe and the oldest cemetery in Germany. In this paper the known burial evidence from this site is presented and the location of the cemetery, mortuary practices, and grave goods are discussed in a broader European context. Northern and Eastern connections appear especially tangible in Groß Fredenwalde and it is suggested that the community associated with the Groß Fredenwalde Mesolithic cemetery was integrated into wider cultural networks connected to the North and East. Keywords: Mesolithic burials, Mesolithic networks, East-West contacts, mortuary practices, grave goods.

The evolution of dual meat and milk cattle husbandry in Linearbandkeramik societies

Cattle dominate archaeozoological assemblages from the north-central Europe between the sixth and fifth millennium BC and are frequently considered as exclusively used for their meat. Dairy products may have played a greater role than previously believed. Selective pressure on the lactase persistence mutation has been modelled to have begun between 6000 and 4000 years ago in central Europe. The discovery of milk lipids in late sixth millennium ceramic sieves in Poland may reflect an isolated regional peculiarity for cheese making or may signify more generalized milk exploitation in north-central Europe during the Early Neolithic. To investigate these issues, we analysed the mortality profiles based on age-at-death analysis of cattle tooth eruption, wear and replacement from 19 archaeological sites of the Linearbandkeramik (LBK) culture (sixth to fifth millennium BC). The results indicate that cattle husbandry was similar across time and space in the LBK culture with a degree of specialization for meat exploitation in some areas. Statistical comparison with reference age-at-death profiles indicate that mixed husbandry (milk and meat) was practised, with mature animals being kept. The analysis provides a unique insight into LBK cattle husbandry and how it evolved in later cultures in central and western Europe. It also opens a new perspective on how and why the Neolithic way of life developed through continental Europe and how dairy products became a part of the human diet.

Palaeolithic Western and North Central Europe

Since their initial discovery in the nineteenth century, human figurines have formed a noticeable part of the artistic record of the 30,000 years of the European Upper Palaeolithic. Some figurines—particularly the ‘Venuses’ of the Mid-Upper Palaeolithic (Gravettian sensu lato)—have long served as icons of Upper Palaeolithic cultural achievement. This chapter reviews our current understanding of figurines of western and North Central Europe. Their first manifestation is with a few enigmatic examples during the Early Upper Palaeolithic (Aurignacian) of southwest Germany. A far more visible and geographically widespread manifestation comes with the Mid-Upper Palaeolithic Venus figurines, and a similarly widespread occurrence comes with the highly schematic side-profile outlines of the Gönnersdorf type, which belong to the Middle and Late Magdalenian. The history of interpretation and current thinking of these figurine horizons is discussed in this chapter, which should be read in conjunction with Chapter 30 (Farbstein).