Jährliche Festversammlung des ÖAI Athen
Report on the Activities of 2022 by Birgitta Eder | OeAI
Lecture by Barbara Horejs | OeAI
»Long & short revolutions in the Neolithisation process between West Asia, the Aegean & the Balkans«
The Neolithic represents a crucial time of immense social, cultural, economic and environmental change in human history, as people move from Epipaleolithic/Mesolithic hunter-gathers to Neolithic settled agricultural communities accompanied by new technologies, skills, practices, materials, symbolism and beliefs. With the spread of the Neolithic way of life currently being seen as associated with migrations from west Asia to Europe, the Aegean represents a key zone for understanding the »Neolithisation« process. Although the connectivity between the Aegean and Anatolian world(s) is widely accepted for the initial Neolithic, a combined study of the new parameters and the meaning behind shared cultural features (»Neolithic Package«) leads to several open questions. The paper will present results from long-term fieldwork with ongoing analyses in west Anatolia (Çukuriçi Höyük) with focus on early farming societies in the 7th millennium calBC. The already proposed »model of maritime colonization« and »pioneer sites« will be discussed and contextualized with the Aegean development of Neolithic societies and regional identities. Primary data from new excavations at the central Balkans (Svinjarička Čuka) will finally offer a contrasting picture along one of the main dispersal routes into Europe leading to the hypothesis of long and short revolutions in this crucial period of the »Neolithisation« process.