Session: #108

Content:

The Atlantic is a period of severe environmental and social changes in Europe. Against the background of the Holocene thermal maximum, widespread forests were dominating the landscapes, reaching heights, where glaciers and alpine grasslands formerly dominated, whereas at the coasts the global sea-level was rising, inundating increasingly large areas. Within these constantly alternating and challenging landscapes, human impact became increasingly profound, as has been shown by the archaeological and paleo-environmental record of the last decades. They show different modes of adaptation and problem solving strategies in the various different climate zones of Europe, with some of these strategies reaching over the shift from a foraging to a producing way of life.
In this session we want to address the archaeological evidence for the Atlantic biozone from ca. 7,000 to 3,700 cal. BC and cast light on different aspects of socio-cultural change, adaptation, and impact. We aim at discussing processes that have started in the Mesolithic and reached over to the Neolithic but similarly “dead-ends” of cultural development. In particular, we would like to address the way humans in the period have utilised their landscapes and available resources and discuss to which extent and level they have caused alterations in natural systems.
We invite researchers from different disciplines to present studies and discuss human-environment interactions during the Atlantic from a diachronic perspective. A wide range of topics will be accepted and may cover, material culture studies, palaeoenvironmental developments, theoretical endeavours, as well as demographic analysis. We do, however, ask for the submitted papers to explicitly address the given chronological frame as completely as possible and refrain from addressing only Mesolithic or Neolithic case studies. To address human reactions in different ecosystems, no regional limitations are given.

Session: #108

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