Session format:
Regular session
Title:
Borderline Lithics: From Spatial Patterns to Social Processes during the European Neolithization [PaM]
Content:
Borderline is understood here as an umbrella term for spatial, temporal overlapping and social processes which clearly shows the indefinite situations, so-called transformations. Our session will explore this notion thanks to lithic analysis. Neolithic cultural entities were mainly defined based on the typo-stylistic analysis of the pottery, neglecting other materials. Lithics have been poorly included in this issue. But they are a first-choice proxy to overcome the spatial perception of these entities. Indeed, of very good conservation, they are ubiquitous on prehistoric settlements and thanks to recent development, it is often possible to finely identify the raw material outcrops. Furthermore, because any action on the material is irreversible, they are offering first-rate documentation to decipher technical know-how. As such it is possible to draw and compare new spatial groupings: systems of the value of lithic tools among groups, raw material circulation networks, communities of practice…How to sketch their outlines? Are there overlaps between different spatial proxies? How to qualify frontiers/margins effects? Our session aims to [re]integrate lithic industries in the construction of Mesolithic and Neolithic narratives, especially from a methodological point of view.
In this perspective, we want to gather experts from Europe with different research traditions to identify and explain borderline effects.
We welcome contributions to the following questions:
1. Methodological point of view: how to highlight the phenomena of boundaries/margins (geographical, spatial, chronological, cultural) from the lithic data?
2. [Re]integrating socio-historical interpretations from this approach: how deciphering European Neolithic according to its lithic’s borderline brings new insights in the understanding of these societies? Which social processes are at play in margins areas - (im)permeability, interaction, opposition, mixture, innovation?
By comparing these spatial patterns on a large European territory, we want to challenge the diversity of behaviours of these first agro-pastoral communities facing different environmental and geographical areas.
Keywords:
lithic industry, Mesolithic, Neolithic, technology, systems of value, circulation network
Session associated with MERC:
no
Session associated with CIfA:
no
Session associated with SAfA:
no
Session associated with CAA:
no
Session associated with DGUF:
no
Session associated with other:
PaM
Main organiser:
Solène DENIS (Czech Republic) 1,2
Co-organisers:
Elsa DEFRANOULD (France) 3,4
Sonja KAČAR (Ireland) 5,6
Kata SZILÁGYI (Germany) 7
Affiliations:
1. Masaryk University
2. UMR 8068 TEMPS
3. Université Côte d’Azur
4. UMR 7264 CEPAM
5. University College Dublin, School of Archaeology
6. UMR 5608 TRACES
7. Kiel University, Institute of Pre- and Protohistoric Archaeology
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