Volume 51, November 2014, Pages 135–153
The world reshaped: practices and impacts of early agrarian societies
Highlights
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- Multidisciplinary study on the Funnelbeaker Neolithic in northern Germany.
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- Scenarios for domestic and ritual processes in a settlement site.
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- Precise reconstruction for the short time span of about 100 yrs only.
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- Water management in a Neolithic lagoon landscape.
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- Crop production and possible apple groves in the advanced northern Neolithic economy.
Abstract
Wells
constitute a seldom, but important archive particularly as a source for
reconstructing prehistoric economy. For the newly discovered Middle
Neolithic well of the Funnel Beaker North Group at the domestic site of
Oldenburg-Dannau LA77 (North Germany), a deposition of settlement refuse
in a former well was documented. Due to depositional processes, the
remains provided a detailed palaeo-ecological and archaeological archive
for a short time-span around 3050 cal BC. The integration of wells in
Middle Neolithic water management strategies, the high value of cereal
production – including cereal threshing in the settlement and the
documentation of a large number of querns – as well as the early
management of “fruit gardens” were reconstructed. Subsequently, the
probabilities of profane versus ritual social praxis associated with the
depositional process were discussed.
Keywords
- Funnel Beaker North Group;
- Neolithic economy;
- Well;
- Deposition processes;
- Palynology;
- Archaeobotany
