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Three variants are recognized:
The Western Linear Pottery variant, the first known, was assigned the name Linearbandkeramik in the German language by the initial investigators. This name has remained the same since then and is not likely to change. English names have changed often. The earliest generally accepted name was Danubian, which is only rarely used now, since the death of its originator, V. Gordon Childe. Currently most names are attempts to translate Linearbandkeramik into good English. No name has the authority and universality of Linearbandkeramik. The problem continues. A number of cultures ultimately replaced the Linear Pottery culture over its range, but there is no one-to-one correspondance between its variants and the replacing cultures. The culture map instead is complex. Some of the successor cultures are the Hinkelstein , Großgartach , Rössen , Lengyel , Cucuteni , and Boian-Maritza . EXTENT AND DURATION The LBK at maximum extent ranged from about the line of the Seine — Oise ( Paris Basin ) eastward to the line of the Vistula and upper Dniester , and southward to the line of the upper Danube down to the big bend. An extension ran through the Western Bug River valley, leaped to the valley of the Dniester, and swerved southward from the middle Dniester to the lower Danube in eastern Romania , east of the Carpathians . The LBK did not begin with this range and only reached it toward the end of its time. It began in regions of densest occupation on the middle Danube ( Bohemia , Moravia , Hungary ) and spread over about 1500 km along the rivers in 360 years. The rate of expansion was therefore about 4 km per year, which can hardly be called an invasion or a wave and does not offer much support to theories of population replacement. A model of gradual colonization is perhaps most apt. The LBK was concentrated somewhat inland from the coastal areas; i.e., it is not evidenced in Denmark or the northern coastal strips of Germany and Poland , or the coast of the Black Sea in Romania . The northern coastal regions remained occupied by Mesolithic cultures exploiting the then fabulously rich Atlantic Salmon runs. There are lighter concentrations of LBK in the Low Countries , such as at Elsloo , and at the mouths of the Oder and Vistula . Evidently, the Neolithics and Mesolithics were not excluding each other; in fact, some use the concepts of "permeable border" or "mosaic" to describe the northern interface between the two. A good many C-14 dates have been acquired on the LBK. One Calibration analysis (under external links below) sets 68.2% confidence limits at about 5430-5040 BC; that is, 68.2% of possible dates allowed by variation of the major factors that influence measurement, calculation and calibration fall within that range. The 95.4% Confidence Interval is 5600-4750 BC. Analyses of this type depend on the data, which continues to vary, and therefore should be taken as a rough guideline only. The reader should be aware also that 31.8% and 4.6% of the dates would fall outside the stated ranges. Overall it is probably safe to say that the Linear Pottery culture spanned several hundred years of continental European prehistory in the late 6th and early 5th millennia BC, with local variations. Data from Belgium indicates a late survival of LBK there, as late as 4100 BC. The pottery styles of the LBK allow some division of its window in time:
Note that the early and middle LBK are considered the Early Neolithic. In Childe's Danubian scheme (according to the Ehrlich reference below), the early Neolithic LBK was Danubian Ia, while the stroked phase was Danubian Ib. It was considered an irregular survival of I in II, the Middle Neolithic. The LBK phase was identical to Gimbutas' early LBK. II refers to the cultures that replaced LBK, but today you might find the Stroked lumped in with II and the Ia, Ib distinction dropped. As the culture is to some degree of greater interest, being the first of agricultural Europe, the process of discovery and definition continues. Some writers and investigators may use alternative names, such as early and earliest, etc. No name is the single authoritative point of view (except for Linearbandkeramik). ORIGINS Most scholars derive the LBK culture from the Starcevo-Körös culture of Northern Serbia and Hungary , but some would argue for an autochthonous development out of the local Mesolithic cultures. Supporting the Starcevo-Körös origin is the fact that the LBK appeared earliest ca. 5600-5400 BC on the middle Danube in the Starcevo range. Presumably, the expansion northwards of early Starcevo-Körös produced a local variant reaching the upper Tisza that may have well been created by contact with native Epi-Paleolithic people. This small group began a new tradition of pottery, substituting engravings for the paintings of the Balkan cultures. The site of Brunn am Gebirge just south of Vienna seems to document the transition to LBK. The site was densely settled in a long house pattern approximately 5550-5200. The lower layers feature Starcevo-type plain pottery, with large number of stone tools made of material from near Lake Balaton, Hungary. Over the time frame, LBK pottery gradually increases, animal husbandry increases, and the use of stone tools decreases. The demographics question remains open. There is now genetic evidence about the population of the LBK. A comparison of Mitochondrial DNA from 24 LBK skeletons at 16 locations in Germany , Austria and Hungary by Peter Forster of the University Of Cambridge , Joachim Burger of the Johannes Gutenberg University Of Mainz , and others, finds that the LBK population left only a minute genetic trace among moderns, a surprising result considering their impact on the environment and development of culture in Europe. The explanation of the researchers is that the LBK population was never a very large one, and that they settled in a mosaic pattern, assimilating larger numbers of Mesolithic s. They were, so to speak, the heralds of a new way of life adopted by the general population of Europe. Demographic analysis of the human remains, however, indicate a 20-30% rise in the number of 5-19-year-olds in the cemeteries, an event termed the Neolithic Demographic Transition (NDT). It is thought to represent in increase in birth rate. If the genetic evidence is being accurately interpreted, the population that increased cannot have been primarily immigrant. The rare genetic types would suggest an immigration. The previous non-genetic arguments for immigration were strong: sheep and goats were imported from southeast Europe, LBK settlement patterns were radically different from the Mesolithic, the pottery appeared fully developed, and the culture is uniform, which is not what you would expect of local Mesolithic traditions. In this regard, the relationship of the LBK immigrants to the indigenes has acquired increasing interest. Critics of the peaceful entry theory, appearing most lately as the "Gimbutas model", subscribe to a forced entry theory, similar to the "killer ape" ideas of Robert Ardrey . Were the LBK people warlike and did they enter Europe in war? In answering this question in the affirmative, the advocates of the killer invader theory often confuse the earlier entry with the later exit of the LBK culture. It had to defend itself against incoming cultures (who spoke Indo-European Languages ) and was destroyed by them or came under the dominion of them. The obvious sites of massacres and defensive works belong mainly to this human interface and not the earlier. The archaeology tells a varied story. There were some walls and ditches indicating the necessity for some defence. But against whom? The fortifications are not the general rule and can just as well be explained by local contention. For the most part the settlements were unfortified. Claims that the adze was a significant war weapon and that the arrowheads were used for war contrast with the contemporaneous Indo-European cultures, who were imbued with a long-standing interest in war. The Indo-Europeans had several kinds of arrowheads and spearpoints, honored their chiefs with cup-crashing funeral skoals, and buried their less fortunate children with daggers at their sides, and the chiefs with daggers in their hands. The LBK does not evidence this general interest. Many scholars are building a new model based on the "invisible presence" of the Mesolithics. Most of them, such as the Ertebølle Culture , owned pottery. In contrast to former belief, they were hunting the horse and wild cattle in the open forests of Atlantic Period Europe. They may have adapted to new ways and assimilated to the immigrants so rapidly as to be "invisible" to archaeology now; that is to say, there are traces of possible non-LBK elements in many LBK sites, such as Limburger pottery with LBK pottery in LBK trash pits. No evidence at all, of course, would require a presupposition of non-existence, according to the principle of scientific economy. Important sites include Nitra in Slovakia ; Bylany in the Czech Republic ; Langweiler and Zwenkau in Germany ; Brunn Am Gebirge in Austria ; Elsloo , Sittard , Köln-Lindenthal , Aldenhoven , Flomborn and Rixheim on the Rhine; Lautereck and Hienheim on the upper Danube; Rössen and Sonderhausen on the middle Elbe. VARIANTS Early or Western Linear Pottery culture The term, Linear Band Ware, is a mnemonic of the pottery's decorative technique. The "Band Ware" or Bandkeramik part of it began as an innovation of the German archaeologist, Friedrich Klopfleisch (1831-1898), in his work, published in 1882, ''"Die Grabhügel von Leubingen, Sömmerda und Nienstädt. Voraufgehend: allgemeine Einleitung. Charakteristik und Zeitfolge der Keramik."'' But, in selecting the words "Band" and "Linear", the initial investigators were depending à priori on certain assumptions:
Since Starcevo-Körös pottery was earlier than the LBK and was located in a contiguous food-producing region, the early investigators looked for precedents there. Much of the Starcevo-Körös pottery features decorative patterns composed of convolute bands of paint: spirals, converging bands, vertical bands, and so on. The LBK appears to imitate and improve these convolutions with incised lines; hence the term, linear, to distinguish painted band ware from incised band ware. The name depends on specialized meanings of "linear" and "band", whether in English or in German. Unfortunately these words without the qualifiers do not describe the decoration. There are few bands going around the pottery and the lines are mainly not straight. In short, there was no need to categorize the pottery as being a northern variant of some other pottery. Perhaps better descriptive names might have been chosen, but it is too late now. The same can be said of many other concepts and names of science. LBK pottery consists of simple cups, bowls, vases and jugs, without handles, but some with lugs or pierced lugs. They were obviously designed as kitchen dishes, or for the immediate or local transport of food and liquids. Patterns are repeated motifs: spirals, rectangles, triangles, chevrons. For the most part they are not placed within bands, but rather, the entire surface of the pot is the artist's field. As is true today, they probably represent the "nice dishes" that are desirable to family matriarchs. Eastern Linear Pottery culture The Bükk Culture belonged to a dense pocket of Cro-magnon type people inhabiting the Bükk mountains of Hungary (inner western Carpathians) and the upper Tisza and its tributaries. The surrounding Neolithic was mainly of a more gracile Mediterranean type, with a Cro-magnon admixture as another possibility. As to whether the Cro-magnons were a remnant squeezed into this pocket, there is no sign of conflict there and the Cro-magnons were doing rather well in the obsidian trade. They were, so to speak, the wealthy men of the European Neolithic. The Cro-magnons did acquire the Neolithic from the Starcevo culture to the south. In the Szatmar Culture prior to 5500 BC, the Cro-magnons modified their Mesolithic ways and took on Starcevan artifact types and pottery styles, and the same can be said of the succeeding Tiszadob Culture of roughly 5200-5000. By 5000 the LBK had replaced the Starcevo in the surrounding region and it influenced the Cro-magnons in the Bükk culture. Bükk pottery is the finest ware of the LBK. It has a larger variety of forms: tall stands, jars with feet, globular bowls, and so on. Their fabric is tempered with sand, as opposed to the chaff of the western LBK. The walls of the pots are thin and delicate. Decoration consists of LBK patterns composed of bands that are both painted and engraved with fine lines. Colors are white, red and yellow, just the ones to brighten and make warm a successful household. The patterns are more complex, more regular and evidence more care in their execution. Some of the patterns are probably symbols. The Cro-magnons also owned abstract human figurines, in which geometric forms represent people. These are covered with symbols. The source of Bükk culture wealth is the fine obsidian of which the mountains are an abundant source. The Cro-magnons probably encouraged each other to settle there and take up the ethnic trade. Workshops for the manufacture of obsidian tools are common. They are identified by the hundreds of tools littering the floor of the site, which must have been a shed. These workshops were near homes. They probably represent a family business. In some cases jars of knives stand ready for export. The knives are sorted by size. An abundance of Spondylus shells in the graves suggests that this collectible was used for currency. Their ultimate source was the Mediterranean. These Cro-magnons, as opposed to the Mesolithics of the Atlantic coast, are probably best regarded as men of the world, dominating the market for stone tools from their mountain retreats. |
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