Correction to ‘Organic residue analysis shows sub-regional patterns in the use of pottery by Northern European hunter–gatherers’ (original) (raw)
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Royal Society Open Science
The introduction of pottery vessels to Europe has long been seen as closely linked with the spread of agriculture and pastoralism from the Near East. The adoption of pottery technology by hunter–gatherers in Northern and Eastern Europe does not fit this paradigm, and its role within these communities is so far unresolved. To investigate the motivations for hunter–gatherer pottery use, here, we present the systematic analysis of the contents of 528 early vessels from the Baltic Sea region, mostly dating to the late 6th–5th millennium cal BC, using molecular and isotopic characterization techniques. The results demonstrate clear sub-regional trends in the use of ceramics by hunter–gatherers; aquatic resources in the Eastern Baltic, non-ruminant animal fats in the Southeastern Baltic, and a more variable use, including ruminant animal products, in the Western Baltic, potentially including dairy. We found surprisingly little evidence for the use of ceramics for non-culinary activities, ...
2020
This thesis aims to provide an understanding of the dynamics underlying the adoption of pottery by pre-agrarian huntergatherer cultural groups around the Baltic Sea. The focus is on three approximately contemporaneous early pottery traditions of the region (ca. 5200-3900 cal BC); the Ertebølle (EBK) of southern Scandinavia (southern Sweden, Denmark) and northern Germany, the Narva of the eastern Baltic, and the Early Comb Ware (ECW) of north-eastern Fennoscandia. To develop knowledge about what ceramics in these traditions were used for, and whether intra-and/or inter-cultural variations occurred, EBK pottery material from Scania (southern Sweden) and Lolland (eastern Denmark), as well as material from ECW pottery sub-styles (Säräisniemi 1, Sperrings 1, and 2, Jäkärlä) from mainland Finland were selected from museum collections in the corresponding countries to be analyzed by means of lipid residue analysis. The use of the EBK pottery was compared to that of the contemporaneous Narva, to assess whether the typological similarities characterizing the two pottery traditions corresponded also to common functions. The comparison was conducted statistically by using the lipid residue data obtained by the author along with that previously published from Narva pottery assemblages in Estonia, and from EBK pottery assemblages from Denmark and northern Germany. The Finnish ECW pottery sub-styles were separately analyzed to assess spatio-temporal use variation.
Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences
The emergence of pottery in Europe is associated with two distinct traditions: hunter-gatherers in the east of the continent during the early 6th millennium BC and early agricultural communities in the south-west in the late 7th millennium BC. Here we investigate the function of pottery from the site of Rakushechny Yar, located at the Southern fringe of Eastern Europe, in this putative contact zone between these two economic ‘worlds’. To investigate, organic residue analysis was conducted on 120 samples from the Early Neolithic phase (ca. mid-6th millennium BC) along with microscopic and SEM analysis of associated foodcrusts. The results showed that the earliest phase of pottery use was predominantly used to process riverine resources. Many of the vessels have molecular and isotopic characteristics consistent with migratory fish, such as sturgeon, confirmed by the identification of sturgeon bony structures embedded in the charred surface deposits. There was no evidence of dairy prod...
Conference report: The 26th Annual Meeting of the German Mesolithic Workgroup
2017
Auf Einladung von Annabell Zander (Universitat York) und Birgit Gehlen (SFB 806, Universitat zu Koln) fand die 26. Jahrestagung der Arbeitsgemeinschaft Mesolithikum vom 10.-12. Marz 2017 in Wuppertal statt. Insgesamt nahmen mehr als 70 Wissenschaftler, Studierende und an der Mittelsteinzeit interessierte Amateurarchaologen aus acht verschiedenen Landern teil. Das internationale Tagungsprogramm bestand aus 24 Vortragen und 10 Posterprasentationen, welche auf Englisch oder Deutsch gehalten worden. Die Vortrage behandelten sowohl internationale als auch regionale Thematiken rund um das Spatpalaolithikum, Mesolithikum und Fruhneolithikum.
Conference report: Mesolithic Conference 2017 in Wuppertal, Germany
Agnieszka Czekaj-Zastawny, Andy Needham, Svea Mahlstedt, Benjamin Spies, Aimée Little, Diederik Pomstra, Rick Schulting, Annabell Zander, Ann-Katrin Meyer, Mathias P Bjørnevad-Ahlqvist, Harald Lübke, Birgit Gehlen, Becky Knight, Eileen Eckmeier, Werner M Schön, Sascha Krüger, Daniel Groß, Felicitas Faasch, Markus Wild, Caroline Posch, Julia Goldhammer, Berit Valentin Eriksen, Luc Amkreutz, Erwin Cziesla, Marcel J L T Niekus, Thomas Richter, Andreas Kotula, Harry K Robson
Archäologische Informationen (Journal of the German Prehistoric Society)
The 26th Annual Meeting of the German Mesolithic Workgroup took place in Wuppertal from 10-12 March 2017 and was organised and hosted by Annabell Zander (University of York) and Birgit Gehlen (CRC 806, University of Cologne). In sum, more than 70 academics, students and amateur archaeologists from 8 different countries attended this conference. The international programme consisted of 24 talks and 10 poster presentations which were held in English and German. The presentations ranged from international to regional themes concerning the Final Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Early Neolithic. Key words – Mesolithic; Final Palaeolithic; Early Neolithic; Westphalia http://www.dguf.de/index.php?id=9
2021
This paper focuses on the functional analysis of Swifterbant pottery (c. 5000–3800 cal BC) in the Lower RhineMeuse area (the Netherlands). It examines pottery use across the transition to agriculture and aims to assess temporal changes in human-animal relations during the 5th millennium BC in the Lower Rhine-Meuse area through lipid residue analysis. We conducted lipid residue analysis of 49 samples from four Swifterbant sites: Hardinxveld-Giessendam Polderweg, Hardinxveld-Giessendam De Bruin, Brandwijk-het Kerkhof, and Hazendonk. A combined approach using both GC-MS and GC-C-IRMS of residues absorbed into the ceramic was employed to identify their context. Their context was then compared to published faunal datasets to present the relative abundance of taxa detected in the lipid residues. Evidence of processing freshwater fish was found in all sites, presenting that it was a continuous and primary function of Swifterbant pottery in the Lower Rhine-Meuse area starting from its first appearance at c. 5000 cal BC till the end of 5th millennium BC regardless of vessel form, size, decoration or temper. The results of our analysis also present temporal changes in the exploitation of food resources from the early to the late 5th millennium BC. From the mid 5th millennium BC onwards, vessels were also used to process different ranges of foodstuffs such as terrestrial resources and dairy products. The identification of dairy residue is the first direct evidence so far from Swifterbant pottery. We tentatively explain these results as an indication of presence of different culinary practices that had developed through the 5th millennium in the Lower Rhine-Meuse area and that the use of Swifterbant pottery is a direct reflection of changing cultural preferences on food preparation and consumption.
Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, 2020
The goal of this contribution is to stimulate a wider reflection on the role of food consumption practices throughout prehistory. We focussed on the Jōmon communities of Hokkaidō Island in Northern Japan since these mobile foragers underwent a process of economic diversification and intensification, eventually leading to higher levels of sedentism across the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. Moreover, dynamic social settings and expansion of the subsistence base at the start of the Holocene would have provided rich opportunities for novel food combinations, and potentially, the rise of diverse regional cuisines. We investigated tool kits and resource landscapes, and sampled pottery from a range of sites, phases and regions. We then applied organic residue analysis to confirm the actual spatiotemporal patterning in cuisine. Although we predicted that ruminants and nuts would have played a major role in local cuisine, especially in inland areas, our results indicate that aquatic resources were central to pottery-based cuisines across the island, and that other food groups had probably been processed in other ways. While organic residue analysis enabled us to reconstruct some major patterns in Jōmon cuisine, we conclude that archaeologists will need to look "beyond the cooking pot" to fully appreciate the full diversity of local foodways.
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