L’enceinte rubanée de Menneville Derrière le Village et les structures associées (Aisne, France) : de la diversité du traitement des défunts à la cohérence d’un système

Within Linearbandkeramik (LBK) studies, several models of social structure and organisation have been debated since the 1960s, influenced by several major anthropological theories that even today guide the debates. We discuss here the notion of social interactions in LBK contexts by focusing on the primary form of LBK social unit: the household. Assuming that the solutions found by the LBK communities to navigate their ambivalent position regarding sedentism and mobility probably formed the basis of their social organisation, social networks would have played a crucial role in ensuring the longevity and spread of the LBK culture. The village pioneer stage crystallises several core mechanisms of LBK society and is particularly relevant for assessing the dynamic processes involved in the fundamental social interactions that structure LBK societies. Invoking rather the “hofplatz” or the “ward” models, the coexistence of different groups attached to specific expressions of identity within the same settlements was highlighted and led to several hypotheses of social organisation putting clan or lineage structures at the foreground. Differentiation or inequalities between individuals and groups were also debated, even recently based on new technological and bioarchaeological data. In the frame of the current ANR Homes project, our goal is to test the reliability of these models based on an evidence-based approach and deepen the economical model we recently proposed.

Social Rules and Household Interactions Within the LBK: Long-Standing Debates, New Perspectives

Hamon¹,

Gomart²

2021

The Mechanisms of Neolithisation of Western Europe: Beyond a South/North Approach

Hamon¹,

Manen

2021

Up until now, the neolithisation of Western Europe during the sixth millennium BCE has mainly been approached through the characterisation of its diffusion vectors (cultural vs demic diffusion) and the emergence of technoeconomic innovations (rhythms, scenarios, and transmission). Traditionally, two primary routes of agricultural diffusion are distinguished: one extending along the Danube river corridor to the Atlantic coast (Linearbandkeramik) and the other along the Mediterranean coastal zone (Impressed Ware). To move beyond this dichotomy, this article proposes a first attempt at an integrated approach to the mechanisms of neolithisation in Western Europe, one of the few territories where it is possible, and therefore necessary, to investigate the processes that are common to both of these principal neolithisation complexes. The most widely held vision, inherited from the 1980s, of a European Neolithic that developed from east to west following a regular rhythm has progressively been replaced by a more complex model of diffusion characterised by arrhythmia and cultural reconfigurations. Despite having different origins and trajectories, the expansion of the first farmers was made possible by a number of common mechanisms. Impresso-Cardial and Linearbandkeramik societies faced similar constraints, especially with regard to ensuring the stability of their social and economic models, while minimising the risks inherent to the colonisation of new territories. Three main mechanisms would have structured the first neolithisation phases of both spheres: a strong mobility of populations regulated to varying degrees by social rules, a strong solidarity expressed at multiple levels of interactions within each sphere, and, finally, the existence of syncretism and cultural recompositions including close and long-distance relations.

Sign-Objects Among Neolithic Faunal Remains, Visible Symbols

Hachem

2021

The purpose of this article is to present an inventory of certain faunal remains from Linearbandkeramic (LBK) settlements in the Paris Basin (Ile-de-France, Hauts-de-France and Champagne) that seem to belong to a particular category, that of “sign-objects,” in other words, tangible evidence intended to be shown and directly interpretable by an observer belonging to the society which produced them. Based on three categories of archaeological contexts, a ceremonial enclosure, settlements and graves, we will attempt to highlight the species that were important to Neolithic society. Two of them, the domestic cattle and the aurochs, are particularly involved in the deposits through the exhibition of their bones or their horn cores. Sheep and roe deer are also involved through, for example, transformed bones such as perforated tibias or sharpened roe deer antlers. The results of the analysis were integrated into an archaeological model previously developed to approach the social structure of the Neolithic society.