The Cucuteni – Trypillia ‘Big Other’ – Reflections on the Making of Millennial Cultural Traditions

Chapman, John; Gaydarska, Bisserka

doi:10.2307/j.ctvndv6qh.28

Cited by 22 publications

(6 citation statements)

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“…However, at the same time as the major planning elements have been strengthened as a consequence of bricolage, the size of the building project enabled local diversity in building design and location at all scales of the plan, from individual houses to Neighbourhoods (groups of houses), Quarters (groups of Neighbourhoods) and major planning elements (e.g., the variations in the width of the space between the Outer and Inner house circuits) (Chapman and Gaydarska, 2016). We have argued that local architectural diversity probably marks not only the contribution of many communities in the Nebelivka interaction zone to dwelling on the megasite but also the passage of social time in the creation of different built ensembles (Chapman and Gaydarska, 2018a).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We have previously discussed the importance of what we term the "Trypillia Big Other" for integrating the vast number of Trypillia settlements and their residents. We think of the Big Other as a suite of beliefs which was materialised in practices involving the three key Trypillia traits-houses, pottery and figurines (Chapman and Gaydarska, 2018a;Gaydarska, 2019a) (Figure 6). The term "Big Other" was developed by Lacan (1988) and elaborated on by Žižek to convey the sense not of an ideology nor a religion but an effective symbolic fiction playing a significant role in everyday life (Žižek, 2007a,b).…”

Section: The Trypillia Big Othermentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Origins of Trypillia Megasites

Chapman

Gaydarska

Nebbia

2019

Front. Digit. Humanit.

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The Trypillia megasites of Ukraine are the largest known settlements in 4th millennium BC Europe and possibly the world. With the largest reaching 320 ha in size, megasites pose a serious question about the origins of such massive agglomerations. Most current solutions assume maximum occupation, with all houses occupied at the same time, and target defence against other agglomerations as the cause of their formation. However, recent alternative views of megasites posit smaller long-term occupations or seasonal assembly places, creating a settlement rather than military perspective on origins. Shukurov et al. (2015)'s model of Trypillia arable land-use demonstrates that subsistence stresses begin when site size exceeded 35 ha. Over half of the sites dated to the Trypillia BI stage-the stage before the first megasites-were larger than 35 ha, suggesting that some form of buffering involving exchange of goods for food was in operation. There were two settlement responses to buffering:-clustering of sites with enhanced inter-site exchange networks and the creation of megasites. The trend to increased site clustering can be seen from Phase BI to CI, coeval with the emergence of megasites. We can therefore re-focus the issue of origins on why create megasites in site clusters. In this article, we discuss the two strategies in terms of informal network analysis and suggest reasons why, in some cases, megasites developed in certain site clusters. Finally, we consider the question of whether Trypillia megasites can be considered as "cities."

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Trypillia Big Othermentioning

confidence: 99%

The Origins of Trypillia Megasites

Chapman

Gaydarska

Nebbia

2019

Front. Digit. Humanit.

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“…Overall, the British team chose to use Lacan's concept of the 'Big Other' to describe the integration of several aspects of Trypillia society (Chapman and Gaydarska 2017). Relying on Žižek's (2006) reading of Lacan, they characterise the 'Big Other' as a general way of life, which allows for local interpretations without distorting its general idea (ibid., 267).…”

Section: Social Interpretationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Maidanets'ke. Development and decline of a Trypillia mega-site in Central Ukraine

Ohlrau¹

2020

Scales of Transformation

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At the end of the 5th millennium BCE, some of the vastest settlements of the time emerged on the forest steppe north of the Black Sea. The largest of these sites were found between the Southern Bug and Dnieper river. There they occur only tens of kilometres apart and are assumed to be partly coeval. The Trypillia ‘mega-sites’ reached sizes of up to 320 hectares with up to 3000 buildings in one place. During their peak times as many as 11,000 people could have lived in one of those settlements. But how did people come together in these Trypillia ‘mega-sites’ with several thousand dwellings? How long were such sites inhabited, and how many people lived there? Were these settlements the first towns, preceding the Mesopotamian development? To address these questions, this book presents the results of the investigations at the Maidanets’ke ‘mega-site’. To date, Maidanets’ke represents the most complex of these enormous sites and is also among the best investigated ones. Based on new excavations by international teams, the settlement’s history, its structure and regional context are addressed. The excavation results, with features like a pottery production site, a causewayed enclosure and several dwellings, are presented in detail. An extensive radiocarbon dating program conducted on various parts of the site, in combination with pottery studies, revealed several phases of continuous occupation between 3990-3640 cal BCE. According to the number of contemporary structures, the demography of a ‘mega-site’ is reconstructed in detail for the first time. Targeted geophysical surveys in the core area of the ‘mega-site’ phenomenon show that exceptional non-inhabited buildings and so-called mega-structures occur regularly in both larger and smaller settlements. Overall, the Trypillia settlement system appears scalable, with small sites being structurally similar to larger ones. With no clear differences in the settlement pattern except size, the urban character of ‘mega-sites’ is called into question.

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“…Elsewhere, we have argued that figurines were one of the elements of the Trypillian Big Other (Chapman and Gaydarska 2018). The aim of this section is to explore whether there were any changes in the overall consumption patterns of anthropomorphic figurines that ultimately point to the (in)stability of social practices involving anthropomorphic images.…”

Section: Figurines In Cucuteni-trypillia: a Proxy Of Social Changementioning

confidence: 99%

Habitus? The Social Dimension of Technology and Transformation

Müller¹

2019

Scales of Transformation

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The problem of the social dimension of technology and transformation seen in the perspective of the habitus has been repeatedly undertaken in various works. However, the complexity of these phenomena causes subsequent attempts to be presented and explained again in new contexts, bringing interesting observations. The edited volume aims to contribute to our better understanding of a system of embodied dispositions hidden under the term ‘habitus’. This will be achieved by presenting the latest studies in the social dimension of technology and transformation. These studies mainly cover the areas of Europe from Scandinavia to Italy and to the Balkans and from the British Isles to the Ukraine and to the North Caucasus. In one case, ethnoarchaeological field studies were conducted in distant Indonesia, but they are used to interpret the Hallstatt Culture in Europe. In the chronological dimension, they include the time from the Neolithic to the beginning of the Iron Age. Among the topics discussed are rock art, Trypillian megasites, stone axes and adzes, metallurgy, wagons, archery items, pottery produced on a fast wheel, mechanisms of cultural genesis, dualistic social systems and comments on Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of practice, including the concept of habitus. The volume Habitus, the social dimension of technology and transformation is intended for international academia, representing an important set of information and interpretations for all archaeologists and readers interested in European prehistory.

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The Cucuteni – Trypillia ‘Big Other’ – Reflections on the Making of Millennial Cultural Traditions

Cited by 22 publications

References 9 publications

The Origins of Trypillia Megasites

The Origins of Trypillia Megasites

Maidanets'ke. Development and decline of a Trypillia mega-site in Central Ukraine

Habitus? The Social Dimension of Technology and Transformation

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