Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-m8qmq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T09:43:57.525Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Regional variations in the European Neolithic dispersal: the role of the coastlines

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 January 2015

Daniel A. Henderson ,
Andrew W. Baggaley ,
Anvar Shukurov ,
Richard J. Boys ,
Graeme R. Sarson  and
Andrew Golightly
Daniel A. Henderson
Affiliation:
School of Mathematics & Statistics, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU, UK (Email: daniel.henderson@ncl.ac.uk; anvar.shukurov@ncl.ac.uk; richard.boys@ncl.ac.uk; g.r.sarson@ncl.ac.uk; andrew.golightly@ncl.ac.uk)
Andrew W. Baggaley
Affiliation:
School of Mathematics & Statistics, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QW, UK (Email: andrew.baggaley@glasgow.ac.uk)
Anvar Shukurov
Affiliation:
School of Mathematics & Statistics, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU, UK (Email: daniel.henderson@ncl.ac.uk; anvar.shukurov@ncl.ac.uk; richard.boys@ncl.ac.uk; g.r.sarson@ncl.ac.uk; andrew.golightly@ncl.ac.uk)
Richard J. Boys
Affiliation:
School of Mathematics & Statistics, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU, UK (Email: daniel.henderson@ncl.ac.uk; anvar.shukurov@ncl.ac.uk; richard.boys@ncl.ac.uk; g.r.sarson@ncl.ac.uk; andrew.golightly@ncl.ac.uk)
Graeme R. Sarson
Affiliation:
School of Mathematics & Statistics, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU, UK (Email: daniel.henderson@ncl.ac.uk; anvar.shukurov@ncl.ac.uk; richard.boys@ncl.ac.uk; g.r.sarson@ncl.ac.uk; andrew.golightly@ncl.ac.uk)
Andrew Golightly
Affiliation:
School of Mathematics & Statistics, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU, UK (Email: daniel.henderson@ncl.ac.uk; anvar.shukurov@ncl.ac.uk; richard.boys@ncl.ac.uk; g.r.sarson@ncl.ac.uk; andrew.golightly@ncl.ac.uk)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The mechanisms by which agriculture spread across Europe in the Neolithic, and the speed at which it happened, have long been debated. Attempts to quantify the process by constructing spatio-temporal models have given a diversity of results. In this paper, a new approach to the problem of modelling is advanced. Data from over 300 Neolithic sites from Asia Minor and Europe are used to produce a global picture of the emergence of farming across Europe which also allows for variable local conditions. Particular attention is paid to coastal enhancement: the more rapid advance of the Neolithic along coasts and rivers, as compared with inland or terrestrial domains. The key outcome of this model is hence to confirm the importance of waterways and coastal mobilities in the spread of farming in the early Neolithic, and to establish the extent to which this importance varied regionally.

Keywords

EuropeAsia MinorNeolithic dispersalmodellingwaterwayspropagating population frontwave of advance
Type
Method
Information
Antiquity , Volume 88 , Issue 342 , December 2014 , pp. 1291 - 1302
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 2014

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ammerman, A.J. & Cavalli-Sforza, L.L.. 1971. Measuring the rate of spread of early farming in Europe. Man 6: 674–88. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/2799190 Google Scholar
Baggaley, A.W., Boys, R.J., Golightly, A., Sarson, G.R. & Shukurov, A.. 2012a. Inference for population dynamics in the Neolithic period. Annals of Applied Statistics 6: 1352–76. http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/12-AOAS579 Google Scholar
Baggaley, A.W., Sarson, G.R., Shukurov, A., Boys, R.J. & Golightly, A.. 2012b. Bayesian inference for a wave-front model of the neolithization of Europe. Physical Review E 86: 016105. http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.86.016105 Google Scholar
Bernardo, J.M. & Smith, A.F.M.. 1994. Bayesian theory. Chichester: Wiley. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470316870 Google Scholar
Bocquet-Appel, J.-P., Naji, S., Vander Linden, M. & Kozłowski, J.. 2009. Detection of diffusion and contact zones of early farming in Europe from the space-time distribution of 14C dates. Journal of Archaeological Science 36: 807–20. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2008.11.004 Google Scholar
Bocquet-Appel, J.-P., Naji, S., Vander Linden, M. & Kozłowski, J. 2012. Understanding the rates of expansion of the farming system in Europe. Journal of Archaeological Science 39: 531–46. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2011.10.010 Google Scholar
Clark, J.G.D. 1965. Radiocarbon dating and the spread of farming economy. Antiquity 39: 45–48.Google Scholar
Collard, M., Edinborough, K., Shennan, S. & Thomas, M.G.. 2010. Radiocarbon evidence indicates that migrants introduced farming to Britain. Journal of Archaeological Science 37: 866–70. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2009.11.016 Google Scholar
Czárán, T. 1998. Spatiotemporal models of population and community dynamics. London: Chapman & Hall.Google Scholar
Davison, K., Dolukhanov, P.M., Sarson, G.R. & Shukurov, A.. 2006. The role of waterways in the spread of the Neolithic. Journal of Archaeological Science 33: 641–52. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2005.09.017 Google Scholar
Dolukhanov, P., Shukurov, A., Gronenborn, D., Sokoloff, D., Timofeev, V. & Zaitseva, G.. 2005. The chronology of Neolithic dispersal in Central and Eastern Europe. Journal of Archaeological Science 32: 1441–58. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2005.03.021 Google Scholar
Fort, J. 2009. Mathematical models of the Neolithic transition: a review for non-mathematicians, in Dolukhanov, P., Sarson, G. & Shukurov, A. (ed.) The East European Plain on the eve of agriculture (British Archaeological Reports international series 1964). Oxford: Archaeopress.Google Scholar
Fort, J., Pujol, T. & Vander Linden, M.. 2012. Modelling the Neolithic transition in the Near East and Europe. American Antiquity 77: 203–19. http://dx.doi.org/10.7183/0002-7316.77.2.203 Google Scholar
Gammerman, D. & Lopes, H.. 2006. Markov chain Monte Carlo: stochastic simulation for Bayesian inference. London: Taylor & Francis.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gangal, K., Sarson, G.R. & Shukurov, A.. 2014. The Near-Eastern roots of the Neolithic in South Asia. PLoS ONE 9: e95714. http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0095714 CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gkiasta, M., Russell, T., Shennan, S. & Steele, J.. 2003. Neolithic transition in Europe: the radiocarbon record revisited. Antiquity 77: 45–62.Google Scholar
Hinz, M., Furholt, M., Müller, J., Raetzel-Fabian, D., Rinne, C., Sjögren, K.-G. & Wotzka, H.-P.. 2012. RADON—radiocarbon dates online 2012. Central European database of 14C dates for the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age. Journal of Neolithic Archaeology 14: 1–4.Google Scholar
Isern, N. & Fort, J.. 2010. Anisotropic dispersion, space competition and the slowdown of the Neolithic transition. New Journal of Physics 12: 123002. http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1367-2630/12/12/123002 Google Scholar
Isern, N. & Fort, J. 2012. Modelling the effect of Mesolithic populations on the slowdown of the Neolithic transition. Journal of Archaeological Science 39: 3671–76. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2012.06.027 Google Scholar
Price, T.D. 2003. The arrival of agriculture in Europe as seen from the north, in Ammerman, A.J. & Biagi, P. (ed.) The widening harvest. The Neolithic transition in Europe: looking back, looking forward: 273–94. Boston (MA): Archaeological Institute of America.Google Scholar
Rowley-Conwy, P. 2011. Westward ho! The spread of agriculture from Central Europe to the Atlantic. Current Anthropology 52: S431–S451. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/658368 Google Scholar
Rubin, D.B. 1988. Using the SIR algorithm to simulate posterior distributions, in Bernardo, J.M., Degroot, M.H., Lindley, D.V. & Smith, A.F.M. (ed.) Bayesian statistics 3: 395–402. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Steele, J. 2009. Human dispersals: mathematical models and the archaeological record. Human Biology 81: 121–40. http://dx.doi.org/10.3378/027.081.0302 Google Scholar
Zilhão, J. 2001. Radiocarbon evidence for maritime pioneer colonization at the origins of farming in west Mediterranean Europe. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 98: 14180–85. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.241522898 Google Scholar
Zilhão, J. 2003. The Neolithic transition in Portugal and the role of demic diffusion in the spread of agriculture across west Mediterranean Europe, in Ammerman, A.J. & Biagi, P. (ed.) The widening harvest. The Neolithic transition in Europe: looking back, looking forward: 207–23. Boston (MA): Archaeological Institute of America.Google Scholar