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10 - Beaker Culture Metal and Mobility in Atlantic Europe: Some Implications for Genetic and Language Origins

from Part III - The Cultural and Linguistic Significance of Bell Beakers along the Atlantic Fringe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 April 2023

Kristian Kristiansen
Affiliation:
Göteborgs Universitet, Sweden
Guus Kroonen
Affiliation:
Universiteit Leiden
Eske Willerslev
Affiliation:
University of Copenhagen
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Summary

The importance of metal for an understanding of the international Beaker culture is well established, whether as a driver of trade connections and other forms of exchange, or as a material expression of ethnicity, ideology, or social relations. While copper and gold were used in earlier times in Europe, Beaker groups can be associated with a spread of metallurgical knowledge across the Atlantic zone during the later third millennium BC. This chapter will consider long-distance networks of metal production and supply in relation to the mobility of the Beaker culture. The nature of those connections will be explored, whether they involved migration of ethnic groups or the small-scale movement of specialists, their ideas and material culture, through trade and other forms of exchange. The implications for genetic and language origins will be considered, with a focus on connections between Iberia, France, and Ireland in that period.

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The Indo-European Puzzle Revisited
Integrating Archaeology, Genetics, and Linguistics
, pp. 146 - 156
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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