Continental extension of the Mediterranean Neolithization

Informations

Funding country

France

Acronym

PROCOME

URL

-

Start date

1/6/2014

End date

-

Budget

394,920 EUR

Fundings

Abstract

From an historical point of view, the Neolithic transition constitutes a fundamental period during which people changed their relationship with the environment, establishing – in diverse ways – an economy based on stock-keeping and agriculture. In archaeology, the approaches to the study of this ‘Neolithisation’ process are extremely varied, since what changed was the entire range of elements making up the human-environment system. For Europe, the study of Neolithisation has focused on the vectors of this change (i.e. cultural diffusion via the indigenous hunter-gatherer societies vs. demic diffusion by the migration of a population from the Near East, where most of the animal an d plant species in question had been domesticated). Equally, the study of Neolithisation in Europe involves examining the rhythms of emergence of novel techno-economic traits (considering the greater or lesser favourability of the natural and cultural milieux within which such novelties appeared). The PROCOME Project focuses on the conditions surrounding the emergence and evolution of agro-pastoral societies in the north-west Mediterranean and in the south-west quarter of France during the 6th millennium BC, especially in the hinterlands. The south-west quarter of France constitutes our area of empirical study, while the western Mediterranean provides us with a reference point and a broader context for our interpretations. PROCOME proposes to adopt an interdisciplinary approach to this field of study, involving specialists in Mesolithic and Neolithic archaeology, palaeoenvironmental scientists and epistemologists, and using tools that are innovative and powerful (GIS, geo-statistics, Bayesian modelling). It will aim to effect a systematic integration of an important database of information that has previously been acquired independently, and in a non-comparative way, by these different specialists. Three general objectives have been defined: - To characterise the different forms of cultural expression associated with the earliest agro-pastoral societies, in terms of technical traits (i.e. lithic and ceramic production), economy (i.e. management of animal and plant resources) and symbolism (expressed through jewellery). - To observe the spatial and temporal dynamics of the diffusion of the Neolithic techno-economic novelties – that is to say, its speed (slow, fast, irregular) and its routeways (i.e. areas that seem to have been favoured, as opposed to others that seem to have been ignored, etc.). - Finally, in bringing together these various observations, to interpret these empirical results and to characterise the processes and the underlying mechanisms of Neolithisation. We shall be paying particular attention to the question of the environment and to social dynamics. Regarding the former, we shall investigate the role of ecological systems and of local biodiversity as encouraging or inhibiting the diffusion of the Neolithic economy; equally, we shall investigate possible causal relationships between environmental factors and the emergence of new systems of values. Was it a question of adapting groups’ ‘savoir-faire’, or a question of making cultural choices – an informed compromise? Regarding the latter – social dynamics – we shall study the relations between the latest hunting societies and the earliest agro-pastoral societies in order to investigate what impact the hunters may have had on the dynamics of the spread of the agro-pastoral economy. We shall also evaluate the role of cultural interaction in the reshaping of cultural expressions. The process of Neolithisation therefore constitutes a particularly favourable field of research for studying the emergence and evolution of cultures. PROCOME lies within the thematic axis 4 of ANR CULT. The association of 15 internationally-acclaimed researchers who have worked collaboratively before guarantees the scientific pertinence of the project, and sets it within a renewed theoretical framework