Image by Johanna Tay from Pixabay
Image by Johanna Tay from Pixabay

How did early hunter-gatherers learn to make their plates and bowls?

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Peer-reviewed: This work was reviewed and scrutinised by relevant independent experts.

Knowledge of how to make and use pottery was probably shared between hunter-gatherer communities in Europe via cultural and social traditions prior to the spread of agriculture, according to international research, who say it seems to have happened faster than previously thought. The team analysed various aspects of 1226 pottery remains from 156 hunter-gatherer sites in Eastern Europe and Russia, including radiocarbon dating, shape, and decoration. The analysis suggests that pottery spread through cultural transmission and social traditions and was inherited by successive generations of hunter-gatherers from around 5900 BC. Hunter-gatherer societies lived on the European continent early in the Holocene period around 12,000 years ago, and relied on hunting, foraging and fishing for subsistence, leaving a relatively sparse archaeological record compared to early farming societies.

Journal/conference: Nature Human Behaviour

Research: Paper

Organisation/s: British Museum, UK

Funder: This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement number 695539, The Innovation, Dispersal and Use of Ceramics in NW Eurasia) to C.H. Research at the site of Dąbki was conducted under the National Science Centre, Poland (grant agreement number 2017/27/B/HS3/00478). H.K.R. acknowledges the British Academy for funding. E.O.’s work was supported by the Estonian Research Council (grant agreement numbers PXX MOBERC14 and PSG492). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish or preparation of the manuscript.

Media release

From: Springer Nature

Archaeology: Pottery reveals connections between ancient hunter-gatherers in Europe

Knowledge of how to make and use pottery was shared between hunter-gatherer communities in Europe via kinship-driven, regional communication networks prior to the spread of agriculture, a paper in Nature Human Behaviour proposes. The findings, based on analyses of pottery remnants, suggest that pottery traditions originated in central Asia or western Siberia and were taken up by hunter-gatherer societies across the continent.

Previous research has examined the spread of agriculture across Europe, but less is known of the hunter-gatherer societies that lived on the continent early in the Holocene period, from around 12,000 years ago. Hunter-gatherer societies in Europe relied on hunting, foraging and fishing for subsistence, and have left a relatively sparse archaeological record compared to early farming societies.

Rowan McLaughlin and colleagues analysed the remains of 1,226 pottery vessels from 156 hunter-gatherer sites across Eastern Europe and Russia. They combined radiocarbon dating, together with data on the shape and decoration of ceramic vessels, and analyses of organic residues found inside the pots. Their findings suggest that the spread of pottery occurred relatively rapidly westwards from 5900 BC onwards and took only 300–400 years to advance over 3,000 km (or up to 250 km in a single generation). Their analysis of the forms and decoration on the pottery suggests that it spread through a process of cultural transmission, and correlations between the properties of the pots and how they were used could be reflective of social traditions inherited by successive generations of hunter-gatherers. Additionally, the authors find evidence that the ceramics were used for cooking a wide range of foods, suggesting that pottery adoption was not driven by any specific economic or environmental pressures.

The authors note that the evidence from pottery is limited by variability in the survival of archaeological artefacts. They suggest that further research is needed to aid our understanding of the interconnected nature of these communities.

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