engleski

Trans-Adriatic Contacts after the Transition to Farming

This paper discusses contacts between the eastern and western Adriatic coasts from the time of transition to farming around year 6000 BC until the emergence of social elites in the 3rd millennium BC. Since those contacts would have required substantial navigational knowledge and technology, trans-Adriatic connectivity is inseparably linked to the history of seafaring. In the ever-changing natural and social environment of prehistoric Adriatic, the reasons for travel also were changing. Navigation took off abruptly around year 6000 BC, at the time of transition to farming. At first, travel was undertaken primarily in search of places to settle. Motives for travel changed after the establishment of farming villages. Rather than seeking new destinations, navigation now allowed the farming communities that were scattered around the Adriatic to remain in contact. Trans-Adriatic travel was undertaken not only to acquire locally unavailable raw materials, but also to maintain long-distance social networks. Yet another change came with the social transformations that marked the 3rd millennium BC, when clear evidence for social ranking appears for the first time in the archaeological record. Long-distance voyaging became crucial to prominent individuals for gaining and consolidating power, for creation and maintenance of social inequality.

Adriatic, connectivity, Neolithic, Copper Age

nije evidentirano