Content uploaded by Dušan Mihailović
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Dušan Mihailović on Nov 17, 2017
Content may be subject to copyright.
A preview of the PDF is not available
Palaeolithic and Mesolithic Research in the Central Balkans
Figures
Figures - uploaded by Dušan Mihailović
Author content
All figure content in this area was uploaded by Dušan Mihailović
Content may be subject to copyright.
... The past 20 years of prospection and excavations of Palaeolithic sites have resulted in an increased number of fossil hominins: in Serbia, Dušan Mihailović and Bojana Mihailović have surveyed vast areas of the country and excavated a number of important Chibanian and Late Pleistocene sites (Mihailović 2008a(Mihailović , 2008b(Mihailović , 2009a(Mihailović , 2009b(Mihailović , 2014Marín-Arroyo & Mihailović 2017;Roksandic et al. 2011), showing the potential of the area to resolve some of the issues. In Greece, a similar revival of interest in the Palaeolithic archaeology is evident since the 1990s (Darlas & Mihailović 2008;Darlas & Psathi 2016;Harvati 2016;Carter et al. 2019). ...
The strategic geographical position of the Balkan Peninsula, at the crossroads between southwest Asia and central and western Europe, make of this territory a key area for understanding the different human migrations into Europe during the Pleistocene. This long-time neglected area for the Palaeolithic research, last years has experienced a blossoming in terms of research projects and key discoveries. Only in the past decade, sites from the Balkan Peninsula have yielded, for instance, the oldest anatomically modern human occupations in Europe, the first human remains of our species in the continent, the first confirmation of interbreeding between us and Neanderthals and evidence of Palaeolithic rock art, a phenomenon traditionally restricted to South-western Europe. This volume provides a comprehensive overview of the previous data and new discoveries, addressed by an international list of contributors among the most renowned scholars developing archaeological researches in this territory. It summarises the state of the art for the Early Prehistory Archaeology of one of the most important emerging territories for the discipline.
... The past 20 years of prospection and excavations of Palaeolithic sites have resulted in an increased number of fossil hominins: in Serbia, Dušan Mihailović and Bojana Mihailović have surveyed vast areas of the country and excavated a number of important Chibanian and Late Pleistocene sites (Mihailović 2008a(Mihailović , 2008b(Mihailović , 2009a(Mihailović , 2009b(Mihailović , 2014Marín-Arroyo & Mihailović 2017;Roksandic et al. 2011), showing the potential of the area to resolve some of the issues. In Greece, a similar revival of interest in the Palaeolithic archaeology is evident since the 1990s (Darlas & Mihailović 2008;Darlas & Psathi 2016;Harvati 2016;Carter et al. 2019). ...
The strategic geographical position of the Balkan Peninsula, at the crossroads between southwest Asia and central and western Europe, make of this territory a key area for understanding the different human migrations into Europe during the Pleistocene. This long-time neglected area for the Palaeolithic research, last years has experienced a blossoming in terms of research projects and key discoveries. Only in the past decade, sites from the Balkan Peninsula have yielded, for instance, the oldest anatomically modern human occupations in Europe, the first human remains of our species in the continent, the first confirmation of interbreeding between us and Neanderthals and evidence of Palaeolithic rock art, a phenomenon traditionally restricted to South-western Europe. This volume provides a comprehensive overview of the previous data and new discoveries, addressed by an international list of contributors among the most renowned scholars developing archaeological researches in this territory. It summarises the state of the art for the Early Prehistory Archaeology of one of the most important emerging territories for the discipline.
... The initial purpose of the project was to search for high-altitude Mesolithic sites, in light of results achieved since the end of the 1960s in the Italian Alps, where dozens of early Holocene hunter-gatherer sites attributed to different Mesolithic periods were discovered [6][7][8]. This is a very important agenda because our knowledge of the Early Holocene archaeology of the entire Balkan Peninsula is elusive, especially with regard to the territories of the interior and the mountain zones [9][10][11][12][13]. Therefore, this paper will focus, in particular, on the Holocene archaeology of the Samarina highland zone, though we will also consider Mount Vasilitsa moraines, where artefacts of different ages have been discovered. ...
Past human mountain settlement patterns and resource and high-altitude landscape exploitation are underexplored research fields in archaeology. This study presents data gathered during more than 20 years of fieldwork in the Pindus range of Western Macedonia (Greece), focusing in particular on Holocene land use. The investigated territory is located around the Vlach town of Samarina. The area is partly bounded by Mounts Vasilitsa, Gurguliu, Bogdani and Anitsa, and their interconnecting watersheds between ca. 1400 and 2000 m a.s.l. This research led to the discovery of many sites and findspots of lithic and ceramic artefacts attributed to the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, Late Neolithic, Chalcolithic, Bronze Age, and several Historical periods. The radiocarbon results show an unexpected longue durée of Holocene human landscape use. The number of sites, their distribution, location, and subsistence strategies exhibit shifts between the Middle Palaeolithic and different periods of the Holocene, which are closely related to the exploitation of the mountain environment and its resources. Moreover, typical knapped stone artefacts have been used as a proxy for dating the glacial landforms which characterise the Samarina highland zone; we correlate them to the better-known moraine systems of Mount Tymphi in Epirus and contribute to the reconstruction of the Pleistocene glacial landscapes of the Pindus Range.
... Finally, the new evidence, combined with the geographic position of the Balkans along several potential routes of dispersal, and the increasing number of UP rock art discoveries outside of southwest Europe, has aroused the interest of specialists in UP symbolism. This has attracted more international interest to the area (see for instance Mihailović 2014), leading to the creation of collaborative projects involving specialists from different countries. ...
Paleolithic art offers unique perspectives on prehistoric societies and cultures. It is also considered a key component of modern human behavior. Until recently, Paleolithic artworks were thought to be geographically restricted to a very few areas, especially southwestern Europe. Discoveries of art in other parts of Europe and other parts of the globe have challenged this vision, expanding the documented distribution
of this important cultural phenomenon. As a consequence, there has been renewed interest in less well-known areas, with the goal of determining whether the current lack of art is a reflection of a past reality, the product of limited research, or a matter of preservation. One of these regions is the Balkan Peninsula, a key area for understanding Upper Paleolithic societies given its location at the crossroads of several
migration routes into Europe. This article provides a comprehensive overview of the Paleolithic symbolic products, including both rock art and portable art from the Balkans. Recent research has led to new discoveries and insights into the symbolism of this long-neglected area. The present review, combining existing literature and new fieldwork, sheds new light on social and cultural interactions in this part of the continent and leads to a better understanding of its role within the European Upper Paleolithic cultural sphere.
... However, the sample is small, and the context and the provenance of the stone tools do not have secure stratigraphic markers. Surface material has been also reported from several find-spots in the Western Morava valley possibly dated to the LP, but no secure dates are available (Mihailović 2014). ...
This thesis explores possibilities for hominin movement and occupation over the exposed dry land landscapes of the Aegean region during the Early and Middle Pleistocene (focusing more on the Middle Pleistocene ca. 0.8- 0.2 Mya). The point of departure and inspiration is the recent palaeogeographical reconstructions from the study area. Geological evidence reveals the existence of extended terrestrial landscapes, with attractive environments, connecting western Anatolia to Europe via the Greek mainland, during the glacial lowstands of the Middle Pleistocene, and possibly during certain interglacials. These lands are now lost, lying underwater, but, in spatial terms, a completely new spectrum of possibilities opens up for hominins moving across or settling over this part of Eurasia, affecting the wider narrative regarding the early settlements out of Africa. Yet, the research potential of the submerged landscapes of the Aegean has not been fully integrated in the way(s) we study and interpret the Lower Palaeolithic evidence from this region.
The discussion about the early colonisation of Europe has been long focused on the western part of the continent due to the abundance of available evidence. The wider Aegean region was excluded, until recently, as a ‘cul de sac’ that blocked movement and dispersal towards the west, representing a gap in the European Lower Palaeolithic archive, with very little to contribute in terms of material culture or hominin fossil evidence. Advances in palaeogeography and geoarchaeology and exciting new finds urging now for a reconsideration. Could the Aegean exposed lands provide land bridges for movement and favourable niches for occupation, offering perhaps an eastern gateway to Europe during the Early and Middle Pleistocene? In order to answer these questions I drew information from archaeology and palaeoanthropology, palaeozoology and palaeoenvironments, and geology and palaeogeography. These multiple lines of evidence have been synthesised within an affordance-based GIS framework, which centres on the relationship between the hominins and their ‘affording’ world. The new methodological scheme developed here led to new hypotheses and scenarios of movement and occupation, predicting areas in the Aegean, onshore and offshore, with increased research potential for the Lower Palaeolithic, based on the level of suitability for the hominin survival, subsistence and dispersal.
The findings of my study suggest that despite the serious methodological challenges imposed by landscape dynamics, temporal limitations and extensive discontinuities in the archaeological record, a cross - and inter - disciplinary approach can help us gain valuable insights into the nature of the past landscapes and land use by hominins. In this respect, the complex topography concept and the concept of affordances constitute the backbone of my approach. The first, by setting out the background against which suitability was built, and the second, by attributing a lived and experienced element into the past landscape.
The contribution of this study is twofold: (a) offers a framing heuristic, to the newly founded discipline of the continental shelf prehistoric research, for testing further ideas on hominin movement and occupation in dynamic environments; and (b) proposes trans-Aegean corridors of opportunity for dispersal and occupation areas, complementing the current Lower Palaeolithic narrative with a potential eastern gateway to Europe.
Accomplishing long-term plans to harvest and modify natural resources has been a crucial skill for the survival of our species since early Prehistory. Research on this first step of production mostly focuses on the provenience study of lithic artifacts uncovered at archaeological sites, using petrographic and geochemical analyses to correlate the artifacts with potential geological outcrops. Although fundamental for understanding key aspects of landscape use and mobility, regional raw material economy, and extraction technology, Palaeolithic raw material sources have been less intensively investigated, as they are often difficult to locate and challenging to tackle with traditional archaeological approaches. Lojanik in the Central Balkans is one of the largest Prehistoric quarrying areas known in Europe, showing numerous lithic raw material outcrops exploited from the Middle Palaeolithic to the Chalcolithic periods, over an area of 18 hectares. In this paper, we present the results from our renewed research program in this region. Combining airborne LIDAR mapping, geomorphological and archaeological survey, and techno-typological analysis of lithic artifacts, we were able to reconstruct the geomorphological evolution of the landscape and its use by prehistoric societies.
During the Late Pleistocene, the Balkans came to be an important region with many isolated areas, enabling fauna, alongside Neanderthals, to thrive in the area. This work is focused on paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic changes that occurred in the northern Balkan Peninsula with a special focus on fossil record from Smolućka cave aging from MIS 5 to MIS 3. Based on available data, an attempt has been made to establish a synthetic chronological context for the faunal assemblages recovered from Smolućka cave. Tentative attribution of layer 5 to MIS 5 relies on the interstadial pattern of our reconstructions, with favorable climate conditions for a large diversity of species and with mean annual temperature (MAT) reaching up to 3 °C higher than present values and abundant rainfall in the area. Cold conditions for MIS 4 are not present in Smolućka, although layer 4 (late MIS 5 or early MIS 4) shows somewhat dryer and cooler climate when compared with other layers. Layers 3z and 3 (MIS 3) are characterized by temperate and humid conditions together with a complex system of mosaic habitats with high environmental heterogeny but generally favorable conditions for a large diversity of life. Although still not fully chronologically constrained, Smolućka cave presents an interesting opportunity for future research, in the time period when only Neanderthals occupied the Balkans and thrived in local conditions. The transition between the Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans has not yet been established but can be expected in future research.
During the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition in the Balkan, Italian and Iberian peninsulas of southern Europe, late Neanderthal and early Anatomically Modern Human (AMH) populations may have overlapped in some capacity. Many of the hypotheses and models for the transition interval suggest that Neanderthal populations remained in, or migrated to, refugial zones while AMHs colonized areas not suitable for, or abandoned by, Neanderthals. However, many hypotheses and models have not been conclusively tested due to general issues impeding a clear understanding of the relevant archeological record and because of a lack of specificity in defining and applying the term ‘refugium’. This paper briefly summarizes what is known about the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition in southern European Peninsulas and discusses some new directions in the use of refugium concepts in the study of Neanderthal extinction and AMH dispersal. We highlight the complexity of the archeological record in each region and in the studies of refugia more generally. Finally, we make an appeal for generating local, multi‐proxy paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic records to address these complexities so that hypotheses and models integrating refugial concepts in explanations of the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition can be properly formulated and tested.
The word ‘refugium’ is often used to describe patterns of human settlement during various parts of the Palaeolithic. While, classically, a refugium is a location which supports an isolated population of a once more widespread species, some have argued that discrepancies in how this term is used have led to methodological confusion and a weakening of its meaning. Differences in the spatial and temporal scales of how refugia are defined, as well as in the specifics of how they operate, mean that many so‐called refugia serve different biological functions and have different implications for long‐term species survival (Ashcroft, 2010). In this article, I review four questions that may shape individual refugia. I then use the late Middle Palaeolithic record of peninsular southern Europe to explore how attention to these questions may help to advance Middle–Upper Palaeolithic research.
The interaction between speleology and tourism has been active in science and society for a very long time. In many countries, tourist caves shape the economic situation at the local and regional level. This shows their value for the development of local communities and for scientific research and promotion of science. Caves represent the indicators of cave tourism development, and they are one of the main geosites for geotourism travel. Transforming speleological objects into show caves has brought numerous positive results for many regions in the world, including Serbia. In this paper, we try to reveal the ability of speleological objects becoming show caves. The case study of our research is four caves in the Valjevo karst area (West Serbia). We examined their current state and the possibilities for cave tourism development. Using the M-GAM (modified geosite assessment model), we evaluated these four caves and thus determined their values and show cave potential. The obtained results point out the significant values of the explored speleological geoheritage, which possess imposing cave tourism potential. Moreover, the regional conception and creation of a geopark in this area is an evident potential, and more concrete indicators are presented in this paper. Cave tourism in the Zlatibor region is considered an important aspect of a potential geopark in Western Serbia and Valjevo karst area as a crucial complementary potential. The importance of including these caves in the tourist market has been determined by the research results. Active cave tourism of researched geosites can significantly influence both local and regional economic growth, as well as the concept of sustainability of the cave environment and its ecosystem, education, and responsibility.
This book was originally published in 1984. For over a million years rocks provided human beings with the essential raw materials for the production of tools. Nevertheless we still know very little about the behaviour and processes that resulted in the creation of archaeological sites at or near lithic quarries. In the past archaeologists have placed much emphasis on the process of 'exchange' in their analysis of prehistoric economies while largely ignoring the sources of the exchanged objects. However, with the development of interest in the means of production, these sites have begun to take on a new significance. Prehistoric Quarries and Lithic Production is the first systematic study of archaeological sites that served as quarries for stone tools. Its theoretical and methodological importance will extend its appeal beyond those archaeologists concerned with lithic technology and prehistoric exchange systems to archaeologists and anthropologists in general and to geographers and geologists.
