Chalcolithic Europe

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
See also: Neolithic Europe and Prehistoric Europe
Chalcolithic
Eneolithic, Aeneolithic,
or Copper Age
↑ Stone Age
↑ Neolithic
By region
Africa (2600 BC–1600 AD)
Naqada culture, Gerzeh culture, A-Group culture, C-Group culture, Kerma culture

West Asia (6000–3500 BC)

Ghassulian culture, Uruk period

Europe (5500–2200 BC)

Metallurgy during the Copper Age in Europe
Vinča culture, Varna culture
Cucuteni–Trypillia culture
Yamna culture, Corded Ware
Petreşti culture, Coțofeni culture
Remedello culture, Gaudo culture, Monte Claro culture

Central Asia (3700–1700 BC)

Afanasevo culture

South Asia
(4300–1800 BC)

Periodisation of the Indus Valley civilisation, Bhirrana culture, Hakra Ware culture
Ahar–Banas culture
Kaytha culture, Malwa culture,
Savalda Culture, Jorwe culture, Anarta tradition
Ajay culture

China (5000–2900 BC)

Mesoamerica (6500–1000 BC)
Related topics
Metallurgy, Wheel,
Domestication of the horse
↓ Bronze Age
↓ Iron Age

The Chalcolithic (also Eneolithic, Copper Age) period of Prehistoric Europe lasted roughly from 5000 to 2000 BC, developing from the preceding Neolithic period and followed by the Bronze Age.

It was a period of Megalithic culture, the appearance of the first significant economic stratification, and probably the earliest presence of Indo-European speakers.

The economy of the Chalcolithic, even in the regions where copper was not yet used, was no longer that of peasant communities and tribes: some materials began to be produced in specific locations and distributed to wide regions. Mining of metal and stone was particularly developed in some areas, along with the processing of those materials into valuable goods.

Ancient Chalcolithic

Further information: Old Europe (archaeology)
Reconstruction of an elite burial, c. 4500 BC, Varna culture, Bulgaria[1][2][3][4][5]

From c.

Dnieper-Donets culture, and migrated northwest to the Baltic and Denmark, where they mixed with natives (TRBK A and C). This may be correlated with the spread of Indo-European languages, known as the Kurgan hypothesis. Near the end of the period, another branch left many traces in the lower Danube area (culture of Cernavodă culture
I), in what seems to have been another invasion.

Meanwhile, the Danubian

Boian-Marica culture evolved into a monarchy with a clearly royal cemetery near the coast of the Black Sea. This model seems to have been copied later in the Tiszan region with the culture of Bodrogkeresztur. Labour specialization, economic stratification and possibly the risk of invasion may have been the reasons behind this development. The influx of early Troy
(Troy I) is clear in both the expansion of metallurgy and social organization.

In the western Danubian region (the Rhine and Seine basins) the culture of Michelsberg displaced its predecessor, Rössen. Meanwhile, in the Mediterranean basin, several cultures (most notably Chassey in SE France and La Lagozza in northern Italy) converged into a functional union, of which the most significant characteristic was the distribution network of honey-coloured flint. Despite this unity, the signs of conflicts are clear, as many skeletons show violent injuries. This was the time and area where Ötzi, a man whose well-preserved body was found in the Alps, lived. Another significant development of this period was the Megalithic phenomenon spreading to most places of the Atlantic region, bringing with it agriculture to some underdeveloped regions existing there.

Middle Chalcolithic

Los Millares, c. 3000 BC, Spain

This period extends along the first half of the 3rd millennium BC. Most significant is the reorganization of the Danubians into the powerful Baden culture, which extended more or less to what would be the Austro-Hungarian Empire in recent times. The rest of the Balkans was profoundly restructured after the invasions of the previous period but, with the exception of the Coțofeni culture in a mountainous region, none of them show any eastern (or presumably Indo-European) traits. The Baden culture was succeeded by the Vučedol culture. The new Ezero culture in Bulgaria, had the first traits of pseudo-bronze (an alloy of copper with arsenic); as did the first significant Aegean group: the Cycladic culture after c. 2800 BC.

In the North, the supposedly Indo-European groups seemed to recede temporarily, suffering a strong cultural danubianization. In the East, the peoples of beyond the Volga (

super-culture
, which extended from southern Sweden to southern Spain, including large parts of southern Germany. But the Mediterranean and Danubian groupings of the previous period appear to have been fragmented into many smaller pieces, some of them apparently backward in technological matters.

After c. 2600 several phenomena prefigured the changes of the upcoming period. Large towns with stone walls appeared in two different areas of the Iberian Peninsula: one in the Portuguese region of

Danubian peoples
had greatly modified their culture.

In the southwestern Iberian peninsula, owl-like plaques made of sandstone were discovered and dated to be crafted from 5500 to 4750 BP (Before Present). These are some of the most unique objects discovered in the Chalcolithic (copper age) cultural period. They have generally a head, two rounded eyes, and a body. Theses species were modeled after two owl species, the little owl (Athene Noctua) and the long-eared owl (Asio otux).[6]

Late Chalcolithic

Further information: Bell Beaker culture
Silbury Hill, c. 2400 BC, England

This period extended from c. 2500 BC to c. 1800 or 1700 BC (depending on the region). The dates are general for the whole of Europe, and the Aegean area was already fully in the Bronze Age. c. 2500 BC the new

Globular Amphorae into the new Corded Ware culture. In Britain, copper was used between the 25th and 22nd centuries BC, but some archaeologists do not recognise a British Chalcolithic because production and use was on a small scale.[7]

Around 2400 BC this people of the Corded Ware replaced their predecessors and expanded to Danubian and Nordic areas of western Germany. One related branch invaded Denmark and southern Sweden (

Beaker people. This group seems to have been of mercantile character and preferred being buried according to a very specific, almost invariable, ritual. Nevertheless, out of their original area of western Central Europe, they appeared only inside local cultures, so they never invaded and assimilated but rather went to live among those peoples, keeping their way of life.[dubious – discuss
]

The rest of the continent remained mostly unchanged and in apparent peace. From c. 2300 BC the first

Beaker Pottery appeared in Bohemia and expanded in many directions, but particularly westward, along the Rhone and the sea shores, reaching the culture of Vila Nova (Portugal) and Catalonia (Spain) as its limit. Simultaneously but unrelatedly, c. 2200 BC in the Aegean region, the Cycladic culture decayed, being substituted by the new palatine phase of the Minoan culture of Crete
.

The second phase of Beaker Pottery, from c. 2100 BC onwards, was marked by the displacement of the centre of this phenomenon to Portugal, inside the culture of Vila Nova. This new centre's influence reached to all southern and western France but was absent in southern and western Iberia, with the notable exception of Los Millares. After c. 1900 BC, the centre of the Beaker Pottery returned to Bohemia, while in Iberia there was a decentralization of the phenomenon, with centres in Portugal but also in Los Millares and Ciempozuelos.

See also

References

  1. ISBN 978-0-19-973578-5
    .
  2. ISBN 978-1-78570-654-7
    .
  3. ^ Grande, Lance; Augustyn, Allison (November 15, 2009). "Gems and Gemstones: Timeless Natural Beauty of the Mineral World". University of Chicago Press. Archived from the original on November 1, 2022 – via Google Books.
  4. ^ Curry, Andrew. "Mystery of the Varna Gold: What Caused These Ancient Societies to Disappear?". Smithsonian Magazine.
  5. ^ Daley, Jason. "World's Oldest Gold Object May Have Just Been Unearthed in Bulgaria". Smithsonian Magazine.
  6. PMID 36456596
    .
  7. ^ Miles, The Tale of the Axe, pp. 363, 423, n. 15

Sources

  • Miles, David (2016). The Tale of the Axe: How the Neolithic Revolution Transformed Britain. London, UK: Thames & Hudson.
    ISBN 978-0-500-05186-3
    .

Media related to Copper Age in Europe at Wikimedia Commons

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