Fitz Jenő (szerk.): Die aktuellen Fragen der Bandkeramik - István Király Múzeum közelményei. A. sorozat 18. A Pannon konferenciák aktái 1. (Székesfehérvár, 1972)
J. Nandris: Kapcsolatok a mérsékelt égőr legkorábbi újkőkora és a vonaldíszes kerámia között
on the middle river terraces, and in general the Bandseramik association with loess is selective. Nor is die „Loess” itself a unitary category. In eastern Hungary the groundwater correlation gives meaning to ;he very general absence of sites from the right bank sf the Tisza, and from the Duna — Tisza-köz in genral. Where there are early sites, as at .Sövényháza, Fivénvháza-kőtörés, or round the Ludvár lakes they :*an often be correlated with quite localised areas of leej) water table."” Even the Bronze Age cemetery, ind probable settlement, at Szőreg shows that this narked correlation (in this case with a very restricted 10 metre deep island of the water table) holds true for ater periods/7’ We cannot go on to consider the detailed regional icology of all the areas covered by the Bandkeramik, t is enough to emphasise the importance of regional actors within the broad pattern. It is not in general lifficult, even without direct palaeobotanical eviden:e, to envisage much more extensive woodland, paricularly oak forest, during the Altithermal period, n the case of the Tiszántúl this contributed to the egional variety, basically expressed in drainage and oils. It may be possible on this basis to account for he very rapidly apparent diversity of its pottery ypes, by postulating relatively localised human groups, perhaps ultimately mesolithic. The correlation >f pottery differences with such groups does remain lo be demonstrated, but the possibility of mesolithic jelationships is one which must be considered, since it pears on the whole European scene at this period. * * * Before considering what might be involved in this bossibility let us look very briefly at the First Tempe■ate Neolithic phenomenon. This is the first neolithic ound in any zone of the world with a temperate clinate and vegetation, certainly the first in temperate Surope. It is in some senses an important precursor >f the Bandkeramik. Since it begins in the sixth milennium and continues during the early fifth millenlium it precedes the Bandkeramik in time. The cultural groups involved are well enough nown under the names of the Körös, Cris, Starèevo, Cremikovci and Karanovo I/II ; but the time has ome to view this unified phenomenon as a whole. We annot do this in detail here'8’ but some essential oints for the present argument may be set out. The Greek neolithic"” was firmly established in the ixth millennium. The so-called PPN phase is mis-tit(0) J. G. NANDRTS, The Prehistoric Archaeology of South East Europe with special reference to Neolithic Figurines. I’h. D. Dissertation, Cambridge University 1968, 289 — 296.; A. RÓNAY, Az Alföld talajvíz térképe. Budapest 1961. (7) J. G. NANDRIS, o. c., Zbornik 6, 1970. '8) ID., The Prehistoric Archaeology of South East Europe. . . '9) ID., The Development and Relationships of the earlier Greek Neolithic. Man, June 1970. led in several respects. It is known to have substantial amounts of pottery, and its neolithic economy seems to be introduced from elsewhere, fully formed. The meaning of the true PPN phenomenon, as found in the Near East, surely lies in the fact that it represents a differentiation of local mesolithic economy bv successive evolutionary stages, until a full variant of neolithic domestic economy emerges. This cannot vet be said to be attested in Greece. At any rate, after a phase of early monochrome pottery in eastern Greece a period of Decorated Wares ensues, still during the sixth millennium. It is during this period that definite relationships can be first observed with the First Temperate area. These are particularly seen in the Vardar-Morava region, and they continue into the Sesklo period around 5000 B. C. or later. They are documented by various distributions, and it must be emphasised that they represent a period of perhaps twenty generations of diffusion and village settlement — not an instant of migration up a „route” from the Mediterranean. But most important, they imply the translation and adaptation of an economic mode from a Mediterranean environment to a temperate one. Again, as in Greece, there is at present no good evidence that the differentiation of a native mesolithic economy underlies the formation of the First Temperate Neolithic. It will be realised that on the basis of the available evidence one can say the same of the Bandkeramik economy, or indeed of the British neolithic. In this sense Greece, the First Temperate Neolithic and the Bandkeramik present the same picture, whatever evidence may be forthcoming in the future. Having clarified the situation thus far we are in a position to seek the antecedent stages of all these groups, and there is no doubt that they will soon be forthcoming. The Körös group is an important part of the whole First Temperate phenomenon. It has a number of early, if isolated, radiocarbon determinations, and about a third of the known First Temperate sites come from the region, together with high proportions of some of the most distinctive traits of the First Temperate Neolithic. It is by no means certain that it represents a late stage of the First Temperate, as in the conventional view which places it on typological grounds as the last of a series of Ktaréevo developments. It is certain that it represents an important riverine adaptation to the Tisza — Körös basins. While there is as yet little to link it with any mesolithic in this region we can at least remember the connections with rivers and lakes (with the Tisza or at Lake Ludas for example) characteristic of much of the European mesolithic at this stage. We can note that it is a distinctive aggregation of settlements which, to the north (on the upper Tisza), abut on an area in which phenomena like the Alföld Bandkeramik emerge. It merges in the south with sites conventionally attributed to the Starcevo. The relations between them can be seen at least as far south as Grabovac south of the Sava near Obrenovac, at Donja Branjevina in the Васка, or at Kozluk in the Banat. In the successors of these Körös and Starcevo sites riverine adap-
