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
find, separated by several metres from a Cucuteni AB oven. It might equally be compared with heads which occur in Vinca —Turdaç, or with that from a ’Flomborn’ context at Griedel.<28) In neither of these cases is there very secure ground for adding to the Bandkeramik repertory in the eastern province. It may be to some extent logical that such figurine material should not be found in the eastern province, that is to say in Podolia, Moldavia, the Ukraine and Roumania, if we consider that the settlement of these regions belongs to the middle phase of the Bandkeramik, with predominantly Notenkopf pottery and therefore later in time. H. Quitt a<29-32) has described how the Notenkopf on the middle Danube was the transmitting agent for traits reminiscent of the Tisza culture to the west. Notenkopf styles however may have a much earlier inception and longer duration than is commonly supposed. The Notenkopf in Hungary is largely restricted on and west of the Tápió, Zagyva and Galga rivers, and it is generally accepted that the „notenkopf expansion” stemmed from Silesia and south Poland north of the Carpathians, rather than from any Moravian or Slovakian source via Ruthenia. Notenkopf decoration is in itself early, and persists for a long time, being consistently found associated not only with Zeliezovce but together with this and with the earliest stages defined by Quitta in the Dunántúl. H. Quitt a<33) explains this as indicating a particular persistence in this area, so that the earliest Bandkeramik was contemporary with these later types. The association between „oldest Bandkeramik” and these types seems however both more consistent and more widespread than this. The whole argument, and indeed the very problem itself, is to some extent vitiated by several unpalatable facts. In the first place the pottery typology of many of these sub-groups, whether Bandkeramik or otherwise, is over-refined in relation to any external frame of dating. Such an external frame of reference is essential. Even the identity of two pottery assemblages is no guarantee of contemporaneity. Such identity is rare enough, but in any case complex traits, and even assemblages, have duration in time. The main frames of reference in archaeology are time and space. Until our material is located in this framework no discussion of processes, whether of differentiation or of diffusion, has any degree of security. In the present instance it is also worth pointing out that at a much earlier stage of research no real distinction was made bet ween the material of the Szakálhát type and that of the Tisza culture. In discussion of Bandkeramik chronology, as opposed to its typology, „Early” and „Late” are very often the most refined categories we should honestly allow ourselves. When these categories can be refined on it is because of the existence of an external frame of reference, primarily radiocarbon. To say that pottery sub-groups are 28 * * (28) H. QUITTA, о. r., TZ 38, I960, fig. 11. (29-32)) Ibid. (33)H. QUITTA, о. с., TZ 38, 1960, I -38, 153- 188. over-refined is simply to assert that there is no valid statistical basis for drawing chronological distinctions between them at the level for which our information is valid. In reality it is now necessary to turn away from a typological and museological approach to archaeological material in favour of a behavioural one. A little more consideration of the peasant populations of neolithic south-east Europe might lead us to the conclusion that what they had in common was more substantial than what divided them. The Neolithic was after all a mode of behaviour characteristic of the Neothermal period in Europe and the Near East. In Europe it acquired particular relevance and adaptive value during the Altithermal, transmitting this mode of behaviour through the FTN into Temperate Europe, and from the FTN through a mediating zone within the Hungarian basin into central Europe. These assertions can be made only by virtue of the broad external frame of temporal reference afforded by radiocarbon dating, which can be used to support a diffusionary model for this mode of behaviour. But a diffusion hypothesis is not an invasion hypothesis, and does not preclude a very substantial element of differentiation of pre-existing, and possibly preadapted, forms in the direction of what proved to have adaptive value. We also know a great deal more now than at the time when this paper was actually written about the rather close relationship which obtained between the hunter- fisher climax of the Altithermal period in the Danube gorges and the FTN in that region. The issues raised here belong in reality to those internal cultural relationships, which must be omitted from this particular discussion. Instead we must try now to evaluate the nature of the problem which faces us as regards the material of the transitional hunter-fisher groups of the Neothermal period. * * * The situation as regards the Mesolithic in Central and Eastern Europe is perhaps the most unsatisfactory of all these major groups under consideration. Claims for a hiatus or absence of any effective Mesolithic settlement, in the areas and period of the earliest Neolithic occupation, rest largely on absence of evidence. The greatest lack is in general the absence of dating evidence. The sites of the mesolithic are usually known as surface finds. Scatters of microlithic tools on sandy areas are conspicuous by virtue of the absence of soil cover, but at the same time are liable to mixing by sub-aerial denudation. Thus even when they occur with pottery a certain amount of caution is needed. We know from the rarity of Bandkeramik house floors and internal arrangements that denudation of the surface of the loess has occurred. Mesolithic flat settlements were insubstantial, by later village standards, and exceptions such as Lepeski Vir emphasise this general rule. The other chief known occurrence of mesolithic sites is in caves, naturally enough usually in highland zones. Both the detection and dating of mesolithic sites depends on 66
