Clemens Lichter (ed.). How Did Farming Reach Europe? Anatolian-European relations from the second half of the 7th through the first half of the 6th millennium cal BC (Proceedings of the International Workshop Istanbul, 20-22 May 2004).

Bogaard, Amy

CLEMENS LICHTER (ed.). How Did Farming Reach Europe? Anatolian-European relations from the second half of the 7th through the first half of the 6th millennium cal BC (Proceedings of the International Workshop Istanbul, 20-22 May 2004). BYZAS 2, Veroffentlichung des Deutschen Archaiologischen Instituts Istanbul. 2005. Istanbul: Deutsches Archaologisches Institut Istanbul; 975-807-106-8 paperback.

While the title of this book asks a fundamental question concerning the spread of agriculture to Europe, its content addresses a more immediate issue: what does recent research in the border regions between Greece and Turkey reveal about settlement in the later seventh-earlier sixth millennium cal BC? The patterns that unfold are complex; 'the archaeological research carried out to date in Greece, the Balkans and Anatolia does not promise a simple answer to the question of how farming reached Europe' (Lichter, p. 6). The book puts to rest the traditional view of Anatolia as a mere 'bridge' between the Near Eastern and European Neolithics. Instead, Anatolia emerges as a complex zone of transformation encompassing distinct regional traditions and ways of life, including what is arguably the 'blueprint' for Neolithic settlement in Mediterranean Europe (Schoop, p. 53).

The volume brings together papers from a workshop marking the 75th anniversary of the German Institute of Archaeology in Istanbul and includes a radiocarbon database by A. Reingruber and L. Thissen (available online at: www.canew.org). In the initial section, 'Anatolian Roots', Ozdogan sketches out the contours of a Pre-Pottery Neolithic 'formation zone' and the nature and timing of Neolithic developments further west. Thissen's paper rejects simplistic east-west models of spread and is concerned to place the neolithisation of Thessaly in a broader context of developments in the later seventh millennium cal BC, such as the emergence of the Fikirtepe complex in north-west Anatolia. Schoop's paper reconsiders the trajectories of central and western Anatolia in the broader sweep of neolithisation. The contrast between lineage-based society in central Anatolia and more explicitly household-based patterns of settlement in western Anatolia provides a stimulating model that can be assessed through further fieldwork and analysis.

Of the six papers on the 'Neolithisation of Western Anatolia', those by Lichter, Abay and Derin discuss recent fieldwork relating to the Aegean coastal region of western Anatolia, which is less well known than the Lake District and Marmara regions. Efe focuses on north-west inland Anatolia, with hints of (as yet unexcavated) pre-Fikirtepe Neolithic settlement potentially going back to the Pre-Pottery Neolithic. Hoca Cesme in Turkish Thrace, discussed by Bertram and Karul, provides a chronological and stylistic link between north-west Anatolia and the Bulgarian Neolithic, its earliest phases showing associations with later Fikirtepe and its latest with Karanovo I/II.

The five papers on the 'Neolithisation of the Balkans and Greece' target relatively controversial areas in current understanding: Mesolithic evidence (Sampson et al., Efstratiou, Kyparissi-Apostolika and Kotzamani), the aceramic Neolithic (Reingruber) and central/southern Greece (Alram-Stern). Reingruber's argument that Milojcic adopted the notion of an aceramic Neolithic from contemporary excavations in the Near East is persuasive, though there is other evidence for a certain 'reiteration' of early Near Eastern developments in Neolithic Greece (e.g. the transition from round pit-huts to rectilinear dwellings--Halstead 2006).

In the section '"Border crossing" cultural elements', Rosenstock explores how far the distributions of site types (tells, flat sites) and construction materials (mud, timber) correlates with climate. Ecological gradients clearly do play a role (e.g. mud use being confined to <1000mm rainfall zones), though tells and flat sites overlap in many regions and other cultural factors are also at work (see for example Halstead 1999, 2006; Kotsakis 1999). Perles contrasts the Near Eastern elements incorporated into the material culture of the Greek and Bulgarian Neolithics, concluding that there were earlier/southern and later/northern waves of colonisation, though the possibility of selective adoption by indigenous communities also merits consideration.

A superficial problem with the book is the quality of the English: further editing and correction would have enhanced some papers, though the errors rarely obscure the meaning. A deeper issue is the traditional focus on artefacts over ecofacts. The title implies that farming is the defining Neolithic practice in the region, but few of the papers incorporate bioarchaeological content, though Schoop's paper does attempt to model farming in different regions of Anatolia. A dialogue involving bioarchaeological specialists will be of key importance in refining and assessing such models.

This book provides a timely synthesis of recent research on neolithisation in Anatolia and southeast Europe. Though the question posed by the title remains open, discussion of the latest fieldwork results, and development of new models susceptible to assessment and refinement, are precisely what is needed to develop reliable answers.

References

HALSTEAD, P. 1999. Neighbours from hell? The household in Neolithic Greece, in P. Halstead (ed.) Neolithic Society in Greece: 77-95. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.

--2006. What's ours is mine? Village and household in early farming society in Greece. Amsterdam: Achtentwintigste Kroon-Voordracht, Stichting Nederlands Museum voor Anthropologie en Praehistorie.

KOTSAKIS, K. 1999. What Tells Can Tell: Social Space and Settlement in the Greek Neolithic, in P. Halstead (ed.) Neolithic Society in Greece: 66-76. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.

AMY BOGAARD

Institute of Archaeology, University of Oxford, UK