Where are the cereals? Contribution of phytolith analysis to the study of subsistence economy at the Trypillia site Maidanetske (ca. 3900-3650 BCE),central Ukraine

Phytolith analysis has been applied in one of the extraordinary Trypillia “mega-site” in central Ukraine. The site Maidanetske, dated to ca. 3900–3650 BCE, is composed of ca. 3000 houses, which were built of earth-based architecture. As these mega-sites were extremely large, their relatively short duration and their population dynamics are under debate. In this study, the focus is set on the detection of daily household activities, including cereal processing. Archaeological contexts have been sampled for phytoliths inside and outside houses, including daub fragments, grinding stones, vessels, floor surfaces and a pit filling. Phytolith records from layers above and below the archaeological contexts were also analysed. The results indicate that cereal by-products such as chaff from pooid cereals, were in use for specific purposes like daub tempering for house building. Thus cereals were a relevant part of the site subsistence economy despite the scarce preservation of archaeobotanical macro-remains. While chaff and straw suggest on-site processing of cereals, the location of processing is unclear. Since house floors and cultural layers are poorer in chaff phytoliths than expected, the future analysis of other special buildings for instance might help to detect specialised areas of processing apart from houses. Besides cereals thephytolith record attests also the presence of wild grasses with probable indication of steppe grassland components.Further investigation of soil sequences outside the site and comparison with modern reference material in future will help to assess the development of the grassland vegetation through time

Трипілля – стратегія та результати поточного українсько-європейського проекту

The aim of the article is to identify the main tasks, strategies and some results of an ongoing UkrainianEuropean Project that is dealing with the Tripolye culture phenomenon. In order to investigate emergence and decline of giant-settlements with thousands of houses and very specific spatial layouts, the challenge need to be mastered to perform representative archaeological and scientific sampling with reasonable efforts. This is only possible through the combination of non-destructive survey techniques, targeted archaeological excavations and the application of modern scientific methods. In order to gain a deeper understanding of the social, ecological, demographic and economic dimensions of such settlements and underlying transformations of human societies also in their regional variability, the consideration of different spatial investigation levels is required. In the first phases of the project, high-resolution magnetic surveys were applied to different large Tripolye settlements and exemplary investigations were carried out at the local scale of the Maidanetske settlement. At the current stage of the project, the studies focus more on the meso-and macro-regional level

Communal buildings in Cucuteni-Tripolye settlements

In recent years, high-resolution geomagnetic surveys in Cucuteni-Tripolye settlements led to the discovery of large, so far unknown building structures which are located at prominent positions within settlements. Due to their extraordinary size, positioning and special architectural characteristics this structures are interpreted as some kind of public or communal buildings such as temples or assemblage houses. Within large settlements two classes of such buildings can be distinguished: high-level ‘mega-structures’ for the whole settlement and low level ring- or pathway buildings for parts of the commune. The second category of buildings, normally show regular distributions within settlements which likely reflect some kind of communal organisation

Майданецьке 2013. Нові розкопки на трипільському мега-поселенні

In 2013 the first excavation campaign took place in Maidanetske by a joint interdisciplinary Ukrainian/ German team. Many aspects of the environment, economy and household organisation of Maidanetske and Trypillia mega-sites (Russian “Tripolye”) in general can now be discussed based on a new range of data. There are new arguments for an anthropogenically-induced transformation of the original forest steppe into steppe vegetation during the existence of Maidanetske. Numerous radiometric dates and typochronological discussions demonstrate that it is most probable that the houses of the concentric rings existed contemporarily, resulting in population calculations of approximately 15,000 inhabitants. Important new information on subsistence economy was gathered, especially through the analyses of botanical macro-remains and phytoliths. The excavations also revealed the spatial organisation of one “normal” domestic house(hold) and its “house place”, while two pits also indicate feasting and ritual activities, probably not within a single household, but a different ‘political’ supra-household level. In chronological terms the burning of houses around 3700 BCE is one ‘story’; burnt remains in pits (dating to the 39th century BCE) is a different ‘story’, perhaps linked to the deliberate (also ritual) deposition of earlier house remains

Stolniceni – Excavation results from the 2017 campaign

During extensive field work, different aspects of the large Tripolye settlement Stolniceni I in northwest Moldova were investigated by an international team. These investigations allow a reassessment of these population agglomerations from the first half of the 4th millennium BCE in Moldova and their comparison with more eastern Tripolye sites. The investigations carried out in 2017 included the completion of the archaeo-magnetic survey of the settlement and the targeted archaeological excavations of various types of contexts. Besides the investigation of a ditch enclosing the site and test trenches in different parts of the settlement, the excavations focused mainly on two areas in the north of the settlement: On the one hand, excavations were carried out in a pottery production complex, including the uncovering of a pottery kiln, several pits and a dwelling. On the other hand, one specific ‘ash-mound-like’ anomaly was investigated which are arranged in regular intervals at the periphery of the settlement. The archaeological excavations were accompanied by comprehensive archaeobotanical analyses, which provide an insight into the subsistence and wood selection in the settlement, as well as permitting environmental reconstructions. A larger series of 14C-datings proves the occupation of the settlement Stolniceni I over a longer period between about 3925 and 3700 BCE

Modelling landscape transformation at the Chalcolithic Tripolye mega-site of Maidanetske (Ukraine): Wood demand and availability

Wood was a crucial resource for prehistoric societies, for instance, as timber for house construction and as fuel. In the case of the exceptionally large Chalcolithic Tripolye ‘mega-sites’ in central Ukraine, thousands of burnt buildings, indicating huge population agglomerations, hint at such a massive use of wood that it raises questions about the carrying capacity of the sensitive forest-steppe environment. In this contribution, we investigate the wood demand for the mega-site of Maidanetske (3990–3640 BCE), as reconstructed based on wood charcoal data, wood imprints on daub and the archaeomagnetometry-based settlement plan. We developed a regional-scale model with a fuzzy approach and applied it in order to simulate the potential distribution and extent of woodlands before and after Chalcolithic occupation. The model is based upon the reconstructed ancient land surface, soil information derived from cores and the potential natural woodland cover reconstructed based on the requirements of the prevailing ancient tree species. Landscape scenarios derived from the model are contrasted and cross-checked with the archaeological empirical data. We aim to understand whether the demand for wood triggered the site development. Did deforestation and consequent soil degradation and lack of resources initiate the site’s abandonment? Or, alternatively, did the inhabitants develop sustainable woodland management strategies? Starting from the case study of Maidanetske, this study provides estimates of the extent of human impact on both carrying capacity and landscape transformations in the sensitive transitional foreststeppe environment. Overall, the results indicate that the inhabitants of the Chalcolithic site did not suffer from a significant shortage in the wood resource at any time of inhabitation in the contexts of the different scenarios provided by the model. An exception is given by the phase of maximum house construction and population within a scenario of dry climatic conditions

Between Cereal Agriculture and Animal Husbandry: Millet in the Early Economy of the North Pontic Region

Broomcorn millet (Panicum miliaceum L.) was frst domesticated in China and dispersed westward via Central Asia in the 3rd millennium BC, reaching Europe in the 2nd millennium BC. North of the Black Sea, the North Pontic steppe and foreststeppe areas are key regions for understanding the westward dispersal of millet, as evidenced by the earliest direct radiocarbon dates on European millet grains, which we present here. Examining various lines of evidence relevant to crop cultivation, animal husbandry, contacts and lifestyles, we explore the regional dynamics of the adoption of millet, broadening knowledge about past subsistence strategies related to the ‘millet farmers/consumers’ who inhabited the northern Black Sea region during the Bronze and Iron Ages. Our re-evaluation of crop evidence contributes to ongoing discussions on the mobility of prehistoric communities in the Eurasian steppe and forest-steppe—for instance, on whether millet was linked to full-time mobile pastoralists, who occasionally grew or only consumed it, or whether it was linked to sedentary farmers and cattle herders who regularly cultivated millet, among other crops. From the Bronze Age to the Late Antique, this crop is attested under diferent socio-cultural conditions that suggest it was adaptable to stockbreeding and the natural environment and consumed since the mid 2nd millennium BC in the northern Black Sea region

Implementation and performances of the IPbus protocol for the JUNO Large-PMT readout electronics

The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is a large neutrino detector currently under construction in China. Thanks to the tight requirements on its optical and radio-purity properties, it will be able to perform leading measurements detecting terrestrial and astrophysical neutrinos in a wide energy range from tens of keV to hundreds of MeV. A key requirement for the success of the experiment is an unprecedented 3% energy resolution, guaranteed by its large active mass (20 kton) and the use of more than 20,000 20-inch photo-multiplier tubes (PMTs) acquired by high-speed, high-resolution sampling electronics located very close to the PMTs. As the Front-End and Read-Out electronics is expected to continuously run underwater for 30 years, a reliable readout acquisition system capable of handling the timestamped data stream coming from the Large-PMTs and permitting to simultaneously monitor and operate remotely the inaccessible electronics had to be developed. In this contribution, the firmware and hardware implementation of the IPbus based readout protocol will be presented, together with the performances measured on final modules during the mass production of the electronics

Mass testing of the JUNO experiment 20-inch PMTs readout electronics

The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is a multi-purpose, large size, liquid scintillator experiment under construction in China. JUNO will perform leading measurements detecting neutrinos from different sources (reactor, terrestrial and astrophysical neutrinos) covering a wide energy range (from 200 keV to several GeV). This paper focuses on the design and development of a test protocol for the 20-inch PMT underwater readout electronics, performed in parallel to the mass production line. In a time period of about ten months, a total number of 6950 electronic boards were tested with an acceptance yield of 99.1%