Η Ελλάδα στο ευρύτερο πολιτισμικό πλαίσιο των Βαλκανίων κατά την 5η και 4η χιλιετία π.Χ. (Greece in the wider cultural context of the Balkans during the fifth and fourth millennium BC)

Edited by Nikolas Papadimitriou, with the collaboration of Zoi Tsirtsoni

City: Athens

Year: 2010

Publisher: Nicholas P. Goulandris Foundation – Museum of Cycladic Art

Description: Paperback, 126 p., colour & b/w ill, drawings, maps, tables, 28,5x22,5 cm

Abstract

In parallel with the exhibition “The Lost World of Old Europe. The Danube Valley, 5000-3500 BC”, the Museum of Cycladic Art, in collaboration with the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Tourism – General Directorate of Antiquities and Cultural Heritage, is organizing a small presentation of characteristic artifacts from Greek Neolithic sites of the 5th and 4th millennium BC for comparative reasons. This presentation aims at revealing the similarities and the differences that existed between Greece and other regions of SE Europe 7.000 ago, and to exploring developments in Greece within a wider historical and cultural framework.

The 5th millennium BC was a period of great development for Greek Neolithic communities. Settlements expanded singificantly and obtained internal structure, technology advanced considerably – mainly with the invention of metallurgy – and contacts with other regions increased dramatically. The similarities that can be traced on various aspect of material culture with other parts of the Balkans are both numerous and intriguing. Several figurine types – especially from nothern Greece – have close morphological and decorative parallels in modern day Servia and Bulgaria. Copper metallurgy starts evidently here also at the beginning of the 5th millennium. A number of ornaments made of gold, silver, stone, clay or shell belong to types common throughout SE Europe. In pottery, there is a certain amount of similarity mainly in decorative styles.

What was the significance of those similarities? Were they the result of direct contact, exchange, common traditions or simply the reflection of prolongated cultural interaction throughout the so-called “Old Europe”? What happened in Greece when other Neolithic cultures of SE Europe started to decline at the beginning of the 4th millennium BC? These are some of the questions treated in the exhibition and the associated publication (currently available only in Greek).

Contents

Ευχαριστίες [6]

Συντομογραφίες [8]

Χάρτης κυριότερων ανασκαμμένων θέσεων του ελλαδικού χώρου με κατοίκηση κατά την 5η και 4η χιλιετία π.Χ. [10]

Χρονολογικό διάγραμμα [14]

1. Νίκος Παπαδημητρίου, ‘Εισαγωγή’ [16-29]
2. Δημήτριος Β. Γραμμένος, ‘Οι νεολιθικές έρευνες στην Ελλάδα με έμφαση στη βόρεια κατά τις πρόσφατες δεκαετίες’ [30-37]
3. Ιωάννης Ασλάνης, ‘H κατοίκηση στην Ελλάδα κατά την 5^η και 4η χιλιετία π.Χ.’ [38-53]
4. René Treuil, ‘Ειδώλια και ιδεολογία’ [54-65]
5. Κώστας Κωτσάκης, ‘H κεραμική της Νεότερης Νεολιθικής στη βόρεια Ελλάδα’ [66-75]
6. Κωνσταντίνος Ζάχος, ‘H μεταλλουργία στην Ελλάδα και στη ΝΑ Ευρώπη κατά την 5η και 4η χιλιετία π.Χ.’ [76-91]
7. Ζωή Τσιρτσώνη, ‘To τέλος της Νεολιθικής εποχής στην Ελλάδα και τα Βαλκάνια’ [92-103]

Βιβλιογραφία [104]