When archaeologists discuss ‘ancestor cults’ or ‘ancestor veneration’, what this might entail in practice usually remains vague, leading to charges that the concept of ‘ancestors’ is often applied generically. In this article, the authors combine bioarchaeological, taphonomic, radiocarbon, and isotopic studies to explore the ritual practice of the selective retention, curation, and deposition of a group of human crania and mandibles. Between 5500–5400 bc, Neolithic people at Masseria Candelaro (Puglia, Italy) deposited broken crania and mandibles from about fifteen individuals in a heap in the centre of the village. These individuals were mostly probable males, collected over the course of two centuries and actively used, with their deposition marking the final disposal of a ritual collection. The motivations for the curation of cranial bone are investigated through comparison with archaeological and ethnographic examples, advancing an interpretation of ritual practice directed towards ancestors.

Early Neolithic funerary practices and the meaning of complete ceramic vessels found isolated are poorly researched topics in western Iberia. However, recent archaeological salvage excavations at Armazéns Sommer and Palácio Ludovice in Lisbon have revealed individual burial pits of male individuals laid in a foetal position and directly associated with necked vessels. These discoveries suggest that finds of isolated vessels, known since the beginning of the twentieth century in Portugal and usually found fortuitously apparently without archaeological context, may also have originally belonged to similar burials, unnoticed by their finders. This hypothesis opens new perspectives for the interpretation of such finds, which are inventoried in the present article.

This article presents the first evidence for cupmarks in the southern Scandinavian Middle Neolithic, in the form of two cupmarked stones recovered during excavations at the Neolithic enclosures of Vasagård on the island of Bornholm in the Baltic Sea. Until now, cupmarks, which are frequently found on dolmen capstones, have been associated with the rich and figurative rock art known from the Bronze Age (c. 1700–500 bc). The evidence from Vasagård opens up the possibility that more cupmarks could be Neolithic. The association of the cupmarked stones from Vasagård with ritual gatherings suggests an affinity with contemporary sites, including Orkney, where cupmarks have been linked to architectural transformations.

Isotope ratios of tooth enamel from ten Early Neolithic individuals buried in a long cairn at Whitwell in central England were measured to determine where they sourced their childhood diet. Five individuals have low Sr concentrations (11–66 ppm) and high 87Sr/86Sr ratios (0.7164–0.7212). Three individuals have relatively low 87Sr/86Sr ratios (0.712–0.711) and Sr concentrations ranging between 54 and 109 ppm. Two individuals have strontium isotope values that bridge the gap between the isotope compositions of these two groups. The high 87Sr/86Sr values are rare in human enamel and exclude sources within the biosphere of central England. Oxygen isotope values are comparable to those found within human archaeological populations buried in temperate regions of Europe. The strontium isotope results should be interpreted in the context of other evidence for migration from northern France to Britain during the Early Neolithic.

This article describes a path to addressing the discomfort that I and many of my braver colleagues have had, when putting words into the mouths and heads of prehistoric actors, knowing that these words say more about us than they do about prehistory. Yet without such speech, how are we archaeologists and the broader public to imagine the intangibles of the deep past (emotions, affect, gender, senses)? Moreover, such words create a misleading certainty that conceals the ambiguities of the archaeological data. Are there alternative options to verbal and vocal clarity when creating imagined fictive narratives about the past? With inspiration from composer Györgi Ligeti, from linguists and experimental psychologists, and from ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response) performers, I explore the emotive power of vocal non-verbal interjections and utterances that have more universality and less cultural baggage, using them in three diverse re-mediations of digital media from three prehistoric archaeological contexts in Europe and Anatolia.

Gender archaeology approaches to Iberian late prehistory have experienced a significant growth in the last two decades. However, much of the work undertaken has focused on specific aspects of the archaeological record (rock art, burial practices), particularly from the Bronze Age and Iron Age periods for which the evidence is more readily available. In addition, it has tended to be regional or local in scope. Here, we attempt an empirically robust multi-proxy approach to the development of early gender inequalities in Neolithic Iberia. Inspired by Gerda Lerner's ideas on the origins of patriarchy and based on a systematic collection of data analysed by means of significance testing, we present the first comprehensive study of gender dissymmetries in Iberian prehistory. Our conclusions suggest that, first, the multi-proxy method used has potential for the systematic study of gender inequalities on the basis of archaeological data and, second, that the Neolithic witnessed emerging gender inequalities that set the basis for male domination in later periods.

The lakeshores of western Switzerland are one of Europe's best-known Neolithic settlement areas, thanks to dendrochronological dating and the exceptional preservation of organic materials. Against this outstanding background, this study uses zooarchaeological data to answer a series of questions regarding the Neolithic economy, environment and human-environment interactions at these lakeshore sites. It also discusses, within an interdisciplinary framework, the possible impact climatic fluctuations, cultural influence, topographical conditions, and demographic growth had on economic change. The results show that the faunal economy was mainly based on animal husbandry, with fluctuations in the cattle-pig ratio. Hunting also played an important role in the food system and focused mainly on large game, especially red deer, which contributed significantly to the meat supply. The results from comparing these animal bone remains also show that multiple factors, such as topography, climatic conditions, and cultural influence, played a part in the socio-economic organisation of the Neolithic communities. Exploratory procedures such as correspondence analysis support these interpretations.

Current knowledge of the beginnings of crop cultivation in Lithuania is based mainly on Cerealia-type pollen data supplemented by other indirect evidence such as agricultural tools. We argue that these records, predating carbonized remains of cultivated plants, are not substantial enough indicators of the early stages of agriculture in Lithuania. Here, we demonstrate that the macroremains of cultural plants that were previously reported from two Neolithic settlements in Lithuania were either mistakenly identified as domestic crops or incorrectly ascribed to the Neolithic period due to movement through the stratigraphic sequence and the absence of direct dating of cereal grains. Furthermore, we present a charred Hordeum vulgare grain from the Bronze Age settlement of Kvietiniai in western Lithuania. It was AMS-dated to 1392–1123 cal bc, and at present represents the earliest definite evidence for a crop in the eastern Baltic region. We conclude that, presently, there are no grounds to suggest that crop cultivation took place in Lithuania during the Neolithic.

The Adriatic Sea and Balkan Peninsula were an important corridor for the spread of agriculture northwards and westwards from the Near East into Europe. Therefore, the pace and nature of the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition along the Adriatic coastline has important implications for the movement of new peoples and/or ideas during one of the most eventful periods in European prehistory. We present new Early Neolithic radiocarbon and stable isotope evidence from humans and animals from the Zemunica cave site in Dalmatia, Croatia. The results show that these humans date to the earliest Neolithic in the region, and they have completely terrestrial diets, where the main protein source was most likely to have come from domesticated animals. Data are then compared to previous isotope and archaeological evidence to explore models for the spread of agriculture along the eastern Adriatic coast.

Excavations at Kouphovouno (Laconia, Greece) have revealed burnt deposits associated with firing structures. The ‘millefeuille’ (vanilla slice) observed was composed of alternating layers of burnt red aggregates and white carbonate. Their description, micromorphological study, and contrast with a more standard structure of the Middle Neolithic allow us to interpret the layers as belonging to a structure for firing pottery: a covered clamp. This study has clarified its method of construction, operation, and use within a domestic context. After heating and cooking, the production of pottery and lime was one of the pyrotechnological activities most consumptive of energy among Neolithic communities, yet direct evidence for firing installations has been elusive. A new approach to the problem of locating pottery firing sites is presented here. The firing of pottery seems the most likely use for this type of structure, though the production of lime is also discussed.

It has long been claimed that the coaxial stone boundaries of Céide Fields, County Mayo, are a phenomenon of the Irish Early Neolithic — analogous to later prehistoric ‘Celtic’ fields in all but age. This study argues that the age disparity is an artefact of the research methods, and that the age of the main Céide Fields complex has been overestimated by as much as two-and-a-half millennia.

The settlement record of the Neolithic of the northern Alpine foreland is used to address the question of what difference having high-resolution chronology — in this case principally provided by dendrochronology — makes to the kinds of narrative we seek to write about the Neolithic. In a search for detailed histories, three kinds of scale are examined. The longer-term development of cultural patterns and boundaries is found to correlate very imprecisely with the character and architecture of settlements. Individual houses and settlements were generally short-lived, suggesting considerable fluidity in social relations at the local level. Greater continuity can be found in the landscape, perhaps involving more than individual communities. We argue that the particular history of the northern Alpine foreland is best understood by interweaving multiple temporal scales, an approach that will need to be extended to other case studies.

Green objects of personal adornment were quite common among Neolithic and Copper Age groups in Western Europe, and variscite was one of the minerals that was most often used for such a purpose. This article presents the results of a series of archaeological campaigns designed to study the mines of Aliste and the ornament production loci of Quiruelas de Vidriales (both in the province of Zamora, Spain). We discovered that initially, during the fourth millennium cal BC, variscite from Aliste was seldom used and the ornaments’ production was dispersed, but that there was a significant shift during the third millennium cal BC: ornament production intensified and became concentrated in the production sites of Quiruelas. We relate this transformation to the socioeconomic processes that developed in the Iberian Peninsula and the growth of supra-regional socio-technical artefact exchange networks.

The study of the Bom Santo Cave (central Portugal), a Neolithic cemetery, indicates a complex social, palaeoeconomic, and population scenario. With isotope, aDNA, and provenance analyses of raw materials coupled with stylistic variability of material culture items and palaeogeographical data, light is shed on the territory and social organization of a population dated to 3800–3400 cal BC, i.e. the Middle Neolithic. Results indicate an itinerant farming, segmentary society, where exogamic practices were the norm. Its lifeway may be that of the earliest megalithic builders of the region, but further research is needed to correctly evaluate the degree of this community's participation in such a phenomenon.

This paper discusses recent data on, and approaches to, the Neolithization of the Iberian Peninsula. A brief outline is given of new discoveries and archaeological evidence, together with an analysis of the main sites and their contexts, with special emphasis on Neolithic pioneer communities and the role of the hunters–gatherers in the Neolithization process. The analysis concentrates mainly on pottery, as it accounts for most of the archaeological evidence, although other components of the ‘Neolithic package’ are also considered, such as evidence of agriculture, animal husbandry and other materials. A hypothesis on the Neolithization of Iberia is proposed, as well as a brief summary of alternative ideas and models. This hypothesis explains the Neolithisation of this territory in a specific chronological framework (between 5700–5600 and 5400–5300 BC), where one can assume the existence of Neolithic pioneer communities and the important role played in the spread of the Neolithic across this area by both local Mesolithic groups and colonization processes (leapfrog phenomena).

The polycentric nature of Neolithic developments in the Middle East has prompted several discussions related to the processes driving regional diversification in the emergence of agglomerate societies. Archaeologists have recognized how diverse social, environmental, and material landscapes shaped various communities, resulting in a heterogenous Neolithic world. In this paper, we use portable x-ray fluorescence analysis to determine the use of different chert resources at the site of Çatalhöyük, Turkey, and question how their consumption affected, and was affected by, different social and material practices enacted within the community. We adopt a network perspective to examine the range of behaviours that consumed particular resources, and trace how alterations in these networks impacted the social fabric of Çatalhöyük. Ultimately, we conclude that different investments involved in the consumption of each resource either promoted or restricted their use through time. A more complete picture of Neolithic life, we suggest, takes note of the varied relationships that communities developed with nearby social and environmental landscapes, including nuances in the ways in which resources were incorporated into different facets of each community.

This paper considers the shift from the practice of collective burials to individual (or double) burials in western Europe at the end of the Neolithic/Copper Age, around 2500–2000 BC, through the lens of a particular mortuary site—the artificial cave of Bolores (Torres Vedras, Portugal). It suggests that the practices involved in making and using collective burials played an important role in this transformation towards increasing social differentiation. It explores how a focus on materiality at different scales, both temporal and spatial, might contribute new insights into geographically widespread and relatively co-synchronous social change.

Cutmarks on the bones of ten individuals from Körtik Tepe, a Pre-Pottery Neolithic site in Southeastern Anatolia, were analysed using a bioarchaeological approach. Half of the ten individuals possess cutmarks on their crania only while the other five have cutmarks on both their cranial and postcranial bones. Diagnoses of these cutmarks suggest they were made on fresh cadavers, while skeletal data and burial customs reveal that the individuals with cutmarks were subject to human intervention in the decomposition process, understood as post-burial practices rather than secondary burials. This conclusion is supported by the application of plaster and paint as part of the burial customs. The process of defleshing is interpreted as an attempt to purify the corpse and to separate death from life.

Neolithic bodies are not only manifestations of subjective principles. Social and symbolic norms are also incorporated within the bodies of both actual and represented individuals. These norms often relate to economic and religious notions of society, as well as to effigies. Owing to high population densities in Neolithic villages, only a select group of the inhabitants were buried within settlements or represented in images. This generated a category of privileged individuals and body features, which were related to symbolic principles rather than social hierarchy. Such practices among Neolithic societies in the Balkans are evident within burials and human representations. Individuals buried inside settlements, anthropomorphic house models, and figurines from several sites in Ovče Pole, Pelagonia, and the Skopje Valley are used as case studies in this paper. Placing these sites into a wider geographical context, it is argued that gender, age and body parts were significant criteria in funerary practices and features of corporeality.

This paper focusses on a set of anthropomorphic figurines. It suggests that realistic human proportion and canonical body posture were pursued in the carving of these objects as a means of expressing ideology, in a context of diversified forms of manipulation of bodies in funerary practices. It is argued that, against a background of predominantly schematic art, the more realistic and canonical anthropomorphic representation of the human body was used to communicate a set of ideological statements in a more controlled and immediate way, in a period of ontological and cosmological transition.