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7/30/2019 Ch2 Kostas Kotsakis
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Kostas Kotsakis8
2. Across the border: unstable dwellings and fluidlandscapes in the earliest Neolithic of Greece
Kostas Kotsakis
The 1960s was an outstanding decade for Greek Neolithic
studies. For Greece as a country, it was the first period of
relative prosperity and peace after a long epoch of
turbulence and unrest. The difficult period opened with
the Balkan Wars in the early 1900s and ended some 50
years later in a civil clash that followed the Second World
War and lasted until well into the 1950s. In 1922, as a
result of the defeat of Greece by Turkey, and the sub-
sequent Treaty of Lausanne, one and a half million
Orthodox Christians were moved to Greece from Asia
Minor, Pontus and Eastern Thrace (Mackridge and
Yannakakis 1997).
Greece reached the middle of the twentieth century a
very different country in many respects; economically,
culturally, demographically and socially. For Neolithic
studies in particular, the period of post-war stability
meant a revival of a research track that was initiated at
the beginning of the twentieth century with the ground-
breaking syntheses of Tsountas (1908) and Wace (Wace
and Thompson 1912). After that promising beginning,
Neolithic studies retreated into a marginal backwater of
research, almost eclipsed by the spectacular discoveries
of the palatial centres in Crete and in continental Greece.
As domestic and international audiences were grasped
firmly by the grand quest for the Hellenic Bronze Ageculture (and to a lesser extent society), the Neolithic was
restricted to small-scale research which focused mainly
on trivial issues of chronology and cultural affinities and
which was undertaken sporadically as a by-product of
major archaeological projects, as at Corinth or Knossos
(Weinberg 1965). Research in Macedonia in the north of
the country was just beginning to map the prehistoric
past of that region, mainly via extensive archaeological
prospection (Heurtley 1939). Too soon for detailed
prehistoric research (let alone any focused on the
Neolithic), the Neolithic retained a marginal role,
dominated by a strong sense of otherness seen against the
Aegean culture. This continued until late in the twentieth
century (Fotiadis 2001; Kotsakis 1998, 47).
It was more than 50 years after Tsountas and Wace
that independent research on the Neolithic period was
resumed. Two central and influential figures of post-
Second World War prehistoric archaeology in Greece,
Demetrios Theocharis and Vladimir Miloji took the
lead. They initiated intensive, systematic excavations in
Argissa Magoula (Miloji 1960) and Sesklo (Theocharis
1957). Both scholars viewed the Neolithic as an indepen-
dent phenomenon, and shared a common belief that the
Neolithic of Greece was crucial for an understanding of
the European shift to the Neolithic. In the meantime, the
Neolithic origins of Europe had become an established
concept as one of the defining features of a European
identity (Zvelebil 1996).
Partly because of the previous research, which had
identified the importance of Argissa and Sesklo, and
partly because of the fascination of archaeology of that
time with central and key-sites, the two sites were judged
by similar criteria and therefore had more similarities
than differences. Both were tells, standing out in the
landscape, indicating a long and uninterrupted habitation.
Both had distinctive substantial architecture, with
abundant material culture. Both could be described as
central sites. Within the normative perception of culture
that was dominant in the discipline at that time, thesesites were understood to contain essential traits that were
representative of Neolithic culture as a whole. Sesklo and
Argissa, thus, were obvious choices for answering the
central questions that were current in the discussion of
the 1960s.
In his comprehensive report on the work in Thessaly
of the German Institute, Miloji defined the aims along
two dimensions: to follow the movement of peoples from
north to south and from south to north, and to shed light
on the permanence of settlement and on the adoption of
agriculture (Miloji 1960). In this report, Thessaly is
perceived as a bridge which connects the south to the
north, a contact point of the various cultures. Childean
diffusionism is resonant here, and the culture-historical
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Across the border: unstable dwellings and fluid landscapes in Neolithic Greece 9
style is unmistakable. In fact, even before the excavations
began, the broad conceptual dimensions of the Neolithic
in Greece (including its emergence) had already been
formed as a regional episode of the Neolithic Revolution.
What followed, in terms of excavation, was more or less
a technical clarification of particular aspects of thatframework.
Both Sesklo and Argissa (and later Otzaki) (Miloji
1983) conformed neatly to this framework. Being long-
lived and prominent, the mounds of Sesklo and Argissa
had already an emblematic significance for the Neolithic
of Greece as focal places of sustained human interaction.
They were soon to be recognized as typical. Argissa, next
to the Peneios River, was strongly reminiscent of the
major Balkan sites, like Vina and Starevo, with which
Miloji was closely familiar, being a Serbian himself,
and having worked on his doctoral research in that area
(Miloji
1949). Argissa offered a direct (not simplyconceptual) link with the Northern peoples. Sesklo, on
the other hand, had a long-established reputation for
being the key-site, a sort of flagship for the Thessalian
Neolithic, an archetypic Neolithic settlement with
distinctive material culture. It is no surprise, therefore,
that the dominant archaeological perception of the Greek
Neolithic was modelled on these two sites. The perception
encompassed prominent tells, formed from long and
continuous habitation (documented by deep anthro-
pogenic deposits), advantageous natural setting next to
rivers (in floodplains or within light arable land), relative
self-sufficiency through successful subsistence economy,
and, above all, early pottery of a distinct style. Theseessential traits, all fashioned after the model sites, were
imperceptibly attributed to the early stages of the
Neolithic as a whole (Demoule and Perls 1993).
For the emergence of the Neolithic in particular, the
significance of Sesklo and Argissa was further asserted
once both excavators reported the earliest aceramic
deposits of the Neolithic in Greece. Although the presence
of true aceramic deposits has been challenged, indeed
almost dismissed, by the majority of researchers (Bloedow
1991; Demoule and Perls 1993; Perls 2001), the
argument brought to the forefront deep notions of stability
and permanence, of a continuous evolution towards theNeolithic as a result of the gradual adoption of typical
traits, in particular, pottery, domesticated plants and
settled subsistence economy, all achievements the
Mesolithic people could not claim. In the meantime, the
detailed sequences of material culture, standardized and
formalized in a meticulous, central European fashion,
enhanced this sense of stability further, and created a
clearly and neatly categorized material culture, radically
different from anything pre-Neolithic.
Of course, we may now argue that this sense of neat
stability, ascribed to the totality of the Neolithic, was an
illusion, created in the 1960s and 1970s both through the
pages of nicely illustrated books (Theocharis 1973) and
by expanding selected traits from the type-sites to
represent the totality of the Neolithic. During the last two
decades, an international archaeological discussion has
become progressively more contextual and has gradually
illuminated the subtle variabilities of the diverse and
ephemeral Neolithic ways within Europe and the Balkans
(e.g. Bailey 2000; Chapman 1994; Edmonds andRichards 1998; Tringham 2000). The power of the old
model, however, which was deeply influenced by the
readings of the post-war pioneers, was still powerful for
the Neolithic of Greece, even well after the 1960s.
Also, we know now that at least some of the proposed
Neolithic traits are not as central as was thought in the
1960s. Recent research in Northern Greece has revealed
that tells are just one type of site; flat extended sites form
a significant part of the habitation pattern and in some
regions are the dominant one (Andreou et al. 1996;
Kotsakis 1994; 1999). The recent excavations at
Makriyalos in Macedonia, Greece (Pappa and Besios1999) and in Thessaly (Toufexis 1997) have confirmed
this insight and provided factual evidence for the structure
and development of flat, extended sites. Similarly, in
view of the many one-period or short-lived sites that have
been explored, the longevity and continuity of Neolithic
settlements now seems less likely to be a recurrent feature.
Moreover, long-term success and complex material
culture as a whole is rarer than previously assumed once
we depart from the stereotypes of the 1960s and the
privileged regions, we see that the temporary, more
mundane sites like Drosia in Western Macedonia (Kotsos
1992) and Kremastos in Grevena (Toufexis 1994) are
common. In short, continuing research undermined thestereotypic approach that had been built on the research
of the 1960s.
The central concepts
The problems with the received view of the Neolithic,
apart from their progressively poorer coincidence with
archaeological evidence, become more critical when the
defining traits inform the discussion of the beginning of
the Neolithic as a historical process. This happens, for
instance, when research into the earliest Neolithic focuses
on regions and environments of later successfulsettlement (such as the eastern Thessalian plain) or
alternatively, when the evidence for transitional material
culture is sought in the deepest deposits of long-lived
mounds (like Argissa). My argument therefore is that the
way we understand, interpret and seek evidence for the
process of Neolithization in Greece is still, to a large
extent, conditioned by the early work of the 1960s and by
the essentialist arguments that were put forward at that
time on the content and character of the earliest Neolithic.
A clear distinction between Neolithic farmers and
Mesolithic hunter-gatherers and foragers is instrumental
to an essentialist understanding of the Neolithic and its
emergence. The distinction is first and foremost about
integrated subsistence modes, and it can be compared to
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Kostas Kotsakis10
the adaptive processes put forward in the Near East (e.g.
Redman 1978). The comparison indicates that the
distinction is directly related to a tradition of normative
archaeology which restricts explanation to defining
successive historical stages. But in the case of Greece, a
country with a strong classicist tradition in archaeology,an additional important factor needs to be considered.
Ian Morris (1994; 2000) has stressed the deep and critical
control of Hellenism on Greek archaeology and classical
studies. Within this austere classicist context, alternative
readings that stressed adaptation processes rather than
subsistence modes were overtly neglected. The anthro-
pological view of culture, as implied by an adaptation
process, has always been considered more or less
irrelevant, almost trivial for understanding classical
civilization (Renfrew 1980). The sense of familiarity with
subsistence as a rational response to the simple needs of
a rural life, and a tacit notion of continuity going back toHesiod certainly contributed immensely to this in-
difference (Fotiadis 1995).
Coming from different directions, all these strands
worked together to form a perception of break and
discontinuity in the prehistory of Greece which has been
firmly established in the literature. The break is not
entirely implausible, in view of the numerous
archaeological characteristics, some of which we have
already discussed. Nevertheless, the influence of the
1960s work should not be forgotten; the excavations
conducted at that time made a lasting impression, and
the ideas formed within the context of Greek archaeology
helped to establish a simplified view that equatedNeolithic people with farmers and Mesolithic people with
hunter-gatherers. Up to now, this clear distinction, plainly
expressed in the work of Miloji and Theocharis, has
informed nearly all discussion about the beginning of the
Neolithic in Greece.
The arguments that elaborate the notion of dis-
continuity in early Greek prehistory refer to major aspects
of prehistoric culture. The absence of a significant
Mesolithic population has been presented as irrefutable
evidence in support of a large-scale colonization of
Greece. Similarly emphasised have been the absence of
wild progenitors of domesticates and the discontinuitiesin Mesolithic and Neolithic material culture. All three
arguments have been discussed since the 1960s (e.g.
Theocharis 1967; 1973), and have been assigned varying
degrees of validity (Kotsakis 2001; 2002; 2003; contra
Perls 2003). In the present paper, the issue is not the
evidence that supports the narrative of the Neolithic, nor
whether scattered immigrants, organized colonizers or
just people were wandering in south-eastern Europe
around the end of the eighth to the beginning of the
seventh millennium cal. BC, carrying with them
domesticates and ideas on how to produce distinct
material culture. Rather the issue is the construction of
research concepts, their context, their presumptions and
their biases, if any. On further analysis, the issue could
also be the social content of the processes in which these
scattered immigrants were engaged. My intention here,
it should be obvious by now, is to anatomize the concepts
that inform the discussion on the earliest Neolithic in
Greece and propose some alternative views.
To begin, we could attempt to identify common basicpoints which can be considered central to the traditional
argument. Setting up of a border comes first to mind.
Obviously the concept of the border is the flip-side of the
disassociation between Neolithic farmers and Mesolithic
hunter-gatherers, which as we have seen, is prominent in
the readings of the Greek Neolithic. In this case, however,
the border does not simply refer to an abstract conceptual
or cultural difference which possesses a metaphorical
significance, to be applied to any form of cross-border
cultural interaction, as Bohannan and Plog (1967)
suggest. Rather, it involves a predominantly strong and
concrete geographical aspect. Disassociation in thiscontext becomes virtual dislocation and, in this sense,
Aegean and Anatolian regions would stand apart: the
former acting as the recipient of the Neolithic, the latter
as the origin. The metaphoric border becomes a frontier,
similar to other colonizing frontiers, familiar in anthro-
pology and history, and deep-seated in European thought
(Turner 1994). On closer inspection, it becomes a
question of scale, within which archaeological investiga-
tion perceives the movement and relocation of people.
For example, how extensive should an area be before the
normal shift in habitation within it is considered
population movement, let alone migration or even
colonization? And how uniform, and in which terms,should this area be before the shift in habitation is
considered usual and the population stable?
A strong tradition of a frontier between Hellas and the
East has informed most of archaeology, well into the
twentieth century (especially classical archaeology).
Historically, this idea goes as far back as Herodotos, where
the definition of the Hellinikon was set against the
oriental Other; also it can be traced in the discussion of
orientalism and the perception of the Orient as a largely
negative element of European identity (Morris 2000).
Henry Frankforts 1926 Asia, Europe and the Aegean
and their earliest interrelations is an eloquent testimonyto the long tradition of this concept in Greek archaeology.
Needless to say, we can ascribe to the same, orientalist
notion the familiar concept of a bridge between the East
and Europe which was so frequent in Childes writings
and which, as pointed out by Ruth Tringham (2000), is
still popular among modern versions of diffusionism (for
example, the island hopping notion discussed by Perls
2001, 5863)
However, what is lacking in this recurring perception
of the frontier is the realization that there, in that zone,
strong social processes are taking place. In discussing
African political culture in relation to Turners notion of
a frontier zone, Kopytoff gives the following general
account for the social phenomena at work:
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Across the border: unstable dwellings and fluid landscapes in Neolithic Greece 11
sweeping like a tidal wave or a succession of waves across
a sub-continental or at least national landmass, such a tidal
frontier brings with it settler societies engaged in colonizing
an alien land from a base in a metropolitan societyBut in
most anthropological usages, the frontier is a geographical
region with sociological characteristics. In this volume,
we shall carry further this reduction in scale by making the
frontier encompass even more narrowly local phenomena.
The African frontier we focus on consists of politically open
areas nestling between organized societies but internal to
the larger regions in which they are found what might be
called an internal or interstitial frontier (Kopytoff 1987,
89).
It is clear from this excerpt that Kopytoff rejects a
linear notion of a single widespread frontier (a tidal
wave) in favour of a far more dynamic and socially
significant concept of many local frontiers where there is
a constant restructuring of bits and pieces human and
cultural of existing societies:For example the thesis sees the frontier as a natural force
for cultural transformation. In this regard, our analysis stands
Turners thesis on its head, for we suggest that the frontier
may also be a force for culture-historical continuity and
conservatism. The frontier perspective taken here is that of
the local frontier, lying at the fringes of the numerous
established African societies. It is on such frontiers that
most African polities have, so to speak, been constructed
out of the bits and pieces human and cultural of existing
societies. This posits a process in which incipient small
polities are produced by other similar and usually more
complex societies. This conception of political development
is entirely opposite to those evolutionary theories that seesmall polities as arising out of some hypothetical archaic
bands roaming over a hypothetical pre-historic landscape.
Whatever the virtue of such speculations about a pre-historic
in-the-beginning they have nothing to do with the formation
of real historic African societies (emphasis added; Kopytoff
1987, 3).
The wave-of-advance model (Ammerman and Biagi
2003) is probably the closest analogy to what Kopytoff
would call a tidal wave frontier, where hypothetical
immigrants are roaming over a hypothetical, empty,
prehistoric landscape. There is good reason to think that
the situation described by Kopytoff for Africa has more
points of theoretic contact with the Greek Neolithic than
the geographical and cultural distance would seem to
permit. Interestingly, this was also an idea of Theocharis,
expressed in 1967, almost twenty years before
Ammerman and Cavalli-Sforza stated their own model
for the beginning of the Neolithic in Greece (Ammerman
and Cavalli-Sforza 1984).
Diffusion of the Neolithic is an element that exists within
the Neolithic itself, mainly because it represents progress
and revolutionary progress at that and progress is
contagious. Less secure seems diffusion as a necessary
consequence of a sudden population increase. Increase,
and sizable at that, existed for sure, but we think that equallysizable was the potential for buffering The crucial point
however, is the way of diffusion: the theory of the single
centre or cradle forces us to assume a diffusion in the form
of concentric circles The relevant attempts, with maps of
the consecutive zones of diffusion failed completelyIt is
clear, therefore, that in order to represent persuasively the
rate of diffusion we have to considernot only geographical
criteria, i.e. the position of each place in relation to a
hypothetical centre. Above all, however, we have to consider
the amenability of each site or region, in other words the
natural or the constructed conditions for the early
acceptance and the successful transplanting of the idea of
the new economy It remains the issue of movement of
population and colonization. We will not challenge here
the role of migrations in prehistorybut population
movementsdo not leave to the miserable recipients any
active part in the cultural process (my translation from the
Greek text, emphasis added; Theocharis 1967, 689).
Clearly, from this excerpt, it is culture (the con-
structed conditions) as an independent phenomenon that
commands first and foremost Theocharis attention.Implicit here are anthropological, rather than culture-
historical arguments. The rejection of diffusionist models
rests on his unwillingness to consider any social activity
outside human culture;1 it does not put forward logistical
doubts about evidence or rates of demic diffusion and
episodes of domestication. Had Theocharis expressed
such factual concerns only, his argument would indeed
be part of the typical indigenist paradigm, as the wide-
spread opinion holds in the literature (e.g. Perls 2001;
Runnels 2003). Nevertheless, that opinion should be
revised, not only to do justice to Theocharis theoretical
thinking, but, more importantly, because it misses an
important dimension of the discussion. A closer look at
the previous quote reveals that the main issue focuses on
the centrality of culture, the active role of human agency,
and ultimately, we might add, its priority as a subject
matter of archaeology. The critical disagreement with
the diffusionists refers to their inherent predisposition to
decontextualize events as taking place in a domain that is
independent of culture and agency, as a linear function of
time and space. Many years after Theocharis, this
predisposition found its formal manifestation in the wave-
of-advance model, which, as a model (it should be pointed
out) has no explanatory value; in Ammermans own
words it does not tell us what happened in the past(Ammerman and Biagi 2003, 8). It should be categoric-
ally stated, that the disagreement with decontexualization
has nothing to do with movement of people as such. This
is the same underlying theme of the dynamic multiple
local frontiers that Kopytoff puts forward for Africa.
Taking the lead from Kopytoff, I maintain that rather
than replicating bipolar obsolete oppositions of the
indigenism versus diffusionism type, the discussion
should turn towards the multiplicity of culture and should
explore at greater depth the social and cultural conditions
of the earliest Neolithic in Greece. In other words,
transition to the Neolithic should be considered as
strongly culture-dependent (Kotsakis 2001; 2003).
Multiple local frontiers offer a better insight on the
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Kostas Kotsakis12
interaction active on the borders, not only between
hunters and farmers, but also, and perhaps more fre-
quently, among farmers of different social groups. Perls
has rightly observed that the material culture of the
earliest Neolithic is heterogeneous and selective when
compared to that of the Near East. However, if materialculture is not considered as evidence of cultural relations
or affiliations, but as elements of identity, the origin of
the material cultural expression is no longer the essential
aspect. Again, Kopytoff offers an interesting insight to
this process:
Rather, the frontier as an institutional vacuum was a place
where the frontiersmen could literally constructa desirable
social order. They came to the frontier not with a sociological
and political tabula rasa, to be shaped by its forests and
plains, but with a mental model of a good society Thus
the efforts to construct a new social order on the frontier
were, from the beginning, informed by an ideal model that
the frontiersman held perhaps vaguely but certainly
culturally The American frontier (the West) allowed
frontiersmen to apply the ideal model and produce a result
that was indeed purer, simpler, more nave and more faithful
to the model that one could possibly have in the East
(Kopytoff 1987, 13).
That simply means that there is an active social
dynamic in the borders that transforms cultural reality,
in ways that produce a purer, simpler and more nave
version of the original cultural template, whatever that
was. This is closely related to the defensive conservatism
of the moving groups, which stick to the ideal model
they carry from home. The social dynamic of the multiplefrontiers would account more convincingly for the
selective and heterogeneous similarities with Near
Eastern material culture, as would the idea that the
adventurous individuals carried only a part of their
technical and cultural heritage and that they were coming
from different original homelands, following different
pathways. Needless to say, that simpler and more nave
version had to be related to interaction with other
populations active on the frontier zone, each carrying its
own cultural template, regardless of their being
colonizers, indigenous, or transients. As Kopytoff points
out, new social groups are formed from bits and pieces,human and cultural, of existing societies.
This brings up the next central point that forms the
perception of break and discontinuity, namely the idea of
direction. Throughout the discussion on the Near Eastern
origins, there is a strong sense of direction, from east to
west, which is expressed quite clearly in the regular maps
that are included in the relevant publications. The
direction in these discussions, like the border we have
seen previously, is completely essentialised. All tem-
porality is suppressed, and what predominantly are the
historically contingent results of agency are perceived as
one decontextualized entity, within a framework of
stability. In reality, directions (like frontiers) can be many
and conflicting, and can reflect variable temporalities.
At times they can be stable, at other times shifting,
reversed or eclipsed. There should not be a single
privileged direction that could substitute the dynamic
cleavage of human agency.
As with the rigid border, however, the single direction
is meaningless, unless the entities involved are definableand self-contained. We return thus to the dichotomy
between farmers and foragers/hunter-gatherers that
persistently appears in the post-1960s discussion. In fact,
this dichotomy represents the third, and probably most
important and complex concept that supports the per-
ception of break and continuity. There is a vast anthro-
pological literature on hunter-gatherer societies and their
diacritical traits (so vast that it is impossible to reiterate
here; see Bettinger 1991; Ingold et al. 1988; Kelly 1995;
Myers 1988). Those who believe that hunter-gatherer
societies share common traits (despite the wide variability
observed ethnographically) stress their economic de-pendence on hunting, fishing and gathering and on
residential mobility (Kelly 1995, 11148; Zvelebil 1998).
Few doubts have been expressed in the literature on
the Neolithic of Greece about the differences between
that subsistence mode and agro-pastoral farmers. As we
have seen in the case of Greece, the earliest Neolithic
settlement was modelled on the successful sites dug in
Thessaly, where longevity and stability was strongly
suggested; the full package of domesticates and the
evidence of agriculture are often the main distinctive
traits for a group to be characterized as Neolithic (e.g.
Hansen 1991). However, to paraphrase Sigaut in his
discussion of the concepts of agriculture and hunting-gathering from their technological perspectives, we know
so little about the earliest Neolithic agriculture that using
it to define the Neolithic is a purely verbal exercise. Food-
producing activities need not be the privileged domain in
our understanding of the earliest Neolithic groups (Sigaut
1994, 443). For example, the use of skins and fleeces for
clothing was at least as important (probably more) as was
meat producing.
The same holds for mobility. Although we accept
mobility as an obvious condition for hunter-gatherers we
understand very poorly the possibility of logistical
mobility for segments of the farming groups, if not fortheir entireties. Again, assuming that we understand from
the start what Mesolithic mobility and Neolithic
sedentism are, we are trapped in false common-sense
assumptions. I would suggest therefore, that we should
abandon the still dominant Childean tradition that
conceptualizes these differing ways of life as pre-
dominantly economic subsistence categories. Instead, it
might be preferable to consider them as places for the
construction of collective and personal identities, of which
food producing could indeed be one dimension (Hastorf
1999) but not necessarily the only one. In this respect,
both foragers or hunter-gatherers and farmers (or
Mesolithic and Neolithic groups) are not constructed as
essentialist, dichotomous concepts and we avoid
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Across the border: unstable dwellings and fluid landscapes in Neolithic Greece 13
simplifying and objectifying the complexity and the social
dynamics of agency that are involved.
Conclusions
We are coming full circle to what we had identified as aplace of historically contingent agency. This is a dynamic
place of mutual exchange, where fluidity must have been
prevalent and where identities and accompanying
material culture expressions were constantly reform-
ulated. Instead of the usual picture drawn in Neolithic
studies depicting a Neolithic landscape winning over the
Mesolithic, this process might have happened in a fluid
landscape with multiple frontiers and conflicting
directions, in a constant process of creating hybrid
identities (Joseph and Fink 1999). The tensions created
would offer a better basis for understanding the selective
and heterogeneous cultural characteristics prevalent inthe earliest Neolithic of Greece, which we have already
discussed. Despite the conservative attitude prevalent in
the frontier zone, we should not understand the earliest
Neolithic as a pure and fixed allochthonous identity which
is confronted by the native Mesolithic identity of the
local hunter-gatherers. All actors in this drama were
equally immersed in dynamic fluidity.
It remains to be discussed where the actual place of
this fluidity might have been. It seems reasonable that
fluidity was less prevalent in the central, long-lived,
Neolithic sites, such as Argissa and Sesklo. The com-
plexity of their material culture and their overall spatial
arrangements indicate that they represent the end of a
long process rather than its beginning. In contrast to
these sites, small experimental sites, established in the
frontier during the earliest Neolithic, would be more
likely to preserve the traces of the fluidity I am proposing
here. These sites would be in areas outside the mainstream
Neolithic landscapes, occupying varying, even marginal,
environments, not necessarily those where successful
mounds subsequently evolved and normalised their
cultural idiom over 1000s of years. They would represent
the initial steps, predominantly as places of interaction
or nodes in extensive networks. On the basis of this
hypothesis, it has been proposed that the mountainousarea of Grevena (western Macedonia) would be one
possible region for the existence of these earliest
experimental sites (Kotsakis 2000, 177). Located on the
western edge of the Thessalian plain, Theopetra could be
a node in this extensive network (Kotsakis 2003;
Kyparissi-Apostolika 1994; 1999); the increasing number
of Mesolithic sites in Greece (Runnels 1995; Runnels
and van Andel 2003) shows that where specialised field
research is conducted, the interface zone in other parts of
the country is quickly populated.
In conclusion, the earliest Neolithic in Greece needs a
radical re-appraisal. To do that we need to revise
traditional models, the basic outlines of which were
formed in the 1960s. The indigenist versus diffusionist
dichotomy is also part of the 1960s way of reading the
Neolithic, or more generally culture, and it should be
abandoned also as merely an essentialized, objectifying
approach. We need to think outside dichotomous,
essentialist categories, and we need to approach the
historical contingency active in Greece at that time, in itsdetails, looking at real people, with real identities and
real lives.
Acknowledgements
Some of these ideas were formed while I was at Stanford
as visiting professor. I would like to thank Douglass
Bailey, with whom I shared both an office at Stanford
and our views on the Neolithic, as well as Ian Hodder,
Michael Shanks and Ian Morris for their intellectual
support. I would like also to thank Alasdair Whittle for
giving me the opportunity to participate in the Cardiffsymposium and present my views and Paul Halstead for
the ongoing and stimulating discussion on the Neolithic
of Greece. In particular, I need to thank Douglass Bailey
for his patience.
Note
1 Consider, for instance, also the following excerpt from
Theocharis (1967, 4):
The role of science and technology in archaeological research
must be recognized, but should not be overrated. Culture is a
human creation, not a creation of the environment, and in
prehistoric archaeology the concept of culture is dominant,roughly similar to the concept ofartin classical archaeology.
As long as this essential restriction applies, the principal role in
research will be held by the archaeologist who is responsible
for the study of the cultural manifestations of man It is
unfortunate that even today, for some cultures, we know
nothing more than pottery styles (my translation from the Greek
text).
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