Sesklo, Starcevo, and Vincas

Sesklo, Starčevo, and Vinčas

      In my posts about early migrations, and the people of the Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic, it may seem that I have been hopping around like a wood tick on a stove top.  I have touched on a culture here and there, and made passing references to others in relation to other subject matters, such as farming, or mass migrations.  I feel it's time to post some of these in chronological order.  I will even post an ongoing timeline to assist with this.  I will be using the accepted dates for these.  

      Let's review.  The hunter gatherers of Europe, who are all genetically tied have lived in those frozen wastes throughout the Pleistocene Glacial maximum.  At their height, one tribe of them, the Solutreans of western France, blocked by glaciers on three sides and by the ocean, turned to the sea ice in search of food.  Many of them got blown off course and ended up in North America.  
      Glaciers began to melt during Boller Interstadial Warming Period, opening the way into North America from the west (the far west - so far west that people call it the far east).  Some Asians from Siberia migrate through the passage.  Some of Jomon Culture moves into China, introducing Ceramics to the rest of the world.  A group of people leave northern Kenya and settle into the Fertile Crescent.  They are now known as the Natufians,  There they harvested wild grains.  
      After this, the Cooling period known as the Younger Dryas began.  The ice sheets grew again, and all the regions around the earth experienced a heavy drought.  The Younger Dryas lasted for about 1500 years.  During this time the cultures that had been harvesting wild grain, planted those grains to survive.  They were successful enough at this that the first cities were built in southern Turkey at Catal Hoyuk, and Asikli Hoyuk.  In the Zagros Mts. Hunter-gatherers captured and bred goats, the first domesticated animals.  After that others tried and succeeded in domesticating sheep, cattle, chickens, and donkeys. 
      When the Younger Dryas ended so did the drought.  As water returned, farming spread out from the river systems.  This caused a huge population bloom, due to an ample, steady supply of food.  Between 8000 and 7000 BC descendants of the Natufians had spread out to all arable land throughout the Fertile Crescent, to the Indus River Valley on one side, and all the way across Asia Minor on the other, and all the way down the Nile River Valley.  
      With nowhere else to go, some of them crossed over to Greece near the present day town of Sesklo.  They had to use new techniques there.  All of Europe was a dense forest that had to be cleared away to do anything.  Therefore they couldn't just sweep through their new land.  They could only settle in pockets and spread out from there.  On the plus side of things, rain was plentiful enough that they didn't have to irrigate.  In Europe other plants were added to their farming repertoire.  They had various vegetables that were native to the area, which they also learned to plant.  After about a thousand years or so, Sesklo itself became a huge city, and smaller farming communities filled the region.  As they spread out, it was time again for some of them to move out farther.  
      New colonies were established in Serbia, and Hungary.  During this phase, these farmer descendants of the Natufians hacked colonies out of the thick forests all the way to the Atlantic coast - to Spain, France, England, Ireland, Skara Brae, and Doggerland.  One would like to think that these people mingled readily with the hunter-gatherers who already lived there, but genetic evidence shows that this wasn't the case.  There was some mingling that went on, but the percentage of their genetic markers among the farming people who invaded them is not high enough to regard such a notion.  Most likely the hunter-gatherers were wary of these newcomers, and for the most part avoided them, as they wandered along in search of game.  There was enough mingling, however for some of their religious rituals to be adopted and adapted by the farming cultures. 
      The first two expansion colonies were in Hungary and Serbia, and are known as the Starčevo, and Vinčas Cultures.  By about 5000 BC these two cultures were thriving.  They each developed their own distinct styles of pottery (pottery didn't arrive that far west [from the Jomon Culture] till after Sesklo had been established as a full fledged city - once it did, it spread through Europe like a wildfire). Their pottery was somewhat acorn shaped with a wide rim for hanging.  The rim was decorated with two variations of a flame motif (one style for Vinčas, another style for Starčevo).  When viewed from above they looked like the sun.  They also made little anthropomorphic and zoomorphic statuettes.  Each of them also had statuettes in different versions of the "mother" or "Doni" figure, which had been an important part of worship for the hunter-gatherers before them. 
      In the Vinčas Culture they also developed what is regarded by some as the first alphabet (this includes myself - I have read arguments for both sides, and the alphabet evidence seems most valid).  Writing didn't reach Egypt or the Harappan Culture of the Indus River Valley until a couple thousand years later.  The Vinčas Civilization had a full set of symbols that they used.  Artifacts such as the Tatania Amulet show that these symbols were used in a way that is not just mere decoration, but rather as a system of writing.  
      What I find extremely interesting about this is that there is not one of these symbols that is not also found among Native American petroglyphs.  These can be seen in the images below.  People crossed over before.  There's no evidence to say that other people didn't cross over again.  Actually the evidence shows that many people throughout the ages made the Atlantic crossing. 

This amulet from Vinčas is what is known as the Tatania Amulet.  Here you can see that the Vinčas symbols were used as a form of writing.