The making of chalcolithic assembly places: Trypillia megasites as materialized consensus among equal strangers?

Figures & data

Figure 1. Distribution map of megasites and Trypillia A sites (M. Nebbia).

Table 1. The main stages of investigation of Trypillia megasites.

STAGE OF INVESTIGATION	KEY CHARACTERISTICS	SITE EXAMPLES	REFERENCES
Discovery stage (1890s–1900s)	Discovery of Trypillia sites defined by burnt houses; comparison of painted pottery to other European Neolithic painted wares	Trypillia	Khvojka 1901, ‘ 1904 Von Stern 1900
First period of ‘normal’ excavation	Discovery of hundreds of new Trypillia settlements; excavation of representative samples	Vladimirovka/Volodimyrivka	Passek 1949
First methodological revolution	First aerial images of megasites; ground-truthing of megasites; first geophysical investigations, with targeted excavation of house-shaped anomalies	Taljanky; Majdanetske	Dudkin 1978; Ellis 1984
Second period of ‘normal’ excavation	Large-scale excavations on two of largest sites; geophysical plans of other sites; refinement of Trypillia ceramic typo-chronology	Taljanky; Majdanetske	Shmaglij and Videiko 1990; Kruts 1990; Ryzhov 2012
Second methodological revolution (2009 – present)	Improved geophysical methods, leading to more accurate plans; discovery of new features (assembly houses, pits, kilns, ditches, paths) and groups of features; use of AMS dating, pollen and phytolith analysis; spatial analysis of megasite plans	Nebelivka; Taljanky; Majdanetske; Dobrovody; Apolianka	Chapman et al. 2014: 2014a; Rassmann et al. 2014; chapters in Müller, Rassmann, and Videiko 2016a; Hale et al. 2017, 2018; Hale, Millard 2018 )

Figure 2. Digitized plan of the Nebelivka geophysical survey. The main architectural features are displayed: ‘regular houses’ (grey), ‘mega houses’ (red), ‘mega-structure’ (green) and external ditch (black) M. Nebbia.

Table 2. The tipping point: arguments against the maximalist hypothesis for Trypillia megasites.

TYPE OF NEW DATA	SUMMARY OF CONTENTS	IMPLICATIONS
Megasite planning	Great variations in planning of quarters and neighbourhoods	Bottom-up development rather than top-down imposition of traditional plan
Assembly house planning	Great variations in planning and burning of assembly houses; rarity of special finds in the mega-structure	As above; heterarchical rather than hierarchical planning
Scalar stress	Calculation of four to five decision-making levels (sensu Johnson [1982]) for coeval occupation of 1500 houses	Argument against coeval dwelling of such a large number of houses
Kilns and cooking places	Dispersed distribution of kilns at Taljanky and Majdanetske (Korvin-Piotrovskiy et al. 2016); communal cooking for feasts rather than kiln at Nebelivka	Decentralized pottery production, showing heterarchical organization; feasting provision fits assembly model
Settlement pattern	The absence of small or medium-size coeval sites in the Nebelivka micro-region (10 km radius)	The absence of a hinterland – often considered critical for urban growth
Arable technology	The lack of evidence for either extensification or intensification of arable practices	Argument against innovations to cope with massive, permanent population
Modelling salt require-ments	Estimates for the provision of salt for populations of >10,000 indicate hundreds of tons of salt per annum (Chapman and Gaydarska 2003)	Beyond the capabilities of prehistoric societies, this logistical challenge argues for much smaller populations
Experimental programme	The house-building and -burning experiment showed burning a house required up to 10x more fuel than timber to build it (Johnston 2018)	Coeval burning of 1500 houses at the end of the occupation would have left a massive environmental signal
Human impact studies	The Nebelivka 1B pollen core showed minor human impact (five indices) before, after and during the megasite occupation (Albert 2018)	The minor human impact is a strong argument against massive, permanent populations

Figure 3. Memory mounds at Nebelivka: (a) early stage; (b) later stage) (B. Gaydarska).

Figure 4. Start and end dates for occupation at Nebelivka, Majdenetske and Taljanki (A. R. Millard).

Figure 5. Hypothetical reconstruction of the first organization of Nebelivka, showing quarters (M. Nebbia).

Figure 6. Spatial distribution of Trypillia settlements by phase (M. Nebbia).

Figure 7. Distribution of Trypillia CII sites. The map has been updated with data collected from Manzura (2005) (M. Nebbia).

Figure 8. Trajectory of Model A by 30-year generations (J. Chapman).

Figure 9. Expansion of the settlement of Quarters, Model B, by 30-year generations: (a) 1st generation (yellow ovals); (b) 2nd generation (green ovals); and (c) 3rd generation (red ovals) (J. Chapman).

Figure 10. Trajectory of Model B by 30-year generations (J. Chapman).

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