Diversified pottery use across 5th and 4th millennium cal BC Neolithic coastal communities along the Strait of Gibraltar

Abstract

The region around the Strait of Gibraltar offered Neolithic societies a bridge connecting Iberia and North Africa. Using the sea for access to additional resources, Neolithic groups in the area developed close links with this territory as evidenced by its burial rites and storage practices. Nonetheless, the role pottery and its contents may have had in the labour activities of these groups is not well understood. In light of research in neighbouring regions, this study presents an initial analysis using an acidified methanol extraction of 29 pottery vessels from four Neolithic sites (Benzú Cave, Campo de Hockey, SET Parralejos and La Esparragosa) selected with the aim of assessing its potential for organic residue analysis at the point of confluence between southern Iberian and North African historic dynamics. The presence of appreciable lipid residues in 79% of the studied samples and the high variety in the results, including animal fats, dairy products, plant resins and two previously unreported residue types, support further research in the region. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12520-023-01751-2.

From bowls to pots: The dairying revolution in Northwest Turkey, a view from Barcın Höyük, 6600 to 6000 BCE

“…By the Middle Period, starting already by phase VId3 and continuing into the later phases of the Neolithic, the tempering showed a gradual shift from calcite to combinations of calcite together with schist, quartz and feldspars. Vessel walls, which range around 5-6 mm in phase VIc, gradually became thicker as the effort put into vessel production decreased towards the end of the seventh millennium BCE [22,23]. The uppermost Neolithic levels, corresponding to the Late Period, also present new characteristics, including dark colors and S-profiles, but are distinguished by the development of easily suspendable pots with four lugs (Figs 3-5).…”

“…Across prehistoric Europe and Southwest Asia, dairying would be practiced in different scales and intensities through time. While it was shown to be prevalent in pottery residues from the sixth millennium northern Balkans and the Carpathian basin [15], and from fourth millennium Neolithic Britain and Ireland, it was rare in early Neolithic settlements in the North European plain and in the Mediterranean [10,[16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23]. However, in a groundbreaking study comparing the fifth, sixth and seventh millennium BCE sites from northern Mesopotamia, parts of Anatolia and southeastern Europe, a surprisingly high ratio of dairy residues was discovered in the region surrounding the Marmara Sea in northwestern Turkey [10] (Fig 1 ), thus highlighting the importance of this territory, as it may have hosted the first comprehensive adoption of dairying.…”