Kababurun: investigations of an eastern Aegean village in the Late Chalcolithic to Early Bronze Age transition

Abstract

The Late Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age (EBA) 1 are dynamic prehistoric eras, encapsulating crucial political, social and economic developments in western Anatolia and the adjacent regions. Although recent fieldwork and synthesis on this transition in western Turkey provide a general framework for this important transitional period, we still lack a holistic understanding of settlement types, subsistence patterns and socio-economic interaction zones. Discovery of the coastal site of Kababurun during surveys on the Karaburun Peninsula enhances understanding of the Late Chalcolithic–EBA 1 transition by providing data on settlement characteristics, material technologies and subsistence strategies. Kababurun is currently the only absolutely dated prehistoric site in the Karaburun Peninsula, offering a reliable chronological basis for comparisons in the region and beyond. In this article, we first introduce and then contextualise the Kababurun data within the eastern Aegean and western Anatolian research problems, then discuss how that data might contribute to a more refined understanding of Late Chalcolithic to EBA 1 communities. In particular, we argue that the site of Kababurun represents a form of community that is vitally important but poorly understood for this period: a small-scale rural settlement, connected to local networks but without a specialised function.