Resilience and Cyclicity: Towards a macrohistory of the Central European Neolithic

Peters, Robin; Zimmermann, Andreas

doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2017.03.073

Cited by 16 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…While the population estimation with 0.6 P km 2 for TAC describes the century of maximum density, the densities for growing and declining populations are considerably smaller. A similar oscillation during the fourth Millennium BC is known for the dendrochronologically dated settlements of the Lake Constance area [ 6 ]. Considering, however, areas of around 150 000 km 2 in western and central Europe, these oscillations are only of minor importance.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 66%

“…These 'revolutions' [1] or 'great transformations' [2,3] are related to unprecedented increases of population density. During each epoch, oscillating or cyclic changes-also termed 'booms and busts' [4] or 'cultural cycles' [5,6]-of the population sizes among cooperating groups become apparent. Building onto this, the Cologne Protocol proposes a methodological framework encompassing three aspects: spatially explicit demographic estimates using suitable proxies, scaling of data and bridging between different epochs.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Approaching prehistoric demography: proxies, scales and scope of the Cologne Protocol in European contexts

Schmidt

Hilpert

Kretschmer

et al. 2020

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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In many theories on the social and cultural evolution of human societies, the number and density of people living together in a given time and region is a crucial factor. Because direct data on past demographic developments are lacking, and reliability and validity of demographic proxies require careful evaluation, the topic has been approached from several different directions. This paper provides an introduction to a geostatistical approach for estimating prehistoric population size and density, the so-called Cologne Protocol and discusses underlying theoretical assumptions and upscaling transfer-functions between different spatial scale levels. We describe and compare the specifics for farming and for foraging societies and, using examples, discuss a diachronic series of estimates, covering the population dynamics of roughly 40 kyr of European prehistory. Ethnohistoric accounts, results from other approaches—including absolute (ethno-environmental models) and relative estimates (site-numbers, dates as data, etc.) allow a first positioning of the estimates within this field of research. Future enhancements, applications and testing of the Cologne Protocol are outlined and positioned within the general theoretical and methodological avenues of palaeodemographic research. In addition, we provide manuals for modelling Core Areas in M ap I nfo , A rc GIS, QGIS/S aga and R. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Cross-disciplinary approaches to prehistoric demography’.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 66%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Approaching prehistoric demography: proxies, scales and scope of the Cologne Protocol in European contexts

Schmidt

Hilpert

Kretschmer

et al. 2020

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

Self Cite

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“…Such is the case of changes in the food production and hunting in Australia around 4200 cal yr BP [82] and the emergence of a new lithic tools over West Africa by 5000 cal yr BP [83]. Demographic expansions through the construction of socio-cultural niches necessarily requires that the cultural/technological accumulation increases more rapidly than population sizes [3,6,21,80,84,85]. So, under this loop as population size increases, the demographic and social environment favours a further expansion of cultural innovations.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Positive feedbacks in deep-time transitions of human populations

Lima,

Gayo,

Estay

et al. 2023

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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Abrupt and rapid changes in human societies are among the most exciting population phenomena. Human populations tend to show rapid expansions from low to high population density along with increased social complexity in just a few generations. Such demographic transitions appear as a remarkable feature of Homo sapiens population dynamics, most likely fuelled by the ability to accumulate cultural/technological innovations that actively modify their environment. We are especially interested in establishing if the demographic transitions of pre-historic populations show the same dynamic signature of the Industrial Revolution transition (a positive relationship between population growth rates and size). Our results show that population growth patterns across different pre-historic societies were similar to those observed during the Industrial Revolution in developed western societies. These features, which appear to have been operating during most of our recent demographic history from hunter–gatherers to modern industrial societies, imply that the dynamics of cooperation underlay sudden population transitions in human societies. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Evolution and sustainability: gathering the strands for an Anthropocene synthesis’.

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“…On larger scales, growth and decline of settlements (as proxied by house area) shows a remarkable synchronicity when measured from the time of first occupation (Dubouloz, 2008). Similar dynamics are observed in distinct areas separated by over 1,000 years (Peters and Zimmermann, 2017). More comprehensively (but also more controversially) population booms and busts are evidenced in summed probability distributions of human presence P a g e | 2 aggregated from radiocarbon databases (Shennan et al, 2013;Timpson et al, 2014;Palmisano et al, 2021a).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 86%

“…The initial boom-bust cycle may be followed by other, recurrent booms and busts, as illustrated in Figure 1. Boom-bust dynamics are documented in many studies that quantified regional population histories by tracing the changes in the number of settlements and houses (Gronenborn, 2015;Peters and Zimmermann, 2017;Zimmermann et al, 2009;Heitz et al, 2021;Pechtl and Land, 2019). Well-understood cases include the expansion and decline of the Linearbandkeramik (LBK) archaeological culture in central Europe, where considerable evidence points to a population decline after centuries of growth (Gronenborn, 2015;Gronenborn et al, 2014;Zimmermann, et al, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Soil fertility depletion is not a credible mechanism for population boom/bust cycles in early agricultural societies

Kondor¹,

Turchin²

2022

Preprint

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Soil fertility is an important constraint on farmers and thus its depletion presents a possible negative feedback mechanism that could have impacted early adopters of agriculture. In this paper, we present a formal mathematical analysis of the question whether such a negative feedback can lead to population cycles in the context of early agriculturalists, such as those of Neolithic Europe where the presence of booms and busts patterns is suggested by an increasing amount of evidence. We do this by considering candidates of second-order analytic models that capture dynamical interaction among farmers and soil fertility. Using general mathematical arguments, we show that under plausible conditions, the feedback between population growth and soil resource depletion is unlikely to lead to population cycles. This result is the consequence of two factors. First, there is an important mathematical difference between biotic (i.e. logistic) and abiotic resource replenishment; soil nutrients are better modeled by the abiotic case which leads to more stable dynamics. Second, under realistic conditions, the resource replenishment process has fast time-scales compared to attainable population growth rates, reinforcing the tendency of stable dynamics. Both of these factors play a role when considering early agricultural societies, and imply that nutrient depletion is not a credible mechanism for patterns of boom and bust cycles observed in the archaeological record.

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Resilience and Cyclicity: Towards a macrohistory of the Central European Neolithic

Cited by 16 publications

References 13 publications

Approaching prehistoric demography: proxies, scales and scope of the Cologne Protocol in European contexts

Approaching prehistoric demography: proxies, scales and scope of the Cologne Protocol in European contexts

Positive feedbacks in deep-time transitions of human populations

Soil fertility depletion is not a credible mechanism for population boom/bust cycles in early agricultural societies

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