The Oxford Handbook of Neolithic Europe

by Chris Fowler

  DURING the second half of the third millennium BC, people scattered throughout Europe made, used and disposed the same pots, known as Bell Beakers.1 This label refers to ceramic vases with an S-shaped profile and a distinctive decoration organized in horizontal bands of repeated motifs. The same people also used other artefacts on a regular, but not systematic, basis, namely stone bracers, daggers with triangular blade, or various types of arrowheads. However, even for such a restricted class of artefacts, the various archaeological assemblages present an impressive variability, rendering any material definition of a coherent Bell Beaker material culture an arduous task. Things become even more difficult when taking into consideration other categories of evidence (e.g. funerary practices, settlement patterns, metallurgy). This messy situation has been increasingly acknowledged by scholars over the past two decades, and most now prefer the expression Bell Beaker Phenomenon (hereafter BBP), a term as vague as the processes it is supposed to document. Comparative research is also difficult, as the BBP falls variously in the late Neolithic, the Chalcolithic, or the early Bronze Age, depending on the chronological scheme prevalent in a given region.

  Culture-historical accounts championed the idea of a unique, coherent historical event expressed by a pan-European material culture which traced the spread of the ‘Beaker folk’ across the continent. Childe suggested that the incentive behind the travels of the ‘Bell Beaker people’ was copper prospecting (Childe 1925). David Clarke identified types of Beakers, associating each with a specific putative continental origin and wave of migrants (e.g. North British/North Rhine, North British/Western Rhine groups: Clarke 1970), whilst Sangmeister’s Rückstrom theory accounted for the material divergences and similarities between the Iberian Peninsula and central Europe in terms of a population oscillating back and forth between these regions (Sangmeister 1966). The wide variation in Bell Beaker assemblages and in cultural practices at sites with Bell Beakers fuelled a processual critique of culture-historic perspectives in the late 1970s. Stephen Shennan showed that Bell Beaker finds in central Europe did not meet the methodological requirements of the classical archaeological culture (Shennan 1978): the sole recurrent coherence he could observe was confined to a restricted number of artefacts in graves, which he grouped together as a package (in particular Bell Beakers, daggers, stone bracers: Shennan 1976). Because this package only occurred in funerary contexts, Shennan postulated a specific social function: Bell Beakers were prestige goods, circulating amongst emerging élites. Shennan’s package ignored the wider range of material culture associated with Bell Beakers across Europe, because that range varied from place to place. He denied the existence of the Beaker folk and pointed to a different social phenomenon, linking a handful of chiefs in the making (Shennan 1976; see also Clarke 1976). Although this model was initially devised in local—central European—terms, it quickly became the leading explanation for the entire BBP (e.g. Guilaine 1984). Over the past 15 years, the wide and uncritical acceptance of this model and its numerous versions (see Brodie 1994, 1997) led to a growing dissatisfaction and a noticeable revival of research, first and foremost amongst continental archaeologists grouped in the Archéologie et Gobelets association (e.g. Benz and van Willingen 1998; Czebreszuk and Szmyt 2003; Czebreszuk 2004). This process also gained momentum thanks to some formidable finds, especially the ‘Amesbury archer’ (Fitzpatrick 2011). As a result, there have been some major publications (e.g. Strahm 1995; Salanova 2000; Heyd 2000; Nicolis 2001a; Besse 2003; Vander Linden 2006), and numerous ambitious research projects are currently in process. All in all, we now have a better knowledge than ever of the regional idiosyncrasies, and clear evidence for connections between these different regions: the question now concerns the nature of those relationships.

  THE BELL BEAKER ARCHIPELAGO

  As shown in Fig. 31.1, the BBP presents a particular geographic patterning, best described as an archipelago, a suite of islands scattered from the southern Baltic Sea to both sides of the Gibraltar strait, and from the Irish Atlantic coast to the Carpathian basin. The ‘blank areas’ correspond to communities using other material cultures who may have explicitly rejected Bell Beaker-related items, although they sometimes share other material traits with regional Bell Beaker groups (Vander Linden 2006). The ‘islands’ of Bell Beaker activity cluster along major rivers and coastlines. In north-western and central Europe, these are scattered along the Rhine–Danube axis, starting with the Dutch group in the lower Rhine and the northern Low Countries (Drenth and Hogestijn 2001; Lanting 2007–8) then, following the Rhine upstream, a group in the French Moselle (Lefebvre et al. 2008) and several groups in Germany (Heyd 2000, 2007), Austria (Neugebauer and Neugebauer-Maresch 2001), the Czech Republic (Turek et al. 2003), and western Slovakia (Bátora et al. 2003). In Poland there are ‘islands’ in the lower Oder and the Vistula basins as well as the south (Czebreszuk 1998). In southern Scandinavia, Bell Beaker finds, mostly in settlements, are concentrated in Jutland, with occasional discoveries in Norway and Sweden (Vandkilde 2005; Sarauw 2007). As summarized for central Europe by Heyd (2000, 2007), and for Denmark by Sarauw (2007), these Bell Beaker groups all present complex interactions with neighbouring contemporary Corded Ware communities, although Lanting has questioned the precise duration of these contacts (Lanting 2007–8). Further east, the BBP is known in central Hungary as the Csepel group, where it borders several groups belonging to the early Bronze Age of the Carpathian basin (Kalicz-Schreiber and Kalicz 1998).

  FIG. 31.1. Distribution map of the Bell Beaker Phenomenon and selection of European Bell Beakers. Upper left: British Bell Beakers (after Clarke 1970). Middle left: Bell Beaker from La Folie (after: Tcheremissinoff et al. 2000). Lower right: Ciempozuelos style (after Blasco 1994). Upper left: late Dutch Bell Beakers (Veluwe style: after Lanting and van der Waals 1976). Lower right: Bohemian cups (after Turek 1995).

  Several Bell Beaker islands are documented along the Atlantic façade. By far the most extensive and well-documented situation is Britain, where Bell Beaker finds stretch from Scotland to the southern English chalks (Clarke 1970; Needham 2005). By comparison, the Irish group is restricted, although it played a crucial role in the introduction of copper metallurgy in the British Isles (O’Brien 2001). The BBP is well-established on the French and Spanish Atlantic coastline, from southern Brittany (L’Helgouach 2001) to the Gironde river (Roussot-Laroque 1998), and the Basque country (Alday Ruiz 1996). In the French Centre-Ouest, the Bell Beaker distribution is mutually exclusive to the area of the Artenac culture, although pots from this later culture sometimes imitate Bell Beaker decoration (Roussot-Laroque 1998). The conspicuous near-absence of Bell Beaker finds in the Seine basin (Billard et al. 1998) dramatically contrasts with the hundreds of collective burials of the previous late Neolithic (Salanova 2004). In the Iberian Peninsula, two small-scale, densely packed, groups are located in Galicia (Rodríguez Casal 2001) and in the Estremadura (Cardoso 2001). The Alentejo region presents a similar situation as the Paris Basin, with rare Bell Beaker finds contrasting with the hundreds of reported megalithic sites (Salanova 2004).

  Lastly, several Bell Beaker islands lie around the Western Mediterranean basin. In southern France and northern Catalonia, the Bell Beaker groups are inserted in a complex cultural mosaic, with mutual geographic exclusion between them and the groups of the local late Neolithic (Guilaine et al. 2001; Martin Cólliga 2001). Several Bell Beaker concentrations are reported in other parts of the Iberian Peninsula, as in the Meseta (Blasco 1994) and in Andalusia (Lazarich González 2000). The BBP is also well documented on the fringes of the Italian Alps and in the Pô valley, but, further south, is confined to the Tyrrhenian coast (Nicolis and Mottes 1998). A similar divide exists in Sicily, the BBP occupying the western shorelines and part of the central coast and inland, the local early Bronze Age developing in the east (Tusa 2001).

  This general intricacy of the Bell Beaker islands and the various surrounding archaeological cultures—as well as the multiplicity of local substr
ata on which the BBP has developed—obviously plays a role in the creation of the global variability of the BBP (Vander Linden 2006). At the same time, this archipelago pattern indicates that any interpretation of the BBP must consider the links which enable the constitution of this archipelago across Europe.

  THEMES IN BELL BEAKER RESEARCH

  Pots for the living, and other objects

  Ceramic petrological studies designed to test Shennan and Clarke’s hypothesis that Bell Beakers were exchanged between élites have established that with a few exceptions, Bell Beakers are always made of local raw materials (e.g. Rehman et al. 1992; Convertini and Querré 1998). If Bell Beakers were not exchanged over long distances as the prestige goods model suggests, how to account for their typological similarities? African ethnoarchaeological analogies suggest that simple motifs can easily be borrowed and dispersed by potters, as their imitation does not imply extensive knowledge of the producing technique (Gosselain 2000). Whilst horizontal bands on Bell Beakers were widespread, preference for some motifs and the way these were symmetrically arranged (Vander Linden 2006, ch. 13) presents some regional consistencies, such as the use of metopes in central and north-western Europe (Vander Linden 2006; Prieto-Martinez 2008). Likewise, technological analyses show some interesting regularities (e.g. preference for grog temper or cardium as a decorative tool: compare for instance Convertini and Querré 1998 with Cleal 1995; on the use of cardium, see Salanova 2000). Both elements indicate that, rather than the pots, it was actually the potters who were circulating within the BBP (Salanova 2000), perhaps as part of post-marital residency rules (Vander Linden 2007).

  Some recurrent patterns concern the context of use and deposition of the Bell Beakers. In western Europe, so-called ‘maritime beakers’ (beakers characterized by a simple zigzag-based decoration, and widely distributed in western Europe, hence the term) were placed in graves over the entire Bell Beaker sequence (Salanova 2000), whilst in central Europe handled jugs were used in the same way (Besse 2003). Beyond geographical differences, there is thus a common theme in funerary practices which implies the deposition of a standardized pot in the grave. These pots could have contained an alcoholic beverage (beer or mead), an hypothesis most famously advocated by Andrew Sherratt (1987). Although the discovery of such ‘Beaker beer’ has been claimed on several occasions (e.g. Dickson 1978, but see Tipping 1994; Rojo-Guerra et al. 2006), Bell Beakers also contained a large array of things, from human bones to flint tools and carbonised food remains (Pétrequin and Pétrequin 1988: 250–255; Brodie 1997). Despite this lack of unambiguous evidence, Beakers can be set in the context of wider third millennium BC types of drinking material culture in graves (Sherratt 1987).

  One of the highlights of recent research has been the critical re-evaluation of domestic pottery. Marie Besse (2003) has defined three large complexes. Her first group loosely corresponds to modern France and comprises ceramic types not found in the preceding local late Neolithic cultures. Her central European group shares close affinities with the Corded Ware culture, as does the third, centred upon the lower Rhine basin (see also Lanting 2007–8). In northern Italy, domestic assemblages are a complex blend of central European, southern French, and local types (Leonini 2004). The Iberian Peninsula seems relatively distinctive, with the occurrence of large wide open vases, perhaps related to specific cooking practices (Rojo-Guerra et al. 2006). Potential links between the Netherlands and Britain have long been suggested (Gibson 1980), but await further investigation (Woodward 2008).

  Despite several publications (e.g. Mottes 2001; Furestier 2007), there remains a relative dearth of data on stone tools. A certain drop in quality is often acknowledged, but this trend only accounts for part of the situation. The BBP also witnesses the development of highly skilled lithic production, such as flint daggers (northern Italy: Mottes 2001; Poland: Czebreszuk and Kozłowska 2007). An excellent example is the large-scale and specialized knapping of daggers and spearheads in northern Denmark (Apel 2008). Whilst these artefacts are mostly produced in Jutland, where the majority of Bell Beaker finds are located, they are distributed over a far wider zone where the BBP is not represented (Sarauw 2007). The manifold small and middle-scale exchange networks which stretch across parts of the BBP ‘archipelago’ (e.g. amber: du Gardin 1998; stone: Orozco-Kohler et al. 2001) are just part of broader European social dynamics of the second half of the third millennium. None of these extends over the entire ‘archipelago’ and thus can account for its existence (Vander Linden 2007). Equally, whilst the rise of the BBP has long been linked with the spread of copper metallurgy (Childe 1925), this can only account for local, sporadic movements, as copper metallurgy was already well established in most of the ‘archipelago’ (see Roberts and Frieman, this volume).

  Death matters

  Funerary practices exhibit a broad divide between, on one side, central and north-western Europe (Netherlands and Britain) and, on the other side, the French Atlantic façade and the western Mediterranean basin. In central Europe, flat graves are often grouped in small cemeteries (e.g. Heyd 2000). In Britain and in the Netherlands, round barrows prevail, with a primary central burial and further burials added either above the first one or in peripheral positions (e.g. Last 1998; Drenth and Hogestijn 2001). In both regions, a very few examples suggest that the dead could have been grouped on the basis of familial links (for central Europe, see Heyd 2007; for Britain, see Vatcher and Vatcher 1976). Mizoguchi (1993) and Last (1998) have suggested that the successive interments in some British barrows could be read as genealogical statements by the mourners.

  The thousands of known graves in central Europe almost unanimously follow the same rules: men are buried in flat graves on their left, head to the north facing east, whilst women are placed symmetrically, i.e. flexed on their right, head to the south, also facing east. A few exceptions exist (Müller 2001): for instance, cremation prevails in the Hungarian Csepel group, probably under the influence of the local early Bronze Age cultures (Kalicz-Schreiber and Kalicz 1998). A similar gender dichotomy is observable in the Netherlands (Lanting 2007–8) and Britain, although more chronological and geographical variation is encountered in the latter region (Garwood 2007). Grave goods also stress a gender dichotomy. Men often receive a beaker, a weapon (triangular daggers, stone bracers, arrowheads), and bow-shaped pendants. Women are often given a larger range of ceramics than the mere Beaker, as well as various ornaments. Interestingly, children are buried similarly to the adults. Not only do they follow the same position/orientation scheme, but in central Europe, some children were given extraordinary grave goods, in particular weapons (Heyd 2007). Ireland stands apart from Britain, as individual graves are extremely rare and most funerary finds are isolated objects from megalithic monuments (Case 1998).

  Two recent studies on bracers throw some light on these objects (Woodward et al. 2006; Fokkens et al. 2008). An analysis of English bracers shows that few present wear traces, suggesting these items were not intended for and used as part of archery practices (Woodward et al. 2006). By studying the position of bracers in a selection of north-western and central European graves, Fokkens et al. (2008) have shown that these wristguards were mostly not worn on the inside part of the arm, as would be expected for archery equipment. Consequently, they argue that bracers were non-functional items displaying ideal warrior images and contributed to a wider martial ideology indicated by the deposition of weapons in graves. Woodward et al. (2006) also demonstrate that English bracers belong to two coherent petrological and technological groups and were embedded in complex exchange networks stretching across Britain.

  In the rest of the Bell Beaker domain, treatment of the dead is more diverse. Finds, both individual graves and beakers in megalithic contexts, remain scarce in the Paris basin (Billard et al. 1998). Beakers have frequently been found with burials in Breton megalithic chambers, but contextual information is generally poor because of the complex life-history and taphonomy of these sites (L’Helgouach 2001). A similar situa
tion occurs in western France, with finds in megalithic monuments (Roussot-Laroque 1998) and few individual graves, such as the recently excavated site of La Folie, where the tomb was surrounded by a ring of postholes, a structure reminiscent of several Dutch sites (Tcheremissinoff et al. 2011). Likewise, southern France is mostly characterized by the re-use of older megalithic monuments and collective burials (Guilaine et al. 2001), although again, taphonomic problems generally prevent more detailed understanding of these re-use episodes (Chambon 2003). A handful of individual graves are known (e.g. La Fare: Müller and Lemercier 1994). Another instance of an older megalithic monument with a secondary Bell Beaker phase is the Swiss site of Le Petit-Chasseur in Sion, which also provided one of the very few cases of Bell Beaker human representation in the form of highly decorated stelae (Harrison and Heyd 2007; Robb, this volume). There are few individual burials in northern Italy, some of them comprising the classical maritime beaker-weapon association (e.g. Santa Cristina, Ca’ di Marco: Nicolis 2001b). Further south on the mainland and in Sicily, Bell Beaker material is found in funerary caves and hypogea (e.g. Tusa 2001). Sardinian bell beakers are placed in caves, megalithic burials, cists, and hypogea, the funerary evidence pointing to a complex mixture of individual and collective graves with post-depositional movement of the bones (Atzeni 1998). The Iberian Peninsula presents a similar range of possibilities, with Bell Beaker artefacts in megalithic burials (Galicia: Rodriguez Casal 2001; Pyrenees: Martin Colliga 2001; Basque country: Alday Ruiz 1996), individual graves set in older megaliths, sometimes associated with architectural modifications (e.g. Estremadura: Cardoso 2001), and a well-established tradition of individual burials in the later Ciempozuelos group in the central Meseta (Blasco 1994).