Equality and Inequality: Social Differentiation in North Central Europe from 4300-2400 cal BC

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

In addition to investigations concerning the early monumentality of Neolithic societies in North Central Europe, the priority programme also concentrates on social differentiation as a second main aspect. Accordingly, in the final phase of the project social interpretations will be chronologically and chorologically differentiated through an intensive investigation on socio-theoretical issues, ethno-archaeological aspects of monumentality, and social structure. It is assumed that indications of social practices are to be found in different patterns recognized in economic strategies, architecture, and material culture which lead from an initial rather segmentary to a more vertically differentiated society. Beyond cooperative and collective principles and their implementation through the central role of “monuments”, the emergence of enhanced “individualization”, which points towards the new guiding principles of the subsequent Single Grave societies, may have occurred in the final stages of Funnel Beaker societies. The investigation of these hypotheses based on a chronological and chorological inventory of data on economic practices and demography as well as on architecture and material culture will yield new model concepts for the period between 4300–2400 BC in North Central Europe.