The rise of metallurgy in Eurasia: Evolution, organisation and consumption of early metal in the Balkans

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One of the most significant technological achievements in human history is the transformation of matter, most spectacularly the invention of metallurgy. This triggered a whole new era of fundamental economic, social and cultural changes. Recent excavations by the core members of this project at Belovode in Serbia revealed copper smelting dated to c. 5000 BC, making it the earliest record of fully-developed metallurgical activity anywhere in the world (Radivojevic et al. 2010). How and why this earliest metallurgy emerged and developed in the Balkans, apparently independently from the Near East, is at the centre of this research project. The origins of metallurgy have so far been studied mostly in isolation and detached from their technological, social and environmental context. What is now required is a systematic and interdisciplinary approach using sites and assemblages of a sufficiently high archaeological and archaeometallurgical resolution to trace these developments in their mutual relationships. Our recent research at Belovode has revealed the huge potential to do this, and our project now seeks to realise this potential at Belovode and other similar Vinca culture sites. Due to the political situation, little internationally-connected research relevant for this has been done in Serbia since the 1990's; our international team comprises established and emerging scholars on early Balkan metallurgy in an attempt to overcome this hiatus. This UK-Serbian joint venture, together with prominent German colleagues, is a collaboration also designed to exchange knowledge and skills as well as build lasting relationships for the future. The project combines targeted excavations and surveys at three copper mining, production and consumption sites in Serbia with intensive scientific analysis of finds at laboratories in Britain and Germany. The excavations focus on known metal workshops in two sites, and a prospective third site associated with prehistoric mines. We expect to retrieve copper minerals such as malachite, artefacts such as malachite and metal beads, and metallurgical waste from well-stratified settlement contexts, enabling us to understand the relationship between the earlier craft of bead making and the emergence and new role of metallurgy within the individual settlements, and the wider Vinca Culture. The laboratory-based study of the remains will allow us to reconstruct technical aspects of the metal production, and how it related to malachite used for bead making and the earlier introduction of pottery production as possible pre-cursors to a fully-developed metallurgy. The study of trace elements and isotope ratios of copper minerals and metal artefacts will facilitate the reconstruction of trade in ore and metal, and their consumption, revealing the multiple layers of interaction between the different settlements of the Vinca Culture, often along major river routes (Danube, Sava etc.). Through a combination of these different approaches to archaeometallurgy, combining fieldwork, technological reconstruction, and theoretical considerations of cultural development, the project looks afresh at the technological, social and environmental context in which metal first appeared and was subsequently shaped, distributed and used across the Balkans. One major discussion concerning the beginning of metallurgy often centres on the question whether metal smelting was only invented once, probably in western Asia, and then spread across Eurasia, or whether there are several independent instances of this invention happening. Our team comprises exponents of both schools of thought, ensuring a balanced approach in our research, and the subsequent interpretations.