The Oxford Handbook of Neolithic Europe

The Neolithic - a period in which the first sedentary agrarian communities were established across much of Europe - has been a key topic of archaeological research for over a century. However, the variety of evidence across Europe and the way research traditions in different countries (and languages) have developed makes it very difficult for both students and specialists to gain an overview of continent-wide trends. The Oxford Handbook of Neolithic Europe provides the first comprehensive, geographically extensive, thematic overview of the European Neolithic - from Iberia to Russia and from Norway to Malta - offering both a general introduction and a clear exploration of key issues and current debates surrounding evidence and interpretation. Chapters written by leading experts in the field examine topics such as the movement of plants, animals, ideas, and people (including recent trends in the application of genetics and isotope analyses); cultural change (from the first farming to the first metal artefacts); domestic architecture; subsistence; material culture; monuments; and burial and other treatments of the dead. In doing so, the volume also considers the history of research and sets out agendas and themes for future work in the field.PART I: INTRODUCTION ; 1. Defining the 'Neolithic in Europe': Diverse and Contemporaneous Communities, c. 6500-2500 BC ; PART II: MOBILITY, CHANGE, AND INTERACTION AT THE LARGE SCALE ; 2. Environments and Landscape Change ; Movement of Plants, Animals, Ideas, and People ; 3. South-East Europe ; 4. The Neolithization of Mediterranean Europe: Mobility and Interactions from the Near East to the Iberian Peninsula ; 5. Central and Eastern Europe ; 6. Moving Animals and Plants in the Early Neolithic of North-Western Europe ; 7. Language, Genes, and Cultural Interaction ; Sequences of Cultural Interaction and Cultural Change ; 8. South-East Europe ; 9. The Neolithic in Mediterranean Europe ; 10. Central and Eastern Europe ; 11. Northern and Western Europe ; PART III: NEOLITHIC WORLDS AND NEOLITHIC LIFEWAYS ; Houses, Habitation, and Community ; 12. Tells and Settlements in South-East Europe ; 13. Domestic Space in the Mediterranean ; 14. Longhouse Lifestyles in the Central European Neolithic ; 15. Lakeside Dwellings of the Circum-Alpine Region ; 16. Households and Communities in Neolithic France ; 17. Houses, Halls, and Occuptation in Britain and Ireland ; 18. Places of Settlement in Southern Scandanavia ; Subsistence and Social Routine ; 19. Stable Isotopes and Neolithic Subsistence: Pattern and Variation ; 20. Subsistence Practices and Social Routine in Neolithic Southern Europe ; 21. Subsistence Practices in Central and Eastern Europe ; 22. Subsistence Practices in Western and Northern Europe ; 23. The Neolithic Year ; 24. Religious Routine and Pilgrimage in the British Isles ; Materiality and Social Relations ; 25. Invention and European Knapping Traditions ; 26. Shared Labour and Large Scale Action: European Flint Mining ; 27. Stone and Flint Axes in Neolithic Europe ; 28. Pottery of South-East Europe ; 29. Linearbandkeramik Pottery and Society ; 30. Ceramics and Society in Northern Europe ; 31. Bell Beaker Pottery and Society ; 32. A Miniature World: Models and Figurines in South-East Europe ; 33. Spondylus and Shell Ornaments ; 34. Amber ; 35. The First Metalwork and Expressions of Social Power ; 36. Early Metallurgy in Iberia and the Western Mediterranean ; 37. Early Metallurgy in Western and Northern Europe ; 38. Deposition in Pits ; 39. Animals and Social Relations ; Monuments, Rock Art, and Cosmology ; 40. Central European Enclosures ; 41. Italian Enclosures ; 42. Causewayed Enclosures in Northern and Western Europe ; 43. Chambered Tombs and Passage Graves of Northern and Western Europe ; 44. Rock Carvings in Iberia ; 45. Rock Carvings in South Central Europe ; 46. Rock Carvings in Northern Europe ; 47. Underground Religion in the Central Mediterranean Neolithic ; 48. A Place in the Cosmos: Monuments and Celestial Bodies ; Death, Bodies, and Persons ; 49. Mortuary Practices, Bodies, and Persons in the Neolithic and Early-Middle Copper Ages of South-East Europe ; 50. Burial and Human Body Representations in the Central Mediterranean Neolithic ; 51. Mortuary Practices, Bodies, and Persons in Central Europe ; 52. Mortuary Practices, Bodies, and Persons in North-East Europe ; 53. Mortuary Practices and Bodily Representations in North-West Europe ; PART IV: CONCLUSION: DEBATES IN NEOLITHIC ARCHAEOLOGY ; 54. Unexpected Histories? South-East and Central Europe ; 55. What Do We Mean By 'Neolithic Societies'? ; 56. The Decline of the Neolithic and the Rise of the Bronze Age Society