Investigating Social Significance and Differentiation of Buildings through Painted and Figurative Decoration, Built-In Furnishings, and Portable Finds

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

A number of sites from the Balkans and Greece dated to the fifth millennium BC, Karanovo and Dikili-Tash among others, provide evidence for a special status of built spaces. A comparative study of painted and figurative wall decoration, built-in furnishings, and portable finds in their archaeological context demonstrates that similar architectural layouts together with a presence of decorative features, a comparable form across the region, might not always correlate with a similar interpretation about the possible uses of a particular building. Sometimes built spaces designated for specialized activities are distinguishable from built spaces used for multiple activities. Emerging patterns are tentative as the relationship between tells and flat settlements is not well surmised for the presence of yet limited data. The study has implications not only for a better understanding of the sociopolitical and cultural transformations in southeast Europe during the Late Neolithic–Chalcolithic period, often viewed as a transition period, but also for designing problem-oriented archaeological surveys in the region.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• SAA 2021: General Sessions

Keywords

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 32931