| In Eastern Europe the period of 6100--2950 BC encompasses the Neolithic and Eneolithic ("copper age") periods, and this time may be generalized in fairly homogeneous terms as having a sedentary "village farming" way of life. Many archaeological studies posit that this sedentism, in hand with greater population density and emergent hierarchical social organization, gave rise to increased socio-political complexity. One fiercely debated context in this scheme is that of the giant-settlements of the Tripolye culture in Ukraine, which existed in several phases from ca. 4100--3400 BC and are the largest archaeological sites of Neo-Eneolithic Europe.;This research explores the interplay between material culture and environment, and in four parts reconstructs the chronology and population development of three thousand years of human settlement in reference to relevant climatic and ecological trends. It concludes that Neo-Eneolithic populations in this region, while sedentary in the short term, were characterized by constant and sometimes intense episodes of migration. Population development is examined in a regionally variegated manner and is shown to correspond with Neo-Malthusian expectations of population dynamics. Meanwhile, systems of large settlements, far from being manifestations of long-term sedentary economic and political intensification, are shown to be a product of short-term migratory behavior related to the colonization of mostly uninhabited but highly productive peripheral regions.;While this study begins from assumptions of climatic determinism, linkages between super-regional climate and local environmental and population trends are ultimately only moderately indicated, with the conclusion being that regional manifestations of Holocene climate change and the human responses to them were highly diverse. A combination of social and environmental factors are put forth as explanations of migratory behavior, with the conclusion that climate was a subtle instigator, but not a prime mover, for changes in settlement patterns and the socio-economic regime of Neo-Eneolithic peoples. |
