The paper presents evidence from the Middle/Late Neolithic settlement of Oreškovica-Selište located in north-eastern Serbia. The site is dated to the early phases of the Vinča culture, i.e. the period from around 5400 to 5000 cal. BC. Results of geophysical prospection indicated multiple ditches and a palisade around a substantial settlement covering ~6.1 ha. These results have been confirmed by excavation of enclosure features. Oreškovica is among the earliest elaborately enclosed settlements in the Balkans. The site is located in the immediate vicinity of the copper-rich mineral zones of eastern Serbia, which provided evidence of the earliest Vinča culture metallurgical activities (Borić 2009; Radivojević et al. 2010; Šljivar and Jacanović 1996). Oreškovica has produced evidence of copper ore collecting for either pigment preparation or smelting likely from the copper mining zone some 10 km away. The site is also situated only 6 km away from the larger Vinča culture ‘mega-site’ of Belovode which provided evidence of enclosure features and copper smelting associated with Vinča culture occupation. Belovode, similar to Oreškovica, dates from the earliest phases of the Vinča culture but lasts until its end in the 47th to 46th centuries BC. The evidence of these two sites from the micro region of the Mlava River drainage offers a possibility to study differential diachronic dynamics of settlement foundation, fortification and abandonment. The paper makes links between settlement developments in this micro region and contemporaneous settlements from across the Balkans and in particular the Greek Neolithic.
Communities, Landscapes, and Interaction in Neolithic Greece
International conference 29-30 May 2015
