Frühe Kulturen im Südkaukasus: Umwelt, Ressourcen und Innovationen im Mittleren Kura-Tal vom 6. bis 3. Jt. v. Chr.
Final Report Abstract
It is hence evident that the two ends of the Middle Kura River did not participate in the same supra-regional networks, but had different orientations: the Neolithic sites in the central part of southern Caucasia, thereby included Aruchlo and Mentesh Tepe, belong to a larger concentration of sites with comparable inventory found from the Araxes valley/Nakhichevan to the Shomutepe-Shulaveri region. The southeastern Mil Plain sites demonstrate a successive development small and flat sites to mounded sites with special architectural features like Kamiltepe, and with a painted ware reminiscent of traditions known in the Iranian highlands. The various excavated sites had – through time – access to different raw material sources, as is evident especially from obsidian. And each site shows a specific adaptation to its environment, visible from both the domesticated and the wild faunal record. Obviously, the geographical setting was hence highly important in shaping the human experience, from the channeling of traffic and access to various resources, to strategies of subsistence and livelihood. Furthermore, the environment is also today a key factor for modern land-use that in turn strongly affects the preservation of the archaeological landscapes: the Mil Plain area is still partially preserved because of the absence of large-scale irrigation, while the Aruchlo-Mentesh area is highly cultivated in the piedmont zone, as well as largely affected by recent constructions of pipe-lines. As demonstrated by these combined results, the Ancient Kura project has provided fundamental new information and insights into the development of prehistoric cultures in the southern Caucasus, and has opened new avenues of collaborative research between areas and among local and French-German specialists. While the strategies of excavation differed between the individual areas, the combination of the results and the systematic comparative analysis brings in new data and new perspectives for a much better understanding of the cultural process in southern Caucasia. Still, the archaeological landscape that now slowly begins to emerge before our eyes still holds an array of unsolved questions for the future.
Publications
- Ancient Kura 2010-2011: The first two seasons of joint field work in the southern Caucasus. Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran und Turan 44, 2012, 1–189
B. Lyonnet/F. Guliev/B. Helwing/T. Aliyev/S. Hansen/G. Mirtskhulava
- Mounds and Settlements in the Lower Qarabakh - Mil Plain, Azerbaijan. In: R. Hofmann/F.-K. Moetz/J. Müller (eds.), Tells: Social and Environmental Space. Proceedings of the International Workshop “Socio-Environmental Dynamics over the Last 12,000 Years: The Creation of Landscapes II (14th-18th March 2011)” in Kiel. Universitätsforschungen zur prähistorischen Archäologie 207 (Bonn 2012) 67–77
B. Helwing/T. Aliyev/A. Ricci
- The Neolithic on the Move: High Resolution Settlement Dynamics Investigations and Their Impact on Archaeological Landscape Studies in Southwest Azerbaijan. eTopoi. Journal for Ancient Studies 3, 2012, 369–375
A. Ricci/B. Helwing/T. Aliyev
- T. R. Əliyev/B. Helving/A. Ricci, Azərbaycan-Almaniya beynəxalq ekspedisiyasının çöl tədqiqatlarının hesabatı. Azǝrbaycanda arxeoloji tǝdqiqatlar 2012, 2013, 335–341
Əliyev et al.
- A monumental Neolithic? New results of the ongoing Azerbaijanian-German investigations in the Mil Steppe, Azerbaijan. In: 8th ICAANE Warszawa (Wiesbaden 2014) 199–209
B. Helwing/T. Aliyev
