DOI chapter:
Grenzgänger, traders and the last hunter-gatherers of the North European Plain
DOI chapter:Hofmann, Daniela; Peeters, Hans; Meyer, Ann-Katrin: Crosstown traffic: contemplating mobility, interaction and migration among foragers and early farmers
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.66745#0265
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Crosstown traffic: contemplating mobility, interaction and migration among foragers and early farmers
Introduction
The history of research of the Mesolithic-Neolithic
transition has always been plagued by the predict-
ably dichotomous thinking that tends to crystallise
around period boundaries. In this particular case,
this initially seemed warranted because an incoming
(Neolithic, sedentary) population could be opposed to
an indigenous (Mesolithic, at least seasonally mobile)
one. These narratives were subsequently critiqued,
and mobility seen as a crucial factor in both social
settings (e.g. Whittle 1996, 160-162; Barker 2006,
361-363; Finlayson/Warren 2010; Watkins 2013).
However, such readings were tied to theoretical posi-
tions which assumed a leading, or at least very large
role of the Mesolithic population in the adoption of
agriculture. This was also the interpretive framework
for initial isotopic data, showing personal mobility
over a lifetime (e.g. Price et al. 2001, 601; Zvelebil/
Pettitt 2008, 199). In contrast, aDNA analyses have
returned the issue of migration to the fore, providing
a wealth of data, with the Early Neolithic of central
Europe as one of the main case studies. As a result,
the many nuanced accounts on the complexities of
identity formation, the selective uptake of innovations
and the role of mobility in farming societies are now
largely ignored in the newer literature. Consequently,
migration narratives have remained undertheorised
(this is also a problem for subsequent migrations, see
e.g. Furholt 2018). In this paper, we focus primarily
on migration, defined as the long-term or permanent
change of residence of individuals or groups, whereby
they must either cross a significant cultural boundary
or be so far removed from their origin community as
to make regular travel back too onerous. In contrast,
mobility is a more general term which also covers
routine (e. g. seasonal) or shorter-term changes in resi-
dence, as well as travel and exploration.
The gap between the (pre-)historic importance
of migration events and archaeologists’ reluctance
to systematically think about how migrations actu-
ally worked was already noted in the 1990s, most
famously by David Anthony (Anthony 1990). He did,
for instance, point out that archaeologists tended to
think of migrations as involving one-off movement
in one direction only, when in fact there was signifi-
cant cross-cultural evidence for return migration, and
groups who had migrated once were also more likely
to do so again. Yet this is not the only way in which
our narratives have lagged behind the theoretical and
interpretative advances already made in the 1990s
and early 2000s. For instance, the way in which we
conceptualise female mobility in the Neolithic remains
highly restricted - women move for the sake of male
politics, i. e. in ‘marriage’ or as captives, and seemingly
without any agency of their own. This grossly over-
simplifies the range of behaviours actually observed
ethnographically, even in patrilocal societies (Bickle
2020; Frieman et al. 2020), quite apart from decades
of work in gender archaeology. Also, where the causes
of migration are alluded to, narratives often tend to
fall back on stereotypical push factors, such as climate
or overpopulation. In these accounts, migration only
happens when the self-evidently preferred solution
of staying put no longer works, rendering migration
a ‘crisis’ behaviour - notwithstanding that this can be
a driving factor - rather than affording it the central
place it could now take in our accounts.
In this paper, however, our main issue is with
another aspect that has so far barely been addressed:
how the migration behaviours of different societies
shaped both the trajectory and eventual outcome of in-
teraction. This topic has been comparatively neglected
in central Europe, because Early Neolithic popula-
tions have been shown to mix very little with resident
hunter-gatherers, at least in the first few centuries (e. g.
Lipson et al. 2017). This means that while there is
evidence for the continuous possible survival of hunt-
ing and gathering groups in non-loess territories (see
below), the question how contact and connections
may have looked has been relatively side-lined. This
also applies to interactions between Neolithic societ-
ies in central Europe and the hunting and gathering
societies of the north European Plain, where at last
another 1,000-1,500 years were to pass before food
production came to dominate more widely. So far, the
main focus has been on the evidence for ‘imports’ or
‘contact finds’ between these societies (e. g. Klassen
2004, 301-338; Gronenborn 2009; Verhart 2012),
but this has barely extended to other aspects of social
life. Instead, the neolithisation scenario once again
works with the idea of incoming farmers and largely
parallel societies for a time (e. g. Gron / Sorensen
2018).
In this article, we argue that we must move the
study of migration away from a fascination with the
fact that it has happened (a question often addressed
at a large, continental or at least culture-wide scale),
to exploring how it unfolded as a distinct historical
phenomenon, enacted by particular people and at a
very specific place and time. In short, if migration is to
be appreciated in social terms, then identifying push
and pull factors is an important first step, but hardly
the end of the story. Both the modalities and conse-
quences of migrations will also differ based on the
expectations, strategies and habituated actions of those
Crosstown traffic: contemplating mobility, interaction and migration among foragers and early farmers
Introduction
The history of research of the Mesolithic-Neolithic
transition has always been plagued by the predict-
ably dichotomous thinking that tends to crystallise
around period boundaries. In this particular case,
this initially seemed warranted because an incoming
(Neolithic, sedentary) population could be opposed to
an indigenous (Mesolithic, at least seasonally mobile)
one. These narratives were subsequently critiqued,
and mobility seen as a crucial factor in both social
settings (e.g. Whittle 1996, 160-162; Barker 2006,
361-363; Finlayson/Warren 2010; Watkins 2013).
However, such readings were tied to theoretical posi-
tions which assumed a leading, or at least very large
role of the Mesolithic population in the adoption of
agriculture. This was also the interpretive framework
for initial isotopic data, showing personal mobility
over a lifetime (e.g. Price et al. 2001, 601; Zvelebil/
Pettitt 2008, 199). In contrast, aDNA analyses have
returned the issue of migration to the fore, providing
a wealth of data, with the Early Neolithic of central
Europe as one of the main case studies. As a result,
the many nuanced accounts on the complexities of
identity formation, the selective uptake of innovations
and the role of mobility in farming societies are now
largely ignored in the newer literature. Consequently,
migration narratives have remained undertheorised
(this is also a problem for subsequent migrations, see
e.g. Furholt 2018). In this paper, we focus primarily
on migration, defined as the long-term or permanent
change of residence of individuals or groups, whereby
they must either cross a significant cultural boundary
or be so far removed from their origin community as
to make regular travel back too onerous. In contrast,
mobility is a more general term which also covers
routine (e. g. seasonal) or shorter-term changes in resi-
dence, as well as travel and exploration.
The gap between the (pre-)historic importance
of migration events and archaeologists’ reluctance
to systematically think about how migrations actu-
ally worked was already noted in the 1990s, most
famously by David Anthony (Anthony 1990). He did,
for instance, point out that archaeologists tended to
think of migrations as involving one-off movement
in one direction only, when in fact there was signifi-
cant cross-cultural evidence for return migration, and
groups who had migrated once were also more likely
to do so again. Yet this is not the only way in which
our narratives have lagged behind the theoretical and
interpretative advances already made in the 1990s
and early 2000s. For instance, the way in which we
conceptualise female mobility in the Neolithic remains
highly restricted - women move for the sake of male
politics, i. e. in ‘marriage’ or as captives, and seemingly
without any agency of their own. This grossly over-
simplifies the range of behaviours actually observed
ethnographically, even in patrilocal societies (Bickle
2020; Frieman et al. 2020), quite apart from decades
of work in gender archaeology. Also, where the causes
of migration are alluded to, narratives often tend to
fall back on stereotypical push factors, such as climate
or overpopulation. In these accounts, migration only
happens when the self-evidently preferred solution
of staying put no longer works, rendering migration
a ‘crisis’ behaviour - notwithstanding that this can be
a driving factor - rather than affording it the central
place it could now take in our accounts.
In this paper, however, our main issue is with
another aspect that has so far barely been addressed:
how the migration behaviours of different societies
shaped both the trajectory and eventual outcome of in-
teraction. This topic has been comparatively neglected
in central Europe, because Early Neolithic popula-
tions have been shown to mix very little with resident
hunter-gatherers, at least in the first few centuries (e. g.
Lipson et al. 2017). This means that while there is
evidence for the continuous possible survival of hunt-
ing and gathering groups in non-loess territories (see
below), the question how contact and connections
may have looked has been relatively side-lined. This
also applies to interactions between Neolithic societ-
ies in central Europe and the hunting and gathering
societies of the north European Plain, where at last
another 1,000-1,500 years were to pass before food
production came to dominate more widely. So far, the
main focus has been on the evidence for ‘imports’ or
‘contact finds’ between these societies (e. g. Klassen
2004, 301-338; Gronenborn 2009; Verhart 2012),
but this has barely extended to other aspects of social
life. Instead, the neolithisation scenario once again
works with the idea of incoming farmers and largely
parallel societies for a time (e. g. Gron / Sorensen
2018).
In this article, we argue that we must move the
study of migration away from a fascination with the
fact that it has happened (a question often addressed
at a large, continental or at least culture-wide scale),
to exploring how it unfolded as a distinct historical
phenomenon, enacted by particular people and at a
very specific place and time. In short, if migration is to
be appreciated in social terms, then identifying push
and pull factors is an important first step, but hardly
the end of the story. Both the modalities and conse-
quences of migrations will also differ based on the
expectations, strategies and habituated actions of those