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2. Across the border: unstable dwellings and fluidlandscapes in the earliest Neolithic of Greece

Kostas Kotsakis

The 1960s was an outstanding decade for Greek Neolithic

studies. For Greece as a country, it was the first period of

relative prosperity and peace after a long epoch of

turbulence and unrest. The difficult period opened with

the Balkan Wars in the early 1900s and ended some 50

years later in a civil clash that followed the Second World

War and lasted until well into the 1950s. In 1922, as a

result of the defeat of Greece by Turkey, and the sub-

sequent Treaty of Lausanne, one and a half million

Orthodox Christians were moved to Greece from Asia

Minor, Pontus and Eastern Thrace (Mackridge and

Yannakakis 1997).

Greece reached the middle of the twentieth century a

very different country in many respects; economically,

culturally, demographically and socially. For Neolithic

studies in particular, the period of post-war stability

meant a revival of a research track that was initiated at

the beginning of the twentieth century with the ground-

breaking syntheses of Tsountas (1908) and Wace (Wace

and Thompson 1912). After that promising beginning,

Neolithic studies retreated into a marginal backwater of

research, almost eclipsed by the spectacular discoveries

of the palatial centres in Crete and in continental Greece.

As domestic and international audiences were grasped

firmly by the grand quest for the Hellenic Bronze Ageculture (and to a lesser extent society), the Neolithic was

restricted to small-scale research which focused mainly

on trivial issues of chronology and cultural affinities and

which was undertaken sporadically as a by-product of

major archaeological projects, as at Corinth or Knossos

(Weinberg 1965). Research in Macedonia in the north of

the country was just beginning to map the prehistoric

past of that region, mainly via extensive archaeological

prospection (Heurtley 1939). Too soon for detailed

prehistoric research (let alone any focused on the

Neolithic), the Neolithic retained a marginal role,

dominated by a strong sense of otherness seen against the

Aegean culture. This continued until late in the twentieth

century (Fotiadis 2001; Kotsakis 1998, 47).

It was more than 50 years after Tsountas and Wace

that independent research on the Neolithic period was

resumed. Two central and influential figures of post-

Second World War prehistoric archaeology in Greece,

Demetrios Theocharis and Vladimir Miloji took the

lead. They initiated intensive, systematic excavations in

Argissa Magoula (Miloji 1960) and Sesklo (Theocharis

1957). Both scholars viewed the Neolithic as an indepen-

dent phenomenon, and shared a common belief that the

Neolithic of Greece was crucial for an understanding of

the European shift to the Neolithic. In the meantime, the

Neolithic origins of Europe had become an established

concept as one of the defining features of a European

identity (Zvelebil 1996).

Partly because of the previous research, which had

identified the importance of Argissa and Sesklo, and

partly because of the fascination of archaeology of that

time with central and key-sites, the two sites were judged

by similar criteria and therefore had more similarities

than differences. Both were tells, standing out in the

landscape, indicating a long and uninterrupted habitation.

Both had distinctive substantial architecture, with

abundant material culture. Both could be described as

central sites. Within the normative perception of culture

that was dominant in the discipline at that time, thesesites were understood to contain essential traits that were

representative of Neolithic culture as a whole. Sesklo and

Argissa, thus, were obvious choices for answering the

central questions that were current in the discussion of

the 1960s.

In his comprehensive report on the work in Thessaly

of the German Institute, Miloji defined the aims along

two dimensions: to follow the movement of peoples from

north to south and from south to north, and to shed light

on the permanence of settlement and on the adoption of

agriculture (Miloji 1960). In this report, Thessaly is

perceived as a bridge which connects the south to the

north, a contact point of the various cultures. Childean

diffusionism is resonant here, and the culture-historical


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Across the border: unstable dwellings and fluid landscapes in Neolithic Greece 9

style is unmistakable. In fact, even before the excavations

began, the broad conceptual dimensions of the Neolithic

in Greece (including its emergence) had already been

formed as a regional episode of the Neolithic Revolution.

What followed, in terms of excavation, was more or less

a technical clarification of particular aspects of thatframework.

Both Sesklo and Argissa (and later Otzaki) (Miloji

1983) conformed neatly to this framework. Being long-

lived and prominent, the mounds of Sesklo and Argissa

had already an emblematic significance for the Neolithic

of Greece as focal places of sustained human interaction.

They were soon to be recognized as typical. Argissa, next

to the Peneios River, was strongly reminiscent of the

major Balkan sites, like Vina and Starevo, with which

Miloji was closely familiar, being a Serbian himself,

and having worked on his doctoral research in that area

(Miloji

1949). Argissa offered a direct (not simplyconceptual) link with the Northern peoples. Sesklo, on

the other hand, had a long-established reputation for

being the key-site, a sort of flagship for the Thessalian

Neolithic, an archetypic Neolithic settlement with

distinctive material culture. It is no surprise, therefore,

that the dominant archaeological perception of the Greek

Neolithic was modelled on these two sites. The perception

encompassed prominent tells, formed from long and

continuous habitation (documented by deep anthro-

pogenic deposits), advantageous natural setting next to

rivers (in floodplains or within light arable land), relative

self-sufficiency through successful subsistence economy,

and, above all, early pottery of a distinct style. Theseessential traits, all fashioned after the model sites, were

imperceptibly attributed to the early stages of the

Neolithic as a whole (Demoule and Perls 1993).

For the emergence of the Neolithic in particular, the

significance of Sesklo and Argissa was further asserted

once both excavators reported the earliest aceramic

deposits of the Neolithic in Greece. Although the presence

of true aceramic deposits has been challenged, indeed

almost dismissed, by the majority of researchers (Bloedow

1991; Demoule and Perls 1993; Perls 2001), the

argument brought to the forefront deep notions of stability

and permanence, of a continuous evolution towards theNeolithic as a result of the gradual adoption of typical

traits, in particular, pottery, domesticated plants and

settled subsistence economy, all achievements the

Mesolithic people could not claim. In the meantime, the

detailed sequences of material culture, standardized and

formalized in a meticulous, central European fashion,

enhanced this sense of stability further, and created a

clearly and neatly categorized material culture, radically

different from anything pre-Neolithic.

Of course, we may now argue that this sense of neat

stability, ascribed to the totality of the Neolithic, was an

illusion, created in the 1960s and 1970s both through the

pages of nicely illustrated books (Theocharis 1973) and

by expanding selected traits from the type-sites to

represent the totality of the Neolithic. During the last two

decades, an international archaeological discussion has

become progressively more contextual and has gradually

illuminated the subtle variabilities of the diverse and

ephemeral Neolithic ways within Europe and the Balkans

(e.g. Bailey 2000; Chapman 1994; Edmonds andRichards 1998; Tringham 2000). The power of the old

model, however, which was deeply influenced by the

readings of the post-war pioneers, was still powerful for

the Neolithic of Greece, even well after the 1960s.

Also, we know now that at least some of the proposed

Neolithic traits are not as central as was thought in the

1960s. Recent research in Northern Greece has revealed

that tells are just one type of site; flat extended sites form

a significant part of the habitation pattern and in some

regions are the dominant one (Andreou et al. 1996;

Kotsakis 1994; 1999). The recent excavations at

Makriyalos in Macedonia, Greece (Pappa and Besios1999) and in Thessaly (Toufexis 1997) have confirmed

this insight and provided factual evidence for the structure

and development of flat, extended sites. Similarly, in

view of the many one-period or short-lived sites that have

been explored, the longevity and continuity of Neolithic

settlements now seems less likely to be a recurrent feature.

Moreover, long-term success and complex material

culture as a whole is rarer than previously assumed once

we depart from the stereotypes of the 1960s and the

privileged regions, we see that the temporary, more

mundane sites like Drosia in Western Macedonia (Kotsos

1992) and Kremastos in Grevena (Toufexis 1994) are

common. In short, continuing research undermined thestereotypic approach that had been built on the research

of the 1960s.

The central concepts

The problems with the received view of the Neolithic,

apart from their progressively poorer coincidence with

archaeological evidence, become more critical when the

defining traits inform the discussion of the beginning of

the Neolithic as a historical process. This happens, for

instance, when research into the earliest Neolithic focuses

on regions and environments of later successfulsettlement (such as the eastern Thessalian plain) or

alternatively, when the evidence for transitional material

culture is sought in the deepest deposits of long-lived

mounds (like Argissa). My argument therefore is that the

way we understand, interpret and seek evidence for the

process of Neolithization in Greece is still, to a large

extent, conditioned by the early work of the 1960s and by

the essentialist arguments that were put forward at that

time on the content and character of the earliest Neolithic.

A clear distinction between Neolithic farmers and

Mesolithic hunter-gatherers and foragers is instrumental

to an essentialist understanding of the Neolithic and its

emergence. The distinction is first and foremost about

integrated subsistence modes, and it can be compared to


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Kostas Kotsakis10

the adaptive processes put forward in the Near East (e.g.

Redman 1978). The comparison indicates that the

distinction is directly related to a tradition of normative

archaeology which restricts explanation to defining

successive historical stages. But in the case of Greece, a

country with a strong classicist tradition in archaeology,an additional important factor needs to be considered.

Ian Morris (1994; 2000) has stressed the deep and critical

control of Hellenism on Greek archaeology and classical

studies. Within this austere classicist context, alternative

readings that stressed adaptation processes rather than

subsistence modes were overtly neglected. The anthro-

pological view of culture, as implied by an adaptation

process, has always been considered more or less

irrelevant, almost trivial for understanding classical

civilization (Renfrew 1980). The sense of familiarity with

subsistence as a rational response to the simple needs of

a rural life, and a tacit notion of continuity going back toHesiod certainly contributed immensely to this in-

difference (Fotiadis 1995).

Coming from different directions, all these strands

worked together to form a perception of break and

discontinuity in the prehistory of Greece which has been

firmly established in the literature. The break is not

entirely implausible, in view of the numerous

archaeological characteristics, some of which we have

already discussed. Nevertheless, the influence of the

1960s work should not be forgotten; the excavations

conducted at that time made a lasting impression, and

the ideas formed within the context of Greek archaeology

helped to establish a simplified view that equatedNeolithic people with farmers and Mesolithic people with

hunter-gatherers. Up to now, this clear distinction, plainly

expressed in the work of Miloji and Theocharis, has

informed nearly all discussion about the beginning of the

Neolithic in Greece.

The arguments that elaborate the notion of dis-

continuity in early Greek prehistory refer to major aspects

of prehistoric culture. The absence of a significant

Mesolithic population has been presented as irrefutable

evidence in support of a large-scale colonization of

Greece. Similarly emphasised have been the absence of

wild progenitors of domesticates and the discontinuitiesin Mesolithic and Neolithic material culture. All three

arguments have been discussed since the 1960s (e.g.

Theocharis 1967; 1973), and have been assigned varying

degrees of validity (Kotsakis 2001; 2002; 2003; contra

Perls 2003). In the present paper, the issue is not the

evidence that supports the narrative of the Neolithic, nor

whether scattered immigrants, organized colonizers or

just people were wandering in south-eastern Europe

around the end of the eighth to the beginning of the

seventh millennium cal. BC, carrying with them

domesticates and ideas on how to produce distinct

material culture. Rather the issue is the construction of

research concepts, their context, their presumptions and

their biases, if any. On further analysis, the issue could

also be the social content of the processes in which these

scattered immigrants were engaged. My intention here,

it should be obvious by now, is to anatomize the concepts

that inform the discussion on the earliest Neolithic in

Greece and propose some alternative views.

To begin, we could attempt to identify common basicpoints which can be considered central to the traditional

argument. Setting up of a border comes first to mind.

Obviously the concept of the border is the flip-side of the

disassociation between Neolithic farmers and Mesolithic

hunter-gatherers, which as we have seen, is prominent in

the readings of the Greek Neolithic. In this case, however,

the border does not simply refer to an abstract conceptual

or cultural difference which possesses a metaphorical

significance, to be applied to any form of cross-border

cultural interaction, as Bohannan and Plog (1967)

suggest. Rather, it involves a predominantly strong and

concrete geographical aspect. Disassociation in thiscontext becomes virtual dislocation and, in this sense,

Aegean and Anatolian regions would stand apart: the

former acting as the recipient of the Neolithic, the latter

as the origin. The metaphoric border becomes a frontier,

similar to other colonizing frontiers, familiar in anthro-

pology and history, and deep-seated in European thought

(Turner 1994). On closer inspection, it becomes a

question of scale, within which archaeological investiga-

tion perceives the movement and relocation of people.

For example, how extensive should an area be before the

normal shift in habitation within it is considered

population movement, let alone migration or even

colonization? And how uniform, and in which terms,should this area be before the shift in habitation is

considered usual and the population stable?

A strong tradition of a frontier between Hellas and the

East has informed most of archaeology, well into the

twentieth century (especially classical archaeology).

Historically, this idea goes as far back as Herodotos, where

the definition of the Hellinikon was set against the

oriental Other; also it can be traced in the discussion of

orientalism and the perception of the Orient as a largely

negative element of European identity (Morris 2000).

Henry Frankforts 1926 Asia, Europe and the Aegean

and their earliest interrelations is an eloquent testimonyto the long tradition of this concept in Greek archaeology.

Needless to say, we can ascribe to the same, orientalist

notion the familiar concept of a bridge between the East

and Europe which was so frequent in Childes writings

and which, as pointed out by Ruth Tringham (2000), is

still popular among modern versions of diffusionism (for

example, the island hopping notion discussed by Perls

2001, 5863)

However, what is lacking in this recurring perception

of the frontier is the realization that there, in that zone,

strong social processes are taking place. In discussing

African political culture in relation to Turners notion of

a frontier zone, Kopytoff gives the following general

account for the social phenomena at work:


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sweeping like a tidal wave or a succession of waves across

a sub-continental or at least national landmass, such a tidal

frontier brings with it settler societies engaged in colonizing

an alien land from a base in a metropolitan societyBut in

most anthropological usages, the frontier is a geographical

region with sociological characteristics. In this volume,

we shall carry further this reduction in scale by making the

frontier encompass even more narrowly local phenomena.

The African frontier we focus on consists of politically open

areas nestling between organized societies but internal to

the larger regions in which they are found what might be

called an internal or interstitial frontier (Kopytoff 1987,

89).

It is clear from this excerpt that Kopytoff rejects a

linear notion of a single widespread frontier (a tidal

wave) in favour of a far more dynamic and socially

significant concept of many local frontiers where there is

a constant restructuring of bits and pieces human and

cultural of existing societies:For example the thesis sees the frontier as a natural force

for cultural transformation. In this regard, our analysis stands

Turners thesis on its head, for we suggest that the frontier

may also be a force for culture-historical continuity and

conservatism. The frontier perspective taken here is that of

the local frontier, lying at the fringes of the numerous

established African societies. It is on such frontiers that

most African polities have, so to speak, been constructed

out of the bits and pieces human and cultural of existing

societies. This posits a process in which incipient small

polities are produced by other similar and usually more

complex societies. This conception of political development

is entirely opposite to those evolutionary theories that seesmall polities as arising out of some hypothetical archaic

bands roaming over a hypothetical pre-historic landscape.

Whatever the virtue of such speculations about a pre-historic

in-the-beginning they have nothing to do with the formation

of real historic African societies (emphasis added; Kopytoff

1987, 3).

The wave-of-advance model (Ammerman and Biagi

2003) is probably the closest analogy to what Kopytoff

would call a tidal wave frontier, where hypothetical

immigrants are roaming over a hypothetical, empty,

prehistoric landscape. There is good reason to think that

the situation described by Kopytoff for Africa has more

points of theoretic contact with the Greek Neolithic than

the geographical and cultural distance would seem to

permit. Interestingly, this was also an idea of Theocharis,

expressed in 1967, almost twenty years before

Ammerman and Cavalli-Sforza stated their own model

for the beginning of the Neolithic in Greece (Ammerman

and Cavalli-Sforza 1984).

Diffusion of the Neolithic is an element that exists within

the Neolithic itself, mainly because it represents progress

and revolutionary progress at that and progress is

contagious. Less secure seems diffusion as a necessary

consequence of a sudden population increase. Increase,

and sizable at that, existed for sure, but we think that equallysizable was the potential for buffering The crucial point

however, is the way of diffusion: the theory of the single

centre or cradle forces us to assume a diffusion in the form

of concentric circles The relevant attempts, with maps of

the consecutive zones of diffusion failed completelyIt is

clear, therefore, that in order to represent persuasively the

rate of diffusion we have to considernot only geographical

criteria, i.e. the position of each place in relation to a

hypothetical centre. Above all, however, we have to consider

the amenability of each site or region, in other words the

natural or the constructed conditions for the early

acceptance and the successful transplanting of the idea of

the new economy It remains the issue of movement of

population and colonization. We will not challenge here

the role of migrations in prehistorybut population

movementsdo not leave to the miserable recipients any

active part in the cultural process (my translation from the

Greek text, emphasis added; Theocharis 1967, 689).

Clearly, from this excerpt, it is culture (the con-

structed conditions) as an independent phenomenon that

commands first and foremost Theocharis attention.Implicit here are anthropological, rather than culture-

historical arguments. The rejection of diffusionist models

rests on his unwillingness to consider any social activity

outside human culture;1 it does not put forward logistical

doubts about evidence or rates of demic diffusion and

episodes of domestication. Had Theocharis expressed

such factual concerns only, his argument would indeed

be part of the typical indigenist paradigm, as the wide-

spread opinion holds in the literature (e.g. Perls 2001;

Runnels 2003). Nevertheless, that opinion should be

revised, not only to do justice to Theocharis theoretical

thinking, but, more importantly, because it misses an

important dimension of the discussion. A closer look at

the previous quote reveals that the main issue focuses on

the centrality of culture, the active role of human agency,

and ultimately, we might add, its priority as a subject

matter of archaeology. The critical disagreement with

the diffusionists refers to their inherent predisposition to

decontextualize events as taking place in a domain that is

independent of culture and agency, as a linear function of

time and space. Many years after Theocharis, this

predisposition found its formal manifestation in the wave-

of-advance model, which, as a model (it should be pointed

out) has no explanatory value; in Ammermans own

words it does not tell us what happened in the past(Ammerman and Biagi 2003, 8). It should be categoric-

ally stated, that the disagreement with decontexualization

has nothing to do with movement of people as such. This

is the same underlying theme of the dynamic multiple

local frontiers that Kopytoff puts forward for Africa.

Taking the lead from Kopytoff, I maintain that rather

than replicating bipolar obsolete oppositions of the

indigenism versus diffusionism type, the discussion

should turn towards the multiplicity of culture and should

explore at greater depth the social and cultural conditions

of the earliest Neolithic in Greece. In other words,

transition to the Neolithic should be considered as

strongly culture-dependent (Kotsakis 2001; 2003).

Multiple local frontiers offer a better insight on the


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Kostas Kotsakis12

interaction active on the borders, not only between

hunters and farmers, but also, and perhaps more fre-

quently, among farmers of different social groups. Perls

has rightly observed that the material culture of the

earliest Neolithic is heterogeneous and selective when

compared to that of the Near East. However, if materialculture is not considered as evidence of cultural relations

or affiliations, but as elements of identity, the origin of

the material cultural expression is no longer the essential

aspect. Again, Kopytoff offers an interesting insight to

this process:

Rather, the frontier as an institutional vacuum was a place

where the frontiersmen could literally constructa desirable

social order. They came to the frontier not with a sociological

and political tabula rasa, to be shaped by its forests and

plains, but with a mental model of a good society Thus

the efforts to construct a new social order on the frontier

were, from the beginning, informed by an ideal model that

the frontiersman held perhaps vaguely but certainly

culturally The American frontier (the West) allowed

frontiersmen to apply the ideal model and produce a result

that was indeed purer, simpler, more nave and more faithful

to the model that one could possibly have in the East

(Kopytoff 1987, 13).

That simply means that there is an active social

dynamic in the borders that transforms cultural reality,

in ways that produce a purer, simpler and more nave

version of the original cultural template, whatever that

was. This is closely related to the defensive conservatism

of the moving groups, which stick to the ideal model

they carry from home. The social dynamic of the multiplefrontiers would account more convincingly for the

selective and heterogeneous similarities with Near

Eastern material culture, as would the idea that the

adventurous individuals carried only a part of their

technical and cultural heritage and that they were coming

from different original homelands, following different

pathways. Needless to say, that simpler and more nave

version had to be related to interaction with other

populations active on the frontier zone, each carrying its

own cultural template, regardless of their being

colonizers, indigenous, or transients. As Kopytoff points

out, new social groups are formed from bits and pieces,human and cultural, of existing societies.

This brings up the next central point that forms the

perception of break and discontinuity, namely the idea of

direction. Throughout the discussion on the Near Eastern

origins, there is a strong sense of direction, from east to

west, which is expressed quite clearly in the regular maps

that are included in the relevant publications. The

direction in these discussions, like the border we have

seen previously, is completely essentialised. All tem-

porality is suppressed, and what predominantly are the

historically contingent results of agency are perceived as

one decontextualized entity, within a framework of

stability. In reality, directions (like frontiers) can be many

and conflicting, and can reflect variable temporalities.

At times they can be stable, at other times shifting,

reversed or eclipsed. There should not be a single

privileged direction that could substitute the dynamic

cleavage of human agency.

As with the rigid border, however, the single direction

is meaningless, unless the entities involved are definableand self-contained. We return thus to the dichotomy

between farmers and foragers/hunter-gatherers that

persistently appears in the post-1960s discussion. In fact,

this dichotomy represents the third, and probably most

important and complex concept that supports the per-

ception of break and continuity. There is a vast anthro-

pological literature on hunter-gatherer societies and their

diacritical traits (so vast that it is impossible to reiterate

here; see Bettinger 1991; Ingold et al. 1988; Kelly 1995;

Myers 1988). Those who believe that hunter-gatherer

societies share common traits (despite the wide variability

observed ethnographically) stress their economic de-pendence on hunting, fishing and gathering and on

residential mobility (Kelly 1995, 11148; Zvelebil 1998).

Few doubts have been expressed in the literature on

the Neolithic of Greece about the differences between

that subsistence mode and agro-pastoral farmers. As we

have seen in the case of Greece, the earliest Neolithic

settlement was modelled on the successful sites dug in

Thessaly, where longevity and stability was strongly

suggested; the full package of domesticates and the

evidence of agriculture are often the main distinctive

traits for a group to be characterized as Neolithic (e.g.

Hansen 1991). However, to paraphrase Sigaut in his

discussion of the concepts of agriculture and hunting-gathering from their technological perspectives, we know

so little about the earliest Neolithic agriculture that using

it to define the Neolithic is a purely verbal exercise. Food-

producing activities need not be the privileged domain in

our understanding of the earliest Neolithic groups (Sigaut

1994, 443). For example, the use of skins and fleeces for

clothing was at least as important (probably more) as was

meat producing.

The same holds for mobility. Although we accept

mobility as an obvious condition for hunter-gatherers we

understand very poorly the possibility of logistical

mobility for segments of the farming groups, if not fortheir entireties. Again, assuming that we understand from

the start what Mesolithic mobility and Neolithic

sedentism are, we are trapped in false common-sense

assumptions. I would suggest therefore, that we should

abandon the still dominant Childean tradition that

conceptualizes these differing ways of life as pre-

dominantly economic subsistence categories. Instead, it

might be preferable to consider them as places for the

construction of collective and personal identities, of which

food producing could indeed be one dimension (Hastorf

1999) but not necessarily the only one. In this respect,

both foragers or hunter-gatherers and farmers (or

Mesolithic and Neolithic groups) are not constructed as

essentialist, dichotomous concepts and we avoid


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simplifying and objectifying the complexity and the social

dynamics of agency that are involved.

Conclusions

We are coming full circle to what we had identified as aplace of historically contingent agency. This is a dynamic

place of mutual exchange, where fluidity must have been

prevalent and where identities and accompanying

material culture expressions were constantly reform-

ulated. Instead of the usual picture drawn in Neolithic

studies depicting a Neolithic landscape winning over the

Mesolithic, this process might have happened in a fluid

landscape with multiple frontiers and conflicting

directions, in a constant process of creating hybrid

identities (Joseph and Fink 1999). The tensions created

would offer a better basis for understanding the selective

and heterogeneous cultural characteristics prevalent inthe earliest Neolithic of Greece, which we have already

discussed. Despite the conservative attitude prevalent in

the frontier zone, we should not understand the earliest

Neolithic as a pure and fixed allochthonous identity which

is confronted by the native Mesolithic identity of the

local hunter-gatherers. All actors in this drama were

equally immersed in dynamic fluidity.

It remains to be discussed where the actual place of

this fluidity might have been. It seems reasonable that

fluidity was less prevalent in the central, long-lived,

Neolithic sites, such as Argissa and Sesklo. The com-

plexity of their material culture and their overall spatial

arrangements indicate that they represent the end of a

long process rather than its beginning. In contrast to

these sites, small experimental sites, established in the

frontier during the earliest Neolithic, would be more

likely to preserve the traces of the fluidity I am proposing

here. These sites would be in areas outside the mainstream

Neolithic landscapes, occupying varying, even marginal,

environments, not necessarily those where successful

mounds subsequently evolved and normalised their

cultural idiom over 1000s of years. They would represent

the initial steps, predominantly as places of interaction

or nodes in extensive networks. On the basis of this

hypothesis, it has been proposed that the mountainousarea of Grevena (western Macedonia) would be one

possible region for the existence of these earliest

experimental sites (Kotsakis 2000, 177). Located on the

western edge of the Thessalian plain, Theopetra could be

a node in this extensive network (Kotsakis 2003;

Kyparissi-Apostolika 1994; 1999); the increasing number

of Mesolithic sites in Greece (Runnels 1995; Runnels

and van Andel 2003) shows that where specialised field

research is conducted, the interface zone in other parts of

the country is quickly populated.

In conclusion, the earliest Neolithic in Greece needs a

radical re-appraisal. To do that we need to revise

traditional models, the basic outlines of which were

formed in the 1960s. The indigenist versus diffusionist

dichotomy is also part of the 1960s way of reading the

Neolithic, or more generally culture, and it should be

abandoned also as merely an essentialized, objectifying

approach. We need to think outside dichotomous,

essentialist categories, and we need to approach the

historical contingency active in Greece at that time, in itsdetails, looking at real people, with real identities and

real lives.

Acknowledgements

Some of these ideas were formed while I was at Stanford

as visiting professor. I would like to thank Douglass

Bailey, with whom I shared both an office at Stanford

and our views on the Neolithic, as well as Ian Hodder,

Michael Shanks and Ian Morris for their intellectual

support. I would like also to thank Alasdair Whittle for

giving me the opportunity to participate in the Cardiffsymposium and present my views and Paul Halstead for

the ongoing and stimulating discussion on the Neolithic

of Greece. In particular, I need to thank Douglass Bailey

for his patience.

Note

1 Consider, for instance, also the following excerpt from

Theocharis (1967, 4):

The role of science and technology in archaeological research

must be recognized, but should not be overrated. Culture is a

human creation, not a creation of the environment, and in

prehistoric archaeology the concept of culture is dominant,roughly similar to the concept ofartin classical archaeology.

As long as this essential restriction applies, the principal role in

research will be held by the archaeologist who is responsible

for the study of the cultural manifestations of man It is

unfortunate that even today, for some cultures, we know

nothing more than pottery styles (my translation from the Greek

text).

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