6.

Plain talk: animals, environment and culture in

the Neolithic of the Carpathian Basin and adjacent
areas
Lszl Bartosiewicz
Introduction
Domestication is at the core of what V. Gordon Childe
termed the Neolithic Revolution (Childe 1936). Since
this revolution was neither instantaneous nor uniform,
domestication has formed a topic that is of equal interest
to archaeologists (Hodder 1990) and archaeozoologists
(Clutton-Brock 1989). In the twentieth century, archaeo-
zoological finds were routinely interpreted as index
fossils in palaeontology, i.e. indicators of the natural
environment. This introduced a degree of geographical
determinism in research that has often led to circular
reasoning. Archaeological animal remains were in-
fluenced by past human action. Environmental recon-
structions based on these finds are biased by this
anthropogenic noise (Bartosiewicz 2001). This primary
human effect, however, is culturally idiosyncratic; wild
animals were hunted selectively, domestic animals could
be herded far from their original habitats. Therefore, the
deposition of their bones in the form of food remains is
far from a proper representation of fauna of any sort.
The problem
In his early studies, Joachim Boessneck published
Neolithic assemblages from Greece that became para-
digmatic in the study of animal exploitation during the
European Neolithic. The pre-pottery and early Neolithic
layers at Argissa Magoula are characterised by sheep/
goat and a small contribution of wild animals (Boessneck
1962, 38).
1
Animal remains from Arapi Magoula and
Otzaki Magoula (Dimini culture) also show the over-
whelming dominance of sheep and the lesser significance
of cattle and pig (Boessneck 1956, 710).
During an early Neolithic climatic optimum, animal
husbandry expanded northwards from the Balkans. This
advance may be traced archaeologically, in particular
along its northern frontier, in the variants of the Starevo/
Krs/Cri culture in Yugoslavia, Hungary and Romania
respectively. Some archaeozoological assemblages are
similar to that of the pre-pottery Neolithic in Thessaly,
although hunting, fishing and gathering complemented
domestic animal resources to varying extents.
The people of the Krs culture brought along a
characteristically south-eastern composition of livestock
(Bknyi 1993, 3). Sheep/goat remains dominated over
those of cattle. Bones of pigs and dogs occurred only in
insignificant numbers. This type of animal keeping was
rather ill-suited to the Carpathian Basin. Stocks of its
most important species, sheep and goat, could not be
upgraded by local domestication in the absence of the
wild forms in the marshy environment. Moreover, as is
shown by several bones with arthritic deformations, sheep
of south-eastern origins were heavily stressed in this
humid and cool habitat (Fig. 6.1); Bknyi described a
number of such bones from Endrd 119, Hungary
(Bknyi 1992a, 231). Pig keeping would have been an
ideal way to exploit the marshy floodplain; pigs need a
lot of water, and the rhizomes found in reed beds are
among the most favoured staple for wild pigs (Farag
2002, 368).
Specialised aurochs hunting seems to have become
characteristic of the middle and late Neolithic in Hungary.
Settlements offer evidence not only of aurochs hunting
(Fig. 6.2) but also of bones from what Bknyi (1974,
26) interpreted as crosses between domestic and wild
cattle. Red deer lagged behind in terms of the number of
identifiable specimens (NISP), in spite of the inclusion of
antler fragments with deer bone in early publications.
The high contributions of cattle and pig in the early
Tripolye culture are comparable to those of the Tisza and
Herply cultures in Hungary. It was Hanar (1956, 67)
Lszl Bartosiewicz 52
who first considered Tripolye culture hunting a superior
form with its concentration on the mighty aurochs.
Many of these observations have become topoi that
are worth re-evaluating in light of the evidence of
Neolithic animal exploitation in the Carpathian Basin
and at a few sites of key importance in adjacent areas. In
the area discussed here, the aforementioned trends may
be clearly seen in the chronological distribution of
Neolithic animal remains. Data from 53 sites published
in the literature have been pooled by gross periods in
Table 6.1 (Bartosiewicz 1984a; 1994; Bartosiewicz et al.
1995; Bknyi 1959; 1964; 1969; 1974; 1981; 1984a;
1984b; 1985; 1987; 1988; 1992a; 1992b; Bknyi and
Bartosiewicz 1998; Clason 1980; Schwartz 1994; Vrs
1980; 1994; 1996; 1997). Bold face numbers in this table
mark categories of outstandingly high values.
As is seen in this table, the preponderance of sheep/
goat remains is indeed most characteristic in the early
Neolithic, when the remains of pig and large game occur
in numbers far smaller than expected. During the middle
Neolithic cattle and pig gain in importance and hunting
remains rather insignificant. By the late Neolithic,
however, a dramatic change takes place: the relative
contribution of sheep and goat is far less than expected
and large game hunting becomes extremely important.
These trends are significant in formal statistical terms
(c
2
=29,184.9, df=20, P0.000).
This change during the Neolithic has been known for
long, but considering that it took place within the largely
identical natural environment of the Carpathian Basin,
relatively little attention has been paid to its socio-cultural
background by archaeozoologists. The gross evaluation
of pooled sites also disregards subtle relationships
between animal species.
Figure 6.1 (left) Arthrotic deformation of the distal end of a sheep metapodium (Ecsegfalva 23).
Figure 6.2 (right) Aurochs atlas from PolgrCsszhalom with a stone projectile point embedded in the ventral arch
(after Bknyi 1975). Size unknown.
Table 6.1. The observed and expected NISP values of various animal taxa in the assemblages of 53 sites pooled by
Neolithic periods.
Species Early (21 sites) Middle (20 sites) Late (12 sites) Total
Observed Expected Observed Expected Observed Expected
cattle 10687 12215.8 3501 2050.4 13142 13063.7 27330
sheep/goat 25646 14858.3 1795 2494.0 5801 15889.7 33242
pig 518 3292.0 902 552.6 5945 3520.5 7365
dog 528 748.2 61 125.6 1085 800.2 1674
aurochs 1129 3759.5 422 631.0 6860 4020.5 8411
wild pig 986 2584.0 144 433.7 4651 2763.3 5781
red deer 2400 4436.2 207 744.6 7318 4744.2 9925
Total 41894 7032 44802 93728

Plain Talk: animals, environment and culture in the Neolithic of the Carpathian Basin 53
Relationships between animal species
Interspecific relationships between domesticates in
developing countries have shown the complementary
roles played by various animals in meat production
(Bartosiewicz 1984c, 200). A previous analysis of
Neolithic archaeozoological assemblages across Europe
has revealed a similar dichotomy between ancient
economies based on sheep/goat and pig keeping
respectively (Bartosiewicz 1990, 291, table 3). That study,
however, did not reckon with the complementary role of
wild animals in Neolithic meat provisioning. The Number
of Identified Specimens (NISP) for mammals in the 53
individual archaeozoological assemblages under dis-
cussion here have been subjected to a factor analysis in
order to outline interspecific relationships and their
impact on major types of Neolithic animal exploitation.
Decimal logarithms of the data were used in order to
reduce the heteroscedasticity of data resulting from
broadly varying assemblage sizes. Factor loadings
(homogenized using Varimax rotation) are summarised
in Table 6.2.
The two factors with latent roots greater than 1.0
represent hunting and animal keeping. They en-
compass 64.7% of total variance; i.e. these combinations
of animal species rather reliably reflect the overall picture
of Neolithic animal exploitation at the 53 settlements.
While there remains unanswered the question of whether
the sharp wild/domestic dichotomy was of decisive
importance in Neolithic thinking, these patterns certainly
define our modern interpretations of prehistoric sub-
sistence on the basis of animal remains. According to the
mathematical interpretation, factors represent indepen-
dent dimensions of the same phenomenon (i.e. hunting
and animal keeping are, in principle, non-correlated).
Although the inclusion of antler in NISP in earlier
publications may result in the overrepresentation of
Cervids, remains of large game form an evident complex
owing to their co-occurrence at many sites. The presence
of wild pig and beaver, especially, are indicative of
forested floodplain habitats.
The only domestic animal strongly associated with
this factor is dog which has had a special status among
domesticates. At Mesolithic sites such as Lepenski Vir
and Vlasac in the Iron Gates (Bknyi 1969; 1975),
domestic dog, the only domesticate, complemented diets
procured by hunting and fishing. This role, however,
seems to have persisted in prehistoric hunting
communities long after the occurrence of other, meat-
purpose domesticates. For example, in the late Neolithic
Fatyanovo culture of the Volga/Oka region (Central
Russia, third-mid-second millennium cal. BC), hunting
played a significant role and dog bones were the most
frequent among domestic animal remains (Bader 1937,
23). The relative contribution of disarticulated dog bones
was also important in the Horgen and Lscherz culture
Table 6.2. Factor loadings showing the relationship between animal species at 53 Neolithic settlements.
Species Factor 1 Factor 2
Hunting Animal keeping
red deer (Cervus elaphus L. 1758) 0.903 0.183
wild pig (Sus scrofa L. 1758) 0.880 0.232
dog (Canis familiaris L. 1758) 0.850 0.289
aurochs (Bos primigenius Bojanus 1827) 0.774 0.336
roe deer (Capreolus capreolus L. 1758) 0.773 0.427
beaver (Castor fiber L. 1758) 0.594 -0.283
brown bear (Ursus arctos L. 1758) 0.581 -0.049
domestic pig (Sus domesticus Erxl. 1777) 0.493 0.381
domestic cattle (Bos taurus L. 1758) 0.513 0.646
sheep/goat (Caprinae Gray 1852) 0.113 0.866
brown hare (Lepus europaeus Pallas 1778) 0.311 0.837
wild ass (Asinus hydruntinus Regalia 1907) 0.192 0.685
small carnivores (Carnivora) 0.488 0.532
Latent root 5.091 3.314
Variance explained, % 39.2 25.5

Lszl Bartosiewicz 54
components at the settlement of St. Blaise Bains des
Dames in Western Switzerland (Bartosiewicz 1994, 63,
figure 1). One interpretation may be that dog remained
an important supplement to the diet in economies
dependent on precarious hunters luck. The complex
cognitive role of dogs was illustrated by Whittle (2003,
79) quoting ethnographic parallels. In the Hungarian late
Neolithic the burial of mask-like dog viscerocrania at
the Lengyel culture site of MrgyTzkdomb
(Bartosiewicz 1994, 65, figure 2) supports the diversity
of roles dogs must have played there. While it seems
likely that dogs served as hunting companions, their role
in herding is more difficult to appraise. The scarcity of
dog bones at Krs culture sites only shows that dog
meat did not consistently form part of the diet.
In Table 6.2, factor loadings of cattle connect the two
extreme forms of animal exploitation. Beef seems to have
been a staple in both basic types of economy. Pig is also
generally present, but as such has little diagnostic value
in characterising types of animal exploitation. Of the
wild animals, ubiquitous small carnivores may have been
exploited for pelt or persecuted as vermin regardless of
the type of animal exploitation.
The high factor loading for sheep/goat defines the
second factor, animal keeping. This shows the impact of
early Neolithic Krs and middle Neolithic Zseliz
assemblages in the data set. Most remarkably, sheep and
goat are followed by brown hare and wild ass, associated
with open grassland habitats. This may be indicative of
the environmental factor in sheep herding in different
ways: chronological (the early Neolithic climatic
optimum favoured these game species and they were
easily exploited even by opportunistic hunting); and
cultural (sheep and goat herders occupied drier, grassland
habitats on levees and banks in a mosaic-like environment
that these wild animals also preferred).
The distribution of animal species in the plane defined
by the two factors is shown in Figure 6.3. Aside from the
wild/domestic dichotomy, natural environment as a
background variable may also be recognised in this graph.
Hunting must have been associated with forested habitats,
while open, dry grassland was better suited for the
keeping of domestic ruminants.
Chronological interpretations
Large game of the forest and domestic ruminants form
two characteristic groups whose alternative exploitation
may be used in characterising Neolithic economies.
Sheep/goat keeping reached south-eastern Europe from
south-west Asia, home to the wild ancestors of sheep and
goat, in the seventh millennium cal. BC. In Thessaly,
domesticates introduced from south-west Asia thrived in
dry habitats closely resembling their native regions.
Neolithic assemblages from both areas tend to be
characterised by the overwhelming dominance of sheep/
goat remains (Bknyi 1993, 7). Wild animal remains
occur in small numbers. The earliest Krs culture sites
have recently been dated to c.62006000 cal. BC in the
area under discussion here (Whittle et al. 2002, 107
117). One of the archaeological questions is, to what
extent did the spread of this culture result from
colonisation or indigeneous acculturation (Whittle et al.
2002, 93). Attitudes to animals may be of help in at least
partially answering this question.
When factor scores representing individual sites
calculated from the factor loadings of Table 6.2 are plotted
against each other, a clear pattern emerges (Fig. 6.4).
Krs culture assemblages fall into the upper section of
the graph (grassland animals), while their late Neolithic
counterparts form a near-horizontal cluster with some
middle Neolithic sites in the lower portion (floodplain
-0.5
0.0
0.5
l.0
0.0 0.5 l.0
Hunting
A
n
i
m
a
l

k
e
e
p
i
n
g
Domestic
Large game
Other wild
8ear
8eaver
GPASSLAND
POPLST Cattle
Pig
Figure 6.3. Relationships between animal species as expressed by factor loadings.
Plain Talk: animals, environment and culture in the Neolithic of the Carpathian Basin 55
forest). Outliers on the far right of the graph represent
early Neolithic settlements with considerable amounts of
wild animal remains.
On the basis of only 202 (!) identifiable mammalian
bones from the settlement of Maroslele-Pana, Bknyi
(1964, 88) made an early attempt to outline animal
exploitation in the Krs culture. His hypothesis was that
Krs culture animal husbandry had been a variant of
Thessalian animal keeping under different geographic
conditions (Bknyi 1974, 56), ill-adapted to the marshy
habitats of the Great Hungarian Plain. Maroslele-Pana,
however, turns out to have been a small and relatively
atypical site, located in the lower left cluster of data points
in Figure 6.4. The 19631965 excavations at Rszke-
Ludvr were the first to have yielded a rich Krs culture
archaeozoological assemblage (Bknyi 1974, 396).
Partially excavated sites of the corresponding Cri culture
(Necrasov 1961, 26572; 1964, 16781; Necrasov and
Haimovici 1959, 563) were also studied in Romania.
Large assemblages from the settlements of Gylart
(Bknyi 1974, 364) and ultimately from Endrd 119
(Bknyi 1992a, 273) reconfirmed Bknyis hypotheses
and also verified Necrasovs (1964, 167) observations.
Characteristic Krs culture assemblages (Endrd 119,
Ludas-Budzsk, Nosza-Gyngypart and Ecsegfalva 23)
are clearly visible in the upper, grassland section of
Figure 6.4. Two early Neolithic assemblages of the related
Starevo culture, Padina and Lepenski Vir, occur in the
lower right half of the graph, indicative of the forested
alluvial environment of the Iron Gates Gorge, in which
hunting was of great importance. Meanwhile, a single
late Neolithic data point in the top section of Figure 6.4
represents late Neolithic layers at Karanovo (Bulgaria;
Bknyi and Bartosiewicz 1998), fitting within the same
pattern as typical Krs culture sites in Hungary; that
environment was ideal for the keeping of sheep and goat
and represents the regional continuity of this tradition in
our study. The remains of relatively small domestic cattle
occur in early Neolithic Krs culture assemblages in the
Carpathian Basin dated to the sixth millennium cal. BC
(Bknyi 1974, 26) as well as in Bandkeramik assem-
blages in Germany by the fifth millennium cal. BC
(Mller 1963, 1).
Large Krs culture assemblages in Hungary are also
similar to that of an early Neolithic Hamangia culture
settlement in Romania. At the site of Techirghiol on the
Black Sea Coast 89.5 % of the remains originated from
domesticates, cattle and sheep/goat made up almost 95%
of the domestic animal remains, the contribution of pig
bones was negligible (Necrasov and Haimovici 1962,
177). The fact that wild ass was the most commonly
exploited game at that site is indicative of a dry grassland
environment. At Krs culture settlements on the edge of
the marshland in the Great Hungarian Plain, the remains
of wild animals with a preference for less humid habitats,
such as aurochs and wild ass, were also somewhat better
represented. Bknyi (1974, 21) even considered the
bones of the latter to be the index fossil in the presumably
Krs culture contamination, at the middle Neolithic
Tisza culture settlement of Leb as well (Bknyi 1958,
61). The combination of wild ass, brown hare and sheep
and goat suggests that even limited Krs culture hunting
concentrated on grassland species. It may be presumed,
however, that the natural fauna of the Great Hungarian
Plain was more or less the same in the early and later
Neolithic. The extinction of wild ass seems to be one of
the few tangible differences between the beginning and
the end of the Neolithic. This species does not occur at
any of the later sites.
Milking was already known during the Krs culture
-3.0
-2.0
-l.0
0.0
l.0
2.0
3.0
4.0
-2.0 -l.0 0.0 l.0 2.0 3.0
Hunting
A
n
i
m
a
l

k
e
e
p
i
n
g
Larly
Middle
Late
Figure 6.4. The distribution of Neolithic settlements in the plane defined by the two factors.The main division between
early and late sites is indicated by a dashed line.
Lszl Bartosiewicz 56
Figure 6.5
1. oldal
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N
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Tell
Horizontal
as is shown by Bovid milk remains on sherds from the
site of Ecsegfalva 23 in Hungary (Craig et al. in prep).
Unfortunately, at this stage of research species iden-
tification is not yet available. It may be hypothesised,
however, that goats were probably more approachable for
this purpose than cattle. Iconographic evidence from the
temple of Nin-Hursag in Tell el-Obed, Iraq (after 2400
BC: Bknyi 1974, 27; 1994, 22, Abb. 1) and Knossos
(ca. 1500 BC: Bknyi 1974, 119, fig. 13) shows that
cows were being milked from the rear, as is usual with
caprines. From these pictures one may infer that cow
milking was modelled after that of small ruminants (i.e.
early Neolithic traces of milk may be associated with
greater probability with sheep or goat).
With the exception of deer antler, correlations between
the taxonomic composition of bones from the food refuse
and worked specimens are low (Choyke 1984): bone tool
manufacturing tends to utilise selected raw materials,
and the aspects of selection are characteristic for each
culture. The dominance of sheep/goat bones in early
Neolithic assemblages is also reflected in the artefact
inventory. Aside from many ad hoc tools, there is a
special Krs type of point with a distinctive looking flat
handle, made on the distal end of the sheep/goat
metapodium, using the so-called groove and split
technique.
Of the middle Neolithic groups defined by ceramic
styles, two have provided suitably large assemblages: the
Zseliz group of the Linear Pottery culture and the Tisza
culture in the early-mid fifth millennium cal. BC (Kalicz
and Raczky 1987, 28). In contrast with the early
Neolithic, when sheep/goat conquered eastern-central
Europe, cattle were by far the best represented domestic
animals in both of these cultures. In the Tisza culture,
pigs were next, followed by sheep/goat and dogs. At
Zseliz group settlements, however, sheep and goat always
preceded pigs and dogs in terms of NISP. Tisza culture
animal keeping thus seems better adjusted to the
environmental conditions of the Great Hungarian Plain,
as based on domesticates whose wild forms (aurochs,
wild pig as well as wolf) lived locally and were thus
readily available to early herders. While the upgrading of
domestic cattle stock using aurochs bulls cannot be
reconstructed, possible crossings with wild pig may have
been sought on purpose to produce more vital offspring.
Even today, wild pigs are attracted by crops in cultivated
zones separating settlements and woodland where they
may interbreed with domestic sows (Dorner 1925, 30).
Similar to the early Neolithic Krs culture, the high
relative frequency of sheep/goat bones at sites of the Zseliz
group may be interpreted as a somewhat exotic feature.
However, these sites were not located in the marshland of
the Great Hungarian Plain but in drier areas of north-
central Hungary (e.g. BksmegyerVrs Csillag Tsz,
Neszmly-Tekeres patak, Pilismart-Szobi rv).
Whereas during the Tisza culture period hunting
increased in significance (with a ratio close to 1:1 between
domesticates to wild animals), the situation was
remarkably different at settlements of the Zseliz group,
dominated by the remains of domesticates (c. 9:1). This
difference between sites may be recognised in Figure 6.4,
as the two types of middle Neolithic sites fall on either
Figure 6.5. The distribution of wild and domestic animal remains at the two sections of the Polgr-Csszhalom
settlement (after Schwartz 2002, 854).
Plain Talk: animals, environment and culture in the Neolithic of the Carpathian Basin 57
Figure 6.6. Probability distribution plots of the overall radiocarbon dates measured at four tell settlements in the
Great Hungarian Plain. The chronological overlap is marked by shading.
side of the dashed line marking the overall division
between the early and late Neolithic types of animal
exploitation. Zseliz group sites tend to cluster with the
Krs culture, while Tisza culture settlements form a
trend with late Neolithic sites below the line in Figure
6.4. The compositions of assemblages from the Zseliz
group in Hungary are also similar to those of the Linear
Pottery culture in central Germany (Mller 1964, 61).
Notably, horse remains are absent from both middle
Neolithic groups in Hungary.
While Bknyi (1974, 27) raised the possibility of
using draught cattle in tillage during the middle
Neolithic, primary osteological evidence in the form of
deformed foot bones (Bartosiewicz et al. 1997) and hips
of overworked animals is rare and inconsistent, even in
later prehistoric periods in comparison with the Roman
period or the Middle Ages which are characterised by
intensive agricultural production (Bartosiewicz in press
a).
It may be hypothesised that by the late Neolithic,
especially in the Herply culture, animal keeping was
better established in absolute terms than it had been in
the preceding Tisza culture. Recent excavations at
PolgrCsszhalom offered a unique opportunity to
compare animal bones from the tell and from the adjacent,
horizontal rural settlement (Schwartz 2002, 853, table
2). Over half of the animal remains in the tell originated
from wild animals, while domestic animal bones
dominated in the horizontal settlement (Fig. 6.5). This
shows that animal husbandry played an important role in
everyday meat provisioning. However, the relative
contribution of domestic animal remains decreased in
comparison to those of large game. PolgrCsszhalom
and BerettyjfaluHerply represent extreme forms of
this trend along the right hand edge of Figure 6.4,
together with the two aforementioned early Neolithic sites
from the Iron Gates gorge.
Between c. 55004000 cal. BC (Hertelendi et al. 1995,
242, table 1; 1998) a late Neolithic domestication fever
seems to have swept across the largely coeval tell
settlements in the Great Hungarian Plain (Bknyi 1962).
This hypothesis was based on an unusually high incidence
of aurochs remains at four of these complex, largely
contemporary sites, which are located within an area
measuring about 150km across (Fig. 6.6).
On the basis of medium size bovine bones it has been
hypothesised that such specimens were the evidence of
local domestication. Subsequent studies, however, showed
that regional size differences in populations identified a
priori as aurochs in south-eastern Europe (Bknyi and
Bartosiewicz 1987, 164) were blurred by great variability
among animals identified as domestic cattle. Sexual
dimorphism evidently complicates the picture
(Bartosiewicz 1984c; 1987) and may provide partial
explanation for the size overlap originally interpreted as
crosses between the wild and domestic forms. Once
human interference (domestication and possibly cas-
tration) enters the picture, clear-cut sexual dimorphism
in size (e.g. Bartosiewicz 1986) turns into yet another
formidable puzzle.
The immense cultural importance of wild animals at
late Neolithic settlements is supported by the evidence of
Lszl Bartosiewicz 58
food remains and trophies, such as boar tusks placed in
burials. The zoological study of bone jewellery from
PolgrCsszhalom revealed that, in addition to real red
deer canines, bone copies of the same tooth have been
strung in great numbers on necklaces. Such imitations
were found mostly in womens graves (Fig. 6.7), while
an elderly woman of high status was ornamented with
real deer canines, usually worn by men (Choyke 2001,
254). Imitation not only shows that real deer canines
were valued trophies, but also that not everyone had equal
access to them. Combinations of real and imitation deer
canine beads are also known from the middle Neolithic
cemetery of Trebur, Germany (Spatz 1999, 422).
In general, at the tell settlements of the Herply
culture, cattle took the lead with pigs second and sheep/
goat and dogs lagging far behind. This type of animal
keeping is strongly reminiscent of that of the Tisza culture
and had apparently originated from it, a hypothesis also
supported by archaeological data (Bognr-Kutzin 1963,
510).
The late Neolithic Tiszapolgr and Lengyel cultures
already represent a transition to the first period of the
Copper Age. Animal keeping and hunting in the Lengyel
culture survived from the late Neolithic and was strongly
late Neolithic in its character, reminiscent of the previous
Tisza and Herply cultures. Domestic animals slightly
dominate. Cattle remains were by far the most frequent,
followed by the bones of pigs. Remains of sheep/goat and
dogs were found in only small numbers. The remains of
aurochs and red deer occurred in comparable numbers.
The contribution of aurochs was still high, as was the
case in the Tisza culture. Five Lengyel culture assem-
blages form a small, distinct cluster among the late
Neolithic sites in the right side half of the graph in Figure
6.4. According to Bknyi (1974, 50), specialised aurochs
hunting during the Hungarian Neolithic gave rise to the
local domestication of cattle in the Linear Pottery as well
as Tripolye, Tisza, Herply, Lengyel cultures. Ambros
(1961, 92) considered aurochs hunting a characteristic
feature of the late Neolithic in Slovakia, and this large
game maintained its significance at Lengyel culture sites
there as well.
Assemblage size and sampling bias
On the basis of his early studies, Bknyi posited that
animal keeping and hunting were of similar importance
in Krs culture economies. His observation was that at
some settlements animal keeping had dominated while at
others hunting had. Krs culture assemblages in the
latter group, however, tend to be small. This means that
wild animals would be over-represented in relative terms
even by only a few bones. Mammalian bones from 17
Krs culture sites show a high and statistically sig-
nificant (R=0.620; P0.032) Spearman rank correlation
between NISP and the percentage contribution of
domesticates (Bartosiewicz in press b). The importance
of hunting is represented by rather small assemblages,
while convincingly large samples all show the
overwhelming dominance of sheep/goat remains. By
contrast, the evidence for hunting is much more
convincing in the case of middle and especially late
Neolithic settlements.
The number of animal species identifiable in an
assemblage is also a function of NISP. The average
number of identifiable specimens was 2097 in early (21
sites), 671 in middle (20 sites) and 2760 in late Neolithic
(12 sites) assemblages. The average number of species
was 12 in the early materials and 11 each in the middle
and late Neolithic periods. Of these, five originated from
domesticates (cattle, sheep, goat, pig and dog) that were
present at almost all sites. The remaining species are all
wild animals, possibly represented by only a few frag-
ments, best seen in unusually large assemblages.
The number of animal species identified at any site
depends on assemblage size (Grayson 1984, 137).
Increasing the number of bones identified, however, is
followed by the discovery of new taxa in a degressive
manner. When decimal logarithms of the number of
species identified are plotted against the number of
identifiable specimens in all assemblages (Fig. 6.8), the
largely linear trend may be expressed by the regression
equations shown in Table 6.3.
Figure 6.7. Imitation red deer canine necklace from a
womans grave in PolgrCsszhalom (after Choyke
2001).
Plain Talk: animals, environment and culture in the Neolithic of the Carpathian Basin 59
Period Number of Regression Integration Correlation Level of
sites coefficient probability
Early 21 0.147 0.658 r = 0.639 P 0.010
Middle 20 0.092 0.756 r = 0.558 P 0.010
Late 12 0.153 0.614 r = 0.903 P 0.000

Coefficients of correlation show a moderate but
substantial relationship between the two variables in the
early and middle Neolithic samples. A very high linear
correlation was found in the case of the small, late
Neolithic sample.
These 0.0920.149 coefficients of regression are
smaller than those observed at rural settlements of Roman
Period Sarmatian (b=0.199) and of early Medieval
Hungarian ones (b=0.217) (Bartosiewicz 2003, 115, table
6), not to mention of urban settlements in both Roman
period Pannonia (b=0.257, Bartosiewicz 19901991, 109)
and Medieval (1116th C) towns (b=0.335, Bartosiewicz
1995, 21), where even small, but concentrated assem-
blages contained a rich variety of species. In the Neolithic
settlements analysed in this study, the great variety of
species results from the contribution of large assemblages
in the early and late Neolithic periods. The high,
statistically significant correlation (r=0.903) obtained for
late Neolithic sites shows that increasing assemblage size
is more consistently related to taxonomic richness than
in the other two Neolithic periods.
The practical significance of these calculations may
be best appraised in the case of Krs culture animal
remains from Transylvania and western Moldova
(Romania; Necrasov 1961, 268). Domesticates dominated
in five small assemblages (i.e. 49300 bones). The
contribution of wild animals sometimes reached 50%.
Results of the Spearman rank correlation between
assemblage sizes and the percentage contribution of
domesticates show that these sites do not represent animal
keeping and hunting as reliably as would have been
suggested thirty years ago by the interpretation of Bknyi
(1974, 56). Moreover, the observation that the presence
of wild animal remains (mostly red deer and wild pig),
was not as varied as at contemporary settlements in
Hungary should also be treated carefully in light of the
linear regression analyses summarised in Table 6.3.
While Bknyi (1974, 56) attributed this difference to
the geographic milieu, it is also clearly biased by the
small size of these samples.
Concluding remarks
When the percentage of bones from locally domesticable
animals (i.e. cattle and pig) are combined and compared
to those of sheep/goat, an almost complete inversion in
Table 6.3. Parameters of the linear regression equations showing the relationship between the decimal logarithms of
assemblage size and taxonomic richness.
Figure 6.8. The relationship between taxonomic richness and sample size.
<
<
<
Lszl Bartosiewicz 60
proportions may be observed through time (Fig. 6.9).
The heterogeneous middle Neolithic, also represented by
relatively small assemblages appears to be transitional
between these two extremes. It is worth pointing out,
however, that extremes shown in this simple graph were
present within a largely identical natural environment. It
is also questionable, whether any climatic change would
have been dramatic enough to justify such a major shift
in animal exploitation. The rich natural fauna reflected
in late Neolithic assemblages was certainly available to
people of the Krs culture, whose small communities
inhabited a much less densely populated plain. Even the
size of aurochs horns did not decline between the
Mesolithic and late Neolithic in the region (Bartosiewicz
1999, 104, table 1).
It has been widely hypothesised that environment had
a major impact on the life of Krs culture settlements,
as manifested in the exploitation of wild animals
(Bknyi 1974, 21; 1989, 15). Fowling (Jnossy 1985)
and fishing were evidently important (Takcs 1992).
Evidence for gathering mussels, snails and eggs is
similarly available at these sites. These remains clearly
illustrate the diversity of animal resources exploited by
people of the Krs culture, though they are difficult to
compare to the subsistence practices of later Neolithic
periods. Owing to their smaller sizes, middle Neolithic
assemblages are less likely to reflect the same taxonomic
richness in bird and fish remains. These latter vertebrate
classes are also underrepresented in the material from
better known late Neolithic settlements. Late Neolithic
bird bones have not been studied as consistently as in the
Krs culture, and fish remains at most sites have been
recovered by hand. The lack of sieved assemblages from
most sites makes the in-depth study of aquatic animal
resources near-illusory.
In light of the relative intensity of late Neolithic
hunting, one may wonder why aurochs and (especially)
red deer are so underrepresented in large early Neolithic
assemblages. A critical evaluation of Krs culture
animal remains in terms of sample size has shown that
the proportion of wild animal remains tends to be
overstated in small assemblages. In the face of mounting
difficulties of sheep herding in a marshy environment,
Krs culture shepherds stuck to what seems to be their
own, traditional form of animal keeping in the Carpathian
Basin. The fact that not even shed antler working seems
to be part of the Krs culture tradition in Hungary (Alice
Choyke pers. comm.) shows that these people were
specialised in sheep and goat, with apparently little
interest or skill in exploiting alternative animal resources
in the Carpathian Basin. The heavy emphasis on the
exploitation of sheep and the relative disregard for the
local wild fauna (limited to complementary, possibly
opportunistic hunting) may show that sheep and goat, in
fact, arrived with pastoral communities to the Carpathian
Basin who tried to stick to their traditional stock as long
as possible, in the face of an environment that was less
than ideal for sheep and goat keeping. Meanwhile large
game, abundant in the broader environment, was
evidently of secondary interest to Krs culture herders
who stuck to their pastoral tradition.
Contrary to the Marxist interpretation that would lay
emphasis on domestic animals as a means of production
superior to game, the intensive exploitation of wild
animals is associated with multi-layer settlements of the
late Neolithic. Settlement structure reflects a complex
social organisation. Meanwhile, far less differentiated,
early Neolithic Krs culture settlements were in the
forefront of almost monocultural sheep/goat keeping.
These looked like small, mobile communities that
Figure 6.9. The contribution of sheep/goat, local domesticates and large game by periods.
Lszl Bartosiewicz 60
Plain Talk: animals, environment and culture in the Neolithic of the Carpathian Basin 61
possibly preferred drier grassland habitats within the
marshy environment. Their insistence of sheep keeping,
complemented by other domesticates and small-scale
hunting gives the impression that these people were new
arrivals themselves. To them, the otherwise rich, mosaic-
like ecotone at the edge of the Great Hungarian Plain was
a marginal zone in a cognitive sense, where their
traditional pastoral way of life came under pressure.
The spectacular increase in the exploitation of large
game during the late Neolithic seems to have over-
shadowed the importance of animal keeping in the
archaeozoological record. In late Neolithic economies,
animal keeping may be called firmly established as a
provider of resources for the population (Vrs 1987,
28). In and of itself, the deterioration of climate cannot
explain a sudden interest in hunting.
These two extremes reflect two culturally different
attitudes to animals and the wild in general. Newly
arrived Krs culture settlers were probably eager to
protect their original domestic stock (in what they must
have perceived as a hostile, new environment), while late
Neolithic communities must have perceived the environ-
ment as a special challenge that had to be tackled every
day.
Acknowledgements
The English text was revised by Alice M. Choyke. The
author is supported by Grant OYKA T047228.
Note
1 See the discussion on the role of Argissa in setting the
agenda for Greek Neolithic studies in Kotsakis (this
volume).
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