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Cultural Response to Environmental Change in the Alpine Lacustrine Regions: The Displacement Model
Author(s) -
Menotti Francesco
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
oxford journal of archaeology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.382
H-Index - 31
eISSN - 1468-0092
pISSN - 0262-5253
DOI - 10.1046/j.1468-0092.2003.00194.x
Subject(s) - pottery , archaeology , shore , human settlement , period (music) , settlement (finance) , bronze age , geography , prehistory , geology , history , art , oceanography , world wide web , computer science , payment , aesthetics
Summary. Following an abrupt change in climatic conditions, the Middle Bronze Age northern Alpine lake‐dwellers were forced to abandon their settlements. As a result, the archaeological record shows a gap of occupation from the end of the sixteenth century to the beginning of the twelfth century BC. Where did those groups go during that period? Recent studies show that some Middle Bronze Age sites hitherto regarded as traditional dry‐land dwellings might represent constructions by former lacustrine people. Typological analyses of pottery assemblages and house structure remains found on these sites have made it possible to trace them back to an origin in the lacustrine tradition. The MBA lake‐dwelling occupational hiatus could finally be bridged and the process of cultural continuity reconstructed. The MBA lake‐dwellers certainly did not disappear; they just temporarily adapted to a drier environment until the lake shores became ‘safe’ again for re‐settlement.