SCALES OF TRANSFORMATION – TRANSFORMATION PROCESSES IN THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL RECORD
Channel: European Association of Archaeologists
Date: 2020-10-29

Transformations are reflected in changes that lead to a substantial reorganization of socio-ecological relationships and occur within different temporal and spatial scales. A transformation is connected with the introduction of new social, cultural and/or material attributes and values that change the existing socio-ecological interaction. These changes can be attributed to both social and environmental factors. In the archaeological and environmental record, we can identify changes in different domains of society and the environment, if the transformation had a certain endurance while building a new status quo. In a transect of Bronze Age sites from northern Germany to Greater Poland, we can detect different time stages and different reflections of transformations. While the early Bronze Age settlement “Bruszczewo” in Greater Poland and simultaneous settlements in the Brandenburg Havel region experienced a collapse around 1600 B. C., at the same time in Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania local continuities up to the pre-Roman Iron Age were evident. In contrast, another drastic phase of transformation around 1200 BC was evident in all regions: the material culture was modified and the practice of burial rites changed from inhumation to cremation. For the study of such changes or turning points as well as collapses within subregions, local processes of change and transformation with regard to social, economic, ecological, cultural and ideological aspects, which are reflected in the material culture and require the socio-ecological interaction, must be identified and compared. Furthermore, regional and supraregional triggers of transformation processes will be evaluated. For this purpose, it is important to observe how far-reaching transformations affect society. Does a society, for example, reorganise itself in its entirety or are only parts of it transformed? In addition, the question arises as to how quickly transformations have taken place.


Author(s): Kneisel, Jutta - Schaefer, Stefanie (Institute of Pre- and Protohistoric Archaeology Univesity Kiel; SFB 1266 Transormation
Dimensons)