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Vinča-Belo Brdo ( sr, Винча-Бело брдо) is an
archaeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology an ...
in Vinča, a suburb of
Belgrade Belgrade ( , ;, ; names in other languages) is the capital and largest city in Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and the crossroads of the Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula. Nearly 1,166,763 mi ...
,
Serbia Serbia (, ; Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia ( Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin and the Balkans. It shares land borders with Hu ...
. The tell of Belo Brdo ('White Hill') is almost entirely made up of the remains of human settlement, and was occupied several times from the Early
Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several pa ...
(c. 5700 BCE) through to the
Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...
. The most substantial archaeological deposits are from the Neolithic-
Chalcolithic The Copper Age, also called the Chalcolithic (; from grc-gre, χαλκός ''khalkós'', "copper" and  ''líthos'', "Rock (geology), stone") or (A)eneolithic (from Latin ''wikt:aeneus, aeneus'' "of copper"), is an list of archaeologi ...
Vinča culture, of which Vinča-Belo Brdo is the
type site In archaeology, a type site is the site used to define a particular archaeological culture or other typological unit, which is often named after it. For example, discoveries at La Tène and Hallstatt led scholars to divide the European Iron A ...
.


Geography

Vinča is situated on the right bank of the
Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , pa ...
, 14 km downstream from
Belgrade Belgrade ( , ;, ; names in other languages) is the capital and largest city in Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and the crossroads of the Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula. Nearly 1,166,763 mi ...
, on a high
loess Loess (, ; from german: Löss ) is a clastic, predominantly silt-sized sediment that is formed by the accumulation of wind-blown dust. Ten percent of Earth's land area is covered by loess or similar deposits. Loess is a periglacial or aeoli ...
terrace. This location was attractive to its Neolithic settlers: the Danube on one side provided water and fishing while on the other the valley of the river
Bolečica The Bolečica ( Serbian Cyrillic: Болечица) is a short river in north-central Serbia, a 12 km-long right tributary to the Danube. During its entire flow it runs through the suburban section of Belgrade and despite being short it flow ...
connected it to a hinterland rich in minerals, ores, hunting grounds and fertile agricultural soils. Belo Brdo is one of the largest tell sites in the Balkans, covering 10
hectares The hectare (; SI symbol: ha) is a non-SI metric unit of area equal to a square with 100- metre sides (1 hm2), or 10,000 m2, and is primarily used in the measurement of land. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometre. An acre is ...
of land with 9 metres of cultural deposits and a total height of 10.5 metres...


Excavations

The first
archaeological excavations In archaeology, excavation is the exposure, processing and recording of archaeological remains. An excavation site or "dig" is the area being studied. These locations range from one to several areas at a time during a project and can be condu ...
at Vinča were carried out by prominent Serbian archaeologist
Miloje Vasić Miloje Vasić ( sr-Cyrl, Милоје Васић; 16 September 1869 – 4 November 1956) was a Serbian archaeologist, regarded as one of the most distinguished representatives of the humanistic studies in Serbia.Inscription below his picture in ...
starting in 1908. These were interrupted by the outbreak of
World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
and, apart from a brief season in 1924, Vasić was unable to obtain the necessary funding to continue working on the site from the impoverished postwar Yugoslav government. However, with the financial backing of British businessman and archaeologist Sir Charles Hyde, Vasić was able to resume excavations, on a much larger scale, between 1929 and 1931. These piqued the interest of the British press and the site was subsequently visited by several prominent intellectuals of the time, including Hyde,
John Myres Sir John Linton Myres Kt OBE FBA FRAI (3 July 1869 in Preston – 6 March 1954 in Oxford) was a British archaeologist and academic, who conducted excavations in Cyprus in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Life He was the son of the ...
, Veselin Čajkanović, W. A. Hurtley and
Bogdan Popović Bogdan Popović (Serbian Cyrillic: Богдан Поповић; 20 December 1863 – 7 November 1944) was one of the most important literary critics and university professors in Serbia and later Yugoslavia and an academic. He was the brother o ...
. Finds from these excavations are now in several UK museums including the
Ashmolean Museum The Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology () on Beaumont Street, Oxford, England, is Britain's first public museum. Its first building was erected in 1678–1683 to house the cabinet of curiosities that Elias Ashmole gave to the University o ...
and the
British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
. New excavations were begun in 1978 under the auspices of the
Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts The Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts ( la, Academia Scientiarum et Artium Serbica, sr-Cyr, Српска академија наука и уметности, САНУ, Srpska akademija nauka i umetnosti, SANU) is a national academy and the ...
. From 1978 to 1982 the project focused on the Bronze Age and later layers, under the direction of Nikola Tasic and Gordana Vujovic. In 1982 excavations began on the more prominent Neolithic occupation, investigation of which continues to the present, led by Milutin Garasanin and Dragoslav Srejovic. Unfortunately in the 47 years between Vasić's and the present research the site suffered considerable damage from unauthorized excavations and looting.


Occupation


Starčevo period, c. 5700–5300 BCE

The earliest deposits at Belo Brdo date to around 5700 BCE. and belong to the Early Neolithic Starčevo culture. Evidence for this phase of occupation is scant owing to the disruption of the later Vinča settlement, and consists mainly of one large grave containing the remains of eleven males. This collective burial is unusual for Starčevo sites, where individual inhumations are the norm. Otherwise the Starčevo finds at Belo Brdo are unremarkable, and it is only one of several contemporary Starčevo settlements in the vicinity of modern Belgrade..


Vinča period, c. 5200–4900 BCE

A century after the abandonment. of the Starčevo settlement Belo Brdo was occupied by people of the Vinča culture. A total of thirteen building horizons from this period make up the majority of the tell's
stratigraphy Stratigraphy is a branch of geology concerned with the study of rock layers ( strata) and layering (stratification). It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks. Stratigraphy has three related subfields: lithost ...
, as new buildings were constructed on the debris left by periodic fires.. Belo Brdo was a major Vinča centre and, at its peak, one of the largest settlements in Neolithic Europe. However, it was abandoned by 4900 BCE, some five centuries before the wider collapse of the Vinča culture... As in the earlier Starčevo occupation, the Vinča houses at Belo Brdo were constructed primarily from wood and clay, but they also made use of levelled foundations, insulation and decoration with paint and wall coverings. In later phases large (40 x 60 m2) rectangular buildings with internal divisions and fixed furniture (benches, braziers, waterwheels, tables, etc.) appeared alongside the predominant one-roomed dwellings. The Vinča settlement was arranged on straight streets, fenced and considerably larger than that of the Starčevo period. The inhabitants' subsisted based both on the cultivation of grains ( einkorn,
emmer Emmer wheat or hulled wheat is a type of awned wheat. Emmer is a tetraploid (4''n'' = 4''x'' = 28 chromosomes). The domesticated types are ''Triticum turgidum'' subsp. ''dicoccum'' and ''Triticum turgidum ''conv.'' durum''. The wild plant is ...
and
barley Barley (''Hordeum vulgare''), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains, particularly in Eurasia as early as 10,000 years ago. Globally 70% of barley p ...
) and husbandry of domesticated animals (primarily
cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus '' Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult ...
, but also
goats The goat or domestic goat (''Capra hircus'') is a domesticated species of goat-antelope typically kept as livestock. It was domesticated from the wild goat (''C. aegagrus'') of Southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of th ...
,
sheep Sheep or domestic sheep (''Ovis aries'') are domesticated, ruminant mammals typically kept as livestock. Although the term ''sheep'' can apply to other species in the genus '' Ovis'', in everyday usage it almost always refers to domesticate ...
and
pigs The pig (''Sus domesticus''), often called swine, hog, or domestic pig when distinguishing from other members of the genus '' Sus'', is an omnivorous, domesticated, even-toed, hoofed mammal. It is variously considered a subspecies of ''Sus ...
). These
agricultural Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled peopl ...
practices probably continued to be supplemented by hunting and fishing in the surrounding environs. In the Early Vinča phase Belo Brdo seems to have developed into a ritual centre for the entire region. The manufacture of various types of cult objects, including 'mushroom amulet' and 'animal head' jewellery made from semi-precious stones, first appeared there and then spread to other Vinča sites. The raw material for these objects often had to be imported from considerable distance, indicating also that from its earliest phase the site was part of large-scale exchange networks.. It is therefore thought that Belo Brdo was a key place in a wider Vinča prestige economy, and an abundance of ritual paraphernalia, especially anthropomorphic figurines, is characteristic of the site. Another ritual innovation of Early Vinča phase Belo Brdo was the '' bucranium'' cult, where the painted skulls of cattle were fixed to the interior of houses. It is speculated that this practice may be linked to the wealth of individual households as measured in cattle. Later, however, Belo Brdo was to some degree eclipsed by the nearby site of
Vršac Vršac ( sr-cyr, Вршац, ; hu, Versec; ro, Vârșeț) is a city and the administrative centre of the South Banat District in the autonomous province of Vojvodina, Serbia. As of 2011, the city urban area had a population of 35,701, while ...
, which became the centre of the much more widespread exchange of ornaments made from ''
Spondylus ''Spondylus'' is a genus of bivalve molluscs, the only genus in the family Spondylidae.MolluscaBase (2019). MolluscaBase. Spondylus Linnaeus, 1758. Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species at: http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=t ...
'' shells.. Subsequently, in the Late Vinča phase figurines became less widely circulated, and at the same time more standardised in form (in contrast to the many idiosyncratic styles of the Early Vinča phase). They also began to be inscribed with Vinča symbols, which perhaps indicates that competition and conflict was arising between different groups within Belo Brdo trying to assert control over the flow of ritual goods.


Post-Vinča occupations

Belo Brdo has been occupied several times since the abandonment of the Vinča settlement, but not on the same scale. From the
Copper Age The Copper Age, also called the Chalcolithic (; from grc-gre, χαλκός ''khalkós'', "copper" and  ''líthos'', " stone") or (A)eneolithic (from Latin '' aeneus'' "of copper"), is an archaeological period characterized by regular ...
there are four graves belonging to the Bodrogkeresztúr culture, a very small Baden culture settlement and some evidence of visits by people of the
Kostolac culture The City municipality of Kostolac ( sr-cyrl, Градска општина Костолац, Gradska opština Kostolac is a town in Serbia and one of two city municipalities which constitute the City of Požarevac. It is situated on the Danube ...
. There was a large but short-lived
Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...
settlement belonging to the Vatin culture. In the
Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly ...
the size of the tell made it an attractive location for a significant
Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foo ...
hill fort A hillfort is a type of earthwork used as a fortified refuge or defended settlement, located to exploit a rise in elevation for defensive advantage. They are typically European and of the Bronze Age or Iron Age. Some were used in the post-Roma ...
complete with defensive earthworks.. The most recent historical use of the site was a substantial
Old Serbia Old Serbia ( sr, Стара Србија, Stara Srbija) is a Serbian historiographical term that is used to describe the territory that according to the dominant school of Serbian historiography in the late 19th century formed the core of the ...
n
necropolis A necropolis (plural necropolises, necropoles, necropoleis, necropoli) is a large, designed cemetery with elaborate tomb monuments. The name stems from the Ancient Greek ''nekropolis'', literally meaning "city of the dead". The term usually im ...
.


Tourism

Vinča-Belo Brdo is classified as an Archaeological Site of Exceptional Importance by the Serbian government, entitling it to the highest level of state protection. Artefacts from the site are on display in exhibitions at the archaeological park, the National Museum of Belgrade, the
Belgrade City Museum The Belgrade City Museum ( sr-cyr, Музеј Града Београда) is a museum located in Belgrade, Serbia. Founded in 1903, the museum operates with several cultural institutions: Ivo Andrić Museum, Princess Ljubica's Residence, Paja Jo ...
and the
University of Belgrade The University of Belgrade ( sr, / ) is a public university in Serbia. It is the oldest and largest modern university in Serbia. Founded in 1808 as the Belgrade Higher School in revolutionary Serbia, by 1838 it merged with the Kragujevac-ba ...
Faculty of Philosophy. Vinča archeological site is open for tourists.


See also

* Lady of Vinča


External links

Site of Vinča-Belo Brdo


Notes


References

* * *


Further reading

* * * * * * * *


External links


Archaeological site Vinca - Belo Brdo
Official
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page
Vituelna Vinča
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vinca-Belo Brdo Neolithic Europe Neolithic settlements Prehistoric sites in Serbia Archaeological Sites of Exceptional Importance Vinča culture Archaeological type sites Paleontology in Serbia