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OBRE Two stratified Neolithic and Chalcolithic sites at Obre, 65 kilometers northwest of Sarajevo in Bosnia, are located on the bank of the Trstionica tributary a few kilometers from the Bosna River, the main prehistoric highway in the western Balkans. Twenty-two radiocarbon dates have established that the sites were occupied between 6230 and 4780 B.C. Obre's position between the Adriatic Sea and the central and eastern Balkans placed it at the center of a long-distance exchange dynamic encompassing the entire Balkan Peninsula and the central Mediterranean. |
Obre II house 3d reconstruction |
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The later levels at Obre II showed no signs of depositional hiatus and represent the sequential phases of Late Neolithic Butmir culture.The earliest occupation at Obre is believed to have been by populations that paralleled each brother's arrival into the microregion: one population came from the Pannonian Plain on the north, the territory of Starčevo culture, and the other population entered from the Adriatic coast on the south, the territory of Cardium-Impresso culture. Migrations have been traced in overlapping distributions of specific pottery shapes. Starčevo culture was characterized by the altars, three- or four-footed vessels and pottery with incised and painted ornaments and barbotine surface treatment, whereas the pottery of Impresso-Cardium culture was monochrome and had impressed ornaments shaped by the edges of marine shells. In the earliest settlement the complete Neolithic package of domesticated animals (cattle, sheep, goats, and pigs) and the main cultivated cereal crops (emmer and einkorn wheat, field peas, and lentils) was recorded. The earliest radiocarbon date from the site shows the existence of a farming settlement in central Bosnia in about 6230–5990 B.C. (the earliest level at Obre I). The Middle Neolithic village at Obre I is hypothesized to correlate with the genesis of local Kakanj culture, marked by stylistic changes in pottery: the painted and Cardium-Impresso pottery found at earlier levels disappears, barbotine surface treatment continues, and the use of monochrome ceramic becomes dominant. Rhytons, vessels with four zoomorphic legs supporting a red-painted oval recipient with a large handle fixed to the top of the bowl, replace the altars found at previous levels. |
Almost identical vessels were found on the Adriatic and Ionian coast, in the Dinaric Alps, and in Thessaly, supporting the idea that rhytons may have been prestige items connected with salt distribution in the Balkans. Evidence indicates that copper was known at this stage of settlement, and the presence of obsidian, probably from Lipari Island, indicates contacts with the central Mediterranean. The continuity in the carbon-14 dating sequence and in cultural tradition at Obre has suggested to some researchers that there was a hiatus between Obre I and Obre II. Obre II exhibits a complete disappearance of highly popular pottery forms from the phases represented at Obre I, and the second location offers the sudden appearance of a fine black burnished pottery completely devoid of tempering as well as pottery having a thin red design on black or gray painted ceramics. The sand tempering of the previous period (Obre I) was replaced by the use in the coarser ceramics and for certain polished ware of an intentionally crushed limestone temper. However, the Butmir pottery is characterized by spiral and band-painted and incised ornamental motifs. The most exquisite are globular vases painted with red or black bands and decorated with interconnected spirals, in relief or incised, which are white or red incrusted. Particularly characteristic is the combination of different spiral patterns at Obre II. The heterogeneous stylistic elements and the presence of imports among Obre II artifacts implies intra-Balkan and trans-Adriatic exchange networks and long-distance connections, evidence that may be connected to the change in economy marked by the shift in the composition of the domestic herd toward the less-transhumant animals. |
Obre II comprises eight habitation horizons of the Butmir culture embedded in the time span 5310–4910 to 4780–4440 B.C. Architectural remains consisted of solid rectangular aboveground houses; several had apsidal (semicircular) ends and sacrificial structures. Houses were built of massive vertical posts supporting heavy walls of wattle and daub. They were up to 15 meters long, and some were subdivided by an internal clay wall into two rooms. A domed beehive-shaped oven with a clay platform in front and an ash pit, including a pot for collection of ashes, stood by the wall in the middle of the large room. Clusters of clay and wooden containers for storage of grain, together with a variety of pots and loom weights, were also found in the rooms.
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