HEADS TO POTS, ANCESTORS TO ARCHITECTURE: SKULL CULTS IN EUROPE AND THE NEAR EAST THROUGH THE PALAEOLITHIC AND THE NEOLITHIC PERIODS (C. 150.000 – 6.000 BC)

Date

2024-12-18

Author

Karamurat, Cansu

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Intricate post-mortem rituals, often termed “skull cults,” that emerged in the Near East during the Early Holocene (circa 12,000-8,000 BP), played a pivotal role in fostering social cohesion and driving social transformation during the significant socio-economic transition known as the Neolithic Period. However, skull cult rituals have typically been regarded as a localized phenomenon, confined to the specific temporal and spatial context of the Near Eastern Neolithic, with limited insight into their antecedents and inter-regional comparisons. By elucidating the development of “skull cult” practices over a broader temporal span (circa 150,000–8,000 BP) and a more expansive geography, particularly encompassing Europe and the Near East, this thesis aims to provide insights into the emergence and evolution of specific symbolic behaviors and material culture elements that culminated in the Near Eastern Neolithic skull cult package. To achieve this goal, 132 features, predominantly related to demographic data, body treatments, burial contexts, and grave goods, from 219 sites have been examined through multifaceted statistical analysis. These results are integrated with pertinent theoretical and methodological frameworks, as well as climatic and archaeogenetic data. Before the Middle Palaeolithic, various mortuary practices may have existed, but Homo sapiens (circa 130,000 BP) and Neanderthals (circa post 70,000 BP) have the earliest identifiable post-mortem ritual. During this time, an original symbolic code including ochre, animal skulls, antlers, skull-focused activities, and grave markers emerged. This original code was likely related to negotiating territories and identities with references to ancestry and the past, a fundamentally human phenomenon. During the Gravettian Period, this original code was augmented by new material culture items, such as figurines, as well as the elaboration of burial spaces with huts, hearths, and ritual pits. These post-mortem practices became part of broader seasonal and social “regeneration” rituals during the harsh conditions of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), particularly in Central and Eastern Europe. During the latter part of the Upper Palaeolithic, as climatic conditions intermittently ameliorated (e.g., Bølling–Allerød), skull cults became widely dispersed and regionally diversified. In Europe, burials without skulls were prevalent among Epigravettian groups, whereas skull-focused customs, such as using skull cups, were common in regions inhabited by Magdalenian groups. In the southern Levant, a marked increase in architectural elaboration, anthropomorphic figurines, and pillars, combined with burial practices, culminated in the skull cult synthesis of the Early Holocene Near East (c. 11,700-8,000 BP). With the emergence of autonomous households subsisting on agriculture during the 9th millennium BP, new symbolic mediums of portable material culture—such as pottery, figurines, and stamps—became instrumental in representing the human body and its connections to community, place, and new concepts of “house,” thereby replacing the formerly ubiquitous skull cult rituals. Ultimately, the relatively rapid and widespread adoption of these material culture items in Europe during the spread of Neolithic lifestyles can be attributed to the broad recognition and acceptance of the ideology underpinning the symbolic elements of pots, figurines, and stamps.

Subject Keywords

Mortuary Ritual, Skull-Cult, Neolithic, Palaeolithic, Burial

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/112698

Collections

Graduate School of Social Sciences, Thesis