MOBILITY, CONTINUITY AND TRANSFORMATIONS – NEW RESULTS FROM THE NORTHERN ALPINE WETLAND SITES AT LAKE BIEL CH (3400 –2700 BC)

The MOVE-project at the University of Bern focuses on settlement interruptions, cultural continuity, and transformations as well as spatial mobility as resilience capacity of lakeshore settlement communities in circum-Alpine region at the end of the 4th M BC. Three sites located in Sutz-Lattrigen, at Lake Biel in western Switzerland are of major importance, “Sutz-Lattrigen, -Neue Station; -Hauptstation Aussen; -Kleine Station”. The dendrochronological data from the three lake shore settlements encompass the so called “Horgen” and “Lüscherz” typochronological units dating between 3400 and 2700 BC and gives precise information about the duration of the occupations as well as the interruptions between them. For example, the settlement layout of “Neue Station” makes it possible to reconstruct a horizontal stratigraphy and to separate the material by phase. We are thus able to study the phases independently of each other but also in an interlinked manner to identify similarities and differences between them. Our study deals with ceramics, stone axe blades and deer antler sleeves, as well as flint and textiles, but ceramics lend themselves particularly well to this exercise and can give us indications of changes in terms of pottery production practices. The biggest changes in terms of pottery typology comes after the long interruption of settlement activity between the “Horgen” and “Lüscherz” period. The typological changes are radical, but is this also the case at the technological level? Are the production habits completely different? On what points? Have the modalities in terms of mobility also changed? How is resilience reflected in these changes? These are all questions that this MOVE project seeks to answer. For more see: MOVE-project – Cultural Transformations and Spatial Mobility as Resilience Capacity of Lakeshore Settlement Communities at the end of the 4th M BC. https://data.snf.ch/grants/grant/19738