Starinar (Jan 2013)
Response to the contribution: On Neolithic authenticity of finds from Belica by Dragana Antonović and Slaviša Perić
Abstract
In the last issue of Starinar (LXII/2012) a contribution On Neolithic Authenticity of Finds from Belica was published. The authors Dragana Antonović and Slaviša Perić (further A-P), dispute the 'Neolithic' provenience of finds from the village Belica. The reason is based on two articles published by me and possibly the pending publication in Tübingen of my monograph Belica, the Greatest Group Find of Neolithic Artistic Cult Sculpture. A-P based their conclusion that the objects from Belica are not 'Neolithic' on the premise that the pit with these objects did not exist, that the objects are of 'contemporary provenience', most probably made by 'an archeologist-amateur aiming to create confusion in Serbian archaeology', that there are 'no analogies for them', that the site in Belica represents 'a small Neolithic settlement', that 'objects were made mechanically' and that traces of fast revolving 'grinding instruments' are visible on them. Also, A-P cite me as the only author to have written about the find from Belica and who believes that the find belongs to the Neolithic period. Technical, geodetic and photo documentation from systematic excavations, as well as the homogeneity of protostarčevo material confirm the existence of a pit, belonging to early Neolith. Four radiocarbon tests prove, apart from the characteristics of the material and the analogies, that the objects are not 'contemporary provenience' but belong to the Early Neolithic period. In connection with the possibility, as A-P state, that 'an archaeologist-amateur ... dug in the finds in the earth.' aiming to 'produce confusion in Serbian archaeology' I cite here what this 'archaeologist-amateur' needed to know to do this. He needed to shape artistically 93 objects of four typically Neolithic materials, stone, flint, bone and pottery (16 pottery, 66 stone, 11 bone objects) and to dig them in clandestinely, together with some protostarčevo pottery. He would need to find various types of stone which are not found in the region, such as serpentine and albite, and to make several dozen objects from them; to find animal bones (Bos/Cervus), from the protostarčevo period and make a large number of figurines exclusively of this material; then using baked clay (as A-P state), also from the protostarčevo period, make anthropomorphic figurines. He would then have to put all these objects into a pit which he dug out in the centre of the Neolithic site, surrounded by a trench 75 m in diameter and then cover it with a great quantity of ochre. To fill up the pit clay of specific content would have to be transport from somewhere else. He would also need to have excellent knowledge of the religious symbols of Neolith, (particularly the connection of the symbolism of woman and moon, as well as the symbolism of moon, woman, snake etc.), to shape such objects which stylistically, typologically, chronologically and symbolically completely correspond with the cultural tradition of the Stone Age of Europe, Asia Minor, Near and Middle East, including the ambivalent figures (which represent at the same time man and woman, i.e. male and female symbols, otherwise a recent term in archaeology) and to know how the vulva looks immediately before birth which was depicted on all figurines of woman in childbirth in Belica. The statement by A-P that 'there are no analogies' is not correct because numerous analogies are known in Serbia and other parts of the Balkan Peninsula as well as in Asia Minor, the Near and Middle East. As geomagnetic investigations confirm, the protostarčevo settlement in Belica, contrary to the opinion of A-P that it is 'a small Neolithic settlement', is one of the largest settlements from the Early Neolith in Serbia, covering an area of more than 7 ha. Also the statement, that parallel traces, such as those which exist on the surface and in grooves on the stone objects, are the remains of work with 'contemporary grind tools with a large number of rotations' is incorrect. The expertise of professional archeometrologists using a 3D electron microscope in the Institute for geology in Heidelberg and an experiment by conservators from the University in Tübingen confirm that the finish of the outer surface and the finish of grooves on the objects of serpentine (expertise was carried out exactly on objects which A-P explicitly marked as examples of mechanical finish) was done with typical Neolithic techniques. The statement that I was the only one who wrote about the Belica finds and identified them as Neolithic, is also not true. Although it is not important in this discussion about the 'Neolithic originality' of the Belica find, the fact is that apart from me five other authors have written on this subject.
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