MOVE – Moving across the plain: reconstructing the lifetime movements of farming pioneers and their successors during the Neolithic in the Southern Carpathian Basin

The main goal of the project is understanding settlement and mobility patterns of pioneering farmers and their successors in the Southern Carpathian Basin during the Neolithic. One of the most significant human migrations took place around 8,000 years ago, in the Neolithic, a period marked by major changes in the way of life of prehistoric communities: in their economy, way of living, and social organization. The MOVE project will study the movements of the first farmers and herders in the area of the Pannonian Plain during the Neolithic period, i.e., the time of the Starčevo and Vinča cultures (ca. 6200-4500 years BC). These agricultural pioneers came from the Near East, bringing new economic strategies and social organization. We will try to find out more about their settlement patterns: how they organized the settlements, how long they stayed in one place, and how they adapted to the new natural environment. We will apply state-of-the-art macroscopic and biogeochemical methods used in archaeology, such as digital anthropology, contextual analysis of settlements, stable isotope analysis, and archeozoological analysis. This multidisciplinary approach will help us gain new knowledge on important questions about the movements of people and their way of life during this important period. With this approach, we will attempt to gain a deeper understanding of the mechanisms that allowed people to establish permanent settlements, where they predominantly relied on agriculture and animal husbandry, providing a foundation for life as we know it today.