Petrographic Evidence of Intercultural Trade During the Chalcolithic. Examples from Neamț County, Romania Otis Crandell1, Vasile Diaconu2 1
Babes‐Bolyai University Cluj‐Napoca, Romania. otis.crandell@ubbcluj.ro; 2 Targu Neamt History and Ethnography Museum, Targu Neamt, Romania. Stone tools from the assemblages. a) artefact SAC-13 (Balkan flint, flake or scaper from Săcăluşeşti), b) artefact TOP-01 (Balkan flint, blade fragment from Topoliţa), c) artefact TOP-02 (Balkan flint, blade fragment from Topoliţa), d) artefact SAC-04 (Moldavian flint, blade or end scraper from Săcăluşeşti), e) artefact SAC-05 (Moldavian flint, flake or scraper from Săcăluşeşti), f) artefact SAC-06 (Moldavian flint, blade from Săcăluşeşti), g) artefact SAC-07 (Moldavian flint, blade from Săcăluşeşti), h) artefact SAC-08 (Moldavian flint, blade or end scraper from Săcăluşeşti), i) artefact SAC-09 (biogenic jasper, blade fragment or scraper from Săcăluşeşti).
Location of the archaeological sites within the territory of the Precucuteni culture (final phase) and the extent of the neighbouring Stoicani-Aldeni and Gumelnița cultures at the time that the settlements were in use. Locations of knappable materials near to the archaeological sites are indicated.
Microphotos (polarized light) of artefacts. a) artefact TOP-01 (Balkan flint), b) artefact TOP-02 (Balkan flint), c) artefact SAC-04 (Moldavian flint), d) artefact SAC-09 (biogenic jasper). Left side, crossed polarizer. Right side, the same with one polarizer.
Moldavian flint Balkan flint Carpathian materials Percentages of different material categories. Moldavian flint 66%; Balkan flint 3%; Various Carpathian materials 31%.
Raw materials: a) flint from Miorcani flint mine, b) flint from Murfatlar, c) chert from Voievodeasa river, d) quartzitic sandstone from the Tarcău river, e) jasper from Damuc valley, f) lydite from Moldovitei river. g) menelite from the Humor river. Microphotos: Left side, crossed polarizer; right side, the same with one polarizer. Macrophotos of typical samples. Acknowledgements. The study was financed by ID-2241/2008 and PN-II-ID-PCE-2011-30881 projects, granted to CI (Romanian Ministry of Education and Research).
Conclusions. 1) although there are numerous raw materials available in close proximity to the settlements in this study, they still chose to use non-local materials, namely flint. If they were simply being opportunistic, they would only have used the nearest available material. They did not. Instead, for the most part they chose to use better quality material even though it was not available in their immediate area. This demonstrates that they were conscious of the quality difference when choosing raw materials and that made a distinct effort to acquire materials of high quality. 2) they were involved in long term intercultural trade. This is an important observation because it is general believed that long distance trade did not appear until the end of the Chalcolithic or beginning of the Bronze Age. Recent research by the author at other Precucuteni-Cucuteni sites also supports this observation. As yet, it is not known for sure why flint was being imported over long distances from the Dobruja area. In this case, it is not a matter of higher quality material as both types of flint are of similar quality.