Dscheitun

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Coordinates: 38 ° 6 ′ 11.8 "  N , 58 ° 12 ′ 26.6"  E

Map: Turkmenistan
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Dscheitun
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Turkmenistan

Jeitun ( Turkmen Jeitun ; also Djeitun ) is an archaeological site from the Neolithic Age in southern Turkmenistan , about 30 kilometers northwest of Ashgabat in the Kopet-Dag Mountains. The Tell settlement was from around 6000 to 5500/5400 BC. Occupied, possibly with brief interruptions. It is considered the starting point of an archaeological culture named after the site , although it is discussed whether this was not in the northeast of Iran .

Jeitun was discovered by Alexander Maruschchenko and excavated since the 1950s by Boris Alexejewitsch Kuftin and Vadim Michailowitsch Masson .

Settlement and finds

The settlement, which was completely excavated in six excavation campaigns from 1989 to 1994 and which existed for about 600 years, consisted in its late phase of around 30 houses made of sun-dried mud bricks. They should have seated around 150 to 200 people. The houses are interpreted as homesteads of individual families, so that their number corresponded to that of families.

Finds such as stone hand mills, decorated ceramics and stone tools together with imprints of einkorn and barley grains in the mud bricks suggest that the residents were already cultivating grain, making the site the oldest evidence of arable farming in Central Asia. Animal bone finds indicate that sheep and goats have already been domesticated , while those of wild animals indicate that they were hunting.

The research results by David R. Harris show that none of the wild forms of einkorn or barley that could have been used for local domestication were present in this region. The same goes for the sheep. The wild form of the goat ( Capra aegagrus ), on the other hand, was also widespread in Central Asia and could therefore have been domesticated on site. The variety of einkorn planted in Jeitun has probably disappeared.

classification

The lack of wild forms together with similarities between different types of artifacts such as clay figurines, ceramics and small stone axes with those from Neolithic sites in the Zāgros Mountains ( Jarmo , Tepe Guran , Tepe Sarab ) could mean that the agricultural way of life was caused by the migration of Neolithic people across the Zāgros Mountains reached Central Asia from the Levant , an interpretation preferred by the excavators. It was still possible, however, that local Mesolithic hunters and gatherers adopted the new way of life. First of all, it could be shown that settlements in northeastern Iran showed great similarities in their material culture with Jeitun, which could be proven for Yarim, Tureng and Sang-i Chakmak . However, further west there was a spatial gap of about 400 km, and only in Sialk do the lowest layers again show similarities with Jeitun.

The assumed migration movement took place mainly from west to east. This probably went hand in hand with climatic changes, but also the improvement of irrigation techniques. At the beginning of the 1980s it was assumed that Triticum aestivum or common wheat , i.e. bread grain , would have emerged from a hybrid form of Aegilops squarrosa and Triticum boeticum . This type of grain did not appear until much later in Western Asia, so research assumed that this variety would have been domesticated in Central Asia. Although this was not detected in Jeitun, probably due to the as yet undeveloped method, it could be detected at sites that belonged to this culture, such as Chagylly-depe.

literature

  • David R. Harris: Jeitun and the transition to agriculture in Central Asia . In: Archeology International 1 , 1997, pp. 28-31, doi : 10.5334 / ai.0109
  • Viktor I. Sarianidi: Food-producing and other Neolithic communities in Khorasan and Transoxania: eastern Iran, Soviet Central Asia and Afghanistan . In: Ahmad Hasan Dani, Vadim Mikhaĭlovich Masson (ed.): History of civilizations of Central Asia , Vol. 1: The dawn of civilization: earliest times to 700 BC , Paris 1992, pp. 109-126.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ David R. Harris: Jeitun and the transition to agriculture in Central Asia , in: Archeology International 1 (1997) 28-31, here: p. 30 doi : 10.5334 / ai.0109
  2. ^ David R. Harris: Jeitun and the transition to agriculture in Central Asia , in: Archeology International 1 (1997) 28–31, here: p. 29.
  3. David R. Harris: Jeitun and the transition to agriculture in Central Asia , in: Archeology International 1 (1997) 28–31, here: p. 29 f.
  4. ^ Philip L. Kohl: The Namazga Civilization. An Overview , in: Philip L. Kohl (Ed.): The Bronze Age Civilization of Central Asia. Recent Soviet Discoveries , 1st ed. 1981, ND Routledge, 2015, VII – XL, here: p. XIV f.
  5. David R. Harris: Jeitun and the transition to agriculture in Central Asia , in: Archeology International 1 (1997) 28–31, here: p. 29 f.
  6. ^ David R. Harris: Jeitun and the transition to agriculture in Central Asia , in: Archeology International 1 (1997) 28–31, here: p. 30.
  7. Dorian Q. Fuller, Agricultural Origins and Frontiers in South Asia: A Working Synthesis , in: Journal of World Prehistory 20 (2006) 1–86, here: p. 23 ( online ( Memento of the original from March 10, 2016 on the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this note. , PDF). @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.ucl.ac.uk
  8. Here one speaks of "Djeitun Styles" (Christopher P. Thornton: Sang-e Chakhmaq: A New Look , in: Roger Matthews, Hassan Fazeli Nashli [ed.]: The Neolithization of Iran. The Formation of New Societies , Oxbow , Oxford 2013, pp. 241–255, here: p. 245) The Japanese Seiichi Masuda with Ken Gotō, Takuya Iwasaki, Hitoshi Kamuro, Setsuo Furasato, Jirō Ikeda, Akira Tagaya, Masayo Minami and provide a more detailed description of the peculiarities of these decorative forms Akira Tsuneki: Tappeh Sang-e Chakhmaq: Investigations of a Neolithic Site in Northeastern Iran , in: Roger Matthews, Hassan Fazeli Nashli (ed.): The Neolithisation of Iran. The Formation of New Societies , Oxbow, Oxford 2013, pp. 201–240, here: p. 228.
  9. David R. Harris: Jeitun and the transition to agriculture in Central Asia , in: Archeology International 1 (1997) 28–31, here: p. 29 f.
  10. ^ Philip L. Kohl: The Namazga Civilization. An Overview , in: Philip L. Kohl (Ed.): The Bronze Age Civilization of Central Asia. Recent Soviet Discoveries , 1st ed. 1981, ND Routledge, 2015, VII – XL, here: p. XIV.