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SPP 1171:  Early Processes of Centralisation and Urbanisation - Studies on the Development of Early Celtic Princely Seats and their Hinterland

Subject Area Humanities
Term from 2004 to 2010
Project identifier Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5472124
 
The aim of the Priority Programme is to gain a deeper insight into the prehistoric processes in southern Central Europe between ca. 800 and 500 BC leading to the development of protourban central places north of the Alps. During the programme, research including surveys and systematic excavations will take place on some of the so called "Fürstensitze" (the Heuneburg on the upper Donau, the Ipf above Bopfingen, the Glauberg on the edge of the Wetterau, the Heidenmauer near Bad Dürkheim and the Mont Lassois on the upper Seine). Supplementary work, systematically acquiring and analysing the existing archaeological data, augments the fieldwork.
The research area stretches from Bohemia in the east to Burgundy in the west with a significant strongpoint in South-Western Germany. Local, regional and macro-regional research complement each other. The main objective of the programme is to develop new approaches and methods to identify centralisation processes, using only archaeological and archaeometric sources and procedures. The main criteria are dimension, architecture and the functional indications of the "Fürstensitze".
The importance of each central place must be evaluated in relationship with both its individual hinterland, as well as with supra-regional settlement-, traffic- and trade-systems. In addition to archaeological methods, archaeobotanical and archaeozoological methods are being employed. Another objective of the programme is to study prehistoric integration processes: the emergence of protourban central places requires the integration of prime-groups into relatively complexly organised secondary groups on the social level. This leads to questions concerning state foundation and ethnogenesis in the early Celtic world. Additional benefit can be expected from a classical archaeology and ancient history project, which will compare the prehistoric phenomena described above with similar processes that took place 100 years earlier in Central Italy.
DFG Programme Priority Programmes
International Connection France

Projects

Deputy Dr. Jörg Biel (†)
 
 

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