4,100-year-old beaker with medicinal & flowering plants in a grave of a woman in Scotland

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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“One thousand years of spirituality, innovation, and social development emerge from a ceremonial center on the Scottish archipelago of Orkney.  Nestled between two lakes on the remote Orkney archipelago in Scotland, the site known as the Ness of Brodgar contains a succession of Neolithic stone buildings spanning 1,000 years—and was likely an important ceremonial center.  On Orkney, a remote archipelago of 70 islands 10 miles off the north coast of Scotland, sits in a stunning natural setting, on a narrow strip of land between two sparkling lochs, and is equidistant from two of the most significant Neolithic stone circle monuments: the Standing Stones of Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar, each less than a mile away. An unearthed notched slab of stone was uncovered that held beneath it was thought there might be a side panel from a Bronze Age stone coffin. And thus the belief was that this find seemed to imply that there were human remains under the field, so a test trench was opened.” ref 

“Rather, they have a prime view of one of the most spectacular Neolithic ceremonial complexes ever discovered. Spanning a millennium of activity beginning around 5,000 years ago, these exquisitely preserved buildings, including foundations and low walls, are revealing how Neolithic society changed over time, and why Orkney—despite its seemingly remote location—was at the center of Neolithic Europe. Instead of digging up a Bronze Age coffin in the test trench, as they expected, the archaeologists uncovered part of a finely crafted Neolithic wall. “It had sharp internal angles, beautifully coursed stonework, and fine corner buttresses. Realizing that they were looking at a major Neolithic complex, it was decided that they should open up a larger area.” ref 

“So far they have identified more than 20 structures, and observed even more through geophysical tests such as magnetometer surveys and ground-penetrating radar, all enclosed by the remains of a thick boundary wall delineating a six-acre complex—the size of three soccer pitches. Carbon dating of animal bone, wood, and charcoal indicates at least 1,000 years of continuous activity, from around 5,300 – 4,300 years ago. The site was likely in use for even longer. “In many cases one structure is built on top of another structure. The whole thing is sitting on a jelly of earlier structures,” says Card. “What we are seeing really is just the tip of the iceberg.” So far the archaeologists have concentrated on a small portion of the site—just 10 percent of the total area—and only excavated down to the floor level of the uppermost structures. In the layers of building foundations, Card and his team are seeing a clear progression in building style and architecture—a pattern they think may reflect some of the changes occurring in Neolithic society over that time.” ref 

“Orkney (Scots: Orkney, Scottish Gaelic: Àrcaibh), also known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelagoin the Northern Isles of Scotland, situated off the north coast of the isle of Great Britain. Orkney is 10 miles (16 km) north of the coast of Caithness and comprises approximately 70 islands, of which 20 are inhabited. The largest island, Mainland, is often referred to as “the Mainland”, and has an area of 523 square kilometres (202 sq mi), making it the sixth-largest Scottish island and the tenth-largest island in the British Isles.[6] The largest settlement and administrative centre is Kirkwall.” ref 

“A charred hazelnut shell, recovered during excavations in Tankerness on the Mainland has been dated to 8,820–8,660 years ago indicating the presence of Mesolithic nomadic tribes. The earliest known permanent settlement is at Knap of Howar, a Neolithic farmstead on the island of Papa Westray, which dates from 5,500 years ago. The village of Skara Brae, Europe’s best-preserved Neolithic settlement, is believed to have been inhabited from around 5,100 years ago. Other remains from that era include the Standing Stones of Stenness, the Maeshowe passage grave, the Ring of Brodgar and other standing stones. Many of the Neolithic settlements were abandoned around 4,500 years ago, possibly due to changes in the climate.” ref 

“During the Bronze Age fewer large stone structures were built although the great ceremonial circles continued in used as metalworking was slowly introduced to Britain from Europe over a lengthy period. There are relatively few Orcadian sites dating from this era although there is the impressive Plumcake Mound near the Ring of Brodgar and various islands sites such as Tofts Ness on Sanday and the remains of two houses on Holm of Faray.  The Norse knew Mainland, Orkney as Megenland“Mainland” or as Hrossey “Horse Island”.  Norwegian settlers arriving from the late ninth century reinterpreted orc as the Old Norse orkn “seal” and added eyjar “islands” to the end so the name became Orkneyjar “Seal Islands”. The plural suffix -jar was later removed in English leaving the modern name “Orkney”. According to the Historia Norwegiæ, Orkney was named after an earl called Orkan.” ref

Skara Brae: Prehistoric Scottish Village 

“Skara Brae is a prehistoric village that was in use between roughly 3100 B.C. and 2500 B.C. Located on the west coast of the main island of Orkney, in Scotland, what makes the site special is its good state of preservation. Visitors can still see the furniture of the stone houses that people used 5,000 years ago. After it was abandoned, it was covered with sand dunes and wasn’t discovered until A.D. 1850, when a ferocious winter storm blew part of the turf off the ruins.  Located within walking distance of a stone circle at Brodgar, the village was part of a prehistoric landscape on Orkney that included other stone villages, farmsteads, tombs and stone circles.” ref 

“While the village’s buildings were modified throughout its 600-year history, the site was never large and consisted of about 10 houses that, in total, probably housed no more than 100 inhabitants at any one time. Eventually, a series of roofed passages were constructed that made it easy to go house-to-house in the middle of winter. “The villagers were real neighbors living cheek by jowl, their houses connected by walled, sometimes decorated, alleyways,” said Simon Schama, a professor at Columbia University, in a BBC documentary aired in 2000. “It’s not too much of a stretch to imagine gossip traveling down those alleyways after a hearty seafood supper.” Today, Skara Brae is by the sea although in prehistoric times it would have been a few miles from the coast. Erosion has led to the coast of Orkney moving closer to the site over the millennia.” ref 

Stone houses

“The houses at Skara Brae each consist of one room made of locally available stones that were held together with a “sticky midden material that provided both insulation and stability. Each house had a central hearth where a fire would have kept the inhabitants warm. The houses also had stone beds that would have been softened with furs, straw or dry seaweed. Archaeologists found that the houses usually had one large stone dresser that typically had three shelves divided into two bays,. The houses even had open areas with drains that would likely have been used as prehistoric toilets.” ref 

“How the houses were roofed is a mystery; it’s possible that driftwood, thatch, turf, whalebones or other material was used. The roof may have contained a hole that allowed some of the smoke to escape. The village’s inhabitants used a sophisticated array of stone tools. “Some are heavy tools such as mattocks and shovels, others are more delicate, such as pins and needles. Additionally, archaeologists have found beads that could have been fastened into necklaces, as well as pieces of pottery, some of it decorated with patterns, providing a fleeting glimpse into the art created by the villagers.” ref 

A communal lifestyle

“How the inhabitants of Skara Brae organized themselves is a mystery with few clues for researchers to work with. Presumably, each house held an extended family that included grandparents and perhaps other relatives. Archaeologists have found no evidence of an elite residence at Skara Brae, which suggests that the people of the village made decisions in a communal way. However, within the houses “between the dresser and the hearth there is sometimes a block of stone,” good for sitting, writes archaeologist Anna Ritchie in her book “Prehistoric Orkney” (Historic Scotland, 1995). She writes that this could be a “seat of honour” of sorts.” ref 

“Archaeologists do know that the villagers were connected to other inhabitants in Orkney and must have played a role in the rituals carried out at the great stone circles and other monuments on the island. “They had contacts across Orkney and the great monuments at Brodgar and Stenness (both of which have stone circles) are likely to have played an important part in their lives, as did the tombs such as Maeshowe, where they could get in touch with the ancestors and where some of the community was buried.” ref 

A village workshop?

“One puzzling house, given the rather bland name “house eight,” appears different from the others. It is not connected to the other buildings and has a porch, of sorts, by its entrance. It also has no beds or dressers but instead has many niches and recesses on the walls. Archaeologists cannot be sure what this structure was used for, although one possibility is that it was a workshop. And one of only two houses “to be embellished by carved patterns on their walls.” ref 

Bull’s head on a bed

“While “house eight” is mysterious, “house seven” (the other house with carved patterns) is perhaps the strangest of all. When archaeologists excavated it, they found two human burials (both of adult females). Furthermore, archaeologists found that “the skull of a bull lay in one bed, a bone dish full of red, ochre pigments lay on the floor (and) there was a cache of jewellery. Of note is that this house continued to be used after the rest of the village was abandoned. These burials “may have been inserted towards the end of its (the house’s) use.” Towards the end of Skara Brae’s existence, its soil was becoming infertile as sand dunes advanced toward it. The settlement was gradually abandoned and the burials at house seven may have been a final act.” ref 

“Skara Brae, like other coastal sites around the world, may be threatened by rising sea levels caused by global warming, a modern-day problem that threatens a site that has withstood 5,000 years of time.” ref 

DNA of Bronze Age Proto-Indo-Europeans

“The so-called Kurgan hypothesis, which postulates that the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) language arose in the Pontic steppe. During the Yamna period, one of the world’s first Bronze Age cultures, Proto-Indo-European speakers migrated west towards Europe and east towards Central Asia, then South Asia, spreading with them the Indo-European languages spoken today in most of Europe, Iran and a big part of the Indian subcontinent. The Kurgan model is the most widely accepted scenario of Indo-European origins. Most linguists agree that PIE may have been spoken as a single language (before divergence began) around 3500 BCE, which coincides with the beginning of the Yamna culture in the Pontic-Caspian steppe, and of the related Maykop culture in the northwest Caucasus. .” ref 

“There is now compelling genetic evidence that haplogroups R1a and R1b, the most common paternal lineages in Europe, Central Asia and parts of South Asia, were mainly propagated by the Indo-European migrations during the Bronze Age. A sizeable part of European maternal lineages also seem to be of Indo-European origin, although the proportion varies a lot across Europe, but generally correlating to a large extent with the proportion of Y-haplogroups R1a and R1b. Other paternal lineages, such as G2a3b, J2b2, and T1a, are thought to have spread the Copper Age from the Balkans to modern Ukraine, then to have been absorbed by the expansion of R1a and R1b people respectively from central Russia (Volga basin) and southern Russia (Kuban, northwest Caucasus).” ref 

“The first PIE expansion into Europe was the Corded Ware culture, which so far have yielded only R1a samples. R1b is thought to have invaded the Balkans, then followed the Danube until Germany, from where it spread to western Europe and Scandinavia. The Asian branch originated around the Volga basin, then expanded across the Urals with the Sintashta culture, then over most of Central Asia and southern Siberia.” ref

“In the Chalcolithic (5,000-4,000 yeas ago), a series of complex cultures developed that would give rise to the peninsula’s first civilizations and to extensive exchange networks reaching to the Baltic, Middle East and North Africa. Around 4,800 – 4,700  yeas ago, the Beaker culture, which produced the Maritime Bell Beaker, probably originated in the vibrant copper-using communities of the Tagusestuary in Portugal and spread from there to many parts of western Europe.” ref 

“R1b is the most common haplogroup in Western Europe, reaching over 80% of the population in Ireland, the Scottish Highlands, western Wales, the Atlantic fringe of France, the Basque country and Catalonia. It is also common in Anatolia and around the Caucasus, in parts of Russia and in Central and South Asia. Besides the Atlantic and North Sea coast of Europe, hotspots include the Po valley in north-central Italy (over 70%), Armenia (35%), the Bashkirs of the Urals region of Russia (50%), Turkmenistan (over 35%), the Hazara people of Afghanistan (35%), the Uyghurs of North-West China (20%) and the Newars of Nepal (11%). R1b-V88, a subclade specific to sub-Saharan Africa, is found in 60 to 95% of men in northern Cameroon.” ref  

“The oldest forms of R1b (M343, P25, L389) are found dispersed at very low frequencies from Western Europe to India, a vast region where could have roamed the nomadic R1b hunter-gatherers during the Ice Age. The three main branches of R1b1 (R1b1a, R1b1b, R1b1c) all seem to have stemmed from the Middle East. The southern branch, R1b1c (V88), is found mostly in the Levant and Africa. The northern branch, R1b1a (P297), seems to have originated around the Caucasus, eastern Anatolia or northern Mesopotamia, then to have crossed over the Caucasus, from where they would have invaded Europe and Central Asia. R1b1b (M335) has only been found in Anatolia/Turkey.” ref 

Neolithic cattle herders

“It has been hypothetised that R1b people (perhaps alongside neighbouring J2 tribes) were the first to domesticate cattle in northern Mesopotamia some 10,500 years ago. R1b tribes descended from mammoth hunters, and when mammoths went extinct, they started hunting other large game such as bisons and aurochs. With the increase of the human population in the Fertile Crescent from the beginning of the Neolithic (starting 12,000 years ago), selective hunting and culling of herds started replacing indiscriminate killing of wild animals. The increased involvement of humans in the life of aurochs, wild boars and goats led to their progressive taming. Cattle herders probably maintained a nomadic or semi-nomadic existence, while other people in the Fertile Crescent (presumably represented by haplogroups E1b1b, G and T) settled down to cultivate the land or keep smaller domesticates.” ref 

“The analysis of bovine DNA has revealed that all the taurine cattle (Bos taurus) alive today descend from a population of only 80 aurochs. The earliest evidence of cattle domestication dates from circa 8,500 BCE in the Pre-Pottery Neolithic cultures in the Taurus Mountains. The Taurus Mountains(Turkish: Toros Dağları), are a mountain complex in southern Turkey, separating the Mediterranean coastal region of southern Turkey from the central Anatolian Plateau. The two oldest archaeological sites showing signs of cattle domestication are the villages of Çayönü Tepesi in southeastern Turkey and Dja’de el-Mughara in northern Iraq, two sites only 250 km away from each others. This is presumably the area from which R1b lineages started expanding – or in other words the “original homeland” of R1b.” ref, ref  

“The early R1b cattle herders would have split in at least three groups. One branch (M335) remained in Anatolia, but judging from its extreme rarity today wasn’t very successful, perhaps due to the heavy competition with other Neolithic populations in Anatolia, or to the scarcity of pastures in this mountainous environment. A second branch migrated south to the Levant, where it became the V88 branch. Some of them searched for new lands south in Africa, first in Egypt, then colonising most of northern Africa, from the Mediterranean coast to the Sahel. The third branch (P297), crossed the Caucasus into the vast Pontic-Caspian Steppe, which provided ideal grazing grounds for cattle. They split into two factions: R1b1a1 (M73), which went east along the Caspian Sea to Central Asia, and R1b1a2 (M269), which at first remained in the North Caucasus and the Pontic Steppe between the Dnieper and the Volga. It is not yet clear whether M73 actually migrated across the Caucasus and reached Central Asia via Kazakhstan, or if it went south through Iran and Turkmenistan.” ref 

“In any case, M73 would be a pre-Indo-European branch of R1b, just like V88 and M335. R1b-M269 (the most common form in Europe) is closely associated with the diffusion of Indo-European languages, as attested by its presence in all regions of the world where Indo-European languages were spoken in ancient times, from the Atlantic coast of Europe to the Indian subcontinent, which comprised almost all Europe (except Finland, Sardinia and Bosnia-Herzegovina), Anatolia, Armenia, European Russia, southern Siberia, many pockets around Central Asia (notably in Xinjiang, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan), without forgetting Iran, Pakistan, northern India and Nepal. The history of R1b and R1a are intricately connected to each others.” ref 

“The British Isles have been populated by human beings for hundreds of thousands of years, but it was the introduction of farming around 7,000 years ago that began a process of radical change. Over the millennia there were phases of extreme cold, when large areas of Britain were covered in ice, followed by warmer times. Around 10,000 years ago, the latest ice age came to an end. Sea levels rose as the ice sheets melted, and Britain became separated from the European mainland shortly before 8,000 years ago. The people living on the new islands of Britain were descendants of the first modern humans, or Homo sapiens, who arrived in northern Europe around 30,000 – 40,000 years ago. Like their early ancestors they lived by hunting and gathering. The introduction of farming, when people learned how to produce rather than acquire their food, is widely regarded as one of the biggest changes in human history. This change happened at various times in several different places around the world. The concept of farming that reached Britain between about 7,000 – 6,500 years ago had spread across Europe from origins in Syria and Iraq between about 13,000 -11,000 years ago.” ref  

“So the majority of early farmers were probably Mesolithic people who adopted the new way of life and took it with them to other parts of Britain. This was not a rapid change – farming took about 2,000 years to spread across all parts of the British Isles. The ‘Neolithic revolution according to radiocarbon dates, shows that the transition from hunter-gatherer to farmer was relatively gradual. We know, for example, that hunters in the Mesolithic ‘managed’ or tended their quarry. They would make clearings in woodland around sources of drinking water, and probably made efforts to see that the herds of deer and other animals they hunted were not over-exploited.” ref 

“The switch from managed hunting to pastoral farming was not a big change. The first farmers brought the ancestors of cattle, sheep and goats with them from the continent. Domestic pigs were bred from wild boar, which lived in the woods of Britain. Neolithic farmers also kept domesticated dogs, which were bred from wolves. It is probable that the earliest domesticated livestock were allowed to wander, maybe tended by a few herders. Sheep, goats and cattle are fond of leaves and bark, and pigs snuffle around roots. These domestic animals may have played a major role in clearing away the huge areas of dense forest that covered most of lowland Britain.” ref 

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Stonehenge: Paganistic Burial and Astrological Ritual Complex, England (5,100-3,600 years ago)

*Around 5,000 years ago Stonehenge (Britain):

Stonehenge: Paganistic Burial and Astrological Ritual Complex, England. 

Stonehenge evolved in several construction phases, 1 (5,100 years ago), 2 (5,000 years ago), 3 I (4,600 years ago), 3 II (4,600-4,400 years ago), 3 III (2400-4,280 years ago), 3 IV (4,280-3,930 years ago), & 3 V (3,930-3,600 years ago). Anatolian/Turkish-farmers built Britain’s famous Stonehenge, as well as current males of Britain, 60-65% have Turkish genetics. Almost as the same as in Ireland where 85 percent of Irish men are descended from farming people that arrived 6,000 years ago. At or around Stonehenge 5,000-4,400 years ago, there were two separate burial rites, either letting the birds feed on bodies or cremation. And a 4,000-year-old burial pit for elite contains 14 females and only 9 males, as well as a chieftain’s grave, held several items including the depicted 4,000-year-old dagger. And a 4,000-year-old child’s grave held the depicted Folkton drums. As well as items from 4,600-3,600 involved gold beads, necklaces, earrings, pendants, and other jewelry show sophisticated burial culture. ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, & ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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“The shaman is, above all, a connecting figure, bridging several worlds for his people, traveling between this world, the underworld, and the heavens. He transforms himself into an animal and talks with ghosts, the dead, the deities, and the ancestors. He dies and revives. He brings back knowledge from the shadow realm, thus linking his people to the spirits and places which were once mythically accessible to all.–anthropologist Barbara Meyerhoff” ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Paganism (beginning around 12,000 years ago)

Paganism (such as that seen in Turkey: 12,000 years ago). Gobekli Tepe: “first human-made temple” around 12,000 years ago. Sedentism and the Creation of goddesses around 12,000 years ago as well as male gods after 7,000 years ago. Pagan-Shaman burial in Israel 12,000 years ago and 12,000 – 10,000 years old Paganistic-Shamanistic Art in a Remote Cave in Egypt. Skull Cult around 11,500 to 8,400 Years Ago and Catal Huyuk “first religious designed city” around 10,000 years ago.

Paganism is approximately a 12,000-year-old belief system and believe in spirit-filled life and/or afterlife that can be attached to or be expressed in things or objects and these objects can be used by special persons or in special rituals that can connect to spirit-filled life and/or afterlife and who are guided/supported by a goddess/god, goddesses/gods, magical beings, or supreme spirits. If you believe like this, regardless of your faith, you are a hidden paganist.

Around 12,000 years ago, in Turkey, the first evidence of paganism is Gobekli Tepe: “first human-made temple” and around 9,500 years ago, in Turkey, the second evidence of paganism is Catal Huyuk “first religious designed city”. In addition, early paganism is connected to Proto-Indo-European language and religion. Proto-Indo-European religion can be reconstructed with confidence that the gods and goddesses, myths, festivals, and form of rituals with invocations, prayers, and songs of praise make up the spoken element of religion. Much of this activity is connected to the natural and agricultural year or at least those are the easiest elements to reconstruct because nature does not change and because farmers are the most conservative members of society and are best able to keep the old ways.

The reconstruction of goddesses/gods characteristics may be different than what we think of and only evolved later to the characteristics we know of today. One such characteristic is how a deity’s gender may not be fixed, since they are often deified forces of nature, which tend to not have genders. There are at least 40 deities and the Goddesses that have been reconstructed are: *Pria, *Pleto, *Devi, *Perkunos, *Aeusos,and *Yama.

The reconstruction of myths can be connected to Proto-Indo-European culture/language and by additional research, many of these myths have since been confirmed including some areas that were not accessible to the early writers such as Latvian folk songs and Hittite hieroglyphic tablets. There are at least 28 myths and one of the most widely recognized myths of the Indo-Europeans is the myth, “Yama is killed by his brother Manu” and “the world is made from his body”. Some of the forms of this myth in various Indo-European languages are about the Creation Myth of the Indo-Europeans.

The reconstruction of rituals can be connected to Proto-Indo-European culture/language and is estimated to have been spoken as a single language from around 6,500 years ago. One of the earliest ritual is the construction of kurgans or mound graves as a part of a death ritual. kurganswere inspired by common ritual-mythological ideas. Kurgans are complex structures with internal chambers. Within the burial chamber at the heart of the kurgan, elite individuals were buried with grave goods and sacrificial offerings, sometimes including horses and chariots.

The speakers of Pre-Proto-Indo-European lived in Turkey and it associates the distribution of historical Indo-European languages with the expansion around 9,000 years ago, with a proposed homeland of Proto-Indo-European proper in the Balkans around 7,000 years ago. The Proto-Indo-European Religion seemingly stretches at least back around 6,000 years ago or likely much further back and I believe Paganism is possibly an approximately 12,000-year-old belief system.

The earliest kurgans date to 6,000 years ago and are connected to the Proto-Indo-European in the Caucasus. In fact, around 7,000 years ago, there appears to be pre-kurgan in Siberia. Around 7,000 to 2,500 years ago and beyond, kurgans were built with ancient traditions still active in Southern Siberia and Central Asia, which display the continuity of the archaic forming methods. Kurgan cultures are divided archaeologically into different sub-cultures such as Timber Grave, Pit Grave, Scythian, Sarmatian, Hunnish, and Kuman–Kipchak. Kurgans have been found from the Altay Mountains to the Caucasus, Ukraine, Romania, and Bulgaria. Around 5,000 years ago, kurgans were used in the Ukrainian and Russian flat unforested grasslands and their use spread with migration into eastern, central, northern Europe, Turkey, and beyond. ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, & ref

Migrations and Changing Europeans Beginning around 8,000 Years Ago

7th millennium BC spanned the years 9,000 through 8,001 years ago

“During this time, agriculture spread from Anatolia to the Balkans. World population begins to grow at an exponential pace due to the Neolithic Revolution, reaching perhaps 10 million. In the agricultural communities of the Middle East, the cow was domesticated and use of pottery became common, spreading to Europe and South Asia, and the first metal (gold and copper) ornaments were made.” ref  

• 9,000 years ago Axe found at Ireland’s earliest burial site, in Co Limerick, which has shed light on the ancient burial practices of our hunter-gatherer ancestors. ref 
• 9,000 years ago  Bones of the dead were sorted and categorized before burial 
• 9,000 years ago Horse Burial Linked to Sheba
• 9,000 years ago:  
• 9,000 years ago  Evidence of Londoners, “tool-making factory” in southeast London. ref 
• 9,000 years ago: English Channel was formed.
• 9,000 years ago: Mesolithic site Lepenski Vir emerges in today’s Serbia.
• 9,000 years ago: Neolithic economy was established on the island of Crete (domesticated sheep or goats, pigs and cattle together with grains of cultivated bread wheat).
• 9,000  years ago: Sweden Large-scale fish processing operation established at Blekinge.
• 8,850 – 6,800 years ago: Advanced agriculture and a very early use of pottery by the Sesklo culture in Thessaly, Greece.
• 8,800 – 6,800 years ago: The earliest domesticated pigs in Europe, which many archaeologists believed to be descended from European wild boar, were introduced from the Middle East by Stone Age farmers.
• 8,500 years ago: Two breeds of non-wolf dogs in Scandinavia
• 8,500 years ago, early hunter-gatherers in Spain, Luxembourg, and Hungary also had darker skin.
• 8,400 years ago: Cardium Pottery begins its move to west along the northern Mediterranean coast, beginning at Sesklo, Thessaly, Greece.
• 8,200 years ago: Firm date of the move of the first farmers from Turkey across the Aegean Sea and up the Danube into Romania and Serbia.
• 8,000 years ago: First traces of habitation of the Svarthola cave in Norway.
• 8,000 years ago: Agriculture appears around in the Balkans, see Old European Culture.  ref  

The 6th millennium BC spanned the years 8,000 through 7,001 years ago. 

“It falls into the Holocene climatic optimum, with rising sea levels, and agriculture spreads to Europe and to Egypt. World population grows dramatically as a result of the Neolithic Revolution, perhaps quadrupling, from about 10 to 40 million, over the course of the millennium. With the earliest evidence of wine, from Georgia. dating to around 8,000 – 7,900 years ago. is a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asiaand Eastern Europe, Georgia is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the south by Turkey and Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. Archaeological finds and references in ancient sources also reveal elements of early political and state formations characterized by advanced metallurgy and goldsmith techniques that date back to the 7th century BC and beyond. In fact, early metallurgy started in Georgia during the 6th millennium BC, associated with the Shulaveri-Shomu culture.” ref, ref

Changes 8,000 years ago

“Ancient European DNA collected from Spain to Russia concluded that the original hunter-gatherer population had assimilated a wave of “farmers” who had arrived from the Near Eastduring the Neolithic about 8,000 years ago. The Mesolithic era site Lepenski Vir in modern day Serbia, the earliest documented sedentary community of Europe with permanent buildings as well as monumental art precedes sites previously considered to be the oldest known by many centuries. The community’s year round access to a food surplus prior to the introduction of agriculture was the basis for the sedentary lifestyle. However, the earliest record for the adoption of elements of farming can be found in Starčevo, a community with close cultural ties. Belovode and Pločnik, also in Serbia, is currently the oldest reliably dated copper smelting site in Europe (around 7,000 years ago). Attributed to the Vinča culture, which on the contrary provides no links to the initiation of or a transition to the Chalcolithicor Copper age.” ref 

Megalithic cultures

Genomics of Middle Neolithic farmers at the fringe of Europe:

“Agriculture emerged in the Fertile Crescent around 11,000 years ago and then spread out from Turkey, reaching central Europe some 7,500 years ago and eventually Scandinavia by 6,000 yearsago. Recent paleogenomic studies have shown that the spread of agriculture from the Fertile Crescent into Europe was due mainly to a demic process. Such event reshaped the genetic makeup of European populations since incoming farmers displaced and admixed with local hunter-gatherers.”ref

 “The Middle Neolithic period in Europe is characterized by such interaction, and this is a time where a resurgence of hunter-gatherer ancestry has been documented. While most research has been focused on the genetic origin and admixture dynamics with hunter-gatherers of farmers from Central Europe, the Iberian Peninsula, and Anatolia, data from farmers at the North-Western edges of Europe remains scarce. Here, we investigate genetic data from the Middle Neolithic from Ireland, Scotland, and Scandinavia and compare it to genomic data from hunter-gatherers, Early and Middle Neolithic farmers across Europe.”ref

“Of note, affinities between the British Isles and Iberia, confirm previous reports. However, there seems to be a regional origin for the Iberian farmers that putatively migrated to the British Isles. Moreover, we note some indications of particular interactions between Middle Neolithic Farmers of the British Isles and Scandinavia.Finally, our data together with that of previous publications allow us to achieve a better understanding of the interactions between farmers and hunter-gatherers at the northwestern fringe of Europe.”ref

“About 8,000 years ago, the plateau of land between what is now the east of England and the Netherlands was flooded by the sea. This brought an end to the forests and animal life that had colonized the region from other parts of Europe, including early human communities. Cores of sediment from the bottom of the North Sea in an area called Doggerland shoal Dogger Bank in the southern part of the North Sea became ice-free about 12,000 years ago, after the end of the last ice age until flooding around 8,000 years ago. Some human remains including part of an ancient skull and several human artifacts, like fragments of stone tools have been recovered.” ref

How Europeans evolved white skin

“Most modern Europeans don’t look much like those of 8000 years ago. Europeans today are a mix of the blending of at least three ancient populations of hunter-gatherers and farmers who moved into Europe in separate migrations over the past 8000 years spreading rapidly throughout Europe. First, hunter-gatherers in Europe could not digest the sugars in milk 8000 years ago, and neither could the first farmers who came from the Near East about 7,800 years ago nor the Yamnaya pastoralists who came from the steppes 4800 years ago. And there was a massive migration of Yamnaya herders from the steppes north of the Black Sea may have brought Indo-European languages to Europe about 4500 years ago. Not until about 4,300 years ago that lactose tolerance swept through Europe.” ref 

“When it comes to skin color, the team found a patchwork of evolution in different places, and three separate genes that produce light skin, telling a complex story for how European’s skin evolved to be much lighter during the past 8000 years. But in the far north where low light levels favored pale skin. Seven hunter-gatherers found at a 7700-year-old Motala archaeological site in southern Sweden had light skin gene variants. And another gene which causes blue eyes and may also contribute to light skin and blond hair. Thus ancient hunter-gatherers of the far north were already pale and blue-eyed, but those of central and southern Europe had darker skin.” ref 

Our ancient ‘mother tongue’ words were spoken around 8,000 years ago.

“8,000 to 5,500 years ago the Proto-Indo-European language was spoken from by all who lived on the steppes to the north of the Caspian Sea. Linguists say it evolved over time to spawn more than 440 modern languages and is the root of all Indo-European languages today. With offshoots in Anatolia (the Hittites), the Aegean (Mycenaean Greece), Western Europe (the Corded Ware culture), Central Asia (Yamna culture), and southern Siberia (Afanasevo culture.) late 6th and early 5th millennium BC: Beginning of Samara culture at the Samara bend region of the middle Volga, Russia. late 6th and early 5th millennium BC: Beginning of Samara culture at the Samara bend region of the middle Volga, Russia.” ref, ref

8,000 years ago, the overwhelming majority of men never reproduced!

“At this time it seems there were 17 WOMEN REPRODUCED FOR EVERY ONE MAN. Once upon a time, 4,000 to 8,000 years after humanity invented agriculture, something very strange happened to human reproduction. Across the globe, for every 17 women who were reproducing, passing on genes that are still around today—only one man did the same.  A researcher, a biological anthropologist, hypothesizes that somehow, only a few men accumulated lots of wealth and power, leaving nothing for others. These men could then pass their wealth on to their sons, perpetuating this pattern of elitist reproductive success. If this hypothesis is correct, it would be one of the first instances that scientists have found of culture affecting human evolution.” ref

8,000 years ago Europeans used cattle 

“Analyses of the residues left inside ancient pottery vessels, suggest that the consumption of dairy products from sheep, goats and cattle likely dates back into the Neolithic period – at least 8,000 years ago in Europe (6,000 BCE) and earlier in the Near East. The precise origins of cattle as engines of labour – known as traction – is also murky. In the past, investigators traditionally looked for evidence of items pulled – primarily (but not only) wagons and ploughs. Wagons – known from preserved images such as figurines and rock art – have existed for more than 5,000 years. Early ploughs, such as the ard or scratch plough, were made of wood, and do not preserve well over thousands of years. The oldest known evidence of ploughs in Europe comes from fragments of ards preserved in water-logged ancient sites. They are just under 6,000 years old. Though not nearly as effective as modern machines, early ploughs would have been far faster and easier than having to break compacted earth in fields with hand tools in order to plant crops. They allowed people to plant more crops using less labour, increasing the amount of food that could be grown each year.” ref

“Analysed such changes to cattle footbones from European archaeological sites dating to 6,000 years ago or later demonstrated the used of secondary products which must have radically changed the capabilities of ancient societies. Moreover, after studying the footbones of cattle from 11 sites in the western Balkans (modern-day Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina) dating to the local Neolithic, ranging from 6100 BCE to 4500 BCE (8,000 to 6,500 years ago) compared with the same bones from wild cattle at these sites expressed the presence and absence of footbone alterations indicative of the strain of traction. Research found changes to the footbones of cattle consistent with traction across these sites that were completely absent from the control group of wild cattle footbones. The presence of these pathologies, and their absence from the control population of wild cattle hunted at these same sites, proves that humans were using cattle as engines of labour in Europe at least 2,000 years earlier than was previously thought. Furthermore, comparisons of sex-specific proportions from some of these footbones showed that humans were using both male and female cattle. In fact, female cows were more common as animal engines than male bulls.” ref

8,000 years ago Manure used by Europe’s first farmers leads 

“Europe’s first farmers used far more sophisticated practices than was previously thought. Scientists have found that Neolithic farmers manured and watered their crops. And evidence for this is abundant in manure, have been found in the charred cereal grains and pulse seeds taken from 13 Neolithic sites around Europe. The fact that farmers made long-term investments such as manuring in their land sheds new light on the nature of early farming landscapes in Neolithic times. The idea that farmland could be cared for by the same family for generations seems quite an advanced notion, but rich fertile land would have been viewed as extremely valuable for the growing of crops. We believe that as land was viewed as a commodity to be inherited, social differences in early European farming communities started to emerge between the haves and the have-nots.” ref

“The territoriality of early farming groups may help to explain documented events of the period involving extreme violence. The study cites the example of a Neolithic mass burial of the late sixth millennium BC at Talheim, Germany, which preserves the remains of a community killed by assailants wielding stone axes like those used to clear the land. The research is based on stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis of 124 crop samples of barley, wheat, lentil and peas, totalling around 2,500 grains or seeds. The charred remains represent harvested crops preserved in Neolithic houses destroyed by fire. The samples were from archaeological excavations of Neolithic sites across Europe, dating from nearly 8,000 to 4,400 years ago.” ref

Proto-Europe 8 000 – 5000 BC with ties to Anatolian Civilization and the Indo-European Language Spreads to Western Europe with Agriculture

“Proto-European Cultures 8,000-2,500 BC Interactive map of the Proto-European cultures in the Balkans. It is now assumed that the pre-Indo-European or Proto-European cultures which have evolved from rich archeological finds in the Greater Balkans, Greece and Sicily/Malta in the last 50 years go back to migrations from Anatolia. The archeological objects found in the Greater Balkans by Marija Gimbutas and others show a high sophistication in sculptures, ornaments, and grave culture. The “Proto-European Culture” in the Balkans and Greece is the oldest collective “civilization” known. They preceded Egypt by 4000 and China by 6000 years. Several large urban settlements (20 000 people) have been found, possibly under a female(?) priesthood.. The earliest temple cities have been unearthed in Göbekli (9200 BP) predating agriculture by 2000 years. The excavators believe that the large concentrations of laborers building the temples precipitated the need for agriculture.” ref

•  8,000 BC: Fully Neolithic agriculture has spread through Anatolia to the Balkans. (1967 McEvedy)
• 8,000 BC: Cycladic culture begin to use a coarse local type of clay to make a variety of objects.
• 8.000 BC: Female figurines holding serpents are fashioned on Crete and may have been associated with water, regenerative power and protection of the home.
• 7,900 BC: Vinča culture emerges on the shores of lower Danube.
• c. 5900 BC: Beginning of human inhabitation in Malta.
• c. 5500 BC: Beginning of the Cucuteni-Trypillian culture in the region of modern-day Romania, Moldova, and southwestern Ukraine.
• 7,500 BC: Earliest evidence of cheese-making (Kujawy, Poland).
• 7,500 BC Danubian culture. ref
• 7,000-year-old Mesolithic hunter-gatherer found in Spain had dark skin and blue-eyes.” ref

Bell Beaker culture 4,800–3,800 years ago

“The Bell Beaker culture/Beaker culture, named after the inverted-bell beaker drinking vessel used at the very beginning of the European Bronze Age. Arising from around 4,800  years ago, and lasting in continental Europe until  4,300 years ago, succeeded by the Unetice culture, in Britain until as late as  3,800 years ago. The culture was widely scattered throughout Western Europe, from various regions in Iberia and spots facing northern Africa to the Danubian plains, the British Isles, and the islands of Sicily and Sardinia. In its early phase, the Bell Beaker culture can be seen as the Western contemporary of the Corded Ware culture of Central Europe. From about 4,400 years ago, however, the “Beaker folk” expanded eastwards, into the Corded Ware horizon. In parts of Central and Eastern Europe – as far east as Poland – a sequence occurs from Corded Ware to Bell Beaker.” ref

“This period marks a period of cultural contact in Atlantic and Western Europe following a prolonged period of relative isolation during the Neolithic. In its mature phase, the Bell Beaker culture is understood as not only a collection of characteristic artifact types, but a complex cultural phenomenon involving metalwork in copper and gold, archery, specific types of ornamentation, and (presumably) shared ideological, cultural, and religious ideas. A wide range of regional diversity persists within the widespread late Beaker culture, particularly in local burial styles (including incidences of cremation rather than inhumation), housing styles, economic profile, and local ceramic wares (Begleitkeramik). The Bell Beaker culture follows the Corded Ware culture and for north-central Europe the Funnelbeaker culture. Its spread has been one of the central questions of the migrationism vs. diffusionism debate in 20th-century archaeology, variously described as due to migration, possibly of small groups of warriors, craftsmen or traders, or due to the diffusion of ideas and object exchange.” ref

“The (R1b-V88) and Middle Eastern records tie back to common ancestors along the upper Nile. And there was an amazing migration to Europe from Africa that is just as interesting. The back to Europe event took place about 3,200 to 4,200 years ago, and Crete played a role as a stepping-stone to the Eastern Adriatic region and spread into Central and Eastern Europe.” ref 

“R1b-V88 is associated with the domestication of cattle in northern Mesopotamia. And R1b-V88 migrated south towards the Levant and Egypt. The migration of R1b people can be followed archeologically through the presence of domesticated cattle, which appear in central Syria around 10,000-9,500 years ago (late Mureybet period), then in the Southern Levant and Egypt around 9,000-8,500  years ago (e.g. at Nabta Playa and Bir Kiseiba). Cattle herders subsequently spread across most of northern and eastern Africa. The Sahara desert would have been more humid during the Neolithic Subpluvial period (around. 9,250-5,250 years ago), and would have been a vast savannah full of grass, an ideal environment for cattle herding.” ref 

“Evidence of cow herding during the Neolithic has shown up at Uan Muhuggiag in central Libya around 5500 BCE, at the Capeletti Cave in northern Algeria around 4500 BCE. But the most compelling evidence that R1b people related to modern Europeans once roamed the Sahara is to be found at Tassili n’Ajjer in southern Algeria, a site famous pyroglyphs (rock art) dating from the Neolithic era. Some painting dating from around 3000 BCE depict fair-skinned and blond or auburn haired women riding on cows. The oldest known R1b-V88 sample in Europe is a 6,200 year-old farmer/herder from Catalonia. Autosomally this individual was a typical Near Eastern farmer, possessing just a little bit of Mesolithic West European admixture.” ref 

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Animism: Respecting the Living World by Graham Harvey 

“How have human cultures engaged with and thought about animals, plants, rocks, clouds, and other elements in their natural surroundings? Do animals and other natural objects have a spirit or soul? What is their relationship to humans? In this new study, Graham Harvey explores current and past animistic beliefs and practices of Native Americans, Maori, Aboriginal Australians, and eco-pagans. He considers the varieties of animism found in these cultures as well as their shared desire to live respectfully within larger natural communities. Drawing on his extensive casework, Harvey also considers the linguistic, performative, ecological, and activist implications of these different animisms.” ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope (Said as “At” “Hope”)/(Autodidact Polymath but not good at math):

Axiological Atheist, Anti-theist, Anti-religionist, Secular Humanist, Rationalist, Writer, Artist, Jeweler, Poet, “autodidact” Philosopher, schooled in Psychology, and “autodidact” Armchair Archaeology/Anthropology/Pre-Historian (Knowledgeable in the range of: 1 million to 5,000/4,000 years ago). I am an anarchist socialist politically. Reasons for or Types of Atheism

My Website, My Blog, & Short-writing or Quotes, My YouTube, Twitter: @AthopeMarie, and My Email: damien.marie.athope@gmail.com