Study concludes that Central Europe's first farmers lived in equality

An international team of researchers, including Daniel Fernandes, a scientist at the Centre for Research in Anthropology and Health (CIAS) of the Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the University of Coimbra (FCTUC), has produced the most complete set of genetic data from the Neolithic period in Central Europe.

The results of this study, led by Pere Gelabert, Ron Pinhasi (University of Vienna), and David Reich (Harvard University), have just been published in Nature Human Behaviour. They reveal that the Linear Pottery culture (LBK), responsible for the expansion of agriculture in Central Europe 8,000 years ago, showed no signs of population stratification.

The expansion of agriculture in central Europe took place in the sixth millennium BC.

The cultural traces of farmers are consistent across this vast area, spanning thousands of kilometres. However, the lack of genetic data from multiple families makes it difficult to determine whether these communities lived in social equality or to assess which individuals migrated across the continent.

More than 80 geneticists, anthropologists and archaeologists studying the social characteristics of the Linear Pottery Culture (Linearbandkeramik, LBK) have integrated new genetic data from over 300 individuals with extensive datasets, including bone studies, radiocarbon dating, burial contexts and dietary data.

"Studying the genetic links between more than 250 Neolithic individuals showed that LBK people spread over hundreds of kilometres in just a few generations," says Daniel Fernandes, co-author of the study.

First author Pere Gelabert, a researcher at the Department of Evolutionary Anthropology at the University of Vienna, says: “We were able to find distant relatives in Slovakia and others in West Germany, more than 800 kilometres away.”

Ron Pinhasi, also a researcher at the University of Vienna, adds: “In this study, we report for the first time that families at the study sites of Nitra in Slovakia and Polgár-Ferenci-hát in Hungary do not differ in terms of the foods they consumed, the objects they were buried with, or their origins.”

This suggests that people living at these Neolithic sites were not stratified by family or biological sex, and we found no evidence of inequality, defined as differential access to resources or space,' the researchers say.

The LBK culture came to an end around 5000 BC, and several hypotheses have been put forward for its collapse. Some suggest that there was a social and economic crisis, often accompanied by episodes of widespread violence. One of the most notable events is the massacre at Asparn-Schletz (Lower Austria), where more than a hundred people were exhumed from a mass grave. Along with Herxheim (Germany), this site represents one of the largest known mass graves of violently killed individuals during the Lower Neolithic, with skeletons showing signs of violence and multiple fractures.

The researchers also emphasise that "this exhaustive genetic study of the Asparn-Schletz individuals showed that fewer than ten were genetically related, challenging the hypothesis that the massacre represented a single population".

Previous anthropological studies, led by Maria Teschler-Nicola of the Natural History Museum in Vienna, had noted a lack of young women among the victims. The new data also confirms the complete absence of family members. The presence of many children among the victims allows for multiple interpretations of this extraordinary episode of Neolithic violence.

The scientific article “Social and genetic diversity in first farmers of central Europe” is available here.