Abstract
We analyze statistically representative samples of radiocarbon dates from key Early Neolithic sites in Central Europe belonging to the Linear Pottery Ceramic Culture (LBK), and of pottery-bearing cultures on East European Plain (Yelshanian, Rakushechnyi Yar, Buh-Dniestrian, Serteya and boreal East European Plain). The dates from the LBK sites form a statistically homogeneous set with the probability distribution similar to a single-date Gaussian curve. This implies that the duration of the spread of the LBK is shorter than the available temporal resolution of the radiocarbon dating; therefore, the rate of spread must be larger than 4 km/yr, in agreement with earlier estimates. The East European sites exhibit a broad probability distribution of dates. We identify in these data a spatio-temporal sequence from south-east to north-west, which implies the rate of spread of the initial pottery-making of the order of 1.6 km/yr, comparable to the average rate of spread of the Neolithic in Western and Central Europe. We argue that this spatio-temporal sequence is consistent with an idea that the tradition of the initial pottery-making on East European Plain developed under an early impulse from the Eastern Steppe.
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