Research Projects
- (A-4-1) Archaeological sources for the early wool usage in the Near East and Europe
Within the scope of this project, two dissertations investigated indirect archaeological evidence of textile production in two separate study areas: the Near East and the South East and Central Europe.
- (A-4-2) Archaeozoological analyzes of domestic sheep in the area between the Near East and Central Europe (5th-2nd millennium BC)
This research project was devoted to the process of a major economic shift in sheep husbandry that by the end of the 4th millennium BC took place in South-West Asia. From that time onwards, sheep management was rather focused on fiber exploitation than on meat and milk, requiring the transformation of sheep with hairy coat to those with a woolly vlies.
- (A-4-3) Mid-Holocene landscape changes due to grazing
This research project was a follow-up project of the dissertation (A-4-3-1) Mid-Holocene landscape development in the Carpathian region. The project was intended to develop a synthesis of the environmental conditions in the regions of early wool economies. The results acquired so far within the Topoi research group (A-4-) The Textile Revolution were integrated and evaluated from a geoscientific perspective.
- (A-4-4) Sheep Husbandry of Mesopotamia in the late 4th to early 3rd Millennium
Based on the earliest cuneiform sources from late 4th to early 3rd millennium Southern Mesopotamia, this research project aimed to provide an examination of the cuneiform evidence related to sheep husbandry, its economic significance, and its administrative aspects.
Dissertations
- (A-4-1-1) Archaeological Evidence for Early Wool Processing in South East and Central Europe
In order to investigate the introduction of fleece baring sheep husbandry and the subsequent “textile revolution” the doctoral research project “Archaeological Evidence for Early Wool Processing in South East and Central Europe” was focused on examining major changes in Eneolithic textile technologies that could be associated with the proposed raw fibre material innovation
- (A-4-1-2) Wool in Western Asia
The project focused regionally on Western Asia with a chronological timeframe from the 7th millennium through 3rd millennium BCE. Its objective was to find direct and indirect evidence for the introduction of wool as a textile fiber and study the procuring and processing of textile raw materials. The two main strands of evidence for this dissertation thesis were published textile traces and spindle whorl data collected from 23 sites. The project was designed to identify patterns of change related to textile production on a large regional and chronological scale.
- (A-4-3-1) Mid-Holocene landscape development in the Carpathian region - pastoralism, climate and their interdependencies
Within the dissertation I will investigate anthropogenic landscape changes that arose due to grazing pressure in selected semi-arid to humid natural environments between the Near East and Northwestern Europe from 7000 to 4000 BP. By combining a landscape sensitivity analysis with an extensive literature research on dated sediments, vegetation cover, climate variability and human activity I will examine the hypothesis that degradation processes resulting from agriculture had such a strong impact on the ecological balance of the landscape that they led to intensified erosion processes.