The Lengyel culture is an archaeological culture of the European Neolithic, centered on the Middle Danube in Central Europe. It flourished from 5000 to 4000 BC, ending with phase IV, e.g., in Bohemia represented by the 'Jordanow/Jordansmühler culture'. It is followed by the Funnelbeaker culture/TrB culture and the Baden culture. The eponymous type site is at Lengyel in Tolna county, Hungary.

Description

thumb|[[Neolithic circular enclosures in Central Europe|Neolithic enclosure, reconstruction|225x225px]]

The Lengyel culture was preceded by the Linear Pottery culture and succeeded by the Corded Ware culture. In its northern extent, overlapped the somewhat later but otherwise approximately contemporaneous Funnelbeaker culture. Also closely related are the Stroke-ornamented ware and Rössen cultures, adjacent to the north and west, respectively.

Subgroups of the Lengyel horizon include the Austrian/Moravian Painted Ware I and II, Aichbühl, Jordanów/Jordanov/Jordansmühl, Schussenried, Gatersleben, etc.

It is a wide interaction sphere or cultural horizon rather than an archaeological culture in the narrow sense.

Its distribution overlaps with the Tisza culture and with Stroke-Ornamented Pottery (STK) as far north as Osłonki, central Poland.

Lengyel pottery was found in western Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria, Poland, and Slovenia. Several Sopot culture finds in Croatia and Hungary were dated to the same general periods as the Lengyel culture finds.

Influence in pottery styles is found even further afield, in parts of Germany and Switzerland.

Agriculture and stock raising (mainly cattle, but also pigs, and to a lesser extent, ovicaprids) was practiced, though many wild faunal remains have also been recovered. Settlements consisted of small houses as well as trapezoid longhouses. These settlements were sometimes open, sometimes surrounded by a defensive ditch.

The Lengyel people also practiced mining. A 2025 archaeological study of a chert mining field in the Krumlov Forest of the Czech Republic, one of the largest in Europe, reported the graves of two adult sisters and an infant within a mine shaft. The women's skeletons bore signs of vertebral degeneration and early arthritis consistent with the heavy labor associated with mining.

Inhumation was in separate cemeteries, in the flexed position with apparently no preference for which side the deceased was laid out in.

Lengyel sites of the later period show signs of the use of copper in form of beads and hammered ribbons, marking the dawn of the Chalcolithic period in Central Europe.

It was associated with the cover-term Old Europe by Marija Gimbutas, though may have been undergone "kurganization" by the Proto-Indo-Europeans and become integrated into the successor Globular Amphora culture.

Archaeogenetics

According to archaeogenetic studies, its population had no or negligible amount of Indo-European steppe ancestry.

Lipson et al. (2017), Narasimshan et al. (2019) and Patterson et al. (2022) detected in nine individuals from Hungary ascribed to the Lengyel culture the Y-Haplogroups H, H-P96, I2a2a-S6635, I2a1a1b-S21825, G2a2a1-PF3148, J2a1a2b-Z6055, C1a2-V86, and E1b1b1a1b1-L618. mtDNA extracted were various subclades of U8b1a2b, N1a1a, T2b, H and H44, J1c, W1. According to ADMIXTURE analysis they had approximately 85-98% Early European Farmers, 4-12% Western Hunter-Gatherer and 0-3% Western Steppe Herders-related ancestry.

<gallery perrow="8">

File:Moravian painted pottery.jpg|Lengyel painted pottery sherds

File:Museum Quintana - Lengyelkultur Gefäß.jpg|Lengyel pottery.

File:Linz Schlossmuseum - Lengyel-Kultur Gefäß.jpg|Lengyel pottery

File:Neolithic pottery, Museum of Western Bohemia, 187697.jpg|Lengyel pottery

File:Oslonki burial with copper goods, Lengyel culture.jpg|Burial with copper items, Oslonki, Poland, 4100 BC

File:020210808 Neolithic copper ax, 4150-3500 BC, Danubian culture, Kraków Zakrzów.jpg|Copper axe, Poland, BC

File:Mitteleuropäische Neolithische Keramik aus 4500 v. Chr.jpg|Pottery

File:02023 0448 Neolithic in Silesia, Lengyel culture pottery, Southern group of Funnelbeaker pottery 25-30.jpg

File:Vénus de Falkenstein.jpg|Falkenstein venus figurine

File:NHM - Wetzleinsdorf Idol 1.jpg|Wetzleinsdorf venus figurine

File:Várad Vénusz2.jpg|Modern sculpture of a figurine found at Nitriansky Hradok

File:Linz Schlossmuseum - Venus von Ölkam.jpg|Ölkam venus, Austria, c. 4500 BC

File:NBAM Neolithikum - Modell Haus 1.jpg|Neolithic long house

File:028 Typishes Fachwerkhaus in der Nahe von Krakau zirka 53. Jh. v. Chr..jpg|House model

File:NBAM Neolithikum - Modell Erdwerk Altheim.jpg|Ditched enclosure, Altheim culture

</gallery>

Jordanów culture

<gallery>

File:02019 0886 (2) Neolithische Widderfigur von Jordanow, Schlesien (cropped).jpg|Ram sculpture, Poland

File:02019 0887 (2) Neolithische Widderfigur von Jordanow, um etwa von 3500 bis 2500 v. Chr, südliche Gruppe der TRB, Schlesien.jpg

File:Pottery, Jordanow culture, City of Prague Museum, 175626.jpg|Jordanow pottery

File:Neolithic Pottery (28140303273).jpg|Pottery

File:Stollhof Hoard 02.JPG|Stollhof Hoard, Austria, c. 4000 BC.

File:Stollhof Hoard 01.JPG|Stollhof hoard

File:Gold disc 1.jpg|Gold disc

</gallery>

See also

  • Circular Enclosures
  • Altheim culture
  • Cucuteni culture
  • Vinca culture
  • Yamna culture
  • Prehistoric Europe

References

Sources

  • The Lengyel Culture Sphere by Maximilian O. Baldia
  • All things bright: copper grave goods and diet at the Neolithic site of Osłonki, Poland (Budd et al. 2020)
  • A Jordanow culture copper pectoral
  • Eneolithic gold disc
  • The orientation of rondels of the Neolithic Lengyel culture in Central Europe