The article presents new results of stable isotope analyses made on animal and human bones from the Mesolithic-early Neolithic sites of Lepenski Vir and Vlasac in the Danube Gorges of the Balkans. It reconstructs the food web for the region during these periods on the basis of stable isotope analyses of mammal and fish species found at Vlasac. These results are compared to measurements made on human burials from the two sites. In the light of these new results, the article also discusses interpretations provided by previous isotopic studies of this material. It concludes that great care is required in the interpretation of stable isotope results due to inherent methodological complexities of this type of analysis, and suggests that it is also necessary to integrate stable isotope results with information based on the examination of faunal remains and the archaeological context of analysed burials when making inferences about palaeodietary patterns.
BARTOSIEWICZ, L. , V. BORONEANŢ , C. BONSALL and S. STALLIBRASS , 2001. New data on the prehistoric fauna of the Iron Gates: a case study from Schela Cladovei, Romania . In R. Kertész and J. Makkay (eds), From the Mesolithic to the Neolithic (Proceedings of the International Archaeological Conference held in the Damjanich Museum of Szolnok, September 22-27, 1996): 15-21 . Budapest: Archaeolingua.
2.
BOCHERENS H. , G. GRUPE , A. MARIOTTI and S. TURBAN-JUST , 1997. Molecular preservation and isotopy of Mesolithic human finds from the Ofnet cave (Bavaria, Germany) . Anthropologischer Anzeiger55: 121-129 .
3.
BÖKÖNYI, S., 1969. Kičmenjaci (prethodni izveštaj). In D. Srejović, Lepenski Vir - Nova praistorijska kultura u Podunavlju: 224-228. Beograd: Srpska književna zadruga.
4.
BÖKÖNYI, S. , 1972. The Vertebrate Fauna. In Dragoslav Srejović, Europe’s First Monumental Sculpture: New Discoveries at Lepenski Vir: 186-189. London: Thames & Hudson .
5.
BÖKÖNYI, S. , 1975. Vlasac: an early site of dog domestication . In A. T. Classon (ed.), Archaeological Studies. Papers of the Archaeozoological Conference 1974, Groningen: 167-178 . Amsterdam and Oxford and New York: North Holland and American Elsevier.
6.
BÖKÖNYI, S., 1978. The Vertebrate Fauna of Vlasac. In M. Garašanin (ed.), Vlasac - mezolitsko naselje u -Derdapu (II): 35-65. Beograd: Srpska akademija nauka i umetnosti.
7.
BONSALL, C. , V. BORONEANŢ and D. SREJOVIĆ , 1996. AMS radiocarbon determinations on human bone from Lepenski Vir, Vlasac and Schela Cladovei . Mesolithic Miscellany17(2): 6-10 .
8.
BONSALL, C. , R. LENNON , K. MCSWEENEY , C. STEWART , D. HARKNESS , V. BORONEANŢ , L. BARTOSIEWICZ , R. PAYTON and J. CHAPMAN , 1997. Mesolithic and early Neolithic in the Iron Gates: a palaeodietary perspective . Journal of European Archaeology5(1): 50-92 .
9.
BONSALL, C. , G. COOK , R. LENNON , D. HARKNESS , M. SCOTT , L. BARTOSIEWICZ , AND K. MCSWEENEY , 2000. Stable isotopes, Radiocarbon and the Mesolithic-Neolithic Transition in the Iron Gates . Documenta Praehistorica27: 119-132 .
10.
BORIĆ, D. , 1999. Places that created time in the Danube Gorges and beyond, c. 9000-5500 BC . Documenta Praehistorica26: 41-70 .
11.
BORIĆ, D. , 2001. Mesolithic and early Neolithic hunters and fishers in the Danube Gorges: an analysis of archaeozoological data . In R. Kertész and J. Makkay (eds), From the Mesolithic to the Neolithic (Proceedings of the International Archaeological Conference held in the Damjanich Museum of Szolnok, September 22-27, 1996): 101-124 . Budapest: Archaeolingua.
12.
BORIĆ, D. , 2002a. The Lepenski Vir conundrum: reinterpretation of the Mesolithic and Neolithic sequences in the Danube Gorges . Antiquity76: 1026-1039 .
13.
BORIĆ, D., 2002b. Seasons, Life Cycles and Memory in the Danube Gorges, c. 10000-5500 BC Cal. Unpublished PhD dissertation: University of Cambridge, UK.
14.
BORIĆ, D. , 2003. ‘Deep time’ metaphor: mnemonic and apotropaic practices at Lepenski Vir . Journal of Social Archaeology3(1): 46-74 .
15.
BORIĆ, D. and V. DIMITRIJEVIĆ, in press. Continuity of foraging strategies in Mesolithic-Neolithic transformations: dating faunal patterns at Lepenski Vir (Serbia). Atti della Società per la preistoria e protoistoria della regione Friuli-Venezia Giulia XV (2004-05).
16.
BORIĆ, D. and P. MIRACLE , 2004. Mesolithic and Neolithic (dis)continuities in the Danube Gorges: new AMS dates from Padina and Hajdučka Vodenica (Serbia) . Oxford Journal of Archaeology23(4): 341-371 .
17.
BORIĆ, D. and S. STEFANOVIĆ , 2004. Birth and death: infant burials from Vlasac and Lepenski Vir . Antiquity78: 582-601 .
18.
BRONK RAMSEY, C. , 1995. Radiocarbon calibration and analysis of stratigraphy: the OxCal ProgramRadiocarbon37(2): 425-430 .
19.
BRONK RAMSEY, C. , 2001. Development of the radiocarbon program OxCal . Radiocarbon43(2A): 355-363 .
20.
BRINKHUIZEN, D. C. , 1986. Features observed on the skeletons of some recent European Acipenseridae: their importance for the study of excavated remains of sturgeon. In D.C. Brinkhuizen and A.T. Clason (eds), Fish and Archaeology. Studies in Osteometry, Taphonomy Seasonality and Fishing Methods: 18-32. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports (International Series 294).
21.
COOK, G. , C. BONSALL , R.E.M. HEDGES , K. MCSWEENEY , V. BORONEANŢ , L. BARTOSIEWICZ and P.B. PETTITT , 2002. Problems of dating human bones from the Iron Gates . Antiquity76: 77-85 .
22.
CLASON, A.T., 1980. Padina and Star_evo: game, fish and cattle. Palaeohistoria XXII:142-173.
23.
ČULJKOVIĆ, B. , S. STEFANOVIĆ and S. ROMAC , in press. DNA-based sex identification of the infant remains from Lepenski Vir, in C. Bonsall , V. Boroneant and I. Radovanović (eds), The Iron Gates Prehistory: New Perspectives. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports (International Series).
24.
DIMITRIJEVIĆ, V. , 2000. The Lepenski Vir fauna: bones in houses and between houses . Documenta Praehistorica27: 101-117 .
25.
DIMITRIJEVIĆ, V. , in press. Lepenski Vir animal bones: what was left in the houses? In C. Bonsall , V. BoroneanŢ and I. Radovanović (eds), The Iron Gates Prehistory: New Perspectives. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports (International Series).
26.
DITTMANN, K. and G. GRUPE , 2000. Biochemical and palaeopathological investigations on weaning and infant mortality in the early Middle Ages . Anthropologischer Anzeiger58: 345-355 .
27.
GARAŠANIN, M. and I. RADOVANOVIĆ , 2001. A pot in house 54 at Lepenski Vir I . Antiquity75(287): 118-125 .
28.
GRUPE, G. , H. MANHART , Ž. MIKIĆ and J. PETERS , 2003. Vertebrate food webs and subsistence strategies of Meso- and Neolithic populations of central Europe. In G. Grupe and J. Peters (eds), Documenta Archaeobiologiae 1. Yearbook of the State Collection of Anthropology and Palaeoanatomy, München, Germany: 193-213. Rahden/Westf.: Verlag M. Leidorf .
29.
HEDGES, R.E.M. , 2004. Isotopes and red herrings: comments on Milner et al. and Lidén et al . Antiquity78: 34-37 .
30.
LIDÉN, K. , G. ERIKSSON , B. NORDQVIST , A. GÖTHERSTRÖM and E. BENDIXEN , 2004. ‘The wet and the wild followed by the dry and the tame’ - or did it occur at the same time? Diet in Mesolithic-Neolithic southern Sweden . Antiquity78: 23-33 .
31.
MIKIĆ, Ž ., 2003. Human skeletal remains from the central Balkans: A survey of the development of human populations. In G. Grupe and J. Peters (eds), Documenta Archaeobiologiae 1. Yearbook of the State Collection of Anthropology and Palaeoanatomy, München, Germany: 51-57. Rahden/Westf.: Verlag M. Leidorf .
32.
MILNER, N. , O.E. CRAIG , G.N. BAILEY , K. PEDERSON and S.H. ANDERSON , 2004. Something fishy in the Neolithic? A re-evaluation of stable isotope analysis of Mesolithic and Neolithic coastal populations . Antiquity78: 9-22 .
33.
MINAGAWA, M and E. WADA, 1984. Stepwise enrichment of 15N along food chains: further evidence and the relationship between δ15N and animal age. Geochemica et Cosmochimica Acta 48:1135-1140.
34.
RADOVANOVIĆ, I. , 1996. The Iron Gates Mesolithic. Ann Arbor, MI: International Monographs in Prehistory (Archaeological Series 11).
35.
RADOVANOVIĆ, I., 1997. The Lepenski Vir culture: a contribution to interpretation of its ideological aspects. In Antidoron Dragoslavo Srejović completis LXV annis ab amicis, collegis, discipulis oblatum: 85-93. Beograd: Centar za arheološka istraživanja, Filozofski fakultet.
36.
RICHARDS, M.P. , 2003. Explaining the dietary isotope evidence for the rapid adoption of the Neolithic in Britain, in M. Parker Pearson (ed.), Food, Culture and Identity in the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age: pp. 31-36. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports (International Series 117).
37.
RICHARDS, M.P. , R.J. SCHULTING and R.E.M. HEDGES , 2003. Sharp shift in diet at onset of Neolithic . Nature425: 366 .
38.
ROKSANDIĆ, M., 1999. Transition from Mesolithic to Neolithic in the Iron Gates Gorge: physical anthropology perspective. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation: Department of Anthropology, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver.
39.
ROKSANDIĆ, M., 2000. Between foragers and farmers in the Iron Gates Gorge: physical anthropology perspective. Djerdap population in transition from Mesolithic to Neolithic. Documenta Praehistorica 27:1-100.
40.
RYAN, W.B.F , W.C. PITMAN , C.O MAIOR , S. KAZIMIERAS , V. MOSKALENKO , G.A. JONES , P. DIMITROV , N. GORÜR , M. SAKINÇ and H. YÜCE , 1997. An abrupt drowning of the Black Sea shelf . Marine Geology138: 119-126 .
41.
SCHULTING, R.J. and M. P. RICHARDS , 2002. Dogs, ducks, deer and diet: New stable isotope evidence on early Mesolithic dogs from the Vale of Pickering, northeast England . Journal of Archaeological Science29: 327-333 .
42.
SREJOVIĆ, D., 1969. Lepenski Vir - Nova praistorijska kultura u Podunavlju. Beograd: Srpska književna zadruga.
43.
SREJOVIĆ, D. , 1972. Europe’s First Monumental Sculpture: New Discoveries at Lepenski Vir. London: Thames & Hudson .
44.
SREJOVIĆ, D. and Z. LETICA, 1978. Vlasac. Mezolitsko naselje u Derdapu (I arheologija). Beograd: Srpska akademija nauka i umetnosti.
45.
STEFANOVIĆ, S. and D. BORIĆ , in press. The new born infant burials from Lepenski Vir: in pursuit of contextual meanings. In C. Bonsall , V. BoroneanŢ and I. Radovanović (eds), The Iron Gates Prehistory: New Perspectives. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports (International Series).
46.
STUIVER, M. , P.J. REIMER , E. BARD , J.W. BECK , G.S. BURR , K.A. HUGHEN , B. KRAMER , G. MCCORMAC , J. VAN DER PLICHT and M. SPURK , 1998. INTCAL98 Radiocarbon Age Calibration, 24000-0 cal BP . Radiocarbon40(3): 1041-1083 .
47.
THOMAS, J. , 2003. Thoughts on the ‘repacked’ Neolithic revolution . Antiquity77 (295): 67-75 .
48.
TRINGHAM, R. , 2000. South-eastern Europe in the transition to agriculture in Europe: bridge, buffer or mosaic. In T.D. Price (ed.), Europe’s First Farmers: 19-56. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
49.
WHITTLE, A. , L. BARTOSIEWICZ , D. BORIĆ , P. PETTITT and M. RICHARDS , 2002. In the beginning: new radiocarbon dates for the early Neolithic in northern Serbia and south-east Hungary . Antaeus25: 63-117 .
50.
Y’EDYNAK, G. , 1978. Culture, diet and dental reduction in Mesolithic forager-fishers of Yugoslavia . Current Anthropology19: 616-618 .
51.
Y’EDYNAK, G. , 1989. Yugoslav Mesolithic dental reduction . American Journal of Physical Anthropology78: 17-36 .
52.
Y’EDYNAK, G. and S. FLEISCH , 1983. Microevolution and biological adaptability in the transition from food-collecting to food-producing in the Iron Gates of Yugoslavia . Journal of Human Evolution12: 279-296 .
