Linear Pottery Culture - Religion

Religion

As is true of all prehistoric cultures, the details of actual belief systems maintained by the Linear Pottery culture population are poorly understood relative to beliefs and religions of historical periods. The extent to which prehistoric beliefs formed a systematic religious canon is also the subject of some debate. Nevertheless, comparative, detailed, scientific study of cultural artifacts and iconography has led to the proposal of models.

The mother goddess model is the major one that applies to the Neolithic of the middle and near east, the civilization of the Aegean and Europe. The iconography was inherited from the Palaeolithic. The Gravettian Culture introduced it into the range of the future LBK from western Asia and south Russia. From there it diffused throughout Europe in the Upper Palaeolithic, which was inhabited by Cro-magnon man and was responsible for many works of art, such as the Venus of Willendorf.

With the transition to the Neolithic, "... the female principle continued to predominate the cultures that had grown up around the mysterious processes of birth and generation." The LBK therefore did not bring anything new spiritually to Europe, nor was the cult in any way localized to Europe. It is reflected in the vase paintings, figurines, graves and grave goods and surviving customs and myths of Europe. In the north the goddess could manifest herself as the mistress of animals, grain, distaff and loom, household and life and death.

The works of the noted late archaeologist Marija Gimbutas present a major study of the iconography and surviving beliefs of the European Neolithic, including the Linear Pottery Culture. She was able to trace the unity of reproductive themes in cultural objects previously unsuspected of such themes. For example, the burial pits of the Linear Pottery culture, which were lined with stone, clay or plaster, may have been intended to represent eggs. The deceased returns to the egg, so to speak, there to await rebirth.

The presence of such pits contemporaneously with the burial of women and children under the floors of houses suggests a multiplicity of religious convictions, as does the use of both cremation and inhumation. Some of the figurines are not of females but are androgynous. Perhaps the beliefs of Europeans of any culture always were complex.