Serbia

the Cradle of Human Civilisation

Research on how written language emerged has identified an extraordinary discovery. Only recently
have archaeological findings confirmed that the entire Danube Valley was populated with an early
advanced civilisation manifesting a surprisingly well developed level of cultural and social
evolvement. Remarkable evidence on mud tablets demonstrate that these Danube Valley settlements
had progressive written methodology and even though the number of excavations is small
astonishing discoveries are being made along much of the river basin.

We await archaeological excavations of sites along the length of the River Danube traversing the
region embraced by the Serbian border. Indeed some of the most fertile land along the Danube is to
be found in the region within Serbian borders and that can only mean that there must have been
large well formed enclaves along its banks as far back as farming communities existed. The Danube
Vinca Culture abandoned the nomadic lifestyle and established permanent settlements to become
farmers.

Danube river basin from its spring in Germany to the Black Sea

Archaeology is demonstrating that by 6000 BC a very sophisticated and well developed society
existed in the Danube Valley producing fine arts, crafts, fashioned furniture, industrial workings and
many examples of designed and worked items. Buildings several stories high have also been
discovered.

A variety of fired ceramic pots 6000 BC

The firing of clay to manufacture ceramics was a hugely important advance introducing household
ware that was a great advance on previous worked clay methodology. Not only did fired pots last
indefinitely but they were easier to maintain and did not lose contents over time. The firing of clay
to produces impermeable pottery has changed little over time and even today clay is fired at a high
temperatures to bring about chemical changes in the materials used. This process of vitrification of
clay forms a glass like glue that binds the particles of clay together and makes the material
impermeable to water loss and has been known for many millennia. The earliest fired clay item was
found in a charred pit. The mud sculpture was that of a woman dated to about 30000 years and
formalised pottery making, about 18000 years. Manufacturing objects from clay was an exhaustive
effort of trial and error extending over many millennia but basically the firing of clay changes its
molecular nature. Chemical restructuring taking place within fired clay are so complex and variable
that even the finest of modern scientific methodology is unable to unravel and understand the exact
detail of the resulting crystallites. Pottery and methodology for producing fired clays is identified in
all parts of the world.

Extraordinary examples of fired pottery have been found in the Danube Basin which confirms that
settlements along this river were well established, stable societies producing many very fine clay
artefacts which were decorated with the finest of advanced pigment formulations. It was the
refinement of the metal oxide pigments used to colour and decorate the manufactured artefacts
which makes it clear that these settlements manufactured sought after pottery, probably forming an
important part of their established trade.

A novelty ceramic item, Ox on wheels?

This extraordinary example of what might be considered a novelty item or perhaps a toy for
children to play with, has far reaching implications for it demonstrates the innovation and use of the
wheel! The innovation of wheels transformed society in that it allowed commercial load to be
carried and in this ceramic item, load is clearly carried on the ideal four wheel assembly still used
today. This design must have been a representation of the innovation of carts pulled by oxen and
that is the first formalised example of industrial methodology for commercial transportation of
goods. These are formative developments of civilised society.

The first wheel identified (an example is held at the Smithsonian Museum USA) is considered to be
an innovation that served the potters to rotate and form pottery items and this most useful of
innovations eventually emerged in Sumerian and Egyptian Chariots in about 3000 BC. The use of
wheels on vehicles by the Sumerian and Egyptian civilisations are quoted as the first examples of
wheeled transportation but such examples appear many millennia later than the above Ox on
Wheels manufactured in the Danube Basin. It seems likely that given the extensive trade in pottery
and copper tools that the Vinca Civilisation conducted in that part of the world that the Egyptian
wheel technology was a copy of the Danube development!
 Sumerian Chariot 3000 BC

All these findings are an indication that the culture established along the Danube river basin was an
advanced human population which by this time must have had a social structure with a consolidated
hierarchy to administer social affairs. And indeed collections of artefacts from various sites are
demonstrating figurines of women who are clearly well fed and prosperous and archaeological
authorities on the period, are suggesting that this civilisation was governed by women. Whatever
the nature of the social administration of the Vinca Civilisation what is clear is that the extensive
settlements along the river Danube were well established, well administered and successful
societies that lived in permanent well organised and defended enclaves, kept domesticated cattle
and had a well established agricultural and and industrial output.

Female figures positioned as discovered

and arranged seated in a circle as if presiding in Council.
Note that all the figurines are those of well fed individuals.

The above suggestion of a woman orientated society is extraordinary for even in modern times the
position of the mother figure in Central European societies has a specific and central role in the
cultural ethos. Majko Mila Majcice, is a phrase still used extensively in Serbian culture.

The industrial evolvement of this society is of particular interests because their well developed
understanding of the use of high temperature clay workings led to the development of metal
smelting and forging of metals. Very well established industrial sites containing molten and formed
metal tools have been discovered and it seems that this culture had extensive metal tool
manufacturing expertise and reputation. Tools and sculptured and works of art demonstrating
aesthetic concepts have been discovered at the metal manufacturing sites. Similar items have also
been identified far and wide across that part of the globe so the wealth generated by manufacturing
and agriculture played a major part in the riches of the region.

Metal sculptures demonstrating aesthetic concepts have been found.

The thinking man has been reproduced in later Greek art form
and the woman figure is again of ample stature

Very considerable ornament and jewellery in precious metals are identified and indeed
archaeological sites have yielded such vast riches that archaeologists are claiming that some of the
graves contained more gold and precious metals than any other archaeological sites anywhere else
in the world. Such finds are a clear indication that the society had a rigid well formed social
structure that was indicative of a fully fledged civilisation. Excavations have revealed a small
number of graves containing vast riches ie gold objects and other precious items whilst the majority
of burial places contained only basic goods. These findings indicate that this society had a
politically and financially stratified society. Worked items fashioned by skilled specialised
craftsmen are dated from the Early Neolithic times dated to about 9000 to 6000 BC and that
predates all other civilisations by thousands of years.

It is in such organised complex societies that the need for writing emerged and complex written text
is expected to be discovered in larger settlements for it was there that the need to register and record
social activity would be best applied and somewhere in the rubble of these settlements must remain
evidence of complex written records.

There is considerable discussion within Academe about the region of the world where written
language emerged but the evolvement of writing was driven by population pressure and the need to
communicate information to others. Certainly the Danube Basin was a cradle of large settlements,
some reportedly exceeding ten thousand inhabitants, a huge metropolis in those times. And the
Vinca metropolis sited some kilometres from Belgrade was not the only large settlement in this
region and indeed the Turdas-Vinca Culture had established many large scale settlements at
Divostin, Potporanj, Selevac, Plocnik and Predionica being identified to date.

In complex societies the pressures to record trading inventories, formalise agreements and have
written documents specifying terms of conduct was the dynamic that forced large societies world
over to find a way of recording events. Examples of paintings, carvings and impressions on rocks
have been carbon dated to 40000 thousand years and are found in many places in this part of the
world so mankind has been trying to formalize a system of written communication far back in its
history. Gradual evolvement of written communication goes back a very long way and indeed,
evidence of Proto-script ie the symbology and a pictogram system of communication that allowed
transfer of ideas and concepts in a written form have been found at the Tartaria site. Archaeology is
confident that many important discoveries are yet to be made.

Baked mud tablets discovered near the Tartaria Village in Romania,

demonstrate a formalised set of symbols dated to about 5000 BC.
The meaning has yet to been deciphered.

The Danube Valley has yielded some very fine examples of symbol and hieroglyphic imagery but
academics are having difficulty accepting a shift in the place of emergence of the human
civilisation. Very considerable disputes are raging in archaeological circles as to the nature of the
symbol impressed in the Tartaria mud tablets but what seems clear is that the symbols and
ideograms form a specific set of uni-vocal characters similar to the formal written hieroglyphics
language of the Egyptian Civilisation. But the problem with these datings is that the Danube Valley
Civilisation predates the Egyptian, Sumerian, Mycenaean, Greek, Roman and all other known
civilisations by several millennia.

Archaeological sites along the river are yielding fascinating evidence of mud tablets carrying
pictograms. In today's Romania the Tartaria Village mud tablets are well documented and dated to
about 5500 BC and seem to conform to the formalised pictogram uni-vocal content. Very similar
mud tablets were discovered several millennia later in Sumeria and Mesopotamia.

The mud tablet specifying symbology that coveys meaning

Scholars fortify their claim that the Danube Valley was the Cradle of Civilisation by referring
researchers to the 700 odd characters in the table of the Danube written symbols. This civilisation
used phonetic symbology that reflected the sounds of the spoken language. The 700 hundred odd
symbols and pictograms closely resemble the 700 hundred odd phonetic assembly of sounds
represented by symbols and pictograms used by the Egyptians several millennia later.
 An example of some of the 700 hundred Danube proto-literate text listed.
But no formalised contextual examples comparable to the Egyptian hieroglyphics
or Sumerian Cuneiform documents, have been discovered to date.

The nature and physical characteristics of the Danube Valley people are of considerable interest and
the problem of reconstructing detail from bone fragments has been resolved by science. Modern
scientific methodology has refined computer programmes which are extensively used by forensic
medicine to reconstruct skeletal remains and rebuild soft tissues on bones fragments. In forensic
investigations that use these reconstructive methods the final reformed features are so accurate that
families immediately recognise the finished reconstructions. In cases of archaeological skeletons the
skull forms a very useful structure on which to build soft tissues, to provide a very accurate final
likeness of the individual to whom the skull belonged. Modern reconstructive examples have
proven the technique valid and very useful.

Modern computer programmes recreate accurately

final resemblances of individuals to whom the skull belonged.
The coloured photograph was of the victim traced via a forensic reconstruction.

And when these same techniques are applied on skeletons discovered in burial pits along the
Danube Basin, an excellent result is obtained in recreating the features of the individual to whom
the skull belonged.
 Forensic reconstruction of a skulls dated to about 6000 BC
to provide a remarkable image of the people
living in the Danube Valley

These handsome people seem to have migrated far and wide along their trade routes, their spread
and fate seems to have a clear progression that can be traced along their extent and beyond. The
Vinca Culture can clearly be traced to the local Minoan and other civilisations lauded by Academia
as the first human civilisations but only because the Danube Valley culture had not been discovered
until recently. The extent of the Vinca Culture is only just beginning to be understood.

Archaeology has discovered items among the Minoan finds that relate to the Vinca Civilisation.
Note the decoration characteristics on this Minoan artefact. The Danube Civilisation spread its
goods far and wide and in its ever expanding trading activity individuals must have moved from the
Danube Basin and settled elsewhere to continue and consolidate the culture they created in their
original homelands. It seems that developments first identified in the Vinca Civilisation are
replicated elsewhere in that region and the Minoan Civilisation (3500 BC to 1400 BC) is the next
phase of the expansion and cultural evolvement of a wealthy trading people. In Minoan art,
sculpture, architecture and the written language, there is clear evidence of Vinca influence.

Minoan artefact showing individuals riding on a bull's head.

Could the Bull on Wheels made by the Vinca Culture and discovered many millennia earlier
be a depiction of a children's game, of a rampaging bull to be evaded?
Note the decoration characteristics on the artefact.

The Minoans demonstrate exquisite and advanced pottery skill with outstanding decoration that had
been refined over thousands of years and not only in the physical composition of the pottery but in
space and form and sophistication of decoration. This advance in the understanding of the elements
used in pottery manufacture is further innovated by the Mycenaean and Greek Civilisations. Elegant
pottery has been found in later historical periods containing elements in design and methodology
seen in the Danube Valley pottery.

Minoan Young Bloods demonstrating their prowess

in a battle of evading a raging bull. Surprisingly, women took part.

What seems clear from archaeological discoveries is that cultures do not die out but diffuse and
integrate with other cultures and in time the best practices of all involved are adopted and integrated
into the lifestyle of any given population. Much of what the Danube Valley civilisation developed
seems to have been adopted by every culture they traded and integrated with and their written
ideograms and symbols are duplicated in Minoan, Mycenaean and other culture writings.

Mycenaean written symbology.

Note similarity with the Danube Valley text

There seems little doubt that the region of Serbia through which the River Danube meanders forms
a part of the original cradle of human civilisation but the fact remains that there is little organised
effort to identify archaeological sites and most of the ancient finds are accidental rather than
discovered by determined searches of the terrain. Methodical efforts to identify possible sites of
antiquity are awaited. On the practical level the problem of identifying archaeological sites relates
to the availability of scientific methodology which is useful in identifying features below ground.
What remains about a meter below ground level is for most part never identified in any but
secondary archaeological excavations.

With this in mind science has recently innovated technology that can look well below the ground
surface relief and produces accurate maps of what lies below ground level. One of the most striking
recent developments in this field was developed by a Serb innovator Mr Zvonimir Jankovic, who
has a very effective system for analysing substrata and verifying geological features to a depth of
1000 metres and deeper. Zvonimir's Electromagnetic Energy instrumentation, the Radian System
is wonderfully effective for ground prospecting and it is surprising that Archaeological
Organisations have not as yet adopted the above detection methodology. Sweeping the Danube
Valley with the Jankovic Radian detection system would improve the rate of detection of
archaeological sites and we look forward to many ancient settlements being identified in due
course. The Cradle of Civilisation has much to yield.

C C o p y rig h t 2 0 1 7 B ra n k o R B a b ic R e s e a rc h a n d In n o v a tio n