Trapezoidal houses and stone sculptures of Lepenski Vir
Casas trapezoidales y esculturas de piedra de Lepenski Vir
- Date
- c. 6300-5500 BCE · confidence medium
- Place
- Lepenski Vir, Donji Milanovac, Serbia
- Credited to
- Lepenski Vir culture (Danube hunter-fishers)
- Field
- Tools
What it is
A settlement on a Danube terrace with about a hundred trapezoidal dwellings, central hearths and large boulders carved with fish-like faces. It is a large sedentary hunter-fisher settlement that predates or coexists with the arrival of farming.
Excavated by Dragoslav Srejović between 1960 and 1970. Mesolithic occupation begins around 9500 BC, but the trapezoidal houses and sculptures are dated by Borić et al. to c. 6200-5500 BC (contemporary with the neighbouring Neolithic). The original site was relocated in 1970 because of the Djerdap dam.
What it led to
- monumental boulder sculpture in the European Mesolithic
- debate on the transition to the Neolithic in the Iron Gates