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Europe’s ‘oldest town’ found near Bulgaria’s Varna, professor says

Europe’s oldest urban settlement is near Provadia, a town of about 13 000 people about 40km inland from Bulgaria’s Black Sea city of Varna, according to archaeology Professor Vassil Nikolov, citing evidence from work done at the Provadia – Solnitsata archaeological site in summer 2012.
The team of archaeologists headed by Nikolov excavated stone walls estimated to date from 4700 to 4200 BCE. The walls are two metres thick and three metres high, and according to Nikolov are the earliest and most massive fortifications from Europe’s pre-history.
There were about 300 to 350 people living at the site in those times, living in two-storey houses and earning their living by salt mining.
To this day, Provadia is an important salt centre, with a large-scale foreign investor represented in the area. Estimates are that salt has been extracted in the area for about 7500.
Nikolov said that salt was the currency of ancient times, both in terms of value and prestige.
As the only place in the Balkans used to produce salt at the time, Provadia –Solnitsatsa of the fifth century BCE was the “mint” of the region, Nikolov said.
He said that finds of grave sites at a necropolis showed that people in the town were wealthy.
Ritual burial practices also were strange and complex, he said. Copper needles and pottery found in graves at the site showed that people had been wealthy, but in some cases the corpses had been cut in half and buried from the pelvis up.
The study in summer 2012, lasting two months, focused mainly on the necropolis and the village.


Salt, early complex society, urbanization:
Provadia-Solnitsata (5500-4200 BC) (Abstract)
Vassil Nikolov

The expanding scope of the field
investigations at Provadia-Solnitsata, and
especially the results of the excavations in
2011 provide a new perspective to this
exceptional archaeological site.
A premise for the prosperity of the
society in the later prehistory (6th and 5th
millennia BC) in the region of Provadia-
Solnitsata was the salt that in the early
agricultural period became the only
strategic resource.
Salt-extraction facilities and salt
production
The production of salt at present-day
Provadia started in the beginning of the
Late Neolithic Period Karanovo III-IV
(about 5500 BC).
During the first stage of the Late
Neolithic (5500-5200 BC), the salt was
extracted by boiling brine from the sources
in thin-walled ceramic vases that were
made especially for the purpose and placed
in special massive domed kilns;
the kilns
were in buildings inside the settlement.
During the second stage of the Late
Neolithic in the region (LN 2, 5200-4900
BC) boiling brine in special ceramic vases
continued, but in shallow sunken structures
near the settlement mound. This
considerably increased the productivity of
salt-extraction.
In the Middle Chalcolithic (Hamangia
IV Culture, 4700-4500 BC), a large
production complex for production of solid
salt emerged near the settlement and
continued in the Late Chalcolithic (Varna
Culture, 4500-4200 BC). The
technological process was modified,
leading to a sharp increase of the
productive capacity. Deep and wide pits
were used and brine was boiled in
numerous large ceramic vases. In the
Middle and Late Chalcolithic, salt was
produced in “industrial” quantities and
solid salt became a medium of exchange in
long-distance trade with neighbouring
regions, as well as a base for a pronounced
economic prosperity in the area of Varna
Lakes.
The settlement and its fortifications
In the Middle and Late Chalcolithic,
the settlement on the settlement mound
was fortified with a strong fortification
system that went through several phases of
modifications and development. Probably,
he main reason for each reconstruction of
the fortifications was either its destruction
by an earthquake, or the need to expand the
settlement. Three successive fortification
systems were identified – the first one
included a wooden-earthen palisade, and
the other two were probably entirely made
of stone. They were built and used in the
Middle and Late Chalcolthic (4700-4200
BC). The stone walls are two to three
meters thick and have bastions. A moat
was excavated in front of the southeastern
gate.
At present, the successive settlements
in the settlement mound remain practically
unexcavated. Still, the remains of several
buildings have been identified so far,
belonging to the three main prehistoric
periods, attested on the site – Late
Neolithic, Middle and Late Chalcolithic.
Three of the buildings that were two-
storied provide most information.
Judging from the excavations of the
southeastern gate of the Middle
Chalcolithic fortification, a street, some
two meters wide, led from the gate to the
settlement’s interior. Obviously, the
settlements of the period were well
organized, but at present there is no
additional evidence.Ritual structures and ritual
complexes
Several Neolithic and Chalcolithic
ritual structures have been identified in the
settlement mound.
A complex of ritual pits was identified
at about 60 m to the W-NW of the
settlement mound. Its surface is at least 0.2
ha.
A complex of ritual structures was
found within the limits of the Chalcolithic
production complex. The ritual structures
that were identified on about 350 square
meters did not affect the production
facilities. These are four ritual pits, a grave
and two rectangular structures, outlined
with stones.
There seem to be two Late
Chalcolithic ritual complexes outside the
settlement, situated almost symmetrically
in relation to the settlement. In the first
one, to the northwest of the settlement,
traditional rituals that could be termed
“agricultural” were practiced. The second
complex, to the northeast of the settlement,
illustrates unusual rituals that combine
various elements: ritual pits, graves and
stone structures. It could be related to a
specialized activity that was new for the
early agricultural society and was set apart
from the traditional economic model,
namely the production of salt.
The Chalcolithic necropolis
Through trench investigations, a
necropolis was located that belongs to the
settlement Provadia-Solnitsata. All graves,
detected so far, date from the Late
Chalcolitic. The cemetery of several
thousand square meters is at about 250 m
to the southwest of the settlement mound.
Three graves have been investigated so far.
They are inhumations in flexed position on
the right side, with the head turned to the
north.
Provadia-Solnitsata, Varna
Chalcolithic necropolis and longdistance
trade
There should have been important
reasons for the emergence of Varna
Necropolis, very unusual for its time, with
numerous pit graves and high
concentration of diverse grave goods, both
as types and materials, as well as for its
appearance precisely on the shores of
Varna Lake. The “wealth” of Varna
Necropolis was acquired through regular
commercial transactions, imposed by the
regionalized division of labour due to
natural circumstances. The main reason for
the precocious development of the region
of Provadia Solnitsata and Varna Lakes,
against the background of Late
Chalcolithic communities in the Balkans,
was the production and trade of salt.
Society and social relations in the
region of Provadia-Solnitsata and V
arna Lakes in the second half of the 5th
millennium BC
The early complex society in present-
day Bulgarian lands created a hierarchical
structure with organizational and
governmental functions. This variant of
politogenesis is typical for the developed
early agricultural communities, especially
in the Balkans. However, the area of the
most rapidly developing politogenesis was
the Black Sea coast (roughly the area of
the so-called “Varna Culture”) in the Late
Chalcolithic. There, it could have led very
early to institutionalization of power and
emergence of a pre-state formation. The
reason was not the sea and the commercial
opportunities it offered. The reason was the
huge salt deposits and the sources of saline
water, respectively the highly efficient salt
production centre of Provadia Solnitsata,
situated close to the sea. A premise for the
economic prosperity of the Black Sea area
was the trade of salt, against which this
otherwise poor in natural resources region
acquired various raw materials, some of
which were processed into luxury goods.
The reason, however, for the
disintegration of this society was the
relatively quick and important climate
change, bringing considerable rise of average annual temperature and severe dry
spell in the region. The flourishing early
agricultural communities experienced a
shock that necessitated their quick
nomadization. The prehistoric salt
production centre of Provadia-Solnitsata
was abandoned for thousands of years,
indicating that it was precisely the drought
that caused the collapse of the Chalcolithic
society, and not a powerful invasion from
the north.
Provadia-Solnitsata – a prehistoric
city
A “city” could be defined only
through criteria that hold true for a specific
age in a specific region. These are
characteristics that portray a certain
settlement as “central place” that could be
defined as “city”.
I offer an analysis of the data about the
Middle and especially the Late
Chalcolithic Period, obtained so far from
Provadia-Solnitsata, in the context of the
emergence of urban centres in ancient
times. Provadia-Solnitsata complex fulfils
the following basic criteria for a prehistoric
“city”: 1. Centre of an agricultural region;

2. Production centre (centre of specialized
productions);
3. Commercial centre;
4.
Military centre;
5. Ideological centre;
6.
Centre of organization and government of
production and social structures.
According to the criteria, accepted for
the period, the prehistoric settlement of
Provadia-Solnitsata could be defined as a
prehistoric city that existed in the middle
and the second half of the 5th millennium
BC. Of the six listed preconditions, most
important are the specialized salt
production and the successful long distance
trade with this product that was vital for
both people and animals.