Stability Through Movement: Theoretical and Practical Considerations of Social Space in Central European Neolithic Lakeside Settlements

Studies related to prehistoric, Circum-Alpine lakeside settlements have for the last decade or so begun to focus increasingly on the reconstruction of its inhabitant’s social dimensions of life. More traditional models attempting to explain the often-fleeting settlement patterns set in a tightly managed cultural landscape focusing on climate and economic factors alone have proven insufficient and opened up to more nuanced and multi-scalar approaches. Especially built structures, due to their exceptional preservation, constitute a popular jumping-off point for a number of theories and interpretations but recent work has also moved beyond the confines of the settlement to include the wider cultural landscape as crucial in understanding the lakeside phenomenon. This article re-evaluates one of the more popular architecture-based models, namely the non-correspondence model, and subsequently suggests an alternative, more integrative approach based on Amos Rapoport’s understanding of space. The aim is to create a more flexible approach to questions of space, time and meaning that does not stop at the built environment. Input from both the natural and the social sciences is combined in an attempt to sketch out an approximation of life on the lakeshores more than 5000 years ago.