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The Late Neolithic period in Southeast Serbian Banat is marked by a host of Vinča culture sites located between the Danube and the Vršac mountains, the south end of the Carpathian mountain range in this area. It is a predominantly flat landscape enclosed by extensive former marshes of Mali and Veliki Rit in the northwest, Vršac mountains in the northeast, and Deliblato sands and River Nera in the southwest and the southeast. Over 40 late Neolithic sites are known throughout the area, most from surveys, but some also excavated. Between 2020 and 2022, as part of the Regional Absolute Chronologies of the Late Neolithic in Serbia project, funded by the Science Fund of the Republic of Serbia, At and Potporanj sites were radiocarbon dated to produce detailed, Bayesian statistical model-based chronologies that could be used as a local chronological reference for future researchers of the Late Neolithic in the region. In this chapter, we present unified chronological data attributable to the beginning and ending phases of the Neolithic in this region.

This paper aims to assess the etiology and differential diagnosis of severe pathological lesions in wild and domestic cattle from the Late Neolithic site of At-Vršac in the northeast part of the present-day Serbia. Excavations of this multilayered site revealed the remains of a Late Neolithic settlement belonging to the Vinča culture network of the Central Balkans. An aurochs metacarpal bone, two domestic cattle fragments of fused ulna and radius and of tibia, all with massive bone proliferations were recovered during the archaeological excavations in 1976. Paleopathological study was undertaken using an interdisciplinary approach, including AMS dating, radiography, computed tomography (CT), and histopathology. The results show severe oblique healed fracture with secondary pronounced bone reaction in the aurochs metacarpal bone and in the domestic cattle ulna–radius, while traumatic alteration infected with disseminated osteomyelitis was found in the domestic cattle tibia. These pathologies of wild and domestic cattle are discussed to reveal the level of environmental and human influence on the origin and development of the lesions in the Late Neolithic cattle.

The paper presents the concept, methodology and preliminary results of the project Regional Absolute Chronologies of the Late Neolithic in Serbia that started in 2020 using a case study from the site of At near Vršac in northeast Serbia. The aim of the project is to create multiple new regional chronological strands consisting of Bayesian modelled radiocarbon dates from sites with material culture belonging to the tradition of the Late Neolithic period Vinča culture. Combining statistical seriation of pottery assemblages and the Bayesian statistical modelling framework of several case studies from various regions of Serbia, new regional chronological anchor points will be created, thus avoiding constant comparison with the assemblage and dating of the eponymous site of Belo Brdo in Vinča. This approach will overcome the effects of the regionalization of material culture evident in most ceramic assemblages located further than 100 kilometres away from the type site. Using archival archaeological records from previous excavations will enable an establishment of a geography of chronological reference points which would then provide new insights into the dynamics of the evolution of the Late Neolithic Vinča societies and changes that occurred throughout its territory during the late sixth and the larger part of the fifth millennia BCE.

This paper aims to assess the etiology and differential diagnosis of severe pathological lesions in wild and domestic cattle from the Late Neolithic site of At-Vršac in the northeast part of the present-day Serbia. Excavations of this multilayered site revealed the remains of a Late Neolithic settlement belonging to the Vinča culture network of the Central Balkans. An aurochs metacarpal bone, two domestic cattle fragments of fused ulna and radius and of tibia, all with massive bone proliferations were recovered during the archaeological excavations in 1976. Paleopathological study was undertaken using an interdisciplinary approach, including AMS dating, radiography, computed tomography (CT), and histopathology. The results show severe oblique healed fracture with secondary pronounced bone reaction in the aurochs metacarpal bone and in the domestic cattle ulna–radius, while traumatic alteration infected with disseminated osteomyelitis was found in the domestic cattle tibia. These pathologies of wild and domestic cattle are discussed to reveal the level of environmental and human influence on the origin and development of the lesions in the Late Neolithic cattle.