Neolithic religion
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The term Neolithic religion summarily refers to hypotheses concerning religious behaviour of the peoples of the Neolithic period and technology, especially in the Levant and Europe. Our earliest textual sources are rather more recent than this era, dating to the Bronze Age, and therefore all statements about any belief systems Neolithic societies may have entertained are glimpsed from archaeology.
The early Bronze Age Proto-Indo-European religion (itself reconstructed), and the attested early Semitic gods would be presumed continuations of certain traditions of the late Neolithic.
The archaeologist Marija Gimbutas has notably put forward views which describe a matriarchal "Old Europe" set of societies dominated by goddess worship, in particular postulating a bird goddess and a bear goddess. Gimbutas considered the Bronze Age Minoan civilization a native continuation of Neolithic Europe, with the labrys and bull worship continuing symbols of matristic power. Gimbutas' views are popularly repeated in feminism, and were syncretized into Neopagan currents such as Wicca.
See also
Sources
- Marija Gimbutas, The Goddesses and Gods of Old Europe (1974)
- Marija Gimbutas, The Language of the Goddess, (1989)
- Marija Gimbutas, The Civilization of the Goddess (1991)
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