The Western Slavs of the Seventh to the Eleventh Century - An Archaeological Perspective

‘Slavic archaeology’ has in recent years overcome the traditional ‘ethnic paradigm’ that had dominated culture‐historical archaeology for decades. The second main step forward has been the application of dendrochronology or tree‐ring‐dating, which shows on the basis of the archaeological record that political development ran much faster sometimes than previously thought. And a third improvement is important – to realize that East Central Europe did share fundamental cultural characteristics, but was far from being a homogenous zone. Political developments, economic exchange and cultural influences caused many regional and chronological differences. Complex interdependencies e.g. between hillfort layout, ceramic technology and the development of supra‐regional power have now become visible. The paper summarizes the current state of research: economy from agriculture and landscape to production and exchange, settlement from houses and hamlets to hillforts and their sometimes central functions, society from history and politics to representation and identities.