Ancient site · Settlement
Vinča–Belo Brdo
Belo Brdo ('White Hill') at Vinča, 14 km downstream from Belgrade, is a tell: a mound about 10 metres high made almost entirely of the remains of settlements built one on top of another. Its main layers belong to the Vinča culture, which is named after it.
Vinča farmers made thousands of clay figurines and scratched mysterious signs on pottery, and the culture has some of the earliest known evidence of copper smelting. Excavations began in 1908, and finds are now in museums in Belgrade, Oxford and London.
- Dates
- c. 5700–4500 BCE (later reoccupied)
- Still standing
- No, or only traces
- Location
- 44.76° N, 20.62° E
How we know
No writing existed; the Vinča symbols scratched on pots are not considered true writing by most scholars, so dates come from layers and radiocarbon.
Nearby sites
- Starčevo culture dated c. 6200–4500 BCE
- Lepenski Vir c. 9500/7200–5500 BCE (trapezoid houses c. 6300–6000 BCE)
- Sarmizegetusa Regia 1st century BCE – 106 CE
- Varna Necropolis c. 4570–4340 BCE
- Hallstatt salt mines and cemetery c. 1200–350 BCE (prehistoric mining)
- Sesklo c. 7000–4400 BCE (earliest levels possibly older)
Related
- Vinča culture archaeological culture