Farmers' spatial behaviour, demographic density dependence and the spread of Neolithic agriculture in Central Europe

Abstract

Since the early 1970s, the demic diffusion model has been the cornerstone of the migrationist approach to European Neolithisation. It considers the latter as a slow, gradual and haphazard process. During the last decade, its relevance has been challenged by the observed variability of the expansion, such as the extreme example exhibited by LBK expansion in Central Europe. To account for it, migration - which is usually explained by exogenous pushpull factors - must rather be viewed as the result of farmers' spatial behaviour. We adopt this approach and highlight the influence of agglomeration effects and the Allee effect in settled areas on farmers' choice of location, an influence which also leads to defining migration as endogenous. Both effects - which find support in archaeological records - exhibit demographic density dependence and help to explain an observed but counter-intuitive result. Indeed, high demographic density is associated with a slower rate of expansion of farming; this may result from strong agglomeration and Allee effects, which hinder - or even prevent - the migratory spread of agriculture. Farmers' cooperation with indigenous populations leads to the acculturation of the latter and, therefore, may reduce the influence of both effects, fostering farmers' migration.