Weekly Romanian Facts: Cucuteni Civilization
The Cucuteni Culture (5500-3500 B.C.) is the oldest confirmed European civilization and at the same time one of the world’s oldest civilizations. Some elements from Cucuteni culture were discovered for the first time in Romania, uncovering a civilization which had spread from the North-East of Transylvania, Moldavia and up to Ukraine.
The oversight of Cucuteni civilization is due to the fact that being located in Romania and Ukraine, Iron Curtain countries at that time and up until the early 90s, the communist regimes intentionally left out certain aspects related to national indentity and did not focus on investigations and archeological research. Thus, Cucuteni Culture remained unknown globally, while the `Oldest Civilization` title remained world-wide associated with the Sumerian and Egyptian civilizations.
Cucuteni Culture was a path opener from many points of view, the Cucuteni people being the first who built two-storied houses, their communities living together in up to 20.000 settlements as such.
The Cucuteni people left behind unique European ceramics; they worked manually and decorated their objects with a spiral motif, red, black and white being their characteristic colors. The only similar ceramics could be found only 1000 years later, in a neolithical Chinese Culture.
An important element of Cucuteni paintings and ceramics was the wolf motif, usually represented on ceramics through drawings of dancers with wolf masks. This motif was passed on through generations and became the primary symbol of the Dacians (ancestors of nowadays’ Romanians), who inhabited Transylvania.
The Cucuteni people were the first in the world engaged in the salt works. Their technique involved heating a salt-water filled ceramics vase, until the water had boiled away exposing the salt on the bottom of the ceramic structure.
To learn more watch the linked video below: