The names of these two river valleys in southwest European Russia define the distributiqn of a long-lived culture which developed throughout the 5th millennium be. Three phases are recognized: Early (Sokoletz), Middle (Samtcin) and Late (Savran). Each phase is typified by short-lived sites on the edge of river terraces, occupied all the year round, perhaps for five to ten years. Subsistence strategies changed little from the preceding Mesolithic hunting, fishing and shell-collecting, with the minor addition of small quantities of domesticated pig, cattle and einkom wheat. Demand for increased storage capacity led to the apparently independent evolution of pointed-base pottery, although local First Temperate Neolithic (Cri§) pottery occurs in the early phase.
The Macmillan dictionary of archaeology, Ruth D. Whitehouse, 1983Copied