Dendroarchaeology at Lake Ohrid: Pine tree-ring chronology and 5th millennium BCE palisades from the pile-dwelling settlement of Lin 3, Albania

Abstract

Archaeological research in 2021–2023 at the site of Lin 3 located on the western shore of Lake Ohrid on the Albanian side shows the extraordinary potential of a cluster of prehistoric lakeshore settlements with wooden architectural remains (so called pile-dwellings) for dendroarchaeological investigations. On an excavated area of 347 m², 706 wood samples from architectural elements were collected, with pine wood comprising 60 %. For the first time on a waterlogged submerged Neolithic settlement in the Balkans and the wider Mediterranean area, several rows of pine piles interpreted as palisades have been identified and dated by combining radiocarbon dating and dendrochronology. Additionally, their year-by-year evolution over six decades has been reconstructed, providing insights into the development of these structures within their wider context. The resulting tree-ring chronology LIN3–01 is 192-years long, with a modelled end-date for its last ring in the range of 4347–4333 cal BCE. Its robust cross-dating against oak and juniper chronologies from Ploča Mičov Grad, a site on the opposite shore of Lake Ohrid in North Macedonia, extends the tree-ring record in the region for another 10 years and increases sample replication in poorly replicated decades.