A study of bronze age ceramics from the forest zone of Eastern Europe: what does the term "fatyanovolike" mean?

The Bronze Age pottery from the forest zone of Eastern Europe includes a category that is often described as "Fatyanovo-like". It reveals a blend of predominantly Fatyanovo and other features. A morphological and technological analysis of 129 vessels from Nikolo-Perevoz I (a settlement with a collective burial) and II has revealed four groups-one Fatyanovo proper and three evidencing a mixture of Fatyanovo with local traditions of various origins. The Fatyanovo-Volosovo group appears to have been a result of local mixture, whereas that from the burial is close to the Fatyanovo-Osh-Pando tradition, which had been introduced from without. These findings are relevant to the relationships between the Fatyanovo, Volosovo, and Osh-Pando people. Also, they demonstrate that the umbrella term "Fatyanovo-like" is meaningless.