Trypillia culture mega-sites: stages of research, old and new sources and formation of ideas

Twenty years ago, Dan Monah’s speech at a conference in Talyanki (2003) was entitled A Ghost is Haunting Europe: the Neolithic ProtoCities. Even then, the idea of a „ghost” was caused more by the lack of information about the state of research than by the real state of affairs. In the time that has passed, this „ghost” has acquired quite real outlines thanks to new research. In the history of the study of mega-sites of Trypillia culture, it is now possible to distinguish the following three stages: before 1971, 1971-2003 and 2009 - to the present day.