The Trypillia megasites of the Ukrainian forest steppe formed the largest fourth-millenniumbcsites in Eurasia and possibly the world. Discovered in the 1960s, the megasites have so far resisted all attempts at an understanding of their social structure and dynamics. Multi-disciplinary investigations of the Nebelivka megasite by an Anglo-Ukrainian research project brought a focus on three research questions: (1) what was the essence of megasite lifeways? (2) can we call the megasites early cities? and (3) what were their origins? The first question is approached through a summary of Project findings on Nebelivka and the subsequent modelling of three different scenarios for what transpired to be a different kind of site from our expectations. The second question uses a relational approach to urbanism to show that megasites were so different from other coeval settlements that they could justifiably be termed ‘cities'. The third question turns to the origins of sites that were indeed larger and earlier than the supposed first cities of Mesopotamia and whose development indicates that there were at least two pathways to early urbanism in Eurasia.

中文翻译：

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背景中的 Trypillia 巨型遗址：铜石时代东欧的独立城市发展

乌克兰森林草原的 Trypillia 巨型遗址形成了最大的第四个千年公元前欧亚大陆和世界各地的遗址。这些巨型网站在 1960 年代被发现，迄今为止一直抵制所有试图了解其社会结构和动态的尝试。英乌研究项目对 Nebelivka 巨型遗址的多学科调查带来了三个研究问题：（1）巨型遗址生命方式的本质是什么？(2) 我们可以称特大网站为早期城市吗？(3) 它们的起源是什么？第一个问题是通过对 Nebelivka 项目调查结果的总结以及随后对三种不同场景的建模来解决的，这些场景与我们的预期不同。第二个问题使用城市化的关系方法来表明巨型遗址与其他同时代的定居点如此不同，以至于它们可以被称为“城市”。