Full Thesis Proposal

What
In and around present-day Romania there exists a rich neolithic history with many artifacts and other remnants that have withstood the test of time.

Despite it predating important touchstones in our history like Mesopotamia and Sumeria, Neolithic Romania (aka Old Europe) is not highlighted in the colloquial canon of our ancient human history. This is for a variety of reasons from a complete shut-off of Romania & the Eastern bloc throughout the 20th century to the accessibility of translated material to the fact that these societies were pre-literate.

There exists a large sprawl of information about these neolithic societies in and around Romania that is relatively disorganized on the web and mainly found in scans of books and papers.

WhyI am Romanian–American and have always wondered where the symbols in our rugs and clothes come from — where the visual language that’s so ubiquitous started and where, if anywhere, was an ancient history.

I am already thoroughly invested in humanity’s prehistory as well. These neolithic societies’ artifacts start to answer that for me, so I wish to dig deeper. I also want to connect with my culture more and, due to the Soviet bloc’s negative impacts on Eastern Europe’s reputation, people (including myself) know very little about our region from before the 20th century — I’d like to rectify that.

The Project
(an interactive mockup of) a website archive — I originally planned on building a fully-functioning website but that proved to get in the way of the design & custom interactions I wanted to implement, so at this stage I’ll present it more as a proof-of-concept with all the pages laid out & their interactions fully animated/interactive
How

Collecting archaeological papers in English and Romanian, existing studies online, and other resources to build a comprehensive archive that everything else (timelines, narratives) are built upon.
Selecting articles that are compelling and easy to engage with. These will feature my reactions & annotations that clarify or add context with interactive components
I have been collecting images, drawings, 3D models of artifacts, to create the visual language & supplement written content. These will all be tied together with the imagery of the Danube River in their final presentation as the common through-line (as shown in this slideshow).

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Fall 2025 pre-thesis publication