Faces of a New Era

About this event

The exhibition explores how the first farming communities on the Balkans lived around 8,000 years ago – and how this shift to agriculture set the course for human history. The focus is on finds from the Neolithic settlements of Cerje-Govrlevo and Slatina-Zelenikovo in North Macedonia, dated to roughly 6000–5500 BCE. You’ll see the remarkable anthropomorphic house model of the “Great Mother”, expressive human and animal figurines, pottery, and everyday objects from the dawn of farming and herding. The objects tell the story of the move to a settled way of life, the cultivation of wild plants, and the domestication of animals. At the same time, the show traces the route by which farming knowledge spread from the Fertile Crescent via Anatolia and the Balkans to the Rhine-Main region – where the first permanent settlements appeared almost 7,500 years ago. A cooperation with the Museum of the City of Skopje brings original pieces to Frankfurt that you’d otherwise only encounter in North Macedonia.