Chronology revised. The finds from Plovdiv, Cherkovna and Esenitsa in Bulgaria

The collective finds of ceramic vessels from Plovdiv and Cherkovna, together with the necropolis at Zimnicea, are eponyms of a Late Bronze Age cultural horizon in the Eastern Balkans. Its chronology is covering the whole period of the Late Bronze Age, as in the Bulgarian literature it is usually placed in the second half or even the last phase of the period. A third find of ceramic vessels, the one from Esenitsa, is considered as the very final stage of the Bronze Age. The current state of the sources, which have grown considerably as a result of numerous archaeological investigations in the last decades, came with a series of radiocarbon dates and Aegean imports found in context. Parallels in well-dated complexes indicate that the initial date of this horizon can almost certainly be set no later than the beginning of the Late Bronze Age. Two differentiated groups of vessels with characteristics respectively indicating later and earlier chronology are distinguished. Both groups are represented in the complex from Plovdiv, with predominance of the first one, while the one from Cherkovna only contains vessels from the second group. This led to the authors defining the Cherkovna find as the earliest, followed by that from Plovdiv. The small number of vessels in the Esenitsa find, two of which have unique shapes hamper precise definition. Still, the latter group is clearly distinguished among the exemplars of this collection, which indicates a later date.