This article, on the Early Neolithic pottery from the Cabeço da Amoreira shellmidden in the Muge region of central Portugal, presents a detailed review of the evidence to date and a systematic analysis of the decorative and mineralogical characteristics of the stratified and radiocarbon-dated ceramic assemblage. A homogenous pottery manufacturing tradition seems to be present right from the beginning, including both local and non-local ceramics. The authors formulate a working hypothesis on the geographic origin of the exogenous pottery, which contributes to the discussion of the dynamics of mobility and social networks in the Neolithization of south-western Europe.

This special issue of the European Journal of Archaeology discusses aspects of animal husbandry in a number of provinces of the Western Roman Empire. In this introduction, we describe the general characteristics of animal husbandry in pre-Roman and Roman times to assess any changes that may have occurred after the Roman conquest. The results suggest that the territoriality typifying the first millennium bc had a significant impact on production, resulting in a decrease in cattle size and frequencies across Europe. Nevertheless, not all the regions reacted in the same way, and regional communities that focused their animal production on pigs implemented more sustainable husbandry practices over time. By bringing together studies carried out across Europe, this journal issue highlights the existence of cases of both change and continuity across the Empire, and the (uneven) impact of the market economy on animal husbandry and dietary practices in climatically different regions.

There has been much talk about the retreat or even death of multiculturalism. Much of this discussion confounds multiculturalism with explicit policy under that name. I argue in this paper that liberal law itself, in particular majority-constraining constitutional law, requires multiculturalism, understood as multiple ways of life that cannot and should not be contained by a state that is to be neutral about individuals’ ultimate values and commitments. The workings of legal multiculturalism are demonstrated through a comparison of benchmark jurisprudence on gays in America and Muslims in Europe. An interesting difference is that for Muslims, liberal law has also functioned as constraint, not only as resource, especially in the post-2001 period of heightened integration concerns.