ABSTRACT
From their discovery in the middle of the nineteenth century to the 1970s, the remains of Neolithic and Bronze Age villages found along the shore of subAlpine and Jurassic lakes caused angry controversies in the archaeologist community. Indeed, how could one explain the presence of settlement remains below the present water-level? The Swiss archaeologist F. Keller interpreted them as true lake-dwellings (Pfahlbauten), like tropical lacustrine or sea-shore villages reported at that time by famous navigators. In this interpretation, it is assumed that the lake-level (and consequently the climate) has not changed since the Neolithic period (Figure 9.1, top).
