ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author examines the theoretical assumptions of his own studies of the demographic and economic processes in the lowlands of north-central Europe during the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages. The history of European archaeology is actually a history of badly applied "hidden" models, whereas in the methodology of history, models are used to study fragments of past reality. The differences in research on the prehistoric economy between the two paradigms consist of different ontological categories in which the "postulated reality" is conceptualized and/or of different interpretations of the idea of historical development. The formulation of a research question is always based on certain initial theses, part of which is the result of previous studies. In research on the prehistoric economy, it is particularly important to return from time to time to the same problems, which allows the reader to discover latent possibilities of solving the problem.
