it to the limping shaman-smith, according to the recent interpretation by Aleksandar Durman of Zagreb. The figure is a remarkable example of artistic creation and religious symbolism associated with a cult of the Great Mother. The "Vučedol Dove" is a 19,5 cm high ritual vessel made from baked clay. Three symbols of double axes and a necklace were incised on its neck with lines covering its wings and chest, and an unusual crest on the back of the head. If the shape of the crest and carefully delineated wings and chest, prove the figure to be the domesticated dove, then it was being raised in Europe 4,500 years ago, much earlier than we commonly think. The "Vučedol Dove" is the oldest dove figure found in Europe so far. The ritual vessel was depicted on the reverse of the Croatian 20 kuna banknote, issued in 1993 and 2001. Astral calendar Among the most famous pieces is a piece of ceramics dated to 2600 BC with an astral calendar, the first one found in Europe that shows the year starting at the dusk of the first day of spring. It is based on an Orion cycle, shown by precise sequence of constellations on a vessel found in an Eneolithic mound in the very center of the modern town of Vinkovci. The climatic conditions in that latitude bring about four yearly seasons. The simple explanation of the Vučedol Calendar is that each of the four lateral bands on the vessel represent the four seasons, starting with spring on the top. Each band is divided into twelve boxes, making up 12 "weeks" for each season. Each of the little boxes contains an ideogram of celestial objects that lie at a certain point on the horizon right after twilight. The place of reference on the horizon is the point at which (in those days) the Orion's Belt disappeared from view at the end of winter, which meant the beginning of a new year. The pictographs in the boxes represent: Orion, the Sun, Cassiopeia, Cygnus, Gemini, Pegasus, and the Pleiades. If the box is empty, it means there was nothing visible at the reference point during the corresponding time. Lifestyle and religion People of the Vučedol culture lived in thatched wattle-and-daub houses. Vučedol people lived on hilltop sites surrounded with palisades. Houses were half buried, mostly square or circular in plan with floors of burned clay;