All sources, traditional (T), historical (H), and archaeological (A), are found on the virtual level S (i.e. temporally in the present). According to cultural types they are classified in three levels: G (gatherers-hunters), A (agrarian) and U (urban). Furthermore they are classified as either an 'autochthonous tradition' (parallelism, upwards) or are regarded as an 'accumulation' (diffusion from a higher level downwards), and are either dated or estimated. Structuro-historically, i.e. based on the ethno-historio-archaeologically densified source situation, it is possible to reconstruct certain continua in each cultural region and to analyze them with respect to interferences between the different levels. A Roman candelabra attributed to (U) can, because of its "fibroconstructive" structure, be related to (A) or (G). Its development can thus be reconstructed: certain elements could be of Mesolithic origin, the plant ornamentation would correspond to the Neolithic period, its bronze material links it with the Bronze Age, and its specific use is urban-Roman. Thus we will discover that many seemingly different objects are evidences of a very similar heterogeneous past in regard to conventional periodisation.

• NE+E...............Near East and Egypt
• MS...................Mediterranean Sea
• WE...................Western Europe
• CE...................Central Europe
• NE....................Northern Europe
• Us.....................Sources of historic urban cultures with script (Centralism and diffusion)
• As...............Sources of agrarian village cultures without script, but showing semantic cyclic rites as a vehicle of handing down highest values (isolated localism and autochthonous parallelism)
• Gs...............Sources of gatherers and huntersÕ cultures without script, but showing semantic cyclic rites as a vehicle of handing down highest values (pluritopological isolated localism and autochthonous parallelism)
• PH-H...............approximate borderline between prehistory and (written) history
• --->...............difference in cultural level and directions of acculturation
• I...............first sources of iron
• B...............first sources of bronze
• Co...............first sources of copper
• Ce...............first sources of pottery
• U...............level of urban cultures
• A...............agrarian village cultures
• G...............gatherers and huntersÕ cultures
• TRs...............traditional sources
• HIs...............historical sources
• ARs...............archaeological sources
• INT...............interferences between levels
• K...............Continuum to be reconstructed with structural-historical method
• t...............timescale

Simple phaseological model of settlement development according to territorial-historical criteria (change in the territorial and legal significance of the sacred sign (after Egenter 1984)

• t1-3............... Phases: t1 clan hamlet; t2 tribal settlement (village); t3 "town" with newcomers from other places (dependent tenant farmers, traders, artisans etc.)
• S1-3 ............... Social classes: S1, primary tier; S2 two-tiered; S3 threeÐtiered
• G ............... Founding line, develops into an aristocracy in phase t3 (dynasty of royals and princes)
• A ...............Descendant, without territorial rights, which must be bought at the price of dependence
• T ...............Territory, i. e. zone of the sign's validity, as based on the claim to founding rights
• W ...............Dwelling area
• TR ...............Sign of territorial rights: its significance increases with the growth of the settlement or with the rising importance of the founding line

Fig. 10 / I.....Sumerian written characters (Egenter 1984)

Fig. 10 / II......Cult huts, reed columns, and other ancient Sumerian cult signs: Babylonian-Assyrian trees of life (Andrae 193O, 1933; Heinrich 1957)

Fig. 10 /III.......Huts of the gods, primitive shrines, fetishes (Djed, Abydos) imperial unity pillars and other ancient Egyptian cult signs

Fig. 10 / IV.......Egyptian pillars of bundeled plants

Fig 10 / V.......Cult signs of Graeco-Roman antiquity

Fig. 10 / VI.......Western, central and northern European Middle Ages

Fig. 10/ VII.......PresentÐday: traditional substrate of agrarian village cultures

For this study a group of Austrian festivals with traditional cult signs were selected: maypole A, whipping posts B (Lungau) and C (Pongau), St.Benedict's plague candles D. Various analyses were undertaken to separate a traditional agrarian substrate from a superimposed Christian layer.

• I.....Morphological comparison of cult signs: the different forms reveal homologies and developmental connections.
  
• II.....Positions of the cult signs: in upright fixed phases, the traditional cult poles are erected either in front of or inside the chief Christian cult site (the church).
  
• III.....Morphology of the settlement, topology of the Christian cult sites and patterns of processions with traditional and Christian cult signs: the traditional elements of the processions point to pre-Christian systems of spatial order (paths, rivers, and streams or mountains and valleys).
  
• IV.....Social organizations and their functions with respect to the cult signs: the cult signs are interrelated in a socio-territorial sense. Case D in particular shows clear indications of a hierarchy among the houses of settlements determined by the genesis of the settlement.
  
• V.....Analysis of the procession with cult signs in village B: the accumulative character of the cult festival is quite obvious. The Christian layer E2 can be regarded as overlaying the traditionalist layer E1.

The schema shows three phases with autonomous villages (AV) at the very bottom. All are structured identically. On the second level three districts (HP) are dominated by a central village. The cults revolving around the renewal of the sacred markers are focused on the "princeÕs" sanctuary. Cult markers functioning as territorial law codex. Sacrifices as tributes. Signs can depict the relation by super- or infraposition. On the uppermost level the central settlement of group 2 has gained control over districts 1 and 3 and forms the centre of a city state, with centralized communications (tributes), state god, and state cult. As founder of the state, the king simultaneously is the highest priest (owner of the deity). His political legitimation is based on his relation with the deity and its territorial implications. The territoryÔs horizontal extension implies a vertical extension of the complementary upper domain: spherically it develops into the heaven of the state.