Regional Formation and Development Studies

Article examines Klaipėda city and its suburban areas territorial change, as well as population change during the year 2005–2013. During these decades, cities experienced major changes because of previously created city models. Because of this, on these days it is still important to predict city’s future development, expansion and metamorphosis. Today it is very important to predict and make future prognoses of city development in case to avoid spatial planning failure, rising from social and demographical economical problems. Even today cities are facing sub-urbanization which leads to city emptiness. Therefore, article’s main aim is Klaipėda city and its suburban zones together with population future analysis and development. According to received Klaipėda city, city suburban areas and population change results during these eight years, the most important thing was to create and understand future of the city, suburban areas and population development in this area till the nearest 2020 year.

The Grebieten burial ground, situated in the former Kreis Fischhausen of the German Empire’s province of East Prussia, (currently in the Zelenogradskii district of the Kaliningrad oblast’, Russian Federation), represents a reference monument of Sambian-Natangian culture, and at the same time is one of its best investigated archaeological sites. However, a recent comparative analysis of the available sources of information showed that the modern state of knowledge is incomplete, while the research potential of the monument is far from being exhausted. This article gives an overview of the state of research, as well as of the open questions and gaps in our knowledge. Along with a description of the currently available sources of information and their limitations, the publication informs readers about recently conducted archaeological studies, performed both on the partially preserved prewar archaeological material and on the monument. Besides the actual reintroduction of Grebieten into scientific research, the authors point out its role and its significance in the much more complex archaeological context. The results of recent research suggest strongly that the Grebieten burial ground is part of a much larger complex of archaeological monuments situated along the western coast of the Sambian Peninsula, in the close vicinity of amber collecting areas. This settlement complex played an important role in the collection and trade in amber, which defined the nature of Sambian-Natangian culture in the Roman Iron Age and Migration Period. Further multilateral investigations of the Grebieten burial ground should lead to a clearer view of the settlement system, the social structure, everyday life and contacts of the population of Sambia in the Roman Iron Age.

This article addresses the complicated issues of the primary population of the forest zone in Eastern Europe at the turn of the Pleistocene-Holocene and the forms of its occupation by humans.