ANTH 201 - Final

Archaeological Fraud

*Piltodown Man *Newark Holy Stones: - Ancient Jewish MIgrants from the Holy Land - David Wyrick, a Land Surveyor and amateur archaeologist, in 1860, 'discovered' a 6 inch by 2.5 inch crudely made stone with modern Hebrew letters - He later discovered another stone written in ancient Hebrew, which seemed to be a version of the ten commandments - An obvious fraud *Moses Wilhelm Shapira, Jerusalem antiquities dealer 1870s-1880s - Produced a wide variety of fake antiquities and manuscripts which he sold to many of the worlds great museums, and high profile individuals - Interest in this period was sparked by the finding of such important archaeological finds as the Moabite Stone, which Shapira used to fake the characters on some artifacts

Uruk Mesopotamia

- 4000-3100 BC - In Uruk Mesopotamia (4000-3100 BC) we see the emergence of a number of indicators of social ranking - Long distance trade and acquisition of rare commodities as "prestige markers" among emerging elites within society - Written tablets (lists of property, commodities) - Personal seals (indicative of personal property) - Reflected in art, e.g. sculptures

Hierarchy or Heterachy?

- A key debate among archaeologists is the degree to which stratified or hierarchical societies are essential for emergence of complex societies - It is argued that in some case, especially among tribal or segmentary societies, the model of heterarchical organization best describes the decision-making process. - Heterarchical societies are not necessarily less complex than hierarchical ones, and can often accomplish quite complex tasks - Evidence for hierarchical societies is usually easier to see in the archaeological record, but it is important not to discount the role that heterarchical decision-making played in ancient societies - Heterarchical organization can still be a potent force in our modern world, dominated by nation states -- as al Qaida

UK Portable Antiquities Scheme

- "The Portable Antiquities Scheme is a DCMS (Department of Culture Media and Sport) funded project to encourage the volunteary recording of archaeological objects found by members of the public in England and Wales." - "Every year many thousands of objects are discovered, many of tehse by metal-detector users, but also by people whilst out walking, gardening or going about their daily work." - "Such discoveries offer an important source for understanding our past." The Treasure Act - All finders of gold and silver objects, and groups of coins from the same find spot, which are over 300 years old, have a legal obligation to report such items under the Treasure Act 1996. Now prehistoric base-metal assemblages found after 1st January 2003 also qualify as Treasure

Iron Deficiency

- Anemia - Characteristic 'hair-on-end' appearance, and thinning of compact bone - Cribra orbitalia: a porotic hyperostosis (porous bone growth) likely caused by iron deficiency

Development of metallurgy

- Copper: mid 5th millennium BC - Gold/Silver: early 4th millennium BC - Bronze (copper and tin): early 2nd millennium BC - Iron (alloy): mid 2nd millennium BC

Glass Forming Techniques

- Core-forming: forming glass around a "core" or organic material, then rolling and forming on a "marver" - Glass rods: pulling glass from the crucible and winding it as a coil around a core, can also be "marvered"--rolled as "canes" for later re-working - Cold-forming (cutting and abraiding) - Molding

The Uluburun Shipwreck Excavation

- Eleven consecutive campaigns of three to four months duration took place from 1984-1994, totaling 22,413 dives - More than 18,000 complete and partial artifacts recovered from the wreck - Artifact categories: shipping, raw materials (most important of the bunch), seals and stamps, ceramics, jewelry, weapons, miscellaneous Was it a royal cargo? - "Speak to the King of Egypt, my brother. Thus says the King of Alashiya, your brother: ... I have sent 500 (talents) of copper to you..." - Amarna letter 35 - The main cargo was approximately 10 tons of copper ingots, most likely from Cyprus in the form of 324 flat "oxhide" ingots, and about 120 discoid or "bun" or plano-convex ingots. - Also on board was a ton of tin ingots (the earliest securely dated) in both bun and "oxhide" shapes - 10 tons of copper and 1 ton of tin was the norm for bronze production in this period - Roughly 325 talents of copper recovered from the wreck (an amount one might expect in a royal shipment) Additional contents: - Canaanite pithoi--149 jars, 6.7 litres each, containing: terebinth resin (from pistachio plant), orpiment mixed with wax for use on writing tablets, olives (one amphora), wine (one amphora), almonds, safflower, figs, pine nuts, grapes, pomegranates, black cumin, sumac, coriander, wheat and barley - Exotic raw materials: elephant and hippo ivory, ostrich egg shells, ebony, murex shells (gives a purple dye which Romans love), Egypt glass ingots (x175; only pharaohs made glass, another indicator that it might be Royal) - Gold, silver and electrum scrap metal, namely a scarab seal of Nefertiti (means the wreck post-dates Nefertiti's rule--clear date indicator) - Cypriot pottery being sipped in a pithos--ringware made only in Cyprus - Evidence of ancient drug trade--vases shaped like opium plants (used to ship drugs across the Mediterranean); opium trade occurred all over the Eastern Mediterranean during the Bronze Age--temporal artefact - Myceneaen pottery - Tools and Weapons -- 3 Mycenaean bronze chisels, 2 Levavntine bronze adze, 2 Cannanite sword, 1 Myceanean sword, bronze trident with prings, North Balkan type shafted spear heads -- variety is more telling of the multiethnic crew's origins then ship's origin - Long-distance trade items (?)--baltic amber beads, ebony, scepter/mace from the North Balkans - Seals--Egyptian scarabs and plaque seal, Mycenaean lentoid seals, Kassite Babylonia, North Syrian (Faience), Old Babylonian (re-carved Assyrian)--different cultural elements found on seals - Religious iconography--Canaanite Astarte, sun disk, and crescent pendant and standing goddess, Egyptian Horus pendant and Bes figurines--reflects multi-ethnic nature of the crew - Ivory and bone objects - Beads--Mycenaean style Faience beads, baltic amber beads, assorted beads--suggests this cargo may come from a King and had multiethnic crew, shows extensive long-distance trade network--ended with the collapse of Bronze Age civilization in the 12th century - Anchors - Evidence of life onboard--knuckle bones (gambling, possibly divination), faience drinking cup, writing tablet, canaanite lamp, cypriot "wall bracket"

Who should the past belong to?

- Museums? - Nations? - Antiquity Collectors? - General Public? - Looters? - Developers? - Tourists? - Indigenous Peoples?

Ideology

- Primary area of interest to cognitive archaeology - One's system of ideas about society, culture, or politics - Divine right of kings, democracy, free-market capitalism, socialism, etc. - A set of ideas that makes sense of social organization, power relations, differential wealth, etc. - These are often manipulated to advance individual or group interests - Or to legitimize the status quo or to justify changing it

Ra I and II

- Reed boards sailed across the Atlantic Ocean from Morocco to the West Indies - Based on Egyptian models (drawings, mostly from the Old Kingdom) - Ra I - 1969 - unsuccessful - Ra II - 1970 - successful - Proved simple boats could cross the Atlantic - Related to very controversial debate that European and Indigenous technologies are similar--possible suggestion that Europeans arrived in the Americas at the same time as or perhaps before Indigenous peoples because their flint technologies are similar; very racially charged. DNA doesn't indicate Indigenous people came from Europe. Was there interaction between these populations? Did they just arrive at the same technologies independently? Interpretation of what the resemblance in flint technologies means depends on one's preconceptions.

Chaine Operatoire

- Sequence of manufacturing steps or operational sequence - Primary reduction, secondary reduction, tool production

Pottery

- The earliest pottery (fired clay) comes from the Yarmoukian culture in the Levant (modern Isreal and Jordan) and dates to just before 6000 BC. - Pottery shaping techniques: pinch pots, coil pots, etc. - Pottery firing technologies: pit firing (difficult to control), up-draft pottery kiln

The individual in society

- The emergence of individuals appears within the first sedentarized societies during the Natufian period in the Levant (12,000 BP) - Evidence from burials and of personal adornments - This new area of focus appeared because, when people settled down, they all formed a big collective group, people increasingly felts the need to set themselves apart individually

Primary burial

- The initial or direct inhumation of the fully articulated corpse. - Deposited with the intention that they remain in a final grave and are generally well articulated

Syro-Palestinian States

- This is seen historically in the Tell el-Amarna letters, an archive of diplomatic correspondence on clay tablets (in Akkadian) between the Egyptian administration and client states in Canaan, and with kings of other empires

Early Copper Metallurgy

- Wax cast technique - Early mining: trying to extract as much copper as possible, production of copper was a restricted knowledge - Signs include rounded was, pick marks and axes - Smelted in crucible, heated at very high temperatures - Very long process - Probably had socio-political ramifications - Very "magical"--maybe part of the reason it was so restricted

Glass Rods

- pulling glass from the crucible and winding it as a coil around a core, can also be "marvered" - rolled as "cane" for later re-working

Key issues in the debate about the nature of society in Neolithic villages

- the role of religion in negotiating social boundaries - ascribed versus achieved status, as seen through burial practices - the increase in evidence for complex organization and control of labour.

Why did Bradley dull the edges of those flakes produced prior to working them into tools? What effect does this have on the stone tool reduction process?

4. Bradley dulled the edges of the flakes produced prior to working them into tools in order to strengthen them before he struck them.

What procedure and tool was used by Bradley in order to notch the base of the projectile point? What precautions or principles were used in order to assure that the notches were successfully completed?

9. To notch the base of the projectile point, Bradley uses a little spatula-shaped piece of antler to remove small pressure flakes from each side of the based of the point. With each move, Bradley had to be careful to create a sharp angle so that the next flake could be removed, otherwise he would not have been able to remove any more pressure flakes.

Inhumation

Burial; act of depositing in the ground

Ordering of space in local contexts

Ideas of how to structure one's environment. E.g.: Indus Valley cities, Mohenjodaro (early third millennium B.C.); one of the most extreme cases of city planning in early times, very structured local environment

Evidence Disease and Trauma

Includes a range of infectious and degenerative diseases and injury ('trauma'). - Mass graves (e.g. English civil war -- "Roundhead" burial pit at York; mass-beheadings -- viking/Saxon massacre pit at Weymouth; modern examples such as in former Yugoslavia) - Blunt Force Trauma (e.g. as caused by Egyptian battle axe and Hyksos swords used in Thebes and Avaris conflict)

Copper Slag

Iron, silica + other impurities

Bone Growth

Long bone length reflects growth in stature with increased age. *There are obviously conditions that stunt growth, but this applies overall.

Cremation

The reduction of a dead human body to inorganic bone fragments by intense heat in a specifically designed retort or chamber.

Which analytical techniques to use?

Thin-section petrography + Easy and inexpensive to produce samples and analyze + Allows for large numbers of analyses to be undertaken + Ease of use allows wide comparison with other data sets - Takes some time to learn about optical mineralogy Neutron activation analysis (NAA) + High precision of measurement of multiple elements of ppb. - Requires source of irradiation and sophisticated counting technology - Not commonly used due to need for a reactor (fewer available) Atomic Absorption Spectrometry (AAS) + High precision of measurement of multiple elements to ppb. - Requires digestion of ceramics and sophisticated equipment to measure samples - Laborious and expensive

What are the six forensic indicators of cannibalism which Turner has enumerated?

Turner wanted to make the test for cannibalism as severe as possible, so, using the science of taphonomy, he enumerated six forensic indicators of cannibalism: a. Breakage such as the fresh cracks in the skull indicating trauma at or around the time of death, or long bones broken to the same length as animal bones in order to fit in cooking vessels or shattered to extract bone marrow; b. Cutting in the bones, namely tiny v-shaped grooves in the bones not caused by erosion or the teeth-marks of carnivores or scavengers, but sharp parallel cuts from stone tools slicing away flesh and muscle; c. Burning on the outside of the top and sides, but not the face, of skulls indicating that the whole skull was placed in a fire to roast the brains inside; d. Anvil abrasions, the distinctive scraping as bone is smashed between stones and which cannot occur when the bone is heavily covered with muscle tissue; e. Polishing on the ends of bone segments distinctive of being stirred around in a pot with a rough interior; and f. Missing vertebrae which are distinctly absent from the remains because they were smashed to extract their bone marrow.

Age Determination

Two kinds of age determination: 1. <25 years: estimates based on developmental changes: dental formation and eruption, bone growth, epiphyseal fusion 2. >25 years: estimates based on degenerative changes; greater environmental influence (diet, exercise, pathology, lifestyle)

Levallois technique

a middle paleolithic technique that made use of prepared cores to produce uniform flakes

Julian Steward

developed the concept and method of cultural ecology; cultures interact with each other and the environment

Debitage

the by-products or waste materials left over from the manufacture of stone tools.

Neutron Activation Analysis (NAA)

- A method used in the analysis of artifact composition which depends on the excitation of the nuclei of the atoms of a sample's various elements, when these are bombarded with slow neutrons. The method is accurate to about plus or minus 5 percent. - Process of neutron capture by a target nucleus followed by the emission of gamma rays - Technique useful for performing both qualitative and quantitative multi-element analysis of major, minor, and trace elements in samples - Induced nuclear reactions on samples followed by measurement of the induced radioactivity to facilitate both qualitative and quantitative identification of the elements present in the samples - The basic essentials required to carry out an analysis of samples by NAA are: 1) a source of neutrons (i.e. a nuclear reactor), 2) instrumentation suitable for detecting gamma rays, 3) and a detailed knowledge of the reactions that occur when neutrons interact with target nuclei. - Can identify where the pottery is coming from - Need a basin of comparison to make it useful - Always choose technique based on specific questions you need answered

Nahal Qanah Cave

- About 4000 BC - Six are electrum (70% gold, 30% silver), and two are 100% pure gold - All cast within open molds may of clay or sand

Types of Disease

- Acute infection: recovery/death within a matter of days--no evidence on bone (e.g. flu virus) - Chronic infection: 'subacute', long-term infections--may leave evidence on bone (e.g. tuberculosis, treponemal infections, leprosy)

Ley Lines

- Alleged alignments of ancient sites or holy places, such as stone circles, standing stones, cairns, and churches. - Ley lines /leɪ laɪnz/ are apparent alignments of landmarks, religious sites, and man-made structures. The pseudoscientific belief that these apparent lines are not accidental speculates that they are straight navigable paths and have spiritual significance.

Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy

- An analytical technique that uses light absorption to measure the concentration of a metal in a sample. - A powdered sample of the ceramics to be examined (typically 10-100 mg) is dissolved in an aqueous liquid which is then atomized in a flame - A beam of light of controlled wavelength is shone through the flame to a detector on the other side. - The wavelength is selected so that atoms of the element under study will absorb some of the light and so will not reach the detector - The amount of energy absorbed is directly proportional to the concentration of the element in the sample - Very labour-intensive technique, why it is not used much anymore

Culture-Historical Approach

- An approach to archaeological interpretation that uses the procedure of the traditional historian (including emphasis on specific circumstances elaborated with rich detail, and processes of inductive reasoning). - Childe made explicit the assumption that a recurring collection or assemblage of artefacts should be termed a "culture", and taken as the material equipment of a particular group of people. - Childe's work is therefore important largely because he moved beyond the simple classification and chronological questions and concerned himself with the process of change in past societies. - In "Man Makes Himself" (1936), Childe tried to answer the questino of why civilization had arisen in the Near East - Childe was influenced by the Russian Revolution and Marxism - Influenced his theories of change in past societies - The "Neolithic Revolution" which gave rise to domestication - The "Urban Revolution" and the rise of the first urban towns in the Ancient Near East - Chile is a significant figure because he was the first to move beyond simple questions of classification and chronology or the development of 'cultural sequences' - Focused on trying to understand how and why things changed in the past - Childe also did a great deal to bring the study of the past to ordinary people, through his popular (non-academic) writing, with books such as "What Happened in History"

Processual Archaeology (New Archaeology)

- An approach to archaeology based firmly on scientific method and supported by a concerted effort aimed at the development of theory - In 1958, Gordon WIlley and Philip Phillips wrote "Method and Theory in American Archaeology", arguing for an emphasis on the process of social and cultural change in the past - From this came the phrase "processual archaeology" - Basically an attempt to explain how and why change occurs - An equally important task, however, was to dewscribe and explain stability or lack of change - This was particularly significant to processual archaeologists who viewed culture through an evolutionary perspective - In an evolutionary perspective, change was inherent in the system, and when no change took place the archaeologist was faced with a different but equally important case to explain (change isn't always inherent or positive) - The goal of processual archaeology differed from those of the culture historian and had four main goals, each of which may or may not be related to the others: 1) to explain why the culture has taken its observed form over time, 2) to document and then explain internal variability within the culture, thus avoiding the normative model, 3) to document how cultures interact with other cultures and with non-cultural components like the environment, 4) to explain how and why interactions work to effect the cultural consequences they produce - There were two distinctly different approaches to doing processual archaeology: 1) general covering laws, 2) systems models

The development of pyrotechnology to make glass

- Approximately 1600 BC - Starts in Mesopotamia (makers of artificial Lapis Lazuli -- the desire for rare minerals drives the production of glass) - Spreads to Egypt about 1550 BC - Egyptians also make green glass in imitation of turquoise - Starts with Egyptian faience amulets and beads ( "pre-glass", closer to clay)

Why is non-publishing so bad?

- Archaeological resources are unique and finite, so once it is excavated, a site is forever changed or destroyed. Only the artifacts and records of excavation remain - The ethical responsibility is to collect and record everything to the best of your ability--and to publish it - Since most archaeology is done with public funds, it is also fraudulent not to complete the research by not publishing

Gobekli Tepe

- Archaeological site in present day Turkey, advanced in terms of tools and architecture, one of the oldest examples of organized civilization and archaeology. - 10,000 BC - Likely erected by hunter-gatherers in the 10th millennium BCE (c. 12,000 years ago) - What were they doing here that required such a complex--when they were not even building houses yet?

Study of distribution in the trade cycle

- Archaeologists are more and more concerned with identifying patterns of distribution of objects and commodities in past societies - This is primarily because we want to track interactions in the past, the influences and ideas which may have accompanied these transactions - This is often done by trying to isolate the origin of specific types of materials found on archaeological sites, and working back to try to understand not only the mechanisms of exchange, but also what this may have meant to the groups/cultures involved in the exchange - The further back in time we go however, this becomes more and more tenuous in terms of identifying both mechanisms and the role that exchange played in society - One of the earliest examples of distribution in prehistoric societies concerns the sourcing of a variety of rock types used to Neolithic societies - In ancient Western Asia and the Eastern Mediterranean, the early use of obsidian, a volcanic glass can be sourced to specific ancient volcanic flows in Anatolia (modern Turkey), and tracked throughout much of the Western Asia and the Mediterranean - The widespread distribution of obsidian can be identified through 'trace element' analysis - It was one of the earliest examples of extensive trade, but exactly what the exchange mechanisms were is difficult to assess - One way that this can be assessed is through plotting the relationship between the quantity of a specific traded type of item and the distance from the sources

Archaeologists, Ethics and the Public

- Archaeologists have an ethical responsibility to not only conduct their work to the highest possible standards, but to explain their work to the public at large - Reporting is done at a variety of levels, some popular, others more formal final reports for professional colleagues - Unfortunately archaeology has a publishing problem and many archaeologists excavate much more than they can analyze or publish in their lifetime - The statistics are shocking

Production, Consumption and Distribution

- Archaeologists studying trade and exchange must realize that the study of trade and exchange is only part of a much larger circle of interaction - It is only one part of a complex cycle of events which we describe as production, consumption and distribution - Distribution is the 'middle' process in the cycle, between production and consumption, but each part of the cycle is 'influenced' by the other parts of the cycle - As archaeologists who are interested in the 'big picture' of human interactions, we have to look at all of these components, and try to understand the complete system - By looking at the complete system we can often say much more about the producers, distributors and consumers, than if we looked at each part of the cycle in isolation

Religion

- Area of interest to cognitive archaeology - Religion is hard to define, although we all think we know it when we see it - We could define it as one's understanding of the supernatural and one's relation to it (may overlap somewhat with cosmology) - Cult: the totality of external religious practice and observance. A pattern of ritual behaviour in connection with specific objects, within a framework of spatial and temporal coordinates - Ritual: stereotyped activities carried out in accordance with religion (and to some extent with cosmology). - Often intended to influence the world by influencing the supernatural; in this case it verges more towards cosmology

Trade and Exchange

- As in so many areas of archaeology we are more interested in the human beahviour than simply in the material remains of the past - This however is usually difficult, and we must inevitably work back from the material remains of the past to reconstruct these past human actions (and inter-actions - In trade and exchange perhaps the most important thing that was exchanged were ideas, but of course this is fairly difficult (but not impossible) to track archaeology - Another fairly common aspect of exchange was in marriage partners, and we know that this likely happened from early prehistory - This of course is now possible to consider in terms of various types of DNA studies (specific haplotypes such as mitochondrial DNA) - The archaeological investigation of trade and exchange is most often concerned with objects, but also with commodities - It is these objects and commodities which provide us with the material or prima facie evidence for contact, interaction and exchange in the past - These material remains are therefore the starting point in most considerations of trade and exchange in archaeological contexts - But we try to mode beyond simply the analysis of things, to consider human actions - We are therefore concerned with the rasons behind trade and exchange, the social mechanisms (behaviour) as well as with the longer-term impact of these exchanges on human populations - Essentially looking at remains to infer social behaviour

Ascribed vs. Achieved Status

- Ascribed status is based on clearly identifiable characteristics (gender, age, race) while achieved status is acquired via direct individual efforts - Terms developed by Ralph Linton in "The Study of Man" (1936)

Ascribed Status

- Assigned to individuals without reference to their innate differences or abilities - Position is assigned to individuals or groups based on traits beyond their control - Accident of birth may determine someone's ascribed status - Evidenced in neolithic burials,

Foragers as a percentage of world population

- At 12,000 BC (end of the Pleistocene), about 10 million (100% foragers) - In 1960, 3 billion (0.001% foragers - In 2005, exceeded 6 billion (virtually no foragers)

Agency THeory

- Attempts to recover our understanding of the individual in the past - Agency theory is a way to try to separate out individuals and understand their actions and role in social change - It also attempts to understand the role that agents play in the construction and maintenance of large social structures - One of the problems with this approach of focusing on the individual is whether all societies shared the same view of the individual

State Sponsored Trade

- Both between the large empires of the period (Egypt, Hati (Hattites), Mitanni, Babylon), as well as with the smaller client states of these empires - Kings of these empires, regularly exchanged gifts, of various kinds, to forge and maintain relationships between these empires - Exchanges included rare and important objects and commodities - Spouses to cement marriage alliances between the families or to make peace treaties - Also included the 'loan' of specific types of craftsmen, which were able to transfer 'technologies' between regions and cultures

Gift Exchange and Reciprocity

- Bronislaw Malinowski ("Argonauts of the Western Pacific," 1922) - Long-distance gift-exchange network in Melanesia by canoe (kula)--the Kula Network - Transfer of gifts, solidifies relationships (often with feasting) but also confers obligations on recipient in terms of reciprocity - Acceptance of the gift implies the obligation of re-payment with another gift at a later date

Explanations of change in past societies

- Catastrophe Theory - Non-linear dynamics / chaos theory - Environmental explanation (environmental determinism) - Demographic change (Binford's theory of the origins of agriculture due to population pressure) - Economic explanations (Marxist) - Post-processual explanations

Explaining Change in Past Societies

- Change through time are clearly evident in the archaeological record - Archaeologist try to make sense of these changes in terms of a variety of causative factors - The way in which we try to interpret culture change from the archaeological record depends upon our theoretical perspective and upon our perceptions and preconceptions (our biases) - Our biases change over time; evolving theoretical perspective - Published record of the past shows evolution of thinking

Mortality Profiles

- Charts that depict the various ages of death of a burial population - Can reveal a number of things

Chiefdoms

- Chiefdoms see the rise of 'ranked societies' - This is where we really begin to see obvious social differentiation between people - this is seen in the archaeological record in the emergence of 'elites' - the ranking is often obviously seen in the acquisition of items of specialized production, rare trade goods

Great Zimbabwe

- City, now in ruins (in the modern African country of Zimbabwe), whose many stone structures were built between about 1250 and 1450, when it was a trading center and the capital of a large state. - Initially believed by white colonists to souther Africa to have been built by "more civilized" populations, and not the ancestors of the local Shona people due to the scale and complexity of the structures.

Characteristics of systems according to processual archaeologists

- Closed systems eventually reach a state of stable equilibrium - Open systems, depended heavily on energy exchange with the environment - because energy can be incorporated into the system, the open system can grow and differentiate, sometimes undergoing significant transformations in the process - Open systems were thought to be characterized by unstable equilibrium - Open systems could therefore maintain their structure to a certain extent by means of homeostasis--a process that operated to keep the system in equilibrium in the face of changing surroundings through negative feedback - "a situation where a small disturbance can lead to a great change in the state of a system, or even to a restructuring of its components"

Core forming

- Coils of glass wrapped around core of organic material over a rod, cooled and then center removed. - Drawbacks: only for very small items, expensive

William Rathje

- Coined the term "garbology" which is the study of refuse and trash; he excavates landfills. - "It is from the discards of former civilizations that archaeologists have reconstructed most of what we know about the past..."

Primary Areas of Interest to Cognitive Archaeology

- Cosmology - Religion, cult, and ritual - Ideology - Iconography and symbols

Dental Hypoplasia

- Counting the number of linear enamel hypoplasias allows one to estimate the period of time during which enamel growth was disrupted due to stress (usually nutritional stress)

Changing "Paradigms" in Archaeology

- Culture-Historical Approach: explanation of archaeological data in terms of reference to individual cases, moving from specific data via "common sense" to interpretations of the data (empirical method); some people still adhere to this paradigm - "New" Archaeology -- Processual Approach: explanation of archaeological data based upon "scientific methodology" ("hypothetico-deductive method"--hypothesis testing); development of theories which promoted generalization; Watson, LeBlanc, and Redman--"Explanation in Archaeology" (1971; classic textbook) - Post-Processual Archaeologies: reaction to the processual approach; favours plurality of approaches and interpretations; worried that processuals weren't giving enough consideration to variety of perspective; whole segments of the past had gone comlpetey unstudied/unrecognized before post-processual archaeologies (e.g. children, women, etc.)

Coloured glass

- Dark blue = cobalt (alum with cobalt) - White = tin oxide - Black = manganese - Red = copper oxide (cuprite) - Green = copper - Yellow = antimony - De-color = manganese oxide (later)

Classification of societies

- Developed by Elman Service (1915-1996) in his book "Primitive Social Organization: An evolutionary perspective" (1971) - Four-fold classification of society: bands (mobile hunter-gatherers), tribes (segmentary societies), chiefdoms, states

Diffusionist/Migrationist Explanations

- Developed by Thor Heyerdahl, a Norwegian explorer, adventurer - Tracing connections between ancient cultures, e.g. trying to link pyramids in diverse cultures - Heyerdalh did experiments to see if people could travel from one continent to the other using primitive technologies (e.g. to see if diffusion could have occurred): Ra I and II (reed boats across the Atlantic), Kon Tiki (balsa wood raft across the Pacific)

Central Place Theory

- Developed by Walter Christaller, 1933) - Basic tenet: In a uniform landscape, the spatial patterning of settlements would be perfectly regular, forming interconnecting hexagons - Developed to help explain the spacing and function of settlements in a landscape - In an ideal landscape the patterning should be regular, reflecting geometric patterns of sites equidistant from each other - Larger sites surrounded by smaller secondary and tertiary sites - In reality this is quite rare, since the pattern of relationships is more complex, and affected by other factors (like the landscape) - So, the actual model of Central Place Theory is an ideal template for thinking about how sites are organized in relation to each other, rather than a working model. Site hierarchy - Simplified hierarchy of site types - Hypothetical site hierarchy on the ground, with the major regional centers serving secondary centers spaced at regular intervals. These in turn serve larger villages and their networks of hamlets.

Biblical Archaeology

- Discovering ancient texts and artifacts that date back to biblical times - E.g. Joash tablet, 'House of the Lord' ostracon, temple pomegranite

Lithic Technology

- During the Upper Paleolithic (c. 35,000 years ago) blade technology became dominant - Blades were removed from a core, which could be retouched to form other tool types (scrapers, burins, borers) - The production of these flakes and blades produces not only the blank tool type, but also leaves distinctive cores and vast amounts of debitage (discarded waste product of knapping). - Archaeologists study not only the tools produced, but also the cores and debitage in order to understand the tool production techniques used

Should the past belong to looters?

- E.g. the stele of King Naram-Sin of Akkad commemorating his victory against the Lullubi people (2250 B.C.) was taken as war plunder about a thoudand years later by the Elamites who relocated it to their capital in Susa; Baghdad Archaeological Museum, Iraq; headdress of Puabi stripped of its gold; illicit digging and smuggled antiquities, including ancient cuneiform tablets, from Iraq - Looters monetize the past regardless of its historical value for humanity

Should the past belong to developers?

- E.g.: Beirut--development work following the destruction large parts of the city after the civil war

Should the past belong to tourists?

- E.g.: Egypt's Valley of the Kings--very large numbers of tourists are causing long-term damage to many of the tombs, due to the humidity and fungus generated by their breath in the tombs, seepage of waste water from tourist facilities into the local geology is also causing cracking in may tombs; Machu Picchu--pre-Columbian, Inca empire site that is locate almost 8,000 above the sea level, chosen as one of UNESCO's "new seven world wonders", up to 2000 visitors visit the site every day, could increase up to 5000, largest threat is from erosion as tourists clamber over the ruins

Iron Metallurgy

- Early use of iron included hematite, bog iron, and meteorites - Most iron production doesn't really begin until the late second millennium BC

Bands as Egalitarian Societies

- Egalitarian societies are defined as societies in which all members have equal access to resources (principally food resources) - Most often thought to be small groups of less than 100 (Service's 'bands') of mobile hunter-gatherers, non-sedentary - Egalitarian societies have informal leadership structure - Early village level societies were also likely egalitarian at the beginning, but we start to see the emergence of status quite early in the archaeological record. - Debates about the nature of society in Neolithic villages revolve around a number of key issues: the role of religion in negotiating social boundaries, ascribed versus achieved status, as seen through burial practices, the increase in evidence for complex organization and control of labour.

Treponemal Infections

- Endemic/Venereal Syphilis - Caused by spirochete bacteria from the genus Treponema - Distinguished by frequency of bone involvement, age at onset, and geography - Causes saber shin, skull lesions Venereal Syphilis - Approx. 10-12% exhibit skeletal lesions - 1st, 2nd, and 3rd stages (final stage -- skeletal involvement) -- tibia, knee joint - Classic lesions on skull -- 'Caries sicca'

Systems Theory's Beneficial Aspects

- Explanation and production of generalizations about the processes of cultural change - Avoidance of monocausal explanations of change - A preference to see the inter-relatedness of various parts of the system, in the cause of an event or change - One of the key strengths of Systems Theory was thought (incorrectly) to be the fact that by modeling and generalizations about how systems worked, it was thought possible to predict or infer aspects about a culture or system, where only part of the system was known or identifiable

Different types of inhumations

- Flexed burials (can vary across cultures and eras) - Supine burial - With or without the skull

Male vs Female Pelvis

- Generally considered best for sex determination - Related to features associated with females and childbearing - Accuracy of approximately 95% - Combined skull and pelvis accuracy of about 98% - Borader hips - Iliac bones more flared more distance between ischial spines and ischial tuberosities - Lighter bones Pelvin Basin - Narrower in males - Round (or heart-shaped) and open in females Sciatic Notch - Wider in females - Narrow in males Subpubic Angles - Large in females (greater than 90 degrees) - Narrow in males (less than 90 degrees)

General Systems Theory

- Grounded in a scientific/engineering models of systems (cybernetics) - The system can be divided into a number of "sub-systems" (reflective different parts of the whole) - These systems overlap/intersect and influence each other - Systems were usually described as "open" or "closed" - An open system is one into which energy flows (or matter or information) - A closed system, receives no such external input - In a broad sense, then, it is input or lack of input that defines whether system is closed or open - Archaeologists ran into troubles when they were too structured/rigid - Interesting because it highlighted interconnectedness

Shaft Furnace

- Heat of the furnace, charcoal mixed with crushed iron ore - Mix of ore and charcoal in the top half of the iron smelting furnace - Charcoal in the bottom half - The mass of molten metal and waste (called a bloom) forms in the bottom of the furnace - Hot bloom is removed from the bottom of the furnace - Bloom composed of slag and iron particles, iron - The bloom is then forged to remove impurities, and create an iron ingot that can be re-heated and worked

Archaeological Legislation in Canada

- In Canada legislation governing the protection of archaeological sites, control over site excavation/disruption, and the ownership of artifacts is covered by a variety of both Federal and Provincial laws depending on circumstances - Federal law applies on lands under Federal jurisdiction (national parks, lands belonging to Federal departments, i.e. National Defense) - Federal laws are not as precise as Provincial ones, but among provinces there is a wide variety of how these laws apply - E.g.: these laws apply to all evidence of human occupation that comes out of the ground (or underwater); everywhere, except Alberta, these laws apply to such items not only in the ground, but on the ground

Establishing the nature and scale of society

- In any inquiry about the social past, the first question to address is size or scale. - e.g. what was the scale of the largest social unit and what kind of society, in a very broad sense was it?

Cultural Resources Management in the UK

- In the UK the laws regarding archaeological sites and finds are quite complicated - Particularly true for items of precious metals under the Treasure Act (1996) - Under the Act any "treasure" regardless of the circumstances in which it was deposited, belongs to the Crown - In general archaeological sites are added to each counties "Sites and Monuments Register", which is a list of all recorded archaeological sites and data - There is also a national organization called "English Heritage" (officially Historic Building and Monuments Commission for England - HMCE) has a broad remit of managing the historic built environment of England - It also maintains the nation public archive, "The National Monuments Register" - On "The National Heritage List" for England, you can search for: listed buildings, scheduled monuments, protected wreck sites, registered parks and gardens, registered battlefields, world heritage sites, current building preservation notices (BPNs)

Some basic terminology for intentional deposition

- Initial distinctions can be made in the treatment of the corpse between cremation and inhumation - Burials (inhumations) can be Primary or Secondary - It is usually quite clear whether the burial is Primary or Secondary, since in secondary burials it is quite common for many of the small bones to be absent

Intensification of copper production

- Introduction of "shaft and gallery" mining - Development of smelting "furnaces - Increased production of copper - Evidence of intensified mining: mine shaft, tailings, backfilling of non-ore bearing rock - Natural draft smelting furnaces dominate most of the hills of the Faynan region - E.g. Khirbat Hamra Ifdan (KHI): early copper manufacturing site, due to "Pompeii Effect" contained sealed rooms due to building collapse, density of metallurgical artifacts plotted on GIS map, evidence of copper casting - Flat casting of copper into clay molds to make a tool

Nutrient-Deficiency Syndromes

- Iron Deficiency (Anemia) - Scurvy - Rickets

Field recording

- It is common when excavating human remains to take great care in sampling the matrix (sub-sampling inside the grave), especially the soil near the abdominal area--to see whether any evidence of the content of the digestive tract remains (e.g. parasites) - As part of the process of recovering human remains on an archaeological site, archaeologists try to ensure that they are able to record as much information as possible in the field (e.g. make Harris Matrices) - Human bones in archaeological contexts are usually quite fragile and poorly preserved so a great deal of care must be taken in both excavation and removal of the skeletal remains - A great deal of information is recorded during the excavation of the human remains, all of which may prove useful (often vital) to the understanding of the archaeological context - Most archaeologists use forms as "aide-mémoires" to remember what to record in the site - Information on the size, shape and orientation of the burial chamber or grave is recorded - In almost all circumstances the skeletal remains are completely exposed before anything is moved - The position and relationship between the bones provide evidence on the burial postures - Archaeologists protect already excavated parts from the elements as the excavate the rest - Sometimes some conservation in the field is required - It is vital to record the precise location, position and identity of the bones in the grave, as well as the relationship to any grave goods

Staffordshire Hoard

- Largest collection of Anglo-Saxon gold and silver ever found, discovered 2009 - Discovered in a field near the village near Lichfield, in Staffordshire, England in 2009, it consists of over 3,500 items - The hoard was valued at 3.285 million pounds

Why might archaeologists not publish enough?

- Laze or incompetence, like people everywhere - A preference to dig new sites than devote time to laborious analysis and writing - Archaeologists often fail to allocate sufficient funds for post-excavation work - Pressures of teaching/mandatory fieldwork leave insufficient time for analysis and writing - In some countries (Isreal, Cyprus, Egypt) permits are now being withheld for archaeologists who have failed to publish enough of their excavations - Other sources of pressure, from peers, and through professional association also help - One philanthropist was so disturbed he created a series of significant grants only for publication of unpublished excavations, hoping to wave the carrot instead of the stick

Examples of mortality profiles

- Life and Death at Avaris, Egypt (capital of Hyksos, about 1700-1550 BC): prepared 'warrior' graves and the so-called 'plague horizon' (scattered skeletal remains, tumbled into pits) - Bimodal distribution: high infant mortality and high mortality in adults 20-40 y/o (warfare? death in childbirth?)

Thin-section Petrographic Analysis

- Light is transmitted through the sample in both plane-polarized light and cross-polarized light 1) Ceramic section cut and ground optically flat 2) Sample mounted on a glass slide and ground smooth until the sample is only 30 microns thick - Using a microscope with two polarizing filters set at right angles to each other, the optical properties of the minerals in the think section alter the colour and intensity of the light as seen by the viewer - As different minerals have different optical properties, most rock forming minerals can be easily identified - This technique was initially developed for geologists but also useful for archaeologists to study ceramics - Pottery a sort of artificial sedimentary rock--you can determine origin based on minerals

Stature

- Like sex and age, estimates of stature are based upon skeletal stature traits from historical and modern populations - We use this data to work back to past populations - Measurements of known height, body proportions, and the length of long bones in different populations are expressed in mathematical formulas that can be applied to bones from the archaeological recard - Race is a term no longer in favor with anthropologists, but it is clear from the archaeological record that populations that maintain some level of reproductive isolation from other populations may possess traits that make them distinctive - Many possess traits that make them distinctive from other populations - Due to the fact that skeletal characteristics are inherited and follow the rules of genetics, skeletal traits seem to be statistically significant for specific geographic regions and populations - In order to see this however you need a wide sample of a population to infer specific characteristics for the population group - We use a combination of metric (measurable) and non-metric (observable) skeletal traits to determine specific population groups

The Uruk World System

- Long-enduring theory, very impactful--30 years later still hotely debated - Basically a colonial model--maps well onto Wallerstein's model - 4th millennium BC Mesopotamia - The earliest cities are thought to have spread north from southen Mesopotamia to "colonize" areas which had necessary raw materials, such as wood, metals, building and precious stones--which they were lacking - Algaze calls this the earliest example of imperialism, domination of other regions and cultures for the extraction of raw materials or resources

Harris Lines

- Longitudinal cracks located at the ends of long bones; indicative of dietary stress during physical development - Growth arrest lines - Dense lines parallel to the growth plates of long bones on radiographs, representing temporary slowing or cessation of longitudinal growth - This is usually indicative of "nutritional stress" caused by malnutrition

Stable Isotopes in Maize in North America

- Maize has different photosynthetic pathway that all native North American food plants - It discriminates slightly in favor of heavier isotopes of carbon - Tissues of maize-eaters have different 13C/12C ratio than the tissues of eaters of native North American plants - The 13C/12C ratio of human tissue allows us to measure actual dietary % of maize

Famine as depicted in ancient records

- Many cultures have written and created art which record famine or food shortage in the past - Some of the earliest examples come from the Old Kingdom (the pyramid age) in Egypt, where reliefs show starving Egyptians

Death and Social Status

- Mortuary remains are one important source of information on extinct political systems - Social ties existed between the living and once living, and the ceremonial connections at death reflect these social relations - Mortuary rituals reflect who people were and the relationships they had with others when they were alive

Various positions for primary burials

- Most commonly burials are extended or supine - In some cultures and quite commonly in the past, burials were often flexed - In both cases the orientation of the body can be an important factor, as is the degree to which the body was flexed

Discussion of Paleolithic Figurines

- Mostly female - All ages and body shapes - Some faceless, some not - Some with headgear or hairdos - What were the creators of these figurines thinking? Fertility? Religious, ritual goddesses? Sex? (Made by men?) Pregnancy, magic talisman for childbirth? (Made by women?) Ideal body type? Different things in different times and places?

Leprosy

- Mycobacterium leprae - Slow developing disease - Probably spread from person to person via respiratory droplets - Possibly skin-to-skin contact from an ulcerated, infected lesion - Presents as characteristic deformity and loss of finders and toes, slow resorption of hands and feet

Tuberculosis

- Mycobacterium tuberculosis - An infectious disease that may affect almost all tissues of the body, especially the lungs - Mainly evidenced on thoracic and lumbar vertebrae - 1st degree identified by lesions on the vertebral column - Pott's disease (tuberculosis spondylitis), inter-vertebral disc tissue death leading to disc collaps - Hip and knee joins also affected

Uses of Archaeology

- Nationalism and symbols; e.g. Saddam Hussein, heir to the great leaders of Mesopotamia; Masada, palace of Herod the Great, in Israel, the last remaining holdout of the Zealots after the destruction of Jerusalem, mass suicide rather than surrender; Macedonian Nationalism, Macedonian Empire of Alexander the Great; destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas in 2001 by the Taliban because they conflicted with Sharia law; destruction of Nimrud by ISIS militants; destruction of the Temple of Baal at Palmya by ISIS militants; renaissance and English civil war iconoclasm;

Orientation of the local with the 'cosmos'

- Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments of Europe are oriented with key seasonal sunrises. - Neolithic and Bronze Age long barrows (chambered tombs) are also oriented with key sunrise events, which illuminate the hallway of their chamber - Neolithic and Bronze Age burial markers also mark out a landscape or territory, perhaps even a 'sacred landscape' of specific populations, who use the burials as key indicators of tribal/clan/family control

Nutrition

- Nutrition is increasingly of interest to bioarchaeologists - Understanding what ancient populations ate and how this affected their health is dependent upon how humans interacted with their environment - Whether they favored specific agricultural crops, were dependent upon meat (hunted or domesticated), or were largely dependent upon seafood resources tell us a great deal about the population - In understanding nutrition, bioarchaeologists use a variety of techniques, including the analysis of specific traits on the skeleton, as well as increasingly chemical analysis of the bone for clues to specific diets

Hypercoherence

- Occurs when the stability of the system depends upon the maintenance of exact relationships between the integral parts of the system - This means that the system is so integrated that change in any one sub-system effects changes in the remainder, and will effect sudden change often in an extreme way. - Hypercoherence has often been used to describe changes in society which cause sudden collapse of systems, i.e. in the collapse of such things as complex societies, or states or even world systems. - E.g.: Bronze Age Collapse in the Mediterranean due to disturbance in the trade of bronze

Why study stone tools?

- One of the earliest and most durable artifacts available to study - The developmental sequence of tool types over time is reflected in changes in technology of tool production, from basic "chopper" to very sophisticated projectile points - These changes are significant since the type of tool produced is reflective of patterns of human behaviour--literally the types of activities undertaken with the tools - It has also been argue that these changes are also reflective of increasing sophistication of thought as humans developed from archaic to modern homo sapiens - E.g.: Oldowan chopper (lower paleolothic period, 2.6 million years ago), Acheulian technique (lower Paleolithic), Levallois technique (middle Paleolithic, Mousterian)

Cosmology

- One of the primary areas of interest to cognitive archaeology - Cosmology is the understanding of the cosmos, the whole universe - It includes ideas about the origin of the world, how the world and living things were created, etc. - It also includes ideas about how the world works - Cosmologies may emphasize spirits in living and even inanimate things or in other societies it may emphasize witches, the belief that events (and usually misfortunes) are literally caused by individuals Example: - to the ancient Egyptians Nut (Nuit) was the personification of the sky - Nut was shown in Egyptian artwork as a dark, star-covered naked woman, holding her body up in an arch, facing downwards - Her arms and legs were imagined to be the pillars of the sky, and hands and feet were thought to touch the four cardinal points at the horizon

Multiplier Effect

- Operates when change in one sub-system promotes change in another sub-system, which in turn promotes change in the original sub-system. - The change is then seen to multiply its overall effect. - E.g.: the inter-relationship between sedentism and population growth, in early Neolithic communities in the Near East. Sedentary population > increased nutrition > increased fertility > population growth > (over) reliance on regional resources (when you run out, you can't just move) > storage facilities > increased sedentism

Metallurgical cycle

- Ore deposit: prospection, mining - Ore - Smelting site: roasting, smelting - Raw material (and slag) - Metal Factory: processing, purification, alloying, casting, shaping, remelting - Trade: metal object (ingot, final product) - Use, burial, archaeological record

Sub-fields of bioarchaeoogy

- Paleodemography (age, sex, stature and changes through time) - Diet and Nutrition - Disease (morbidity and mortality) - Molecular studies (DNA)

Sequence of use of pyrothecnology to make key synthetic materials

- Plaster: 8th millennium BC - Pottery: 6000 BC - Copper: 5500 BC (native or naturally occurring used from 7000 BC) - Bronze: 2100 BC (alloy of copper and tin, later also arsenic) - Iron: 1500 BC (iron from meteorites used from at least 3000 BC) - Glass: 1600 BC

Iconography/Symbolism

- Primary area of interest to cognitive archaeology - One's system of visual symbols and relations among them that express ideas (even if only in a vague way) - Usually art, decoration, sculpture, etc. - Writing systems can be regarded as an example, but are usually treated separately Problems with Iconography/Symbols: - This field of study touches on several areas within past societies - Controversy over whether symbols of past societies can be properly understood by modern people - Symbols are arbitrary - Symbol and meaning (the signifier and the signified) can be culturally specific - Several area of iconography and symbolism are of particular interest to archaeologist Areas of interest in looking at iconography and symbols: - ordering of space in local contexts - orientation of the local with the 'cosmos' - symbols of value - symbols of power - visual display (of elites) - writing

What can a mortality profile reveal?

- Prior to developments in medicine in the past 200 years, most human populations had infant mortality (defined as death before age 1) rates as high as 15-30% - Therefore, if an archaeological mortality profile lacks a high infant mortality peak, it probably means either that infant skeletons have not preserved, or that infants were disposed of somewhere other than where older people were buried (inherited vs. attained status?) - Typically, if you survive infancy and weaning (which can produce a second peak in mortality), you are likely to survive your child and early teenage years. - Mortality usually begins to increase in late teenage years - For females this is often mortality due to complication of childbirth - For males, this is often due to participation in violence/warfare - The timing of these increases in mortality can reveal the society's characteristic age-at-marriage for women, and the age at which 'boys' become 'men' - Female mortality typically declines rapidly after menopause, and women who have survived to that age often live many more years - In contrast, there usually is no such drop-off of mortality for males - Overall, there should be about the same number of males as females - Significantly unbalanced sex rations suggest different valuations attached to male and female offspring, with more attention lavished on keeping boys (or, less commonly, girls) alive

Reciprocity

- Reciprocity can occur at a number of levels - In Melanesia this inolved reasonably long-distance exchanges between individuals - Because of the distances involved this would vary between intra- and inter-regional exchanges - However, reciprocity also occurred quite commonly on the local level, especially between emerging elites or 'chiefs' and members of his kin-group, tribe or community - In this context the reciprocity is usually part of a 'redistribution' network, whereby the elites procure rare or exotic goods, to re-distribute to members of the society - In theses the expected reciprocation was more likely loyalty and adherence to the chief, or perhaps labour rather than a gift. - It is very telling about how elites form; how was can observe their emergence in the material record

Achieved status

- Requiring special qualities and open to achievement - Can be acquired on the basis of merit, and reflects personal skills, abilities and efforts - Performance or effort may determine achieved status

Results of poor nutrition

- Retarded growth - Delayed maturation - Diminished stature - Increased susceptibility to infection - Several nutrient-deficiency syndromes which produce characteristic skeletal abnormalities

Analytical Techniques of Material Characterization

- Scanning electron microscope (SEM) - Neutron activation analysis (NAA) - Atomic Absorption Spectrometry (AAS) - X-ray Fluorescence spectometry (XRF) - Optical Emission Spectrometry (OES) - Inductively-Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectrometry (ICP-AES)

Segmentary Societies

- Service's 'tribes' - Segmentary societies are most often seen as settled village-based societies or pastoralists - They are usually organized at the level of kinship/clan - Segmentary societies have leaders, but are largely organized along the lines of family or kin - They may have hereditary tribe/clan leadership - These societies may also be a regional group of villages, organized through some local seat of government (pan-tribal societies)

Kennewick Man

- Skeleton found on July 28, 1996 near Kennewick, Washington - The Umatilla, Colville, Yakima, and Nez Perce tribes have each claimed Kennewick Man as their ancestor - They seek permission to rebury him - Male of late middle age, 40-55 years - Radiocarbon dating fixed the age of the skeleton at approximately 9,300 years - 79 mm (3.1 in) stone projectile lodged in the illium, part of the pelvic bone - Type of point is a feature of the Cascade phase, which occurred roughly 7500 to 12000 years ago - Comparison of the skull of Kennewick Man to 18 modern populations showed he was most closely related to northeast Asia

Bands

- Small-scale societies of foragers. - Economic organization and, to a large extent, political organization are constructed exclusively at local level--there are no permanent administrative centers. General characteristics: - Bands have set rules for the division of labour - Strong division of labour by sex - Strong interdependency between sexes, making for egalitarian relationships - Unhappy people "vote with their feet" and leave - Shunning and other such punishments are the only rule enforcements possible Their study is particularly relevant to the Paleolithic (Old Stone Age) - Paleolithic societies were forager/hunter societies - important distinctions can be drawn between cave sites and open sites - the aim is to understand the nature of the activities that took place there, and of the social group that used it.

Evidence of sugar or starch in the diet

- Streptococus mutans, one of the hundreds of species of microorganisms that lives in our mouths, consumes sugar and produces lactic acid as a waste product - The acid etches tooth enamel, causing caries (the technical term for cavities) - More sugar (or starch, which is converted to sugar by an enzyme in saliva) in the diet leads to more growth of these microorganisms, and hence more caries

Egyptian Faience

- Technique first perfected in Egypt. Involves firing and glazing of terra cotta to produce a permanent material that has a luxurious qual-ty about it. Blue or Green in color. - Faience, is not a true glass, but could be thought of as a "pre-glass," and has more in common with ceramics than later glass - It is composed of crushed quartz sand, with small amounts of calcite lime and a mixture of alkalis (burn plant ash) - Faience displays surface vitrification due to its soda lime silica glaze often composed of copper pigments giving it a bright blue-green luster - Faience production starts in the Egyptian Predynastic and continues troughout Egyptian history, right up to the Roman period.

Theories for the origin of the state

- The Hydraulic Hypothesis, Wittfogel (1950s)--large-scale irrigation - Internal conflict, Diakonoff (1960s)--state imposed order on class conflict - Warfare - Population growth--carrying capacity - External Trade - "Staple Finance", Stein--coercion, storage of local surpluses and as a centre for redistribution of these resources - Environmental circumscription, Robert Carneiro, Peru - Also works well for the foundation of the state in ancient Egypt

Ancient Egyptian Ideology

- The Pharaoh as the source of ma'at (truth, balance, order, law, morality, and justice).

Ideological change through time

- The Sumerian world view of humankind serving the gods was a key aspect of their culture - The Akkadian dynasty which eventually conquered the Sumerian cities had quite a different world view - Sargon of Akkad was not a Sumerian but a Semite, and his prowess in warfare and great abilities in ruling lead to an expansive empire - Sargon's grandson changed the ideology in the region by declaring himself not a servant of the gods, but a god in his own right, he was the first to place the divinity marker before his name

Mecca, Saudi Arabia

- The birthplace of Muhammad and a site of the revelation of the Quran - The holiest city in the religion of Islam - Pilgrimage to Mecca, known as teh Hajj is obligatory for all able Muslims - The officially approved form os Islam in Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism, is hostile to any reverence given to historical or religious places of significance for fear they may give rise to idolatry - As a consequence, under Saudi rule, it has been estimated that since 1985 about 95% of Mecca's historic buildings, most over a thousand years old, have been demolished - Historic sites of religious importance which have been destroyed include five of the renowned "Seven Mosques" initially built by Muhammad's daughter and four of his "greatest Companions" - It has been reported that there now are fewer than 20 structures remaining in Mecca that date back to the time of Muhammad - Abraj al Bait Tower complex was built after the demolition of the Ajyad Fortress, the 18th century Ottoman citadel which stood atop a hill overlooking the Grand Mosque. The destruction of the fort in 2002 by the Saudi government sparked Turkish and international outcry. Development continues as other historic buildings and landmarks are demolished

Investigating Social Ranking

- The essence of a centralized society and of centralized government is a disparity between rich and poor in ownership, access to resources, facilities, power, and status - The study of social organization in complex societies is thus in large measure the study to social ranking Sources of data - elite residences, size and patterns of elaboration - evidence of great wealth, especially access to "elite" and rate products, as well as items of "specialized production" - Depiction of the elite - Different kinds of materials in household garbage (food, ceramics) - Burials (the most abundant and useful archaeological resource)--elaboration in burials/evidence of wealth through grave goods, also in the elaboration of grave construction as an indicator of labour - e.g. the Minoan Palatial complexes: once thought to be centres of redistribution, now believed to be more elite residences; Elite hierarchies: Mycenaens; Elite burials: Mycenaean shaft graves; Elite burals at Varna and the Moche burial of the 'Lords of Sipan'

Ethnoarchaeology

- The ethnographic study of peoples for archaeological reasons, usually through the study of the material remains of a society. Aids archaeologists in reconstructing ancient lifeways by studying the material and non-material traditions of modern societies. Archaeologists can then infer that ancient societies used the same techniques as their modern counterparts given a similar set of environmental circumstances. - Has become an independent sub-field of archaeological investigation

Health and Diet

- The general health of a population is often directly related to diet - Scarcity of food or variation which reduces specific types of food can lead to noticeable patterns in skeletal stature - Nutritional deprivation, such as specific vitamin deficiencies and other nutritional stress leave evidence in the skeletons as well, sometimes in very specific clues. - Malnutrition (chronic food and nutrition shortages) were not uncommon in the past - We have both historic and artistic evidence of this, which can also support our understanding of the human archaeological record

Non-State Sponsored Trade

- The other principle type of exchange seems to have been commercial trading between merchants - This trade was dominated by the trade in a number of key types of products or commodities, principally metals, glass, and a variety of organic substances - The Uluburn and Cape Gelidonya shipwreck may be our best examples of this type of trade since these ships were wrecked off the coast of Turkey, and contained VAST quantities of different trade goods - Although there is some debate over whether they could be carrying-out state-sponsored trade - The Uluburun wreck has been date to c. 1300 B.C., while the Gelidonya wreck to c. 1200 B.C.

Dental Information

- The pattern and timing of crown formation and tooth eruption is consistent among human populations - Tooth formation begins during fetal development and continues through adolescence - Specific events are easily determined, such as eruption and replacement of the 'milk teeth' with permanent dentition - Sequence of eruption of permanent dentition - Patterns of wear on teeth of older individuals - For the reasons teeth are especially useful in telling age in juveniles and sub-adults

secondary burial

- The practice of removing the remains of a corpse to another grave or ossuary which were initially buried or put elsewhere. - Re-deposited skeletal remains, which have been moved, usually from a primary grave, or in some cultures after decomposition or defleshing - Can vary significantly - Practiced by Jewish populations in the Levant--bones were gathered a year or so after death, when the flesh had desiccated and fallen off - Easy to identify, because most of the small bones will be absent

The Uluburun Shipwreck

- The ship contained a large and varied cargo (perhaps a royal one), as well as items of a personal nature owed by those on board.

Cognitive archaeology

- The study of all those aspects of ancient culture that are the product of the human mind: the perception, description, and classification of the universe; the nature of the supernatural; the principles, philosophies, ethics, and values by which human societies are governed; and the ways in which aspects of the world, the supernatural, or human values are conveyed in art. - Renfrew and Bahn conied the term: "the study of past ways of thought from material remains" What might this include? - designs, forms and styles - techniques of technology--some say you can tell a lot about human cognition though tool technologies (e.g. flintknapping) - art, writing, and other symbolic systems Working back from these material remains archaeologists try to reconstruct the worldview of past populations Archaeologists try to understand the assumptions and beliefs of past populations: about how the world should and did work. Problem: the further in the past we look, the less likely our inferences will be correct. In other words: - what people thought in the past - when they thought it - how they came to think it - and how that affected other things

Fall-off Analysis

- The study of regularities in the way in which quantities of traded items found in the archaeological record decline as the distance from the source increases. This may be plotted as a fall-off curve, with the quantities of material (Y-axis) plotted against distance from source (X-axis). - The relationship between quantity and distance can lead to assumptions about the mechanisms of exchange - This is referred to as the fall-off curve - The quantity of traded goods is plotted on the y axis, while the distance from source is plotted on the x axis - As an example of this, 'down-the-line' trade gives a very specific 'exponential fall-off' curve, while others, such as 'central place' exchange will likely give a 'multi-model' curve - In practice it is not always easy to be definitive about this, since sometimes: 1) the quality of the data may not allow definitive conclusions, 2) different models of distribution can produce the same curve. - Can help us infer the type of distribution that occurred

Writing

- The two earliest writing systems were the Sumerian and Egyptian (they developed for different reasons) - Sumerians developed writing almost exclusively for economic transactions - The Egyptians developed writing which was used almost exclusively for religious inscriptions and in the service of the Pharaoh - The two quite different uses of writing underscore some of the key differences between Sumerian and Egyptian societies

Pseudo archaeology

- The use of selective archaeological evidence to promulgate nonscientific, fictional accounts of the past - Also known as 'the fringe' - Ancient astronauts - Public fascination with the past is misdirected to bizarre interpretations of the archaeological data - "Earth Mysteries", Ley Lines, Earth Vortices, Pyramid theorists - Silbury and Avebury

Exchange mechanisms

- There are a variety of different types of 'exchange mechanisms' - However, in the absence of written records these can be difficult to identify - Sometimes these mechanisms ca be inferred from the actual types of materials, their origin, and the context in which they are found - This however can be quite tricky E.g.: Down-the-line-trade: reduplicated home-base or boundary reciprocity, so that a commodity travels across successive territories through successive exchanges.

Kon Tiki

- Thor Heyerdahl (1947) - Tracing connections between South America and Polynesia Callao, Peru to Tuamotu Islands - 18 x 45 foot deck made from nine balsa trunks lashed with hemp rope - 29 foot A-frame mast which held a 15-by-18-foot mainsail - The raft was steered by a long oar at the stern - Journey covered 4,300 nautical miles in 101 days (41 1/2 miles/day) - DNA evidence from Peru and Polynesia suggest this may have actually happened.

Evidence of meat vs plant diets

- Trace element analyses (neutron activation analysis, principally) are used to determine the ratio of strontium to calcium in bone mineral - Higher ratios = more meat in diet - By comparing the human Sr/Ca ratio to the ratios in local herbivores and carnivores, we determine actual percentage of human diet that was meat - Ancient diets can also be reconstructed by analyzing the carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes preserved in human bones - Human bones will reflect the isotopic ratios of plants (and animals) ingested during life - The two principle isotopes used are Carbon and Nitrogen - Bioarchaeologists analyze a bone's stable isotope to determine its composition, which can infer which types of food are being consumed

Early Glass

- True glass was made by melting quartz sand, which melts at 1723 C - Since during early times it was nearly impossible to achieve this high temperature, early glass producers discovered that they could achieve fusion at a lower temperature by adding a "flux," which included both soda and lime. - Crushed quartz and ash from burnt plants (alkali) mixed and heated in ceramic vessel, the resulting mix was then crushed and stored as a powder for melting (evidence of powder in vessels and partially melted quartz). - The mix is heated in a crucible - Crucibles are heated in glass furnaces, like those found at Egyptian New Kingdom city of Amarna, c. 1350 BC - The mix will melt to form glass, but sometimes retains unmelted fragments of quartz

Scurvy

- Vitamin C deficiency leads to a defect in the formation of bone matrix as it is necessary for formation of hydroxyproline, which is vital for collagen - About 90% of matrix of mature bone is collagen and hence a lack of collagen will have sever effect on bone formation - Skeletal symptoms of scurvy include the re-absorption of bone around the teeth - Lack of vitamin C has been chronic problem in past population - Most humans get their vitamins C from flesh fruits and vegetables - In arctic regions where humans subsisted largely upon meat and fish, vitamin C came from eating uncooked meats, as well as blubber and skin

Rickets

- Vitamin D deficiency - Characteristic bowing of legs - 'Trumpet-shaped' appearance of long bones - Historically a serious problem in Western nations - Controlled today through vitamin D supplements or fortification

Aztec Cosmology

- Was based on a belief in the existence of two worlds, the material and the divine. In an effort to postpone the day of reckoning, the Aztecs practiced human sacrifice. sun god, Huitzilopochtli, Victims were prepared for the ceremony through elaborate rituals and then brought to the holy shrine, where their hearts were ripped out of their chests and presented to the gods as a holy offering. writing based on hieroglyphs that represented an object or a concept. no phonetic significance, scribes carefully painted the notes on paper made from the inner bark of fig trees. Unfortunately, many of these notes were destroyed by the Spaniards as part of their effort to eradicate all aspects of Aztec religion and culture. - Sacrificial rituals among the Aztecs and in Mesoamerica should be seen in the context of their religious cosmology - The gods created four successive worlds or "suns" for their subjects to live in, all of which were destroyed - Then by an act of self-sacrifice one of the gods caused a fifth and final sun to rise - Humans were responsible for the sun's continued revival, and this was accomplished through sacrifice and death, which was necessary for the continued existence of the world

Epiphyseal Fusion

- Where the top or bottom of the bone fuses to the shaft of the bone. - Appearance and fusion of ossification centers - Many bones form from multiple ossification centers - Over time growth stops and epiphyses fuse - Temporarily visible line / Eventually line is obliterated - Schedule of epiphyseal fusion have been developed - Known rates, useful between 10-25 years (e.g. sternum, femur, iscium, pubis and ilium) - Example: long bones are made of central shaft and two epiphyses (the ends that articulate with other bones); proximal (end nearest center of body) of the radius (forearm) completely fuses by age 19; portions of the scapula (shoulder blade) do not fuse until age 23; determining which bone are fused and which are not can narrow age ranges. - Most bones are fused and teeth erupted by age 25 -- from that point on, age can begin to be determined by wear in various part of the body (degenerative changes)

The Cultural Ecological Model

- Whereas the cultural historical approach often treated 'environment' as a single entity, cultural ecology considered a given culture as interacting within environmental system composed of three complex subsystems: 1. the physical landscape (habitat), 2. the biological environment (biome), 3. the cultural environment or other adjacent human groups - Developed by Julian Steward - Each sub-system is composed of further subordinate systems, which in turn comprise smaller component systems, and so on. - For example, the cultural subsystem has three component systems: technological, social, ideational - Each of these, in turn, can be broken down further: the social system, for example, includes such constituents as political systems, kinships systems, economic systems - For any given society, the sum of specific interactions contained within an overall cultural ecological system was seen to describe the nature of the society'S cultural adaptation - Each society was thought to adapt to its environmental primarily through its technological system, but also, secondarily, through the social and ideological systems - The full set of interactions within such a complex system was of course difficult to study all at once - As a result, processual archaeologists often began by isolating one or more of the subordinate systems directly involved in cultural adaptation

Steps of Pottery-Making

- clay selection - clay mixing - soaking - levigation - ponding and drying the clay through evaporation - foot-wedging - hand-wedging - multiple-stage fast wheel throwing - drying and firing

Cultural-Historical Approach

- culture historians treated culture as a body of shared ideas and beliefs (norms) - according to Flannery, Culture Historians often attempted to derive information about "the Indian behind the artifact"--empirical method, deductive approach - Change in "cultural attributes" in this phase of archaeology often led to explanations which relied upon three possibilities: 1) migration, 2) invasion, 3) diffusion

States

- develop from chiefdoms, but emerge as a result of population increase and concentration - increasing social differentiation - emergence of broad classes, i.e. 'craft specialists' - range of 'classes' from leaders to specialists, to agricultural workers and broad categories of slaves - institutionalized religious practices - religion used to reinforce social divisions and boundaries - Obvious differentiation in wealth and access to goods - Increasingly, power in the hands of a few individuals - Large increases in power of the few, and accumulation of wealth - Sometimes leads to warfare between competing states/leaders/groups - Development of slavery as an economic tool to increase wealth at the expense of certain members of society

Ways to think about change

- endegenous (internal) vs. exogenous (external) factors - single factors (monocausal explanation) vs. a number of factors in combination (multivariate explanation) - consideration of timescale of changes (can be very rapid, or incremental, slow)

Evidence of increasingly complex labour organization:

- extensive mining operations spread throughout the region - transportation of ores to smelting sites - fuel procurement (charcoal production) - transportation of fuel to smelting sites - large-scale smeling operations, multiple furnaces - post-smelting crushing and sorting of copper from slags - secondary processing of copper - transportation of copper metal to final production sites - evidence from mines, smelting and ore/slag processing sites suggest and exponential increase in scale and complexity of production

Renfrew and Bahn suggest some of these subsystems could include

- subsistence - technology - social - symbolic - trade (and communication) - population

Bioarchaeology

- the archaeological study of human remains, emphasizing the preservation of cultural and social processes in the skeleton - archaeologists commonly must deal with human remains - in some cases human remains are specifically targeted as part of a research design to investigate specific aspects of past societies - this is quite commonly done through excavation of known cemetery sites - at other times human remains are encountered in the process of excavation, and are unexpected finds - in all of these cases, the same care and respect is paid when excavating and dealing with human remains on an archaeological site - Combines the fields of archaeology and biological anthropology - The study of the human biological components of the archaeological record - There are a number of sub-fields of analysis: paleodemography, diet and nutrition, disease (morbidity and mortality), molecular studies (DNA)

Paleodemography

- the study of ancient demographic patterns and trends - Demography is the age and sex composition of a population - If the sample size is sufficiently large, we can look for patterns of death (infanticide, weaning death, maternal death during childbirth, adult makes killed in warfare, etc.) - We can also examine demographic changes through time, such as increase/decrease of average lifespan - Paleodemography works best with well-defined (usually cemetery) populations, where the samples are derived from the same biological population over time - Bioarchaeologists use a variety of data to prepare mortality profiles of populations

Plaster

-The earliest use of pyrotechnology - E.g. plastered floor in a large 'public building' at Wade Fidan 1 in southern Jordan; Ayn Hazal, a Neolithic site in Jordan, has plastered floors which cover sub-floor burials; plastered and painted skulls, plaster statues

Example of Egyptian Cosmology

-To the ancient Egyptians Nut (Nuit) was the personification of the sky - Nut was shown in Egyptian artwork as a dark, star-covered naked woman, holding her body up in an arch, facing downwards - Her arms and legs were imagined to be the pillars of the sky, and hands and feet were thought to touch the four cardinal points at the horizon

Two approaches to processual archaeology

1) General covering laws - one group saw the task of archaeological explanation as a process of formulating and testing "general covering laws" - Their ultimate goal was the discovery of laws of human behaviour - This was an attempt to give archaeology a formally scientific approach (like the natural or physical sciences) - These generalizations proved to be trivial because they were so generalized 2) Systems Models - Second group's primary goal was the search for the ways humans adapted (like other living systems) - They were skeptical about the possibility of "covering laws" - They preferred to explain culture change through systems models - They saw causality as multivariate rather than linear

Two specific qualities of systems which can be useful concepts in thinking about 'systems'

1) Multiplier effet 2) Hypercoherence

What are the characteristic signatures on bone of butchering animals for food?

1) a concentration of cuts near the end of the bones by the joints where tendons hold the muscles tight 2) bones are splintered from being struck and dismembered in the butchering process; long bones are generally shattered for the extraction of the bone marrow 3) vertebrae are telling by their absence—they are generally absence from butchered remains because they were pulverized to extract the bone marrow 4) skulls are found burned on the outside of the back and sides from being placed in a fire; the inside of the skull is intact because the entire skull was placed in the fire 5) "fresh" cracks on the skull are characteristic of trauma which has occurred at or around the time of death (i.e. the bones were not broken long after the person had died) 6) anvil abrasion—distinctive scraping as bone is smashed between stones 7) tiny v-shaped grooves from the use of stone tones on the bones. 8) long bones are all broken to the same length—the diameter of the pot used to cook the pieces of meat 9) the ends of bones may also have a distinctive polishing from being stirred around in and rubbing on the rough interior of a cooking vessel. These characteristic signs of meat processing are generally observed in game. Observed in human remains, it suggests that humans were processed as food the same way animals are.

Instead of falling back on invention, diffusion or genius to explain the changes taking place within a culture, processual archaeologists using systems theory tended to focus from

1) the mechanisms that maintained stability, thus counteracting change, or 2) the mechanisms that actually amplify small deviations, thereby bringing about change

What are the qualities of obsidian that allowed Bruce Bradley to make the stone tools?

1. Bradley can use obsidian to make stone tools because it has the properties of a pure piece of glass. Indeed, obsidian is the natural product closest to glass. It is brittle, breaks with a sharp edge, is elastic, in other words will not shatter into a million pieces when struck, t has the strength and hardness to maintain a sharp edge, has no impurities or changes in texture, and does not have any internal breaking plane, which means it breaks equally well in any direction.

Properties of glass, flint and other siliceous stone

1. Brittle, breaks easily 2. Breaks with a sharpp edge 3. Elastic, bends but doesn't shatter 4. Has strength and hardness, to keep an edge 5. Pure, free of flaws 6. Breaks equally well in any direction, no predetermined internal fracture planes

Age determination through degenerative changes

1. Dental wear 2. Degenerative joint changes (e.g. new bone formation--arthritis, basically); theory that modern nutrition, post-agricultural revolution is causing health problems , idea that human genome is not adapted to modern diet (the idea of the paleo diet) 3. Loss of bone, decreases in cortical thickness: Bone in humans is generally classified in two types--cortical bone, also known as compact bone, and trabecular bone, aka cancellous or spongy bone; cortical bone thickness decreases as you age

What were the general characteristics of Anasazi society?

1. The Anasazi people, now generally referred to as Ancestral Puebloan, were a society that existed in the American Southwest from 200 AD until about 1200 AD when they seemingly disappeared. Their society centered around the Chaco Canyon, a 90,000-miles area intersected by a network of 30-feet-wide roads that stretched across the canyon, linking ancestral Great Houses to one another. Little is known about the Ancestral Puebloans. Based on the limited information available, it appears the Ancestral Puebloan were a model society, peaceful, democratic, a near-utopia of happy maize farmers who observed the stars and kept astronomical records. They built sophisticated architecture, practiced advanced engineering and urban planning, and produced beautifully adorned pottery. Their civilization appears to have peaked from about 900 to 1150 AD, shortly after which they disappeared, leaving behind abandoned buildings and bones.

If there were external influences on the Anasazi, what role does Turner suggest cannibalism played in their society?

10. He thinks that, when this group of Mexicans encountered the Ancestral Puebloans, a peaceful, pliant people, they set out to subjugate them and recreate the same system they had left behind. They established this culture of intimidation and social control by practicing cannibalism on a few Ancestral Puebloans to set an example and instil fear and control in the Chaco people. So, the Ancestral Puebloans may not have been the cannibals but the victims. The fact that the cannibalism was done by an outgroup to the Ancestral Puebloans further explains the inhumane treatment of the remains.

List some of the similarities between the archaeological evidence from the Classic Mayan period and the Mayan people today?

10. Mayans still live much like their ancestors did. The myths they remember and the ceremonies they perform are all part of the tradition they say God gave them at the beginning of time. Mayan living today learned from God in their dreams, as their ancestors had, when to set fires and when to do the corn ceremony. Mayans still weave according to ancient patterns they say come from the beginning of the world and are almost identical to the weavings found in ancient sculptures. Despite time and hardships, Mayas today still weave, still farm their corn according to natural cycles. They've maintained their customs and their ways of organizing their societies.

What is Turner's general argument about the Anasazi?

2. Despite this general perception of the Ancestral Puebloan as a peaceful, near-utopian civilization, Turner believes Chaco Canyon to be the site of severe violence. There is evidence that inhabitants of the Canyon engaged in violence and warfare, but Turner's main and most controversial argument is that he has found what he believes is clear and convincing evidence that cannibalism was practiced at Chaco Canyon, that humans were processed like game animals—butchered, cooked, and eaten. He studied roughly 80 sites across the Chaco region and found that roughly half of them met criteria for cannibalism, that in at least one in every 50 cases there was evidence of murder and worse—bodies of men, women and children dismembered, bones broken into fragments. In all, he has found the remains of about 300 humans processed as game.

What angle of percussion is most critical to the production of stone tools? Why is this angle critical to producing stone tools?

2. The most important angle of percussion when producing stone tools is the angle at which the flintknapper strikes the obsidian at the ridge of two planes with their hammer stone. That angle is critical because it must be 90 degrees or less to produce a flake, and how much less than 90 degrees will determine the shape of the flake produced. It is critical to understand which angle produces which shape because once we understand how the stone will break, it can be predicted and controlled

What specific tools were used by Bruce Bradley to produce the various flint tools in his demonstration? Name two specific tools, and how and why each tool was used for a specific stone tool reduction process.

3. In the reduction process Bradley used various hammer tools made of different materials, namely stone and antler, throughout the reduction. He first used the stone hammer tool to remove a large flake of obsidian to produce a very sharp edge—the sharpest known edge. The resulting tool could be used to easily skin an animal. He then used pieces of antler to strike the obsidian and produce flakes. The softer material of the antler produces thinner pieces of flake and can be used to thin the stone tool out or create a serrated edge. Then, Bradley used a small antler tine, placed right at the edge of the blade, pushed inward and then shifted to a downward angle to remove small flakes from the surface to fine tune the shape of and sharpen the arrowhead. Finally, he used a small piece of antler shaped like a spatula to carve out the notches of the projective point.

What are some of the religious beliefs of the Maya mentioned in the film?

3. The Mayans knew the universe moved in cycles and were fascinated by the relationship between time and the events in their own lives. Their lives were ruled by the rhythm of the natural world—planting and harvesting, birth and death. They also engaged in a number of rituals, like blessing fields at times of harvest, playing sacred ball games, or bloodletting, that aimed to preserve the rhythm of these cycles. They played a game, for instance, where the ball was supposed to be a metaphor for the movement of the Sun and, by extension, also the moon and the stars. They wanted there to be regularity in that movement, they thought that if they played the game the right way and honored the gods the right way they would ensure the agricultural cycles and enable the sun to rise, the rains to come on time and for there to be a bountiful harvest. In the sacred world of the Maya, the gods were considered the source of all life, and only the Kings had the power to intervene with them. The gods sustained the physical universe with the sun and the rain and expected humans to nourish them in return. The supreme source of that nourishment was blood. The supreme source of that nourishment was blood. When the Maya wanted to acknowledge the sacredness of the moment or an important event, they would let blood. Blood was the vehicle that carried a quality that not only permeated human bodies but also permeated buildings, trees, the sky, and all things sacred in the world. When they gave blood, they activated what they believed was the force of the universe. In Mayan society the line between the secular and the sacred was almost imperceptible. Almost everything had a deeper meaning than it seemed—pyramids symbolized sacred mountains where the ancestors dwell, doors represent the mouths of cave passageways into the mountain's dangerous underworld. The Maya believed they went to that underworld when they died. It was a place of fright, a watery realm of disease and decay that ordinary people had little hope of escaping.

What did the early archaeologists (1890s) at Chaco Canyon think? Why?

3. The early archaeologists who excavated Chaco Canyon in the 1890s noticed human bones scattered around the rocks, which was unusual given that ancient burial sites were typically orderly, showing reverence to the deceased. These sites, however, were different—bones mangled, crushed and tossed aside like refuse. These early archaeologists did not quite know what these findings meant but they had suspicions that they suggested cannibalism. The unearthing of charred skulls and cracked and hollowed long-bones especially supported the hypothesis that cannibalism may had been practiced, either because of hunger or religious reasons, at Chaco Canyon.

What is unique about the Rosalila Structure (pyramid) at Copán?

4. Like many Mayan pyramids, the Copán pyramid, Temple 16, was built over a large, older pyramid which was at least eight stories high. What has unique about this structure was that without those first two pyramids was a third pyramid: Rosalila. Rosalila was different from other hidden pyramids because, while other pyramids are smashed before another structure is built over them, Rosalila was perfectly preserved. When loose dirt was removed, a set of giant masks, still tinged with traces of the original paint, were revealed. In its prime, Rosalila was adorned with brightly painted sculptures. It once crowned the highest point in Copán. Framing its central doorway, two giant birds face the setting sun. Above, undulating serpents extend their bodies towards the sky. For archaeologists, Rosalila is unique because is poses a fascinating question: What was so revered about it that it was effectively mummified. While excavating Rosalila, archaeologists found, in a small cache, a bundle of blades, expertly chipped from an especially sacred material: flint, the fire stone. They were probably used on sacred occasions and the faces on them may depict royal ancestors or sacrificial victims. Nine were found in total, maybe representing the nine Mayan lords of the night. The blades were probably placed in the cache in the 7th century AD, when the Mayan civilisation was at its peak.

What do the modern Hopi think about Turner's assertions?

4. Modern Hopi, the descendants of the Ancestral Puebloan, caution against drawing hasty conclusions suggesting that their ancestors practiced cannibalisms. If these claims are unfounded—and the Hopi believe they are—they needlessly dehumanize Hopi people, relegating them to no more than animals. This is a serious concern given the long history in the United States of science trying to dehumanize Native Americans. They argue that Turner is so detached from this history that he is insensitive to the harms his research could do to Hopi people. When the narrative of cannibalism is picked up by the media, it takes on a life of its own and is uncritically assumed to be fact when it is much more fraught. For instance, the Hopi believe that these theories are simply inaccurate. Just as any other group, they engaged in some level of violent behaviour, but they have no tradition or other evidence of practicing violence that extreme. They argue that claiming so amounts to no less than cultural slander. Even if it could be proven that the the Ancestral Puebloan people has massacred humans, modern Hopi warn against jumping to the conclusion that they also consumed the flesh—that would be a great and unwarranted leap. Finally, critics of Turner's argue that it is dehumanizing to make sweeping generalizations. How are we to know what was an aberration and what was systemic?

Why might an antler tine be used ― over the use of a stone tool ― in flaking flint tools? What properties does the antler lend to the reduction process?

5. Antlers are sometimes used over stone tools in the reduction process because they are made of a softer material than stone and are thus able to remove flakes that are smaller and thinner or start at the edge of the obsidian piece and run fairly well across the surface. Antler are also able to take "bites out of the edge" of stone tool leaving it very sharp and straight.

What is the significance of the hieroglyphic stairway at Copán?

5. The significance of the hieroglyph stairway at Copán is that it records important events in the lives of Mayan rules. It is the longest inscribed text in the new world, but early archaeologists reassembled it out of order, so it can only be read in segments. It shows the Maya's historical consciousness. They made historical writing part of their lives.

At Caracol what were the differences between elite and non-elite burials?

6. At Caracol, the difference between elite and non-elite burials was that ordinary people were usually simply buried under the floor of their own house in was resembled a family mausoleum, while the elite were placed in tombs.

Why might it be necessary to flake in two different directions along the edge of a piece of obsidian? What value does edge preparation hold in the production of stone tools?

6. It is necessary to flake in two different directions along the edge of a piece of obsidian straighten and thin it out. Edge preparation is important because different edges (i.e. serrated or smooth, sharper or duller) will be better suited to different tasks.

How did Bradley go about thinning the center and base of the projectile point he was working? What specifically did he do in order to achieve a thinner cross section for the tool in question?

7. In order to thin out the center and base of the projectile point he was working on, Bradley used the antler tool to remove flakes from the piece of obsidian. To achieve a thinner cross section for the tool in question, he used a small antler tine and placed it right at the edge of the blade, pushed it inward and the shifter the pressure to a downward angle to remove thin flakes from the surface to fine tune the shape and sharpen the arrowhead.

What change takes place in the 8th century AD with regard to the motivation for warfare? Why is this different from the early part of the Classic period?

7. In the 8th century AD, the Mayan motivation for warfare changed from its ritualized and religious ends, where men literally dressed up in silly costumes with big Paleolithic spears and went out, knocked each other around, took a prisoner captive and ritually sacrificed him, to violent campaigns of expansion. After this change, the Kings of Dos Pilas attacked tows along the Pasión River and thereby seized control of a vital trade route. This change in warfare led to an intensification and a shifting of warfare for conquest, actually absorbing ther territory of others. This seems to have somehow gotten out of hand, forming an arms race, in a sense. Attacking population centers and burning temples became acceptable.

Why does the research of Richard Marlar suggest about the possibilities of cannibalism?

7. Richard Marlar's research confirmed the occurrence of cannibalism by testing coprolite found by excavators in the hearth of a site called Cowboy Wash, also the site of an ancient massacre, for human myoglobin, a protein only found in human arms and legs (not naturally occurring in animals or in the human gut). Finding human myoglobin in coprolite therefore indicates that human flesh was consumed. That is the only way this protein could occur in human feces. When Marlar found human myoglobin in the coprolite, he could conclude with confidence that those people had indeed consumed human flesh.

How many different types of tools did Bruce Bradley produce from the single piece of material that he began with in his demonstration? Name at least three of those tools produced!

8. Bradley produced four tools from the single piece of material he began with at the beginning of his demonstration. First, he produced a tool with an extremely sharp edge to skin the game. Then, he produced a tool with a serrated blade to cut the meat from the bone and into strips to dry it. Later, he produced a duller tool to scrape and process the hide. Finally, in the end, Bradley turned the same piece of material into a projectile point to replace the one that would likely have been lost or broken while hunting the game the tools were used to process.

What evidence from Dos Pilos indicates the severity of the warfare in the late Classic?

8. In Dos Pilas, Demarest found a large, perfectly preserved hieroglyphic text which explicitely talks about a series of wards, battles, and conquests involving all the major Maya cities, Tikal, Dos Pilas, battling each other, and records the outcomes. The severity of the warfare can also be seen in other architectural remains. People were so scared, for instance, that they ripped off stones from the Royal Palace to build a protective wall running against their hieroglyphic stairway to create a desperate protective system. There are also remains of low house platforms that held little huts that filled the central ceremonial plaza at the time of the siege and the collapse of Dos Pilas. It indicates, again, that the desperation of those final moments was so complete that an entire population was living at the center of the ceremonial plaza. This would be tantamount to Americans living barricaded on the White House lawn, waiting for the collapse of American civilization.

Why does Turner think that 'external influences' may have played a part in the arrival of cannibalism amongst the Anasazi? What evidence does he have for this? Why is this so controversial?

9. Turner thinks that external influences may have played a part in the arrival of cannibalism among the Anasazi. He argues there are signs of Meso-American influence on the architecture in the Chaco Canyon, namely the presence of ball courts and long walls with columns like those on many Meso-American sites. He argues this influence is also likely because there is no evidence of severe violence in the Ancestral Puebloan population, while there is abundant evidence of violence and mistreatment of humans as well as ritual cannibalism and a particular reverence for human sacrifice in the Meso-American peoples. Moreover, Turner thinks that the Meso-Americans not only influenced the Ancestral Puebloan people but actually settled in the American Southwest. As evidence for this, Turner remarks that the beginning of cannibalism in Chaco Canyon coincides with a period of a great civil anarchy which rocked the Meso-American world. He believes a small cult of Mexicans fled the Valley of Mexico and travelled North to the Chaco Canyon, carrying their bloody beliefs with them. Turner argues this is evidenced by the discovery of skulls with modified teeth in Chaco Canyon. While there is no tradition of modifying teeth in or around the American Southwest, chipping, filing, or inlaying teeth is characteristic of peoples from the Valley of Mexico. Turner thus argues that he can identify the presence of Mexican peoples in Chaco Canyon.

Chavin de Hauntar

A ceremonial centre in the Andes - Central platform is 11 meters (33 feet) - Temple is honeycombed with corridors, niches and tiny rooms - Central platform has large projecting stone heads - Portal to the divine - Lanzon: a 4.53 m granite monolith in the very center, in a cross-shaped gallery; portrays a human-like form with raised right hand, lowered left with feet and hands as claws; gallery above the chamber with a hole over the Lanzon: for priests to speak to worshippers - Early example of how religion was used to control people

Polity

A politically independent or autonomous social unity, regardless of scale (might e a city-state or a band of foragers).

Marver

A stainless steel table used to shape and cool your glass. The Italians used to use a marble slab. Marver is the Italian word for marble.

Ritual

A stereotyped activities carried out in accordance with religion (and to some extent with cosmology).

Down-the-line trade

An exchange system in which goods are traded outward from a source area from group to group, resulting in a steady decline in the item's abundance in archaeological sites farther from the source

Pyrotechnologies

Ancient technologies which use fire/heat in creating synthetic materials (like plaster, pottery, metals, glass) are called pyrotechnologies - Early humans discovered and controlled the use of fire from at least c. 400,000 - It was essential to the daily lives of humans for cooking, heat, protection - It wasn't until the Neolithic period in the Levant (8th millennium BC) that we begin to see fire/heat being used to create synthetic materials

Primary Categories of Trade and Exchange

Archaeologists (and anthropologists too) usually break Trade and Exchange into two primary groups: 1. Internal exchange: - when we consider this we usually think of this in terms of social organization within a family/kin-group/tribe - this is sometimes an important consideration, especially in the context of the development of elites in early complex societies 2. External exchange: - this is usually studied in terms of trade and exchange over much larger distances, between groups or cultures - this can be studied at a variety of scales, from the local, regional and inter-regional level - at the extreme end of this is the study of very large trade and exchange systems such as those proposed by Wallerstein, the so-called "World Systems" (essentially developed by looking at colonial-era exchange networks, but adapted by archaeologists)

Characterization of materials

Archaeologists spend a lot of time determining the origin of specific types of materials used by past populations. There are a variety of techniques which are available to do this, depending on the type of objects/materials: - Macroscopic methods: visual identification of materials with the naked eye (typically done with stone and pottery types) - Non-macroscopic methods: using a variety of microscopic and other analytic techniques. They are usually broken down to 1) visual (microscopic) examination, such as thin section analysis of pottery, 2) trace-elelement analysis to determine minor changes which indicate provenience of materials (such as in obsidian sourcing), 3) compositional analysis using a variety of techniques determine the specific elemental composition of materials, and 4) isotopic analysis, often used on metals to 'fingerprint' specific ore and metal sources.

Sex estimation in adult skeletons

Based on (for the most part, but not always): - size differences (men are usually larger) - Functionally related morphology (related to childbearing) - Robusticity/Muscularity (often more evident in males) This is best observed in distinct populations, as characteristics may vary across populations groups. Sex Differences - Hormonally controled - Evident in adults, not in children - Sex hormones increase at puberty, leading to secondary sex characteristics - Varies both within a population and between populations - Sex as a bi-modal distribution along a spectrum

What are the possible alternative explanations of social behavior based on the observed patterns in the data?

Based on the observed patterns in the data, there are a few different possible explanations of the social behaviour. There is evidence of cannibalism in almost all populations across the world: in the Americas, the South Pacific, England, Spain. Evidence of cannibalism in some cases, like in Europe, suggests the practice of medical cannibalism based on the belief that consuming human blood and body parts cured disease. In other cases, like in some sites in England, the discovery of human bones in the same trash heap as animal bones with the same marks as those found on animals suggests that humans were processed and consumed in the same was as animal bones. This indicates hunger as a driving force. This is known as survival cannibalism: consuming humans as a source of food. This was probably not the case in the American Southwest at that time, given that the environmental conditions seemed favorable at that time. Evidence of mass killings and processing of human remains (more meat than the community could eat at ones) also rejects survival cannibalism as hypothesis in Chaco Canyon. In other contexts, cannibalism was related to worship and reverence of the dead. Some groups believe that consuming part of the deceased helps keep their spirit alive. Symbolic forms of this are found in Western religions as well. This seems unlikely in the Chaco Canyon context given that bones were discarded like those of animals. Cannibalism can also be related to warfare and the ritual consumption the enemy. This hypothesis might have been supported in the context of the Chaco Canyon given the type of buildings in the Canyon (fortresses) and their defensive positions (on the top of hills). However, the evidence of cannibalism comes from a time of peace, not war.

Evidence of consumption in the trade cycle

Consumption: - In complex societies rare and precious objects of 'specialized production' increasingly become a significant part of the process of wealth accumulation by elites - Often as part of 'ritual display' elites use these rare and precious objects as indicators of wealth, status and prestige - Significantly these rare objects begin to be taken out of circulation through the process of burial of the objects with the elite owner - These are often found as part of excavations of elite tombs, which are found in many early civilization * Appears in many emerging complex societies - Consumption = Increased Production - Conspicuous consumption of these goods for burial has the effect of increasing demand and the need to replace these items - This has the effect of fueling demand for increased production at the production end of the cycle - It also likely causes changes to the distribution of the objects or commodities - These changes are some of the key indicators of the rise of elites in a number of complex societies in both the Old and New Worlds - The types 'elite objects' varies from culture to culture, and period to period, but these can be identified and tracked in the archaeological record - In North America among the Hopewell groups rare commodities were traded across the entire continent, including, shells, rare types of flint, copper, mica - This is often referred to as the "Hopewell interaction sphere"--no imperial component

Should the past belong to Antiquity Collectors?

E.g. the Sevso Treasure, antiquities collection is useless because it takes items out of context--no way to reconstruct behaviour behind artefacts

The concept of 'time'

E.g.: - the Mayan calendar, very keen sense of time, two overlapping calendars, places of overlap are important dates

Symbols of value

E.g.: Indus Valley civilization during the Harappan phase used standardized concepts of weights and measurements - Must have been central to how they saw their society working - Could also have been used for trade, their system of weight and value? We don't really know. - Seals and small written 'labels'? - Emphasis upon trade, both within region and beyond

Recognition of Cult

E.g.: catholic mass - focusing of attention - boundary zone between this world and the next - presence of the deity - participation and offering

Symbols of power

Elites in early complex societies gathered rare and exotic items as indicators of their wealth, power, and ability to gather and redistribute resources. E.g.: - Moche elites in Peru, visual display of power, divinity for the public - Assyrian kings created impressive palaces decorated with statues and wall friezes of battle and hunting to impress their visitors with their power and importance - Mayan kings built impressive architecture and dressed in exotic and rare clothing while performing rituals to demonstrate their 'difference' from the rest of society; their conduit of the gods - Mayan kings also performed ritual sacrifices through the killing of captive enemies to emphasize their power and importance - Visual displays of power are quite common in emerging complex society

Ancient copper trade, c. 2600-2100 B.C.

Example of trade and exchange. - Crucible smelting on a small scale (3500-3000 B.C.) E.g.: Copper production and consumption during the 4th/3rd millennium B.C. in western Asia - during the 4th millennium B.C. copper is initially produced on a very small scale (as seen in our previous lecture) - this is a complex, time-consuming process, involving small scale crucible smelting, and a length process of smelting/crushing/sorting and melting to form even a small copper axe - around 2900 B.C. this changes very dramatically - new technologies are developed in mining, smelting and in casting of copper - the scale changes from very small scale to very large scale mining and smelting, and introduces mass-production in casting activities - archaeologically the BIG question is "why"? - small-scale casting of simple tools - ... changes very quickly to large scale production (with clay moulds, centralized production for melting and casting) of not just tools, but also to producing copper ingots--suggesting a trade in copper as a commodity Evidence of increasingly complex labour organization: - extensive mining operations spread throughout the region - transportation of ores to smelting sites - fuel procurement (charcoal production) - transportation of fuel to smelting sites - large-scale smeling operations, multiple furnaces - post-smelting crushing and sorting of copper from slags - secondary processing of copper - transportation of copper metal to final production sites - evidence from mines, smelting and ore/slag processing sites suggest and exponential increase in scale and complexity of production Hypothesis: copper production increases due to the Egyptian use of copper during the Old Kingdom (e.g. copper saw, bowl, razor, ewer, statues). As part of production/consumption cycle copper ingots are traded through the key sites in the Negev Desert of Israel on the way to Egypt. - ceramic links between Faynan and the Negev - 38% of all Negev pottery composed of an Arkose fabric, suggesting a Faynan origin - Pottery from Faynan includes 'Ora shale' fabrics of the Negev - Lead isotopic ratios prove Faynan origin of Negev bar-ingots - Asiatics (perhaps metal smiths from Faynan) in an Egyptian tomb painting at Beni Hasan

Central Place Theory and Survey Results

Example: Robert McCormick-Adams' surveys of Mesopotamia published in "Hearland of Cities" and "Land Behind Baghdad" - size/scale of sites and their dispersal are reflections of networks of related sites - most significant factors in location of key sites was in fact their proximity to transportation routes, and especially water transport along the Euphrates River

Experimental Archaeology

Field of study which attempts to generate and test archaeological hypotheses, usually by replicating or approximating the feasibility of ancient cultures performing various tasks or feats. It employs a number of different methods, techniques, analyses, and approaches in order to do so, based upon archaeological source material such as ancient structures or artifacts. E.g.: experimental tree felling with reconstructed adzes of the Linear Pottery culture for the analysis of stress marks on the adze blades and ghost lines on the tree stump and the timber in comparison with marks on archaeological finds; creating medieval "wattle and duab" wall in the Viking style; casting metal in flat ingot moulds; building a medieval house using original tools and techniques

House of David Inscription

Fragments of an Aramaic royal inscription that recounts a defeat of the kings of Israel and Judah by an Aramean king in the 9th century [Hazael]. Identifies the king of Judah as belonging to the house of David—the only reference to David in contemporary sources outside of the Bible

The earliest pottery

From the Yarmoukian culture in the Levant (modern Isreal and Jordan) and dates to just before 6000 BC.

Glass molding

Glass can also be formed in a mould, where the cut glass rods are placed in the mould and heated until they fuse.

When did the southern Mayan sites become abandoned?

In the middle of the 8th century, throughout the southern Maya world, the power of Kings waned. Disease and hunger became commonplace due to the warfare, unbridled population increases or environmental degradation, depending on the city, that occurred in the first half of the century. People are beginning to drift away from the cities. Slowly, one-by-one, the great southern cities are abandoned. In 761, the King of Dos Pilas is captured and killed. From that point on, there are no more hieroglyphic inscriptions there. The last written date at Palenque is 799. Twenty years later, Copán falls silent. Caracol stops recording in 859. The last inscription date at Tikal is written in 870. Only a handful of Mayan cities in the south survive beyond the first years of the 10th century.

Should the past belong to Indigenous populations?

Indigenous population human remains - Colonialism has a long history of imposing its own view on the culture and archaeology of indigenous populations - This is particularly true where the collection of indigenous human remains are concerned - Collection of skeletal material in many countries, including New Zealand (Maori), Australia (Aboriginal groups), North America (First Nations), have left significant issues between archaeologists / anthropologists and these groups - Recent legislation and repatriation of remains for burial from museums has begun to redress these wrongs Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) - United States federal law (1990) requiring federal agencies and institutions that receive federal funding to return Native American "cultural items" to their respective peoples - Cultural items include human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, and objects of "cultural patrimony" - The law demand consultation with potential lineal descendants or American Indian tribal officials in the repatriation process - This can be complicated in some situations where no obvious descendants are known, or where one or more group is a possible descendant - Particularly true for "archaic" period remains, such as Kennewick Man

Male vs Female Skull

Male Skull: - Heavier and larger - Large mastoids - Large supra-orbital ridges - Square orbits - Square chin - Sloping forehead - Pronounced muscle markings Female Skull: - Gracile and smaller - Smaller mastoids - Sharp supra-orbital margin - Round orbits - Pointed/Round chin - High forehead - Slight muscle markings Accuracy is approximately 80-90%, but reference collections are heavily biased towards males. Systemic bias in favor of males when using morphological characters.

Cultural Resource Management (CRM) in the US

Management of sites of archaeological, architectural, and historical interests in compliance with environmental and historic preservation laws - In the USA, this falls under a variety of laws, but most importantly under: The National Historic Preservation Act (1996) and the National Environmental Policy Act (1969) - Archaeological and CRM specialists working with each State's Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) must determine whether sites are eligible to be listed in the "National Register of Historic Places" - Construction and land use projects--whether on Federal land or in some way receiving Federal funds--must be reviewed to determine the effects on environmental, cultural, and historic resources.

Goals of Archaeology

Modern archaeological research has three main goals: 1) To construct culture history 2) To reconstruct ancient lifeways 3) To explain culture change

Should the past belong to Museums?

Museums? The Elgin Marbles - Greek architectural frieze 6th Century B.C. - Obtained permission from the Ottoman authorities to remove pieces from the Partenon (temple of Athena; symbol of Greek nationalism), on the acropolis of Athens - 1801-1812 agents for Elgin removed about half of the surviving sculptures - Transported to Britain, where after some public debate they were bought by the government in 1816 and put on display in the British Museum (where they remain) Museums and the return of cultural heritage - This is a large and growing issue in archaeology and heritage (not to mention international politics) - Many of the great museums of the world are stuffed to overflowing with the cultural heritage of other nations, which were collected on a vast scale as part of the colonial enterprise of the 16th through 20th century - Examples of some of the largest: British Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum (London), The Louvre (Paris), The Metropolitan Museum (New York), The Fitzwilliam Museum (Cambridge), Ashmolean (Oxford), Pergamon Museum and the Agyptisches Museum (Berlin)

Hertzian Cone

Name for the bulb of force produced in fracture of cryptocrystalline materials.

Oded Golan

Oded Golan (Hebrew: עודד גולן‎) (born 1951 in Tel Aviv) is an Israeli engineer, entrepreneur, and antiquities collector. He owns one of the largest collections of Biblical archaeology in the world. Some of the artifacts in his collection have produced great excitement in religious and archaeological circles, including the James Ossuary (the bone box of James, brother of Jesus), which achieved international fame in 2002, after world-renowned experts confirmed the authenticity of the writing inscribed on it. Another famous item from Golan's collection is the Jehoash Tablet, a monumental 16-line commemorative inscription in ancient Hebrew. After its publication, the date of the Tablet became a topic of debate among scholars. Golan was accused by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) of involvement in the forgery of one half of the James Ossuary inscription, the Jehoash Inscription and other items. Golan denied any involvement in forgery, and argued that he purchased the two items from licensed antiquities dealers in 1976 and 1999 respectively, and to the best of his understanding, the inscriptions are ancient. Four other defendants were indicted along with Golan, including two of the largest antiquities dealers in Israel. In 2012, the court acquitted Golan of all charges of forgery and fraud, but convicted of illegal trading in antiquities. In late 2013, the Supreme Court ordered the State to return to Golan the James Ossuary, the Jehoash Inscription and hundreds of other items that had been confiscated by the IAA "for the purpose of investigation.

Can there be multiple levels of explanation for change? Are we wedded to a single perspective?

Often times we can only infer what the factors of change were. This inevitably leads to multiple interpretations.

Oxhide ingot

Oxhide ingots are metal slabs, usually of copper but sometimes of tin, produced and widely distributed during the Mediterranean Late Bronze Age (LBA). Their shape resembles the hide of an ox with a protruding handle in each of the ingot's four corners. Early thought was that each ingot was equivalent to the value of one ox. However, the similarity in shape is simply a coincidence. The ingots' producers probably designed these protrusions to make the ingots easily transportable overland on the backs of pack animals.

Settlement Patterning

Possible site categories include (ascending scale): - hamlet - dispersed village - nucleated village - town - local center - regional center - capital Many archaeologists say the most reliable source of information about the structure of past societies is the pattern associated with their physical distribution across land's surface E.g.: - A crannog is an ancient artificial or natural island in Ireland and Scotland, used for a settlement. The name may also refer to a wooden platform erected on shallow loch floors - Central Place Theory

Types of change

Renfrew and Bahn list a few examples: - Explaining a specific event (i.e. the Maya Collapse) - Explaining a specific pattern of events (patterning in the archaeological record) - Explaining a class of events (i.e. origins of agriculture, the rise of complex societies) - Explaining a process (i.e. large scale processes common to large parts of humankind; i.e. development of metallurgy)

Two general categories of groups

Residential groups: - Live together in the same physical area and feel associated with each other - Sometimes similar to "corporate" groups (those that may only occasionally get together physically as one body) - Examples of residential or corporate groups: family units, villages, neighbourhoods, cities Non-Residential Groups: - Categories of people who share common interests or conditions, but may/may not live in the same physical area - Examples: Men/Women, religious groups, political affiliations, professions, age sets Both categories may cross-cut each other, such as political groups in several cities, each groups may be a part of a residential group as well as a non-residential group on the basis of their political affiliation

Sumerian Religion

Rituals - daily rituals ensured the support and good will of their gods - daily temple rituals, depicted in Sumerian art, described in texts - sacrifices and offerings to the god: they would literally dress and 'feed' the god, trying to care for its needs - Why spend so much time and resources on this? Mesopotamian pessimism--Gods could be malevolent, so best to ensure their good will. - Noted for their peity Sumerian flood story in the Epic of Gilgamesh - The god Enlil decides to destroy humankind - Sends disease and famine - The god Enki warns Ziusudra of the city of Shurrupak - Who builds a boat and takes his wife, family and 'the seeds of all living things' - Humankind is wiped out, but Ziusudra survives - On emerging from the boat, they make a sacrifice which draws the gods 'like flies' - sounds like Noah story--Hebrew 'borrowed' it from narratives of the time; endings are very different though; Judeo-Christian version has happy ending, Sumerian ending shows blood-thirst of gods, symbiotic relationship between people and gods.

Siliceous Stone

Sedimentary rocks that have silica (SiO2) as the primary constituent

Ingot casting

Solidification of molten metal in a mold of simple shape. The metal then requires extensive plastic deformation to create a finished product.

Which corridor had a significant role to play during the Late Bronze Age?

Syro-Palestinian states, including Uqarit, Qatna, Tunip, Amurru, Gubla (Byblos), Beruta (Beirut), Tyre, Acco, Qadesh, Damascus, Megiddo, Shechem, Gezer, Hazor, Jerusalem, Ascalon

Amarna Letters

The Amarna Letters are a body of 14th century BCE correspondence exchanged between the rulers of the Ancient Near East and Egypt. They are perhaps the earliest examples of international diplomacy while their most common subjects are negotiations of diplomatic marriage, friendship statements and exchanged materials. - Letters were found in Upper Egypt at Amarna, the modern name for the capital of the Pharaoh Akhenaten during the New Kingdom - These 381 letters date primarily from the reign of Pharaoh Amenhotep IV, better known as Akhenaten (1350s-1330s B.C.), but also to his father Amenhotep III - These letters give us a window on political relations at the time - Five of these tablets contain correspondence between Kadishman-Enlil, King of Babylon with Amenhotep III surrounding the procurement of the Babylonian King's daughter as a bride - Many letters contain request for military assistance but also detailing state sponsored gifts - "And now my brother is going to see the things that I have dispatched to my brother. Thus I will dispatch to my brother [gifts]." Mitanni King Tushratta to Amenhotep III--very formulaic structure, perceived themselves as a brotherhood, exchange of resources through reciprocity, a gift from a King to another with the expectation of resource in return

Should the past belong to the general public?

The General Public? - E.g. Rick Savage, "American Digger" - We should care about this because the archaeological record is finite

Authenticity of 6th Century Kouros at J. Paul Getty Museum

The Getty kouros is an over-life-sized statue in the form of a late archaic Greek kouros.[1] The dolomitic marble sculpture was bought by the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, California in 1985 for ten million dollars and first exhibited there in October 1986. Despite initial favourable scientific analysis of the patina and aging of the marble, the question of its authenticity has persisted from the beginning. Subsequent demonstration of an artificial means of creating the de-dolomitization observed on the stone has prompted a number of art historians to revise their opinions of the work. If genuine, it is one of only twelve extant complete kouroi. If fake, it exhibits a high degree of technical and artistic sophistication by an as-yet unidentified forger. Its status remains undetermined: today the museum's label reads "Greek, about 530 B.C., or modern forgery".

Where did the earliest scientific investigations of a Mayan city take place?

The earliest scientific investigation of a Mayan city took place in Western Honduras at Copán

Who were the earliest explorers to document the cities of the Maya, and when?

The earliest to document the cities of the Maya were an American explorer called John Lloyd Stephens and an English artist by the name of Frederick Catherwood.

The Potters of Hebron

The film is an ethnographic study of rural pottery production in southern Palestine/Israel circa 1970, which documents the al-Fakoureh family as they produce traditional potter, including: - zirs--large water storage jards that cool water by convection - tabla--small drums - ibrek--small water jug (with spout) The film is a remarkable piece of work which shows how the entire family (the male family members at least) are involved in the process, including adults, juveniles, children and even disabled family members. - Many of the things observed in the movie were likely practiced by past populations as well The film documents all stages of the production process (all of which can be observed archaeologically), in particular: - clay selection--two types of clay (red and white) are collected, they have different properties, they are mixed to create an optimal texture - clay mixing - soaking--clay is churned with the feet, water becomes saturated with clay particles - levigation--clay-watter is put into settling tank, clay settles at bottom, canal is openned to let excess water back into mixing tank, whole process is repeated, takes approximately 7 days to fill settling tank with fine particle clay - ponding and drying the clay through evaporation--sand from Gaza is added, settling tank is then emptied into the drying tank, in the summer, it takes approximately 5 days for water to evaporate and be left with a malleable clay - foot-wedging--very arduous--really need help from gluteus maximus and bodyweight/gravity - hand-wedging - mechanical wedging ensures homogeneity and removes air bubbles that could cause pottery to explode when fired - multiple-stage fast wheel throwing-- takes several days and is done in separate stages - drying and firing *importance of intuition and deep familiarity of local practices and environment

Garbology

The study of modern trash to gain insight into changing patterns of modern refuse, and how ancient populations may have discarded their own waste. - Not uncommon to see students engaged in reviewing modern trash as a means of analogy to discover patterns in past trash deposits E.g.: - William (Bill) Rathje's Garbology Project - Museum of London (UK) -- 20th century archaeology, plastic bags from 1980s, shows transition to plastic age, use materials to infer behaviour

Paleonutrition

The study of the nutritional (in)adequacy of a past population's diet.

Cult

The totality of external religious practice and observance. A pattern of ritual behaviour in connection with specific objects, within a framework of spatial and temporal coordinates.

Settlement Patterns

The ways in which people distribute themselves across the landscape can be very revealing about that culture's structure and relationships with others.

Briefly describe the following flintknapping methods: (a) hard-hammer percussion, (b) softhammer percussion, (c) indirect percussion, and (d) pressure flaking.

There are a few different flintknapping methods one can use to produce stole tools. First, Bradley demonstrated the use of hard-hammer percussion. This technique entails using a hard stone as a hammer to hit the piece of obsidian and produce flakes. This method works better on large, less fragile pieces of obsidian and produces larger flakes. The soft-hammer percussion method is similar to the hard-hammer method in that it involved directly striking the piece of obsidian to produce flakes. However, it differs from the previous method because it uses a softer hammer tool to accomplish this process—usually a piece of antler, but wood or bone are also sometimes used. The softer material of the soft-hammer can also be shaped into more precise tools than the hard-stone hammers. This method is usually used on smaller, more fragile pieces of obsidian after they have already been worked by hard-stone hammers. They are preferable for this purpose because they can shape the sharp edges of worked stone instead of shattering them. This method also produces thinner flakes and run flatter across the surface of the stone. Unlike the conchoidal flakes produced by the hard-hammer percussion, the flakes produced by soft-hammer percussion are produced by "bent-fracture"—they are peeled from the core. A third flintknapping technique is indirect percussion. This method involves using a punch and hammer, thereby applying a large force to a very small area of a stone tool. This technique is usually used to accomplish final detail work on stone tools. With this technique, as opposed to others, the flintknapper needs both hands to strike the tool. A platform is therefore needed to hold the stone. A fourth flintknapping method is called pressure flaking. In pressure flaking, the edge of a stone tool is trimmed by removing lithic flakes by pressing on the stone with a sharp instrument—like an antler tine in Bradley's demonstration—rather than striking it with a hammer or punch. This technique can be used to shape the edge of a tool or to form grooves. Because the stone tool must be grasped in the flintknapper's hand, a piece is usually wrapped in a piece of leather to protect the flintknapper's hands.

Diet Reconstruction

There are a variety of aspects of the skeletal biology which infer back to diet: - caries - Meat vs. plant foods - Stable isotopes

Exchange during the Late Bronze Age of the eastern Mediterranean (1550-1150 BC)

There are two primary categories of exchange which occur between the large empires of the period: - State sponsored trade - Non-state sponsored trade (i.e. commercial trading)