Material Culture Assemblages Research Articles

Zhuravlevo complex of the of Borki 1 hillfort in the Lower Ishim River Basin

At the end of the Late Bronze Age, there were events taking place in the history of the Eurasian steppes that manifested the beginning of the formation of cultures of the Scythian type. These processes, in many aspects triggered by the climate changes, spread into both southern taiga and forest-steppe territories of Western Siberia. In understanding the processes of the transitional period from the Bronze to Early Iron Age and beginning of the Early Iron Age in the southern taiga and forest-steppe Ishim River Basin, a major role pertains to the materials of the multi-layered hillfort of Borki 1, in the study of which, as well as of the cultures of the concerned period in ge-neral, a significant contribution was made by E.M. Danchenko (1991, 1996). The site is located nearby the village of Borki of Vikulovo District, Tyumen Oblast. This paper aims at the analysis and introduction into the scientific discourse of the materials of the Zhuravlevo type from the excavation trench of 2014 with the clean archaeological layer of the beginning of the Early Iron Age. During this period, the fortified platform of the hillfort was overbuilt with dwellings of the above-ground type, probably timber crib. The Zhuravlevo ware of the settlement finds its closest similarities in the materials of the sites of the Lower Ishim Basin: the settlement of Borovlyanka 2, hillfort of Lastochkino Gnezdo 1, fortified settlement of Maray 4, as well as the sites of Yamsysa 7, Kip 3, Novonikolskoe 3 and others in the southern-taiga Ishim-Irtysh area. Differences in the pottery and material culture assemblages even within a range of the Zhuravlevo complexes, not to mention the later ones of the Bogochanovo type, which have certain continuity with the aforementioned complexes, help to reveal evolutionary development of the culture of the transitional period in the Lower Ishim Basin and to raise the issue of the revision of its chronology and peri-odization. Giving the studies of E.M. Danchenko credit for unification of the Zhuravlevo and Bogochanovo types within the framework of the Bogochanovo Culture of the Early Iron Age, we believe that it would be more logical to consider earlier, Zhuravlevo, materials as a stage in the development of the Krasnoozerka Culture. The existence of the latter we tend to define from the mergence of the Suzgun and Atlym complexes to the formation of the steady Sargatka Culture. In spite of certain dissimilarities in the ware originating from the forest-steppe territories of the Lower Tobol River Basin, Ishim-Irtysh interfluve, Baraba and the Ob River Basin, it still seems that the pro-cesses of the development of the cultures of the concerned period in these regions have similarity in many as-pects. There is a notable uniformity in the bronze assemblages of the sites of these and much wider territories. Products, similar to those found at the hillfort of Borki 1, are present in the complexes of the steppe belt of Eurasia from Tuva to the Circumpontic area and date to, most likely, the period within the 8th–6th cc. BC.

Reconstructing rock art chronology with transfer learning: A case study from Arnhem Land, Australia

In recent years, machine learning approaches have been used to classify and extract style from media and have been used to reinforce known chronologies from classical art history. In this work we employ the first ever machine learning analysis of Australian rock art using a data efficient transfer learning approach to identify features suitable for distinguishing styles of rock art. These features are evaluated in a one-shot learning setting. Results demonstrate that known Arnhem Land Rock art styles can be resolved without knowledge of prior groupings. We then analyse the activation space of learned features and report on the relationships between styles and arrange these classes into a stylistic chronology based on distance within the activation space. By generating a stylistic chronology, it is shown that the model is sensitive to both temporal and spatial patterns in the distribution of rock art in the Arnhem Land Plateau region. More broadly, this approach is ideally suited to evaluating style within any material culture assemblage and overcomes the common constraint of small training data sets in archaeological machine learning studies.

A UNIFIED MODEL FOR THE GOVERNING DYNAMICS OF AGRICULTURAL FRONTIER ZONES

We present a unified model for the movement of agricultural frontiers based on the construction of the parallax shift and its relation to normalizable science. The model is based on data from the Baltic Basin, where for thousands of years, complex and semi-complex hunter/gatherer/fishers and agriculturalists remained in an equilibrium state. When agriculturalization occurred, it occurred in a punctuated equilibrium manner, which defies current models of agricultural frontier movement, and by extension, current understandings of the underlying dynamics of social change. This new model is a modification of Structuration (Giddens 1984), with the emerging field of selforganized criticality within Physics (Bak et. al 1988; Brunk 2002b). These odifications require two additional governing dynamics not included in Giddens’s original formulation. When joined to an agricultural frontiers model with selective information permeability, these governing dynamics allow for societies to undergo punctuated equilibrium change under stress affect conditions. This results in critical behavior without the need for chaotic state change (Bak et. al 1988). This results in the creation of new material culture assemblages, reflecting new societal structures which are in equilibrium with the social and environmental landscape. The model is scale independent in both space and time, presenting some interesting conclusions. Keywords: SubNeolithic, Corded Ware, Agricultural Frontier, Dynamic Model, Self Organized Criticality.

An Island in Crisis? Reconsidering the Formation of Roman Crete

This paper critically assesses the transformation of material culture assemblages on Crete between its conquest by Rome in 69–67 B.C.E. and the mid first century C.E. by first applying the frameworks of eventful archaeology and globalization. These paradigms demonstrate that the conquest, despite being an important historical event, was not the primary impetus behind transformation of material culture assemblages but instead served as a preliminary step for gradual transition that varied in pace across Crete. Previous analyses have highlighted the mid first century C.E. as the point when transformation becomes evident even at sites resistant to change up to that point. An explanation of the specific factors that led to this situation, however, is lacking. Building on an argument tied to globalization that investment is a key variable behind gradual transformation, this paper examines economic developments on Crete before and after Rome's conquest—including infrastructure expansion, increase in agricultural output, and the growth of social and economic networks—that permitted increased connectivity with other regions of the Roman empire. These developments, which led to intensification of economic contacts by the mid first century C.E., particularly with Italy, provided a conduit for transformation to reach all sectors of the island.

Stability and change at Çadır Höyük in central Anatolia: a case of Late Chalcolithic globalisation?

AbstractScholars have recently investigated the efficacy of applying globalisation models to ancient cultures such as the fourth-millennium BC Mesopotamian Uruk system. Embedded within globalisation models is the ‘complex connectivity‘ that brings disparate regions together into a singular world. In the fourth millennium BC, the site of Çadır Höyük on the north-central Anatolian plateau experienced dramatic changes in its material culture and architectural assemblages, which in turn reflect new socio-economic, sociopolitical and ritual patterns at this rural agro-pastoral settlement. This study examines the complex connectivities of the ancient Uruk system, encompassing settlements in more consistent contact with the Uruk system such as Arslantepe in southeastern Anatolia, and how these may have fostered exchange networks that reached far beyond the Uruk ‘global world‘ and onto the Anatolian plateau.

AGMT3-D: A software for 3-D landmarks-based geometric morphometric shape analysis of archaeological artifacts.

We present here a newly developed software package named Artifact GeoMorph Toolbox 3-D (AGMT3-D). It is intended to provide archaeologists with a simple and easy-to-use tool for performing 3-D landmarks-based geometric morphometric shape analysis on 3-D digital models of archaeological artifacts. It requires no prior knowledge of programming or proficiency in statistics. AGMT3-D consists of a data-acquisition procedure for automatically positioning 3-D models in space and fitting them with grids of 3-D semi-landmarks. It also provides a number of analytical tools and procedures that allow the processing and statistical analysis of the data, including generalized Procrustes analysis, principal component analysis, a warp tool, automatic calculation of shape variabilities and statistical tests. It provides an output of quantitative, objective and reproducible results in numerical, textual and graphic formats. These can be used to answer archaeologically significant questions relating to morphologies and morphological variabilities in artifact assemblages. Following the presentation of the software and its functions, we apply it to a case study addressing the effects of different types of raw material on the morphologies and morphological variabilities present in an experimentally produced Acheulian handaxe assemblage. The results show that there are statistically significant differences between the mean shapes and shape variabilities of handaxes produced on flint and those produced on basalt. With AGMT3-D, users can analyze artifact assemblages and address questions that are deducible from the morphologies and morphological variabilities of material culture assemblages. These questions can relate to issues of, among others, relative chronology, cultural affinities, tool function and production technology. AGMT3-D is aimed at making 3-D landmarks-based geometric morphometric shape analysis more accessible to archaeologists, in the hope that this method will become a tool commonly used by archaeologists.

Imperializing the province: a residence of a Neo-Assyrian City Governor at Tel Dan

Creation of imperial space in antiquity was achieved by territorial expansion, followed by processes of consolidation. An administrative provincial system was set up with power in the hands of imperial officials, conquered towns were reorganized and strategically-located centres were built. Following the conquest and annexation of the Hula Valley by the Assyrian Empire in the 8th century BC, a new settlement system was put in place, with the Assyrians choosing Dan to fill the role of regional centre. Under Assyrian rule, the city experienced a rapid recovery, becoming even more populous. New residential quarters were constructed and an imperial edifice (Building T1-3/1) was built. Analysis of the architectural plan and material culture assemblage from Building T1-3/1 attests to the physical manifestations of Assyrian dominion in the provinces, especially a lifestyle reflecting ‘imperial enclaves’. This involved an awareness of the local environment, the selective use of cultural elements borrowed from the imperial core and other provincial centres, integrated with local materials, construction techniques and objects deriving from indigenous society.

Cypriot ritual and cult from the Bronze to the Iron Age: a longue-durée approach

In two recent studies on Early Iron Age Cypriot sanctuaries and religion—the first dedicated to the memory of John N. Coldstream, the second to the memory of James R.B. Stewart—I attempted to show that looking at Cypriot ritual places (and practices) ‘before and after’ can be a stimulating and valuable methodological tool for understanding Cypriot ritual and cult diachronically. A drastic transformation imprinted upon the physical and socio-political landscape of the island during the Early Iron Age relates to the establishment—for the first time in the history of the island—of the extra-urban temenos sanctuary, related to the territorial formation of the Cypriot polities. After a careful analysis of Early Iron Age sacred topography and material culture assemblages, the next step would be a meticulous examination of their associated rituals, cults, and iconography in order to illustrate better the transplantation and transformation of Late Cypriot ideas (and ideals) into the Iron Age.

Cultures of lights

This paper is part of a larger project, looking at electricity access in rural India. For the project, a nine months long ethnographic research was carried out in five villages in Bihar, an eastern state of India. It involved looking at various sources of light – grid electricity, solar lanterns, biomass micro-grids and kerosene oil. The paper tries to understand, and explain, the cultural notions that dictate peoples’ specific lighting practices and lighting practices that propagate particular cultural notions. The paper argues that, through the mediation of materiality, light cultures (cultivates and propagates) culture and culture cultures light. It does this by engaging with three key ideas. First, it argues that light has a critical role in establishing and reinforcing honour. Following this, it examines light’s role in hospitality. Lastly, it connects light to the religious beliefs among Hindus, and looks at how culture affects the materiality of light. The paper approaches what light does and what it means as emerging from a material-culture assemblage, which embodies the external and the internal, the political and the productive, the corporal and the conceptual, the material, moral, and the sensible. From this, light emerges with dual – material and non-material – properties, as it interacts with culture.

A Reanalysis of the Black Wheel-Made Ware of the Intermediate Bronze Age

The paper focuses on the distribution, typology and technology of Black Wheel-Made Ware (also known as “Megiddo Ware”) and presents a discussion of its origin and date. In the second half of the third millennium BCE the southern Levant witnessed a radical change in settlement pattern, nature of sites and material-culture assemblages. One of the features defining this period was the regionalism in the ceramic repertoire. Despite varying opinions regarding the division of the pottery groups, it is agreed that one of these groups-the Black Wheel-Made Ware-was limited to northern Israel.

Woodland and Caddo Period Sites at Toledo Bend Reservoir, Northwest Louisiana and East Texas

Toledo Bend Reservoir is one of the largest artificial lakes in the United States and the largest reservoir in the South. The lake is approximately 65 miles long and contains over 1200 miles of shoreline in both Louisiana and Texas. Construction began in 1964 with completion of the power plant, with the subsequent filling of the lake in 1969. Archaeological investigations at Toledo Bend Reservoir on the Sabine River and tributaries in both Louisiana and Texas took place primarily took during the 1960s, with survey and excavations, sometimes of a very limited nature by the University of Texas (UT) and Southern Methodist University (SMU). Girard has continued archaeological investigations along the Louisiana side of the reservoir, however, focusing particularly on work at the James Pace site. In this article we review the nature of the material culture assemblage of the Woodland and Caddo sites at Toledo Bend Reservoir based on the collections at the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory at The University of Texas at Austin (TARL). This consists of ceramic and/or lithic artifacts from 76 different sites in Louisiana and Texas. We have also examined ceramic vessels from Woodland and Caddo burial features at several Toledo Bend Reservoir sites. Our purpose in re-examining the TARL collections from the Toledo Bend Reservoir is to better understand and characterize the material culture assemblages (primarily decorated ceramic sherds) from sites that date between ca. 2500 years B.P. and the late 17th-early 18th century A.D., particularly in light of questions concerning the cultural affiliation and cultural taxonomic relationships of the ancestral Caddo sites in this part of East Texas and western Louisiana.

The Ransom and Sarah Williams Farmstead: Post-Emancipation Transitions of an African American Family in Central Texas Vol. 2

In conjunction with the proposed construction of the southwest segment of State Highway 45 in southern Travis County, the Texas Department of Transportation sponsored archeological testing and data recovery efforts at the Ransom Williams farmstead. Prewitt and Associates, Inc., conducted an interdisciplinary community-based historic archeological study of the farmstead from 2005 through 2011. Extensive archival research reveals that the 45-acre farm was owned and occupied by Ransom Williams and his wife Sarah, both former slaves, from about 1871 to ca. 1905. The Williams family lived in the predominantly white rural community of Bear Creek, but they had connections to the nearby freedmen communities of Antioch Colony in northern Hays County and Manchaca in southern Travis County. The stories of the Ransom Williams family and their connections to these communities are enhanced by extensive oral history research, with over 46 hours of taped and transcribed interviews with 27 descendant community members. Data recovery investigations focused on a landscape archeological study to define the layout and design of the entire farmstead, including a stock pond and a network of dry-laid rock walls that facilitated water drainage, demarcated property boundaries, and formed livestock pens. Intensive hand excavations were used to examine features associated with the Williams house, outbuildings and activity areas, and a large trash midden. This work recovered more than 26,000 artifacts. They constitute an impressive material culture assemblage that is associated, with few exceptions, with the Williams family tenure on the land. The combined archival data, oral history interviews, and archeological evidence tell the fascinating story of how one African American farm family lived and thrived in central Texas during Reconstruction and into the Jim Crow era.

Women and Class in Landlord Villages of the Tehran Plain, Iran

This paper explores the presence of women in the landlord villages of the Tehran Plain, Iran, drawing on recent fieldwork in the form of spatial analysis of the built environment, ethnographic interviews, excavation, and analysis of material culture assemblages. The visibility of women in the buildings and material culture of the villages is assessed and compared to the evidence gained through interview. Given the acknowledged importance of class as a social structure, analysis and discussion is extended to consider whether it is possible to distinguish women of different classes in the villages. Although largely ignored in many previous historical and ethnographic accounts, it is clear that women have played a key role in these villages, and that they can be detected in the material culture. While the ethnographic evidence and spatial analysis indicate the presence of different classes of women, determining this from the artifactual assemblages alone is very difficult. q ]My story is about ordinary women like myself, whose lives were transformed by events in the late twentieth century. My story is about Iran, or Persia, and the women of Iran whose popular history barely exists. We have had thousands of poets, writers and historians who across the centuries have left a rich cultural heritage. None the less, women are rarely mentioned as creators and mentors of the society. They are hidden behind curtains and high walls (Shafii 1997:xii–xiii).

OS BANCOS DE CERÂMICA MARAJOARA: SEUS CONTEXTOS E POSSÍVEIS SIGNIFICADOS SIMBÓLICOS

Esse artigo apresenta um estudo sobre bancos da fase marajoara da tradição Policrômica da Amazônia, realizado a partir de dados obtidos durante escavações e análises de laboratório. Informações etnohistóricas e etnográficas são usadas para construir hipóteses sobre os possíveis usos e significados dos prováveis assentos circulares de cerâmica encontrados na ilha de Marajó, mas raros em outros contextos etnográficos e arqueológicos. A ausência de bancos nos contextos funerários é tida como indicação de seu uso mundano, ainda que possam ter sido usados em contextos rituais que não o funerário. O exame da iconografia desses objetos, onde predominam os motivos incisos que parecem imitar esteiras produzidas com fibras trançadas, sugere seu uso como assento. Finalmente, uma descrição etnográfica de uma cerimônia de castração feminina é apresentada, mostrando, o uso, nesse contexto, de quatro objetos exóticos e raros, mas que fazem parte da cultura material da fase marajoara. A analogia etnográfica, neste caso, traz novas possibilidades para entender os possíveis usos para os bancos de cerâmica marajoara. Palavras-chave: bancos de cerâmica, fase marajoara, arqueologia amazônica.

Small Finds, Space, and Social Context: Exploring Agency in Historical Archaeology

The George Washington Foundation Department of Archaeology has combined a number of excavation and artifact-recovery techniques with a deliberate approach to artifact research and analysis in the laboratory to enhance interpretations of past behaviors. This article describes the elements of this approach and provides a case study involving the numerous 18th-century wig hair curler fragments found at the boyhood home of George Washington. The historical record together with the material culture assemblage allow us to demonstrate that the Washington family engaged in a home-based system of wig maintenance, allowing the economically struggling Washington boys to don wigs, an essential element of male gentry attire. This approach illustrates that conscientious recovery and analysis of small finds, such as wig curlers, can provide data used to reveal a great deal about the agency and consumer motivations of their owners.

Phylogenetic analyses of Lapita decoration do not support branching evolution or regional population structure during colonization of Remote Oceania

Intricately decorated Lapita pottery (3100-2700 BP) was made and deposited by the prehistoric colonizers of Pacific islands, east of the main Solomon's chain. For decades, analyses of this pottery have focused on the ancestor-descendant relationships of populations and the relative degree of interaction across the region to explain similarities in Lapita decoration. Cladistic analyses, increasingly used to examine the evolutionary relationships of material culture assemblages, have not been conducted on Lapita artefacts. Here, we present the first cladistic analysis of Lapita pottery and note the difficulties in using cladistics to investigate datasets where a high degree of horizontal transmission and non-branching evolution may explain observed variation. We additionally present NeighborNet and phenetic distance network analyses to generate hypotheses that may account for Lapita decorative similarity.

Survey at Arediou "Vouppes" (Lithosouros), a Late Bronze Age Agricultural Settlement on Cyprus: Settlement on Cyprus: A Preliminary Analysis of the Material Culture Assemblages

A Late Bronze Age settlement was identified at Arediou Vouppes, Cyprus, in 1993. This has been interpreted as an agricultural support village and, as such, forms a lynchpin in the development of ...

The prehistoric fisher-gatherers of the western coast of the Arabian Sea: a case of seasonal sedentarization?

The analysis of the settlement structures, material culture assemblages and handicraft activities of the aceramic, fifth millennium bp shell middens of the coast of Oman has shown that sedentarization had already taken place in this area among the Middle Holocene fisher-gatherers. These observations have been possible thanks to the study of four settlements and their habitation structures that indicate the relative permanence of their inhabitants throughout a long period of the year, at least during the autumn and winter months. The archaeological evidence for seasonal movements towards the regions of the interior is very limited, although ethnographic parallels would suggest that they occurred at least in the summer. Of particular importance are the observations regarding the handicraft activities. They show that some of the sites were related to the production of specific prestige and utilitarian goods such as polished stone earrings, different types of necklace beads and marine shell fishhooks.

Pharaonic Ventures into South Sinai: El-Markha Plain Site 346

The objectives of the University of Toronto expedition to South Sinai include tracing pharaonic routes to the turquoise and copper mining region, investigating pharaonic and indigenous camps, mines, and their material culture assemblages in this area, and assessing Egypto-Sinaitic cross-cultural relations. The 2000-01 reconnaissance work and 2002 excavations focused on Site 346, a New Kingdom anchorage and copper smelting camp beside the Red Sea, located at the northern end of el-Markha Plain and to the west of the mining region around Serabit el-Khadim. Two contemporary small pottery scatters (Sites 346a-b) and a circular limestone structure (Site 345) were also investigated. The project has incorporated satellite image interpretation to isolate vegetation signatures and associated water sources within the arid el-Markha Plain, thereby detecting potential archaeological sites for ground reconnaissance work.

The early second millennium ceramic assemblage from Kenan Tepe, southeastern Turkey. A preliminary assessment

AbstractIn the initial survey of the upper Tigris river valley the authors of the survey report concluded that ‘either this portion of the Tigris basin was bypassed entirely by Middle Bronze Age development attested to elsewhere or, more likely, it is characterised by a thus far unreported and unrecognised assemblage’ (Algaze et al. 1991: 183). Recent research by members of the Upper Tigris Archaeological Research Project (UTARP) at the site of Kenan Tepe confirms the latter hypothesis, that the early second millennium in this area is marked by a regionally distinct material culture assemblage that is influenced by ceramic traditions in upper Mesopotamia and other material culture traditions in Anatolia. This article outlines our initial assessment of these data including an analysis of the ceramic corpus, architecture, archaeobotany, small finds and carbon-14, and places these data in a regional context. We conclude by speculating that the inhabitants of Kenan Tepe may have participated in interaction spheres that linked the upper Tigris river region to greater Mesopotamia and Anatolia.