Sixth Century Research Articles

Archaeobotanical evidence of plant cultivation from the Sanbaopi site in south-western Taiwan during the Late Neolithic and Metal Age

Despite decades of lively debate about Taiwan’s role in the spread of early agriculture, crops and cultivation practices to the Indo-Pacific region, there is little archaeobotanical data from the island. Here we present the first directly dated and systematically analysed macrobotanical records from Taiwan obtained by flotation at the archaeological site Sanbaopi 5 (23°07′03′′N, 120°15′32′′E), representing the Dahu (1400 BCE–100 CE) and Niaosong (100–1400 CE) culture periods. The results suggest that Middle Dahu (900–100 BCE) communities in the study area practiced rainfed crop cultivation with mainly foxtail ( Setaria italica) and broomcorn ( Panicum miliaceum) millet and rice ( Oryza sativa). Pulses ( Vigna angularis, Glycine soja/ max) were also part of the subsistence of local farmers and used as supplementary food and/or green manure. The archaeobotanical record together with archaeological site data for prehistoric China substantiates evidence that the Dahu culture originates in the Lower Yellow River region and migrated to Taiwan along the East China Sea coast. The emergence of the Dahu culture coincided with the spread of mixed millet-rice farming to the Korean Peninsula and Japan and was possibly related to enhanced economic and political expansion of the Shang and Western Zhou dynasties and the long-term weakening of summer monsoon precipitation. Pigeon pea ( Cajanus cajan) and mung bean ( V. radiata var. radiata) assemblages from the sixth century CE Niaosong period highlight the influx of goods, crops, knowledge and people from South and Southeast Asia via southern routes in the context of enhanced exchange across the South China Sea region.

Archaeology and History: A Late Antiquity for Britain

Archaeology and History: A Late Antiquity for Britain

Review: Religious Violence in the Ancient World: From Classical Athens to Late Antiquity, edited by Jitse H. F. Dijkstra and Christian R. Raschle

Review: <i>Religious Violence in the Ancient World: From Classical Athens to Late Antiquity</i>, edited by Jitse H. F. Dijkstra and Christian R. Raschle

Reconceptualizing the Environmental History of Sixth-Century Italy and the Human-Driven Transformations of Its Landscapes

For much of Italy, the second half of the sixth century was fraught with danger: sporadic warfare, conquest, pandemic, and climate change, in addition to further crises catalyzed by these events such as famine and economic decline. While the impacts of these events are frequently recorded in written sources, sometimes in parallel with the archaeological records, a different story emerges from the fossil pollen records reflecting the ecology of human-managed landscapes. Taking two sites as case studies, a local perspective from Rieti in central Italy and a larger regional synthesis from Sicily, we see records that demonstrate the impact of different human drivers. The arrival of the Lombards and changing economic and administrative systems were the main factors in the transformation of landscapes during this period as local communities continued the management of their agricultural, pastoral, and silvicultural resources.

Mammal tracks record anthropogenic environmental influence in late-Holocene inland dunes of the European Sand Belt, Poland

Structures previously suggested to be footprints or tracks, but which have been little described, were observed within Quaternary inland dunes of the European Sand Belt. Excavation of these in several localities of the eastern part of the belt in Poland reveal that they are hoofprints of various ungulate mammals, both wild and domestic, as well as footprints of humans, ranging from potentially as early as the fifth to sixth century to the 19th century or later. Trample grounds and horizons with high densities of tracks are associated with other signs of intensifying usage of dune habitats for pasture and farming, including constrained movement of livestock, relatively well-developed paleosols, and evidence of ploughing. The presence of such abundant life traces not only reflects the presence of individual animals and people in an area, but sheds light on the potential processes and feedbacks that the tracemakers were involved in, in terms of maintaining and modifying the habitats themselves, which were dynamic and changeable. Footprints and their associated sedimentological records can be integrated with archaeological and historical data to analyse anthropogenic influence through time on physical landscapes and on the wild biota.

The Wu Region as Locality and as Empire

Abstract This essay uses the history of the Wu region in the first millennium ce to explore the relationship between locality and empire. Many major East Asian empires are considered to be “Chinese” and to have essentially similar characteristics which are largely independent of their local base. Recent work on the Jiankang Empire (third to sixth centuries ce, also known as the “southern dynasties”) has shown that it had an imperial culture which was quite different from Central Plains-based empires, and which is in part attributable to the distinctive culture of the local Wu region. The relationship can be further illustrated by linking those developments to evidence from the tenth century, when the Wu region again served as the core of a political regime with imperial pretentions.

Reconstructing biblical military campaigns using geomagnetic field data

The Hebrew Bible and other ancient Near Eastern texts describe Egyptian, Aramean, Assyrian, and Babylonian military campaigns to the Southern Levant during the 10th to sixth centuries BCE. Indeed, many destruction layers dated to this period have been unearthed in archaeological excavations. Several of these layers are securely linked to specific campaigns and are widely accepted as chronological anchors. However, the dating of many other destruction layers is often debated, challenging the ability to accurately reconstruct the different military campaigns and raising questions regarding the historicity of the biblical narrative. Here, we present a synchronization of the historically dated chronological anchors and other destruction layers and artifacts using the direction and/or intensity of the ancient geomagnetic field recorded in mud bricks from 20 burnt destruction layers and in two ceramic assemblages. During the period in question, the geomagnetic field in this region was extremely anomalous with rapid changes and high-intensity values, including spikes of more than twice the intensity of today's field. The data are useful in the effort to pinpoint these short-term variations on the timescale, and they resolve chronological debates regarding the campaigns against the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, the relationship between the two kingdoms, and their administrations.

Interaction Problems in Madytos 1st Millennium BC Gray Wares: Phrygian Relations

Madytos kazılarında ele geçen MÖ 1. binyıl gri seramik topluluğu, Orta ve Geç Tunç Çağı öncüleri yanında farklı çağdaş kültürlerin metal ve seramik işçiliğinden beslenen kuzeybatı Anadolu gri seramikleriyle benzerlikler taşımaktadır. Bu çalışma bu bağlamda Frigya metal kap ve seramikleriyle ilişkili olan Madytos buluntusu gri seramiklerin kronolojik ve etkileşimsel yapısına dair bazı sorunları ortaya koymayı amaçlar. Çalışmada ele alınan örnekler, Madytos gri seramiği ile Frigya kapları arasındaki etkileşimin en geç MÖ 9.?/8. yüzyıla kadar geriye gittiği ve MÖ 6. yüzyılda devam ettiğini gösterir. Gri seramikte Madytos-Frigya ilişkilerinin karakteri; kuzeyden üst üste gelip Madytos’tan geçen Balkan ve Aiol göçleri, daha sonra kurulacak olan Frig Krallığı’nın kuzey-doğu Ege etkileşim ağının seramik biçim ve süslemelerine nüfuzu ve Hellespontos İyon kolonizasyonu gibi her biri kendi içinde ve birbirileri arasında girift sorunları barındırır. Madytos’ta ele geçen Frigya bağlantılı gri seramikler, kuzey-doğu Ege seramik etkileşim ağının kıyı bölgeler ve adalarla izole bir sistem olmadığını, gri seramikte görülen Frigya unsurlarının varlığından da anlaşıldığı üzere etkileşimin iç kesimleri de kapsadığını göstermektedir.

The Old Testament in Syriac according to the Peshiṭta Version. Part III, Fasc. 2: Jeremiah – Lamentations – Epistle of Jeremiah – Epistle of Baruch – Baruch

This volume is a much anticipated addition to the important series of editions of the books of the Old Testament Peshitta under the aegis of the Peshitta Institute, formerly of Leiden University and now in Amsterdam. The base text for the entire series is Codex Ambrosianus MS B 21 inf., dated to the sixth or seventh century and known as 7a1. It is not the earliest Peshitta manuscript by any reckoning, but it is the earliest of the complete biblical manuscripts known as ‘pandects’. For reasons of expense and the necessary scribal and binding techniques, these were rare productions in this early period and, moreover, only survive by chance. (The earlier, sixth-century manuscripts for Jeremiah whose witness is included in the edition are only fragmentary.) The employment of this particular pandect for the series is one reason for the inclusion of not only Lamentations in the volume, but also three short works, the Letter of Jeremiah, the Letter of Baruch, and Baruch, for which witnesses are rare. In 7a1 this three-book ‘Baruch corpus’ is presented as ‘a cohesive unit’ (p. viii), and the manuscript also contains a second version of the Letter of Baruch at the end of the Apocalypse of Baruch. These two different versions of the Letter of Baruch are presented on facing pages at the end of the volume, the second in a smaller font.

Freedom and Responsibility in Neoplatonist Thought

<i>Freedom and Responsibility in Neoplatonist Thought</i>

“The Robe of Righteousness”: Exilic and Post-Exilic Isaiah in The Book of Mormon

“The Robe of Righteousness”: Exilic and Post-Exilic Isaiah in <i>The Book of Mormon</i>

A Falcon Shrine at the Port of Berenike (Red Sea Coast, Egypt)

During excavations at the Hellenistic-Roman port of Berenike (on the Red Sea coast of Egypt) in the winter of 2019, work in the so-called Northern Complex documented a religious space from the Late Roman period. The excavation of a portion of this space recorded material that, together with the architecture, suggests a ritual function associated with a falcon cult. This study examines the features of this edifice and the interpretation of the religious materials found in it and proposes a possible relationship with the Blemmyan population who lived in Berenike between the fourth and sixth centuries CE.1

Le De Trinitate du Pseudo-Didyme et le culte des archanges : un élément méconnu de datation

Abstract Pseudo-Didymus’ De Trinitate mentions many sanctuaries of the archangels Michael and Gabriel, finely adorned, some of which were quite famous to attract people from very far in the hope of a miracle. Although this testimony was usually considered as an ancient evidence because of its purported attribution to Didymus the Blind, it does not actually reflect the state of the archangels’ cult in the fourth century. However, it proves to be an important element for the dating of the De Trinitate itself, since it refers to a time when the cult of the archangels was developed in the East. The documentary and literary evidence shows that the churches dedicated to them, especially to Saint Michael, significantly multiply in the sixth century, and that their cult is being established under the reign of Justinian (527-565). It is from this period that the composition of Pseudo-Didymus’ De Trinitate is likely to date.

The Ancient Greek Symposion as Space for Philosophical Discourse: Xenophanes and Criticism of the Poetic Tradition

The aim of the present article is to discuss relations between archaic Greek philosophy and poetry through the example of Xenophanes of Colophon (sixth century BCE), the poet best known for a critique of traditional religion using anthropomorphic imagery. The initial problem lies in understanding the performative aspect in Xenophanes’ elegiac poems; analysis of fragments 1W and 2W has revealed that his literary output can be situated within the framework of the aristocratic symposium. This sympotic context determines the second question: how the poetic fragments fi t with those compositions in which Xenophanes attacks traditional beliefs and poetic ideas of Homer and Hesiod. As I suggest, the critique of traditional mythical narratives, and undermining other poets’ authority, can be interpreted as an expression of performative practices functioning at symposia of the archaic and classical epochs. By removing the division between “philosophy” and “poetry”, different aspects of Xenophanes’ fragments begin to coincide with the phenomenon of the ancient symposium, understood as a space for intellectual competition.

Pendekatan Mistisisme Dalam Pengkajian Islam

Mysticism as an approach tries to see Islam from the side of the spiritual experience of a salik. The spiritual experience is in the form of encounters and revelations experienced by a creature towards the Creator. To reach this station, a seeker must first neglect several stages of purification of the soul (tazkiyatun nafs). These stages have been formulated by influential figures in the development of Sufism. The method used is qualitative with a library research approach, examining related references. As a result, the history of the development of mysticism can be divided into several periods, namely: the period in the first and second centuries, the third and fourth centuries, the fifth century, the sixth century, the seventh century, the eighth century, and the ninth century. and X and thereafter. Second, maqamat in Sufism include: al-taubah, al-zuhud, al-shabr, al-faraq, al-tawadlu, al-taqwa, al-tawakkal, al-ridla, al-ma-habbah, and al-marif, mahabbah, ma'rifat, fana' and baqa', ittihad. And unity (ittihad) can take the form of al-hulul or wahdat al-Manifestation. The three influential figures in the development of Sufism include Hasan Al-Bashri, Junaid Al-Baghdadi, Rabiatul Adawiyah, Al-Ghazali, Muhyidin Ibn Arabi, Husain bin Mansur Al-Hallaj, and so on.

HED: Afghanistan, Changing Room of Empires

HEDAfghanistan, Changing Room of Empires Adrian Bonenberger (bio) First they fell slowly, fort by besieged fort, province by province, then all at once. When Kabul collapsed it happened with the speed and fury of a thunderclap. Alongside the video of desperate Afghans chasing and falling from planes were photos and videos of the Taliban, dressed like US special operators. They emulated the iconic photo of Marines raising the flag on Iwo Jima and strutted into an air hangar, M4 rifles pointed toward the ceiling, massed at a checkpoint with night-vision devices perched paradoxically above the wraparound "operator" sunglasses popularized by special operations forces and CIA paramilitaries. While visually arresting, these scenes didn't come as a surprise. We've seen this happen repeatedly throughout history, the conquered rising to conquer in their turn. Before its fall over the course of the fifth and sixth centuries A.D., Western Rome's military and those of its neighbors had come to mirror each other in important ways, both in terms of tactics and aesthetic preferences. Drawing heavily on Germanic tribes (Goths, Vandals, Alans, Burgundians), Western Rome's military (and, given the role its military played in culture and politics, Rome itself) came to resemble the tribes it fought. Romans lived alongside their Germanic neighbors for nearly four centuries and progressively intermingled until in some places little meaningful distinction existed (and none, in the end, worth fighting for—the ultimate measure of a culture's durability). The Afghans have spent much of the last four decades living side by side with the militaries of the USSR and the US. Culture shifted more slowly back when it moved at the speed of a horse-drawn wagon or sail. Now, culture moves at the speed it takes to upload a video to TikTok or Instagram. It seems beyond question that Afghans have been observing and internalizing the violence they experienced at Soviet and American hands. Watching the History Channel, playing Call of Duty, reading accounts of SEALs, Afghans have come to understand power the way Americans have applied it. Many of them received tactical training from American and other Western militaries. Too, ISIS and the Taliban received extensive training from [End Page 14] Western forces, with those members who survived battles gaining firsthand experience of American, Russian, and European military capabilities and adapting to counter them. Literature on or in Afghanistan over the past forty years has tended to focus on the experience of the country that's deployed there. The Soviet Afghansi with their various permutations (Soviet Baltic, Ukrainian, Russian, and other ethnicities from within the USSR) are the protagonists (or, occasionally, antagonists, if one's watching or reading from the perspective of the US), as are British colonial troops described by writers like Rudyard Kipling, as are Americans and those allied countries deployed alongside the US. The closest one gets to the Afghans or Iraqis is through their cuisine, to which soldiers escape for variety, or their clothing—especially the distinctive pakol cap and shemagh headwrap, which make appearances in (almost every?) novels and short fiction collections about Afghanistan or Iraq published in the last two decades. The food, caps, and scarves do little to change how Western militaries operate in the countries to which they have deployed, and have made a consequently superficial impact on those militaries. One place where the Afghans especially have made a more lasting impact on the US and British militaries is in the tendency of Western special operations units to adopt beards. Originally, this was made out of diplomatic expediency—special forces units embedded with locals claimed that they needed the beards to "fit in" and develop rapport with their counterparts—but the beards quickly became a signifier, a way to demonstrate that one's unit was elite and didn't need to obey the same rules as more conventional units. Some writers exploring Afghanistan refer to this phenomenon through the voice of the Afghans, who refer to special operations units as "the men with beards." In my own short fiction collection, The Disappointed Soldier and Other Stories from War, I write satirically about a conventional unit that contracts beards and the equipment of special...

The oldest foundation tablet from the Ottoman era in Baghdad bears the name of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, dated 963 AH (1556 AD)"An artistic archaeological study"

This paper deals with the study of the oldest founding tablet that came to us from the Ottoman era in Iraq, bearing a commemorative writing from the reign of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, dated in the year (963 AH / 1556 AD). The tablet dates the renovation of an old mosque built by the Abbasid Caliph Al-Nasir Li-Din Allah at the end of the sixth century AH, known as the Saray Mosque. It is preserved today in an ancient mausoleum that probably belongs to one of the Seljuk princes who took power in Baghdad called Bahruz al-Khadem (d. 540 AH). The importance of this study lies in documenting a memorial text, which none of the archaeologists have ever studied or documented, so the researcher sought to read it, unpack, analyze its text, and indicate its calligraphy and engraving, according to the approach of the archaeologists with the intention of preserving it, and urged specialists in Arabic scripts to provide more Scientific studies about it, to make it a link in the series of Arab-Islamic writings.

Tradycja prawa rzymskiego a obowiązek przyjęcia świadczenia częściowego

Is it possible to compel a creditor to accept partial performance of a contract, even if parties of a contract have not agreed on such a method of performance? A comparison of the contemporary regulations with the view developed and finally expressed in Justinian's Digest - D. 12.1.21 (Julian, book 48 of his Digest) supports the view that in the sixth century AD a solution was found which is still in force in practically all civil codes. According to it, the compelling of a creditor to accept a partial performance is generally not allowed, apart from clearly defined exceptions. Meanwhile, the 1964 Polish Civil Code departed from the solution adopted in the "mainstream of European legal orders" and, although this is not a sufficient basis for its evaluation, nonetheless this decides about its uniqueness.

Melōsa and her prize: The victory of a woman in ancient Greece

AbstractThe earliest example of the Ancient Greek word for a victor's prize, nikatērion, comes in a verse inscription from the sixth century bce on an Attic kylix (wine cup) from Taras. It records the victory of Melōsa in a competition with other young women. This article draws out the significance of her victory and redefines our understanding of who she was. Previous interpretations which define Melōsa by her relationship to men are rejected. Instead, it is argued that Melōsa's verse defines her place within a female world. This inscription is significant in the pursuit of feminist historical recovery, revealing aspects of female–female social relationships outside the confines of the traditional male–female paradigm.

‘Where the Wild Things Are’: Etruscan Hunting and Trophy Display at Poggio Civitate (Murlo), Italy

An integrated study of the zooarchaeological, iconographic, and artefactual data from the Etruscan site of Poggio Civitate (Murlo, Italy), inhabited from the eighth to the sixth century bc, reveals intra-site differences in the distribution and disposal of animal body parts and species represented, including wild animals. Smaller mammals and birds that would be trapped are encountered more frequently in the site's workshop area and larger prey (deer, wolf, bear, and aurochs) that would be hunted are found more often in the area of the elite residence. We suggest that some of these remains are evidence that hunting was for the purpose of trophy display by the elites of Poggio Civitate and we discuss the social implications of such an activity in this community.