Stone Bowls Research Articles

Modeling and monitoring submerged prehistoric sites during offshore sand dredging and implications for the study of Early Holocene Coastal Occupation of Southern California

AbstractBeach sand dredging projects off the coast of Southern California provide data for improved understanding of the stratigraphic setting for early Holocene sediments and the potential for offshore buried archaeological materials. Geophysical data, core sediments, and invertebrate fossils allow models to be developed for six borrow sites within drown river valleys off San Diego County. These site‐specific models were tested during dredging operations, and the dredge spoil was monitored for archaeological materials. Two of the borrow sites yielded stone bowls consistent with those found in previous offshore archaeological investigations in this region. These artifacts, however, were determined to come from nearshore and lagoonal sediments, not appropriate for direct occupation, raising questions about both the function of stone bowls and the process that resulted in their deposition. The competing hypotheses presented are that these bowls originated in settlements located adjacent to the lagoons, but were eroded and redeposited into the lagoon during transgression, or that they were part of a fishing toolkit used from boats or in shallow waters within the lagoon. This project illustrates the potential for commercial development projects to yield information on submerged archaeological resources, as well as the challenges.

PENGEMBANGAN WISATA RELIGI PETILASAN PANGERAN BENOWO DI KECAMATAN BENER KABUPATEN PURWOREJO

The existence of religious sites is currently very popular among the community, so that the existence of this religious site is not only a site to be visited as a destination for takziyah but also along with the development of the existing religious sites can provide other economic values, namely as a medium for preaching and trading. One such religious site is located in Benowo Village, Bener District, Purworejo Regency. namely the Prince Benowo site which became the forerunner to the existence of Benowo Village in Purworejo Regency. Prince Benowo is the son of the king of the Pajang kingdom named sultan Hadiwijaya or better known as Jaka Tingkir, where during the Dutch colonial period around 1600 AD Prince Benowo and his followers stepped aside or took refuge somewhere on the way from the Pajang kingdom to the Mataram kingdom and stopped at Menoreh Mountains, to be precise on a hill called Batur, which is currently known to the general public as Benowo Village. Prince Benowo's petilasan is currently being used as religious tourism which can be a special attraction for tourists to visit Benowo village. Tourists can see the historical value of the existence of Prince Benowo's petilasan, including the existence of the sendang used by the followers of Prince Benowo for drinking and cleaning, as well as items used by Prince Benowo's entourage, including ceramic plates, stone bowls, umbrellas, and etc. The existence of special religious interest tourism has made the managers of the Benowo tourism village start to improve by optimizing the existing tourism potential, both natural, cultural and artistic tourism to be able to attract more tourists to visit Benowo tourism village. The weaknesses of the development of this religious tourism village in Benwo Village are 1) There is no development plan for the development of existing religious tourism potential, and 2) Prince Benowo Religious Tourism has not been managed properly Based on the above problems, the service and partners will solve the above problems through planning training activities for the development of religious tourism, Prince Benowo, and 2) Assistance in the management of religious tourism through strengthening human resources. So that the output target of this service activity is 1). The creation of religious tourism development in Benowo village, 2) The creation of religious tourism governance

Functional studies of flaked and ground stone artefacts reveal starchy tree nut and root exploitation in mid-Holocene highland New Guinea

Ground stone technology for processing starchy plant foods has its origins in the late Pleistocene, with subsequent intensification and transformation of this technology coinciding with the global emergence of agriculture in the early Holocene. On the island of New Guinea, agriculture first emerges in the highland Wahgi Valley, potentially from c. 9 kya, and clearly evident by 6.5 kya. Approximately 400 km further east in the highland Ivane Valley, long-term occupation sequences span the Holocene and late Pleistocene, but there is currently no direct evidence for wetland agriculture. Here, we report rare evidence for ground stone implements from a secure mid-Holocene archaeological context in the Ivane Valley. The Joe’s Garden site has flaked and ground stone artefacts with significant starch assemblages dating to approximately 4.4 kya. We present the first empirical evidence for the function of stone bowls from a New Guinea highland setting. Usewear and residues indicate the grinding and pounding of endemic starch-rich plant foods. Geometric morphometric analysis of starch grains shows that at least two taxa were processed: Castanopsis acuminatissima (nut) and Pueraria lobata (tuber). This regional example adds to our understanding of the trajectories of diverse plant food exploitation and ground stone technology development witnessed globally in the Holocene.

Grinding-stone implements in the eastern African Pastoral Neolithic

ABSTRACTGrinding-stone tools are a poorly utilised source of archaeological information in eastern Africa. Their presence is noted in multiple contexts, including both domestic and funerary, yet the inferences drawn from them are often limited. This short review paper presents existing information on grinding-stone tools (and stone bowls) from Pastoral Neolithic (PN) contexts in eastern Africa. Data on the diverse grinding-stone tool assemblages of the Pastoral Neolithic have been compiled with a focus on details of morphology and spatial, temporal and contextual distribution. Summarising what is known (and, perhaps more importantly, what is not known) about grinding-stones in the Pastoral Neolithic, this paper serves as a reminder that the function of grinding-stone tools was neither singular nor their significance simplistic.

Investigating the function of prehistoric stone bowls and griddle stones in the Aleutian Islands by lipid residue analysis – CORRIGENDUM

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Investigating the function of prehistoric stone bowls and griddle stones in the Aleutian Islands by lipid residue analysis

AbstractThe earliest durable cooking technologies found in Alaska are stone bowls and griddle stones recovered from the Aleutian Islands. This article aims to identify the function of these artefacts. Molecular and chemical analyses of carbonised residues found on their surfaces confirm that these artefacts were used to process marine resources. Both artefacts have high lipid content and C:N ratios, suggesting they were used to process oily substances. Stable isotope results of individual lipids suggest that they were used to process different sets of resources within the aquatic spectrum as griddle stones have slightly more 13C-depleted lipids than stone bowls, possibly indicating more variable use. Integration of these results with archaeological and ethnographic data leads us to infer that griddle stones were used for cooking a diversity of aquatic resources, possibly with the addition of plant foods, whereas stone bowls were specifically used to render marine mammal fats. We further hypothesize that a sudden peak in stone bowl frequencies at 4000–3000 cal yr BP was connected to a Neoglacial cold spell bringing sea ice conditions to the Aleutian Islands. This may have led to new subsistence strategies in which the rendering of marine mammal fats played a central role.

Identification of possible source areas of stone raw materials combining remote sensing and petrography

ABSTRACTUnderstanding the location and distribution of raw materials used in the production of prehistoric artefacts is a significant part of archaeological research that aims to understand the interregional interaction patterns in the past. The aim of this study is to explore the regional locations of the source rock utilized in the production of stone bowls, which were unearthed at the Neolithic (approximately 6500–5500 BC) site of Domuztepe (Kahramanmaraş-Turkey), via a combination of remote-sensing methods, petrographic and chemical analyses. To accomplish this task, the stone bowls were identified mineralogically, geochemically and spectrally, and then mapped with Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) sensors. According to the defined mineralogical composition, which is iron-rich chlorite, the target areas were selected among geologically potential areas that would bear similar source rocks in near vicinity and the target spectral signature was searched within these target areas. In order to overcome the problem of spectral similarity of chlorite group to some other minerals such as carbonate or epidote group minerals, band ratioing (BR) and feature-oriented principal component analysis (FOPCA) were used with an integrated approach and then their results were filtered according to the outcomes of the relative absorption band-depth (RBD) images. The areas with highest potentials were vectorized and then field checked. Mineralogical investigations on the collected field samples reveal that there is a mineralogical match between the source and target material. One group of stone bowls samples have similar geochemical signatures as the field samples having ultramafic origins. However, there is another group of stone bowls samples which are geochemically dissimilar to the first group of field and bowls samples. The data regarding the geochemical signatures of these two groups indicate a genetic relation between the sample sets. Therefore, it is concluded that the source rock of a major portion of the stone bowls unearthed at Domuztepe most probably originated from the near vicinity of the site.

THE UPPER PALAEOLITHIC OF NORTH CHINA: THE XIACHUAN CULTURE

A rich assemblage of typical Late Palaeolithic stone tools was found at the Xiachuan Culture sites in Shanxi Province, China. The greyish-brown soil layer in the upper part of Stratum I (radiocarbon dated to ca. 20,000 b.p. or earlier) at the site of Fuyihe yielded a large amount of Xiachuan Culture lithics. The Xiachuan assemblage is representative of the Late Palaeolithic in North-Central China, and it includes blade cores and various microblade cores, burins, backed blades, scrapers, flakes, and cores. The microblade cores are of two principal types: wedge-shaped and conical. There are also some large stone implements such as adze-shaped objects, stone hammers, stone grinding slabs, and stone bowls. This article distinguishes six classes of Xiachuan burins.

Stone Bowls in the Northern Cape: A New Find and Its Possible Context

Stone Bowls in the Northern Cape: A New Find and Its Possible Context

Holocene Sites North-East of Lake Turkana: A Preliminary Report

Summary Mr Barthelme is engaged in research for a Ph.D. degree for the University of California at Berkeley. His work, of which this is a preliminary report, has been undertaken under the auspices of the Koobi Fora Research Project of the National Museums of Kenya. The area to the north-east of Lake Turkana has proved to be extremely rich in archaeological material. Over thirty-five sites were discovered and a significant proportion either excavated or surface sampled. Sites containing bone harpoons and fish remains were the primary focus of the research project and at least thirteen occurrences were discovered. Later sites with domestic animals, various forms of decorated pottery and stone bowls were also investigated.

Aspects of the Size and Shape Variation of the East African Stone Bowls

Summary This article presents the results of a simple quantitative analysis of a large number of the East African stone bowls. The analysis indicates that stone bowls at individual sites tend to cluster about a distinct norm and “modal type”. Further, the norm and the “modal type” can vary greatly between sites. Possible explanations for this type of patterning and its significance are discussed, and it is suggested that the use of simple quantitative analysis combined with traditional typological approaches might aid in the interpretation of the temporal, spatial and cultural significance of the stone bowls.

Seronera: Excavations at a Stone Bowl Site in the Serengeti National Park, Tanzania

Summary Excavations at six localities at Seronera in the Serengeti National Park of northern Tanzania have revealed traces of prehistoric occupation from the “Middle Stone Age” to within the present millennium. A stratigraphical sequence of pottery styles was established; the earliest ware being of Gumban A type, here dated to around the first century B.C. Subsequent and perhaps partly contemporary with the Gumban A material is a previously unrecorded ware now named TIP (= thin incised panelled) ware. This is now recognised at other sites, where it has been dated to the first millennium A.D. It was succeeded by plain and rouletted ware thought to be of relatively recent date. A few sherds were also attributed to Kansyore ware but their position in the sequence could not be ascertained. Stone bowls were recovered at Seronera but could not incontrovertibly be associated with any of the pottery wares: it is suggested that they are best attributed to the makers of the Gumban A pottery. Hunting was evidently o...

Excavations at Narosura, a Stone Bowl Site in the Southern Kenya Highlands

Summary The article describes an excavation carried out at Narosura in Narok District, Kenya. The site is located about 2000 metres above sea level in semi-arid country. The people living around Narosura today are Masai, predominantly pastoral, but also practising some irrigation agriculture. The precise extent of the prehistoric habitation area cannot be given, but it is estimated to be about 8400 square metres. Twenty-one square metres were excavated down to 100 cm from the surface. A large amount of stone artefacts, pottery and animal bones and teeth were recovered. There were also grindingstones, pestle-rubbers, bone implements, broken stone bowls and fragments of polished stone axes. The animal teeth have been analysed by Richard Gramly. They were from cattle, goats or sheep, and unidentified equid. Non-domesticated species constituted less than 5 per cent of the total. Four charcoal samples have given dates between 870±115 and 460±110 B.C. The pottery is highly characteristic. Similar ware is known ...

A Reassessment of the Stone Bowl Cultures of the Rift Valley, Kenya

Summary During 1968 and 1969 the author undertook a reinvestigation of the stone bowl cultures, including a restudy of available collections, and a survey of all known sites. Test excavations at the Prospect Farm site and at Keringet Cave provided a series of carbon samples which verified a first millenium B.C. date for stone bowl assemblages of the Njoro Cave type. The excavation at Prospect Farm also provided evidence of the association of ground stone axes and of domestic cattle with this complex. The author was unable to find any evidence to support the contention that the Gumban A and Gumban B pottery styles were associated with stone bowls.

The Egerton Cave on the Njoro River

In this article the authors describe the finds from the excavation of a burial cave which yielded stone bowls. It is interesting to read this in conjunction with the article by Mrs. Jean Brown elsewhere in this number.

Stone Bowls of Kha'ba (Third Dynasty)

Stone Bowls of Kha'ba (Third Dynasty)

Stone Bowls of Kha‘ba (Third Dynasty)

Stone Bowls of Kha‘ba (Third Dynasty)

Bahrains oldtidshovedstad gennem 4000 år

Bahrains oldtidshovedstad gennem 4000 år

Stone Bowls of Kha'ba (Third Dynasty)

Stone Bowls of Kha'ba (Third Dynasty)

Stone Bowls of Kha'ba (Third Dynasty)

Stone Bowls of Kha'ba (Third Dynasty)