archaeology test 3

What is the strict definition of historical archaeology?

In the strictest sense, historical archaeology is the archaeology of societies that left behind historical records

The study of societies that have written records

What does the term 'historical archaeology' commonly refer to?

refers to a narrower aspect of archaeology, namely the archaeology of the modern period with a focus on colonial and post-colonial contexts influenced by European Imperialism.

In Europe, do they use the term 'historical archaeology'?

In Europe, researchers prefer to use "post-medieval archaeology".

In North America, historical archaeology refers to what?

In North America, historical archaeology generally means the study of "post-contact" sites, that is to say, sites that postdate the arrival of Europeans

List some of the topics that North American historical archaeologists tend to focus on.

as early culture contact and the ways colonists formed settlements and adapted to new environments. In the study of later periods, topics of interest include how the struggle for independence manifests itself in the material culture, the lives of enslaved or newly free people, urbanization, industrialization, the archaeology of institutions such as prisons and asylums, conflict and warfare, farmsteads, factories and labor, capitalism, mass production, transportation systems, trade networks, infrastructure, and the intersection of any of those with class, race, and gender

Why bother to do archaeology for cultures or time periods that have written records?

They cant tell us everything

For example, historical records often lack details about people's daily lives - details that are reflected in the material culture studied by historical archaeologist. Even more importantly, most societies or groups that left behind written records also included large cohorts of people who did not write, or who were not written about.

Nowadays, what kinds of subgroups in North American history form the focus of historical archaeological research?

historical archaeologists have increasingly focused on people who are far less visible in the historical record

For example, written records about slavery are generally from the point of view of those who did the buying and selling of human beings, in the form of record keeping, or possibly discussions on the morality of slavery.

Women, enslaved or newly free people, industrialized, prisons asylums, factories labor, transportation....

List some famous historical archaeology sites in the USA.

See for example Monticello Archaeology, Mount Vernon Archaeology, Jamestown Rediscovery, Colonial Williamsburg Archaeology, and perhaps less famous on a national level, but still considered historically important for the history of the western expansion of the US, the site of Fort Union at the confluence of the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers).

What is the purpose of doing historical archaeology?

the purpose is to get more info on everyday life outside of the written record because it leaves out marginalized groups.

According to archaeologist James Deetz, what new information can archaeology provide about this mining town, which historical documents cannot?

What they do, how they live, the experiences of people who were not documented in the written record. see what day to day life of miners was like, missing real people's life, most of the people who have lived here are left out. Gives context. Ethnic and cultural diversity there, voices of women and children.

What are the other available sources for information about this town (historical data)? (coal mining town)

Other people's journals and garbage, coal mines, cemetery, the actual land there, documents of birth records, school records, marriage and tax certificates, death certificates, gravestones, nation of origin, voting records, housing ownership, photographs, occupation, survey maps, probate (like a will, it's all their assets), newspapers

Why do the archaeologists conduct oral interviews of the living residents of the town?

Because you can get better information and memories out of them and they give visual examples. traditions and holidays, dinner/food, school classrooms, when the butcher came to town

What new inferences can the archaeologists make from the pottery and cow bone? mining town

Pottery made in England; means they were linked in with international trade. 1890's

Cow bone (femur) has a sawn face, and the butcher came from out of town 2-3 times a week, the people chopped bone with an axe which shows diff practices being done by English, whales, Scotland, PA, Ireland, Italy, they or their parents came from the old world. A two-part artifact.

Why excavate the slave quarters of this plantation? st simons island georgia

Because it was never done, and we didn't know anything about them as people

What do the historical records tell us about the plantations slaves?

Name, age, skills/experiences in it, occupation, how much the slave's cost (property value), how much they received for food, it doesn't tell us anything about them as people though and all the accounts are biased

What can the archaeologists infer from the discovery of a gun flint and animal bones?

Flint Locke musket, infer that it came from all over the world, French and English. Surprising and shows that slaves had guns even though they weren't allowed

Animal bones from a smoke house, crab claws, and racoon jaws, it shows the way their diet was, and they needed more food than that, so they foraged and trapped for themselves because they only were given 3000 calories a day but they would've needed 7000-7500 calories. Small wild animals allowed them to eat enough

What is the significance of the pencil piece?

The eraser is unusual because it indicates they could write or had access to writing materials, some people taught them how to read and write but unknown how some knew how to read and write.

What do the bones tell bioarchaeologist Rebecca Storey about the earliest Copan Valley residents?

Social organization of the culture, if everyone is treated the same then it is equal but if others are better then there are inequalities Males and female were present

Children and adults present

Vertebrae showed age through arthritis

Everyone was treated the same, egalitarian burials

No real power of peers

What is the benefit to an archaeologist of studying modern tribes and chiefdom in Papua New Guinea?

Organization of society and religion can be studied through living populations and make an analogy between the two

First residents and now don't really get wealthier

Big men raise the pigs

How does Bill Fash find "ranking" in the 50 skeletons he presents to us?

Ceramic vessels with religious symbolism were buried with one man

Involved in religious beliefs that his brothermen didn't have

He also had jade buried with him showing his presitge

Was he a big man or chief like the modern society

What is the evidence for inherited rank at Copan?

Chiefdoms are divided into lineages, groups of people who come from ann ancestor, people who are ore closely related to that ancestor would inherit a higher rank

Highest ranking was the chiefs

Rules of succession evolved, status was then inherited by birth

The chief who had the highest rank would be the leader of the chiefdom

First evidence went to the highest ranking lineages family's building

What message is ruler Smoke Imix's stelae sending to his people when he places his stelae (inscribed stone slabs) on the edges of Copan valley, rather then near the main acropolis?

He is sending the message that he was declaring his ruling on the outskurts of the copan valley, staking a claim to the entire valley

How can data from a Maya quarry site allow us to measure the power of Maya kings like 18 Rabbit?

Centralized authority and served as head of state?

Using experiemnts to see the labor and how many people may be needed

Many people were needed, so persuasion or military force or having land/water that people need

They ruled through authority not power

Settled disputes, spearheaded the common defense, and control land. As well as redistributing prescious goods and leading religious rituals

What archaeological evidence signals a change in Copan's power structure after the death of the ruler 18 Rabbit?

The structures found in the mounds show that there were no separate classes

Vaulted roofs were mostly for high status but after his death vaulted roofs started to appear in other lineage compounds

Platforms used by lineage head was found in a strcuture, a noblemans house surrounded by his poor relatives, how did he rise dramtically? He got the scarce resource and rse to power

King only spent 3x more labor days then the noble but nobles house required 90x more labor than a commoners house

It split into the three classes of royals, nobles, commoners

How does the ownership of different plots of land tell us about the growing power of non-royal noble families at Copan?

It shows the growing power of non royal noble families because it is a scarce thing that people want so they use it to persuade thosearound them to gain status. There wasn't enough lanf to go around then they would use hillside or other pockets of land. Poeople who have access to the irrigated land have the most power in the society. Nobles were depended on by the poor so they gave them their labor

What is the benefit of studying the development of Roman hierarchy in this context of Mayan archaeology?

Important because their political power continued where copans ended. Also because it showed what mayan kings could not achieve, broke down the power of the landed aristocrats, and conquested foreign territories

Romann society had a much broader spectrum of classes than mayan

But shows that even a slave can become bery wealthy

Shows that whether or not someone succeeds is often a birth right as well as the nature of society and its relationship to the environment

And shows that all populations started as tribes then a charismatic people gain more prestige, then it beomes formal and selected heirs inherit it

bands are

hunter gatherer groups

tribes are

segmentary societies

Chiefdoms

Centralized political systems with authority vested in formal, usually hereditary, offices or titles

early states

Societies characterized by: the prominent role played by cities, a ruler with explicit authority to establish and enforce laws, a class hierarchy, a bureaucratic administration of officials.

egalitarian or hierarchical?How to identify, using the archaeological record: Bands, segmentary, Chiefdoms, States

Settlement analysis and site hierarchy

Burial analysis

Monuments and public works

Written records

Ethnoarchaeology