Archaeology Final Exam

food production

includes both farming and herding

22

herding/ husbandry

intervention in reproduction and subsistence of animals

22

neolithic

the period when people began to use ground stone tools and pottery, live in permanent villages, and engage in food production ( agriculture and herding)

* all of these things may not go together at the same time
* In southwestern Asia

22

sedentism

means to reside in one location for extended periods during the year, often using that location as a base for exploiting diverse, surrounding resources in the area

* mobile
* idea that it was a prerequisite for food production

22

agriculture

* can support larger human populations
* Enables a division of labor
* Enables the emergence of “complex” societies

22

southwestern Asia

* earliest explorations of early farming societies
* large excavations take place
* what they find will be considered the “model” for the transition from hunting and gathering in living permanent settlements and engaging in food production

22

holocene

* 11,700 years before present
* coincides with the beginning of agriculture and the neolithic period in southwest Asia
* follows the cold and arid younger dryas period

22

younger dryas

* cold and arid
* followed by the holocene

22

abu hureyra

First occupation = Epipaleolithic village

* c. 13,500 BP
* Small, round, dwellings cut into sandstone
* Subterranean pits for food storage
* DELAYED RETURN FORAGERS

second occupation:

* seeds of grasses increase
* grinding equipment
* evidence for cultivation, domestication of rye (before 11,000 BP)

22

rye

* domestication of rye during abu hureyra
* Rye is more easily threshed from the spikelets

• chaff more easily winnowed from the grain

• the wild rye grain is less glassy wild wheats....so more easily prepared as food

22

“2nd choice” foods

* population growth leads to more use of these
* people spend more time and energy encouraging these species to thrive
* open up more habitat for them
* eliminate their predators and competitors

22

domestic cats

* Worldwide: 220 million owned, 480 million stray
* Companion animals, pest control
* lots of cat burials
* clear meaningful relationship between cats and humans
* domesticated in SW asia
* attracted to the new food opportunities at human settlements

22

Behavioral characteristics in animals

* initially selected for animals
* Usually selected for less aggressive/easier to manage animals \n and selective hunting of males (to sustain population growth
* Animal generations are longer
* Morphological change happens slowly (usually a later “side-effect” ofdomestication)

23

docile behavior

what humans selected for in animals (behavioral traits)

23

reduction in horns, body size in domestic animals over time

The selection for docile, easy to handle behavioral traits in animals had a major impact on horn shape, size (humans now select who gets to breed, horns no longer important I competition)

23

zagros mountains, Ganj Dareh

* Early evidence for goat domestication
* human intervention
* before changes in size/ morphology
* ganj dareh: goats are morphologically wild, same size as wild hunted populations at paleolithic sites
* fewer males surviving to old age

23

evidence of human management

* selective slaughter patterns indicated by bone fusion
* sex specific mortality profiles

23

mortality/ slaughter profiles

* based on bone epiphyseal fusion
* Early human management at Ganj Dareh: fewer males surviving to old age
* Why this strategy? You don’t need a bunch of males to maintain a herd (just a few for breeding). Males also more aggressive, harder to manage. So, kill off most males, leave a few less aggressive ones for breeding

23

selective hunting of males

* you don’t need a bunch of males to maintain a herd (just a few for breeding)
* males are more aggressive and harder to manage
* kill off most males and leave a few less aggressive ones for breeding

23

early holocene African climate

* during early holocene, most of Africa was much wetter than today
* lots of rainfall
* sahara was a vast grassland
* large lakes everywhere

23

pottery and grinding stones

* early holocene in Northern Africa
* Grinding tools
* Bone fish hooks & harpoons
* Pottery (as early as \~10k BP!)
* Pottery & grinding tools suggested agriculture to some! Why?
* Because in southwest Asia, where the first explorations of food production took place, grinding tools are abundant in agricultural sites, and pottery appears very late, after people domesticate plants AND animals

23

donkeys, pathologies

* the only animal domesticated in Africa
* earliest evidence for domestication at Abydos
* evidence for human management at abydos
* pathologies consistent with load carrying
* compression of vertebral spines
* evidence for arthritis in spine

23

pastoralism

* people who rely primarily on the products of herd animals
* staring around 8,000 BP, takes hold in northern africa
* not the same as domestication
* domestication: initial process of keeping animals

23

pastoralism + mobility

* Cattle, sheep, goat and donkey encourage mobility
* Grain wild-harvesting embedded in pastoral movements
* Before 4500 bp, in northern half of Africa
* pastoralism + intensive gathering, hunting, fishing
* no dependence upon domesticated plants
* differs from SW Asian order of events

23

animals as a predictable food source

* milk
* meat
* ceremonies/ scheduled consumption
* wealth
* animals can convert plant matter that humans can’t eat unto food that they can

23

harvesting grans by beating (not cutting)

* cereals typically have shattering seed heads—so that when disturbed (by wind/animals), ripe seeds can disperse
* Cutting grain = you lose the seeds that come off
* Domestic grains don’t appear until c. 4500 BP
* Wild-harvesting by beating and scooping still practiced
* If not CUTTING grain, you don’t select for the non- shattering seed head

23

floatation

* separates the macrobotanical remains from the dirt
* put sediment samples into water
* heavy stuff settles and plant remains rise to the top

23

eastern US domesticates (chenopodium, squash, sunflower, marshelder)

6000 BP squash/gourds

• 2500-2000 BCE seed plants

• marshelder, sunflower, Chenopodium

• But, by CE 1 maize starts to appear

• 1000 BP Mesoamerican trinity largely supplants EAC as primary source of calories in many areas

23

maize, teosinte

Domesticated maize spreads from Mexico down to Ecuador by 5000 BP, then into South America. It spreads north to the Southwest by c. 4000 BP and to the Eastern Woodlands by \~2000 BP

23

status

* consists of the rights, duties, privileges, powers, liabilities, and immunities that accrue to a recognized and named social position
* determined by:
* age
* gender
* kinship
* birth into a class or locality
* education, achievement, etc

24

ascribed status

assigned by membership in a group that passes on status to their members only

* princes, earls

24

achieve status

assigned based on persons own accomplishment

* knighthood

24

egalitarian societies

* mobile hunter-gatherers,pastoralists, some farming peoples
* Persons can achieve status
* fine hunter, gatherer, mother, brave warrior
* Ritual knowledge, etc.
* ‘Egalitarian’ ≠ equality
* age, gender difference

24

ranked societies

* Status is ascribed by birth or adoption
* Elite family lineages distinct from commoners
* inherit their rank from parent(s), relatively few marry “across” to high-rank lineages elsewhere
* Mississippian, Chumash Indigenous elites, feudal Europe
* “Upward mobility” sometimes possible

24

class societies

* Status ascribed by birth
* Marry within group, relatively numerous
* “Upward mobility” sometimes possible
* Ancient Egypt - becoming a scribe
* Medieval Europe - becoming a knight
* U.S. today: going to college, mastering a trade, winning “American Idol”

24

statues as indicated by: irreversible body modification

* tattooing
* cranial deformation
* tooth filing/removal
* foot deformation

24

status as indicated by: bodily decoration

* dress, ornaments
* sumptuary regulations
* housing, furnishings, transport
* mideval serfs could not own horses

24

statues as indicated by: costly/rare/exotic objects

* controlling exotic, rare, costly objects
* Mexico: obsidian, turquoise, jade, sea shells
* NW coast groups: whaling canoes
* atacama elites: feathers (study by caprices and colleagues)

24

identifying households

* Identify Social/Domestic Space: Architecture: walls, footings, postholes, pits, special structures, etc.
* • Features: hearths, storage pits, caches
* Identify Consumption Patterns

• Artifact functions: tasks, production roles

• Artifact distributions: “activity areas”, types of food consumed, types of materials used

* Identify Individuals
* • Burials: diet, health, genetics, social status markers

24

burials, grave goods

* Funerary objects & tombs
* • constructed by the living
* • signify ideas of status of the living


* Status is often marked by: • dress, ornament, funeral furnishings, \\n grave construction, sacrifices and offerings


* Ascribed Status Societies:
* • very young (often children) buried with very high-status objects
* • too young to have achieved such status in life

24

turkana pillar sites

* egalitarian example
* 30 burials recovered in central 2x2m unit
* GPR shows extent of mortuary cavity
* possibly 500 individuals buried at lothagam north
* gerbil teeth
* stone beads
* hippo tusks
* ivory rings
* tooth beads
* ostrich eggshell beads
* all ages (infant to old individuals), males & females buried at pillar sites No differences in ornamentation/grave goods among individuals
* Pastoralism= impossible to accumulate wealth
* • ”Boom and bust” cycles: sometimes herds wiped out by disease
* • Livestock given away as gifts (marriage)
* • Still not totally clear how much pillar site users were dependent on livestock

24

nubian cemerteries (kadero, A-group, Kerma)

* status differences in burials in Nubia
* cataracts: obstacle for integration (in contrast to egypt)
* kadero
* earlier hunter fisher gatherer camp
* neolithic settlement
* fishing
* domestic + WILD GRAINS
* domestic livestock abundant
* burials with grave goods in neolithic contexts
* grave 114 and 162
* incised pottery, globular
* mace heads
* nubian A group
* mostly known for cemeteries
* simularities with naiad of upper egypt
* regional elites linked with contemporary Egyptian kinds
* black opped pottery
* Egyptian imports common (faience, shell, texts list honey, oil)
* incipient rulers enhance social status/prestige through displau of these imports and displays of motifs of egyptian kingship
* kerma
* dongola reach: 3rd-4th cataracts
* complex burials, cattle sacrifices
* Egypts 2nd intermediate period
* rich burial goods
* tumulus X
* 322 sacrifices
* Egyptian imports
* native nubian features: round tumuli, flexed burials, human sacrifice

24

burials in Nubia

Kadero: Neolithic burials show status differences, some people are buried with rich grave goods

• Burials with grave goods include some children = ascribed status

Nubian A Group burials: high status individuals (rulers) buried with imports from Egypt

• Imports signal high status

Kerma: high status burials accompanied by sacrifices

• Middle Kerma period: cattle sacrifices abundant, cattle crania surround tumuli

• Classic Kerma period: some graves of very few individuals contain human sacrifices

24

power (coercive, exploitative, resistance)

Potential to initiate or influence social action

• Can be either constructive, cooperative (“power to”)

• or exploitative and coercive (“power over”)

• or ability to resist or circumvent authority (“power not to”) \\n Sources of power

• Economic

• Ideological

• Political

• Military/Coercive

• \*Mutually reinforcing

25

politics

How a society organizes itself in order to make and enforce decisions, to resolve conflicts, and to control access to and distribution of social status and power.

• Small Scale Societies: political structures are informal and situational.

• Large Scale Societies: political power vested in formal institutions of government, coded in law, and backed by coercive force

25

managerial theories

* leaders emerge to manage societal demands
* leaders served integrative functions

25

nekhen (hierakonpolis)

* political center
* nile levels low, centers established at edge of floodplain
* Large settlement
* Social stratification (mastabas = tombs forleaders)• Palaces, temples• By 3500 BCE Hierakonopolis = capital of upper Egypt

25

mastaba

* burials of the early dynastic
* pharos buried in pyramids in the old kingdom, but mastabas still used for other officials
* arabic for bench

25

king Narmer, the narmer palette

* Ruled in Dyansty I
* Depicts unification of Upper and Lower Egypt into a single STATE
* • Long process, accomplished through military means • Development of state religion headed by a god-king


* \

25

graves of rulers at Abydos

* boat graves represent sun barge, carry king on journey to after life
* economics: ships are really expensive
* mastaba and subsidiary graves of king aha
* earliest known retainer sacrifices in egypt
* \

25

old kingdom egypt

* Pharaoh presented \n as an incarnatio of Horus (sky god)
* Pharaoh alsorepresented ascenter of Ma’at
* rapid political consolidation, bureaucracy expands, military force is established

25

\

pyramids

* steed pyramid of djoser/zoser
* 2700 BCE beginning of pyramid age
* saqqara
* kings khufu
* khafre
* menkaure

25

sed festival

* Every 30 years
* Held at Saqqara
* Ritual rebirth of king, eventually took form of jubilees, celebrating success of the Pharoah
* Not every pharaoh makes it to the Sed festival
* • Long reigns = political stability

25

taxation

* in place by 2nd dynasty
* Egypt divided into many districts (“nomes”), each ruled by a nomarch
* When national government was stronger, nomarchs appointed by king. When weak, nomes – hereditary lines of succession
* Taxes collected

25

nomes, nomarchs

\
* Gain more power in the first intermediate period

25

First intermediate period

\
2195-2066 BCE

• Old Kingdom period comes to an end

• Drought • Social + political upheaval

• Nomarchs gain more power

• 18 kings & 1 queen in 20 years!

• No monumental architecture for royal burials

25

water management

Wittfogel argued that river irrigation requires management

• “the hydraulic hypothesis”

• Complex irrigation systems require cooperation, organized by leaders

• ....But....irrigation systems are correlates or consequences, rather than primary causes, of the emergence of inequality

25

circumscription

not in egypt

* Robert Carneiro:
* • Population growth
* • Limited land and resources leads to competition between communities, some win and take over(e.g. Copán, from film)
* But.... Nile is highly productive
* But no lack of cultivated land until after emergence of Egyptian state
* Little population pressure!

25

redistribution

* had it in egypt
* Managerial, service oriented model.
* • State extracts tribute/taxes, funnels it toward social services
* • Build pyramids in sync w/ agricultural cycle
* • workers build during growing season and supported by the state
* • workers supported later by tribute/taxes

25

ma’at

* the sun god
* in the old kingdom, the pharaoh presented as an incarnation of Horus (sky god), pharaoh also represented as center of Ma’at

25

monumental architecture

Includes large houses, public buildings, and special purpose

• its scale and elaboration exceed the requirements of any practical functions building is intended to preform

* who makes it?
* Sometimes egalitarian societies:
* • Large dwellings, cemeteries, lineage shrines
* • modest scale
* • often no monumental architecture at all
* may be extremely visible in the archaeological recor

testifies to the ability of powerful individuals or the state to deploy skilled craftsmen, material resources, and massive amounts of labor
* • These buildings were the creations of an upper class that controlled much of the surplus production of their societies and had the political power to utilize surplus labor to carry out major, non-utilitarian construction projects.
* • Monumental constructions were likely rationalized as serving various practical and supernatural ends.
* • E.g. serving and winning the favor of the gods


* \

26

conspicuous consumption

wasteful spending to enhance social prestige and power

26

principle of least effort

expend as little energy as possible. Minimizing risk = avoiding energy expenditure in the future.

26

conspicuous consumption

wasteful spending to enhance social prestige and power

26

ideology

\
Culturally specific ideas about the way the world is, and why

• Legitimizes social relations and institutions

• Structures how individuals perceive and act e.g. gender ideologies

• Makes intelligible (or “natural”) a set of human relations with other humans, plants, animals, the world

* broad set of rationalizations for common human problems and experiences

27

religion

A particular aspect of ideology. Aims to understand and mediatethe relationship of humans to the supernatural

• gods, spiritual beings

• ancestors

• forces beyond human control

• weather, luck, death

• Often involves ritual practices but not all rituals are religious

27

ritual

Stereotyped behavior aimed at producing certain internal states in participants Expresses fundamental ideological tenets

• Catholic mass

• Graduation ceremonies

• Presidential inauguration Calendrical ritual

• Obon, Passover, Easter, 4th of July Critical (transition) ritual

• Bar/Bat Mitzvah, 1st Communion

27

symbols

a symbol is an object or act (verbal or nonverbal) that by cultural convention stands for something else with which it has no necessary connection

27

art

A set of material practices and \\n performances

• Evokes feelings and responses

• Not separable from worldview, politics, economy

• Part of social life

• Way of making meaning

• Must be understood in local and historical context

32,000-10,000 BP

• First discovered in late 19th century

• Over 300 painted cave and rock shelter sites

• Concentrated in northern Spain (Cantabria) and southern France (Dordogne)

• Famous Sites: Altimira Cave, Spain; Lascaux and Grotte Chauvet, France

27

upper Paleolithic lifeways

\
* Rich, diverse environments

• Seasonal but predictable resources

• Mobile hunter-gatherers; collecting strategies

• Required coordination and cooperation • Altamira--seasonal aggregation site--group hunting of red deer and shell-fish collecting

27

shamanism

\
David Lewis-Williams

• Ethnographic evidence from southern African !Kung San foragers

• argues that much of the world’s hunting- and-gathering rock art is the result of shamanism.

• Paintings may represent a shaman harnessing power of ritually important animals

27

functionalist approach to cave art

Abbé Henri Breuil (1940s and 1950s)

• Functionalist Approach

• Caves were sacred sites or sanctuaries

• Painting were part of rituals preformed to increase success in hunting (“sympathetic magic”)

27

structuralist approach to cave art

Andre Leroi-Gourhan (1965)

• Paintings part of elaborate system of meaning with specific structure or grammar (“mythogram”)

27

Altamira

portable art reflects complex mix of diverse design elements

* Female Bison = Core Group or Lineage Other Animals = Outside Males or Visiting Act of making cave art is way of creating knowledge and meaning in the material world
* • Makes personal experience public

• Transmits social information

• Aesthetically and symbolically charged representation of social/material reality

27

bordieu

* a theory of practice
* structures of the body
* habitus: our internalized, embodied view of how the world works and how things should be done
* constituted in the practice; in how we go about our daily lives; in how we experience the world
* manifested materially
* continually reproduced or transformed

28

deetz

* Were there deeper cultural roots of this “ideology”
* Between 1607 and 1760 English colonists experienced major transformation in how they conceived, ordered and lived in the world.
* Archaeologists can read these material patterns to understand patterns in Anglo-American culture change.
* Domestic Architecture
* Foodways
* Mortuary Ritual

28

vernacular

* midieval mindset
* 17th early 18th c
* group oriented, coporate, organic
* the anglo american worldview
* “earthfast houses”
* “longhouses”

28

hall and parlor

* 17th C: “a gothic building just evolved… it was not planned… it just grew”
* typical English hall and parlor plan

28

midieval mindset

* group oriented, corporate, organic, vernacular
* 17th-early 18th C

28

Georgian order

* orderly, planned, and based on popular, academic principles of design
* focus on individual, formal, order, more academic, popular
* mid 18th C

28

Georgian architecture

* classic 3-4-5 proportions of Shirley plantation mansion and flanking dependencies
* order, balance, symmetry
* greco-roman inspiration
* bilateral symmetry

28

17th C foodways

* midevil mindset
* group oriented, corporate, organic
* ingredients stewed together
* food served in trenchers, beverages = communal vessels

28

trencher

* used in the 17th century
* midieval mindset
* communal vessels
* in inventories until 18th C

28

Georgian meals

* separation between main ingredients in meals
* emphasize order
* individual place settings

28

individual place settings

* in Georgian meals
* mid-18th century

28

deaths head

motif of battle ship curve seriation

\
28

cherub

motif of battleship curve seriation

28

willow and urn

motif of battleship curve seriation

28

gravestones

* motif changes linked to ideological shifts
* puritan descendants rejoin English mainstream
* rise of middle class, emphasis on individual

28

Leone

* built on deter model
* critiqued deetz for not raking into account issues of power and agency
* an ideology of individual freedom taking root in a period marked by internal contradictions to that ideology:
* rich/poor; free/enslaves; british/american
* threats to economic and political stability of new American middle class

28

William paca’s garden

* ostentatious displays of power and wealth in the inner confined of the household
* symmetry and order demonstrate control over nature = control over society “out of control”

28

order over nature

* discursive acts designed to stabilize and assert individual prosperity and power- not just a material reflection of it

28

coercive theories

* leaders are out of their own self interests
* propertied class makes descisions

the Middle Kingdom

2055 BC – c. 1650 BC 11th and 12th dynasties Repeated high Nile inundation levels Thebes becomes capital of Egypt

• during Middle and New Kingdom eras

processual view

* Culture is a system, ideology is a product of subsistence adaptations and of social relations
* • a “dependent variable”
* Ideology and religion are “adaptive” because they...
* • solve an organizational problem of society (Émile Durkheim 1915): how to integrate diverse groups into a functional whole
* • contribute to individual mental health and survival
* • regulate social interactions by encouraging morally correct behavior
* Cultural meanings of ideology cannot be inferred from the archaeological evidence
* • focus on function of ideology and ritual in organization of society
* • correlate changes in ideology with changes in organization
* Technic functions: utilitarian
* • A crown is a hat, keeps rain off of one’s head
* • Sociotechnic functions: social functions

• A crown is a symbol of political authority

• Idiotechnic functions: ideological functions

• The crown is a symbol of leadership

* Processual approach to symbols: material culture is a passive reflection of social/cultural needs

post processual

* Ideology pervades all human thought and action
* • an “independent variable”
* • perspective of contemporary cultural anthropology, as well Even subsistence and technological activities are always performed within an ideological context
* • e.g. “men’s work, women’s work,” etc.
* Ideology often masks, makes “natural” social inequality

“This race is biologically incapable of intellectual work

“women will damage their reproductive organs if educated
* Social relationships and ideology supporting them may not be equally “functional” or beneficial to all members of society
* Material culture is symbolic and meaningful
* Reflects socio-cultural values & actively shapes them
* \
* Stylistic differences often emerge at points of contact

academic architecture

* Georgian order
* mid 18th C
* orderly, planned, and based on popular, academic principles of design
* focus on individual, formal, orderly, more academic, popular

the garbage project

* directed by william rathje
* consumption and refuse disposal patterns today

31

antiquities act

* first archaeology legislation
* enacted to protect sites of national significance from looting and destruction
* allowed US presidents to create national monuments from historic/prehistoric landmarks
* protects these monuments from destruction

31

national historic preservation act (NHPA)

* 1966
* enacted to provide better processes fro identifying and evaluating cultural resources beyond executive orders
* created systematic, nationwide program of historic preservation
* created:
* the national register of historic places
* the advisory council on historic preservation
* state historic preservation offices
* a process to mitigate the impact of development
* what we think of now as “contract archaeology” or cam

31