Les Aśvin Dans Les Énumérations Divines Du Neuvième Mandala De La Rgvedasamhitā

Although they are soma-drinkerslike Indra or Vyu, the Avins, in the ninthmandala of the Rgvedasamhit do not appear morethan four times, probably because their culthas lost importance. Nevertheless, the fewstanzas mentioning them among other vedicdeities in order to compose a minimal pantheon do notcontain very interesting data except the fact that thosetwins seem to be somehow more closelyassociated with the ambiguous Vyu. Having analysedthe stanzas, I propose some new solutions tothe grammatical and semantical problems they present(9.7.7 rána,dhármabhih;9.7.8 vidnah;9.8.1 abhí priyám;9.81.4 suyám;9.88.3 istáym,vivávrah)     

On the Origins of Pottery

Renewed research interest in the origins of pottery has illuminated an array of possible precipitating causes and environmental contexts in which pottery began to be made and used. This article is an attempt at synthesizing some of these data in hopes of stimulating further research into this intriguing topic. Following a review of theories on the origins of pottery, discussion proceeds to a survey of geographic and cultural contexts of low-fired or unfired pottery, highlighting the role(s) of pottery among contemporary hunter-gatherers and summarizing data pertaining to varied uses of pottery containers. It is argued that objects of unfired and low-fired clay were created as part of early prestige technologies of material representations beginning in the Upper Paleolithic and are part of an early software horizon. Clay began to be more widely manipulated by nonsedentary, complex hunter-gatherers in the very Late Pleistocene and early Holocene in areas of resource abundance, especially in tropical/subtropical coastal/riverine zones, as part of more general processes of resource and social intensification (such as competitive feasting or communal ritual). Knowledge of making and using pottery containers spread widely as prestige technology and as practical technology, the kind and timing of its adoption or reinvention varying from location to location depending on specific needs and circumstances.     

The archaeology of the Spanish contact period in the Caribbean

The arrival of Spanish conquistadors and colonists to the Caribbean in the late fifteenth century set in motion the processes that produced the post-1500 New World. The sixteenth-century cultural and ecological exchanges among Europe, Africa, and the Americas that took place during the early contact period greatly affected the social and economic patterns of life in both the Old and the New Worlds. Nowhere was this change manifest as profoundly and dramatically as in the sixteenth-century Caribbean. This essay explores the archaeological insights into the processes of encounter between the Amerindian peoples of the Caribbean region and the first permanent Europeans in the Americas and the responses of each to contact with the other. Archaeological research has informed our understanding of this seminal era in New World cultural development in important ways. It had also allowed the documentation of both the cultural and demographic disintegration of the Caribbean Indians and the formation of Euro-American culture.     

Resisting Traditions: Ceramics, Identity, and Consumer Choice in the Outer Hebrides from 1800 to the Present

On a number of levels, peripheral status has been imposed on the Outer Hebrides (Scotland) since the Jacobite Rebellion in 1745. Drawing on a series of interviews with Hebridean families, this paper explores the changing meanings of ceramics imported into the islands from the early nineteenth century and displayed on wooden dressers. It is argued that in renegotiating their identity in the face of a series of externally generated economic changes, rural communities in the Hebrides have acted as thoughtful consumers, appropriating mainland material culture to their own ends. Throughout this process, imports have behaved ambiguously. This ambiguity is crucial to our understanding of the relationship—here characterized not as resistance but as resistant adaptation—between the Hebrides and the mainland.     

Philosophy of archaeology: Current issues

Recent literature reflects continuing concern with problems such as explanation, skepticism, and objective knowledge. Some authors urge archaeologists to abandon positivism in favor of new philosophical approaches, such as feminism, Marxism, hermeneutics, and critical theory. Ethical issues have received increased attention as archaeologists have become involved in determining public policy with regard to disposition of artifacts and uncovering of human burials.     

Working Without a Net: Recent Trends in Ceramic Ethnoarchaeology

This paper reviews ceramic ethnoarchaeological research conducted subsequent to Kramer's (1985) seminal stock-taking. Among current trends are a continued interest in the relationship between ceramics and economic specialization, the degree to which manufacture constitutes a technological style, and the link between pots and formation processes as represented in assemblage sizes, use-lives, and recycling. At the same time, some pesky theoretical issues continue to be sidestepped in the current literature. Despite its reputation as a pleasant break from the real business of archaeology, this paper argues that ceramic ethnoarchaeology can and should play a more substantial role in archaeological investigations.     

The Woodland and Mississippian traditions in the prehistory of Midwestern North America

Cultural developments in Midwestern North America between 5000 and 400 B.P. are reviewed and related to two overlapping, but contrasting, cultural traditions: Woodland and Mississippian. Significant changes in prehistoric subsistence systems, settlement patterns, and sociopolitical organization are reviewed within a three-division framework, beginning with a Transitional period (5000–2000 B.P.) when Late Archaic and Early Woodland societies settled into different regions, constructed regional markers (cemeteries, mounds, earthworks), and established economic and social relations with both neighboring and more distant groups. This was followed by the Middle Woodland period (2000–1500 B.P.) that is associated with the Hopewell climax of long-distance exchange of exotic materials, mound building, and ceremonial activities, although all Middle Woodland groups did not participate in this Hopewell interaction sphere. In the Late Prehistoric period (1500–400 B.P.), the Woodland tradition persisted in some areas, while the Mississippian tradition developed from local Late Woodland societies elsewhere. Finally, the patterns of interaction between the two traditions are discussed.     

Iron Age temperate Europe: Some current research issues

The Iron Age designates the 800 years preceding the Roman conquest of Europe. This period represents the latest social and cultural development of indigenous European societies before the annexation of much of temperate Europe into the Roman Empire and the final phase of cultural change before the beginning of local traditions of written history north of the Alps. Our understanding of the Iron Age has changed substantially over the past 30 years, as a result both of recent discoveries and of new perspectives. Much recent research has focused on specific themes such as changing social structure and patterns of ritual behavior. I attempt here to provide an overview of current understanding and debate on some of these topics in Iron Age archaeology. The subject and its literature are vast, and my treatment is selective. The references will guide the interested reader to the wider literature.     

Les parties étiologiques de l'Ardvīsūr Bānūg Yašt et les noms de la grande déesse iranienne

In this paper, we show that the Yats wehave are not authentic in so far as that theyare the fruit of the arbitrary mixture of thethree kinds of the original Yats: theliturgical one, the legal one and theetiological one. In a lot of our Yats, moreweight is given to the liturgical version (withyazamaide), but, in the bnYat, the legal one (with yazaa)plays the main role. By considering alltogether the etiological fragments thebn Yat contains, it is possible toenlarge upon what we knew already of what mayhave constituted the etiological myth of thesacrifice offered to a deity.Incidentally, all the different names thegreat Iranian goddess receives, ap-, areduu-,sr- and anhit-, are explained: `water, soft,opulent, unaffected'.     

Change and Inertia on the Frontier: Archaeology at the Paraje de San Diego, Camino Real, in Southern New Mexico

Archaeological testing was conducted at the Paraje de San Diego, a late sixteenth- through nineteenth-century camp site on the Camino Real 30 mi north of Las Cruces. The site is well preserved, though the site structure is complex, reflecting repeated, short-term occupation. The archaeological record (especially the many, diverse ceramics to be recovered) reflects certain changing conditions in southern New Mexico and elsewhere over time. However, the record also indicates a pervasive resistance to development. This resistance, which might be a widespread frontier phenomenon, is called structural interia.     

A History of Normative Theory in Americanist Archaeology

Efforts in the 1960s to demonstrate the value of the new archaeology involved showing that the competing culture-history paradigm was inferior. One allegedly weak plank in that paradigm had to do with how culture historians viewed culture—as a set of ideas transmitted in the form of ideal norms or mental templates. Lewis Binford referred to this view as normative theory. In archaeology that view was manifest in the equation of artifact types with prehistoric norms—an equation that, according to Binford, the culture historians had made so that they could track the flow of ideas through time and thus write culture history. Culture historians regularly subscribed to cultural transmission as the theoretical backdrop for their artifact-based chronometers such as seriation and the direct historical approach, but with few exceptions they perceived only a weak relationship between norms and artifact types. It was not until 1960, in a paper by James Gifford, that what Binford labeled as normative theory appeared in anything approaching a complete form. Ironically, the first applications of normative theory were products of the new archaeologists, not the culture historians.     

Low-Fired Earthenwares in the African Diaspora: Problems and Prospects

Local earthenware associated with enslaved African populations in the Americas, variously called Colono-Ware, Afro-Caribbean Ware. Yabbas, and Criollo ware, has received considerable attention from researchers. What unifies this disparate group of ceramics is not method of manufacture, design and decoration, or even form and function but the association or potential association with African diaspora populations. The ceramics incorporate some skills and techniques possibly brought by African potters to the Americas, as well as skills reflecting European and Native American traditions, and local adaptations in form, function, and manufacture. Analogies linking African ceramic traditions to American industries have at times been employed uncritically and have relied on generalized characteristics to infer overly specific meanings. With particular reference to low-fired earthenwares from Jamaica, this paper examines the historical and cultural context of these ceramics and the methodological and theoretical problems faced in their interpretation.     

Neolithic settlement patterns in temperate Europe: Progress and problems

The study of settlement patterns must be accompanied by careful evaluation of the processes of formation of the archaeological record and of its recovery. A selective review is offered of Neolithic case studies from central and western Europe, from theLinearbandkeramik culture (fifth millennium bc) to Denmark and Britain (fourth and third millennia bc). The emphasis of the study is upon dispersed settlement patterns. Possibilities of specialization and hierarchy are discussed. Settlement studies should be further exploited for the system, or social rules and contexts, that may be inferred from the patterning of settlements.     

Considérations sur une technique du Rasāyana āyurvédique

Summary Rejuvenation techniques, inspired by a common classical tradition, are described in Caraka (Cikits I, 1–4) and in Suruta (Cikits XXVII–XXX), followed up by the Nvantaka (Bower Ms., sl.188–200) and by the Astngahrdayasamhit (Uttara XXXIX). Valuable mediaeval tk comment on the details of these techniques and indeed interesting modern examples of a treatment closely following the ancient medical texts are known.[Contrary to the cure taking place in the open air and in the sun (vttapika), the practice of rejuvenation characterized by the ku is applied indoors in premises called kut or gra, built according to definite rules (site, architecture, etc.). The patient enters at a time astrologically auspicious, after performing certain rites and preparing his mind for a treatment which is as perilous as it is laborious.The rites of the operation and the unusual type of abode, difficult to interpret, permit, however, an examination of the textual data in a different light from that of the scholiasts themselves, who remain very guarded, and even obscure, on important points of detail. Here one must presume an initiation ceremony whose method was used for the legendary sages as well as patients of today. The technique which is called retreat in a hut implies the idea of regressus ad uterum. Rejuvenation which constitutes, from the biological point of view, a regeneration of the body (kyakalpa) must be considered on the symbolical plane as a new birth: the patient is assimilated to the embryo, and to the uterus correspond both the hut described in the classical yurvedic treatises and the dark enclosed premises recommended by the modern kavirj.

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Texte intégral dont fut tirée la communication présentée au séminaire Médecine et pharmacopée en Asie, organisé dans le cadre du XXIX^e Congrès international des orientalistes, qui a eu lieu à Paris, du 16 au 22 juillet 1973. Voir le texte abrégé dans XXIX ^e Congrès international des orientalistes. Résumés des communications [IV]: Section 11, Colloques, Séminaires, [Nogent s/Marne 1973 ], pp. 46–47.     

The prehistory of Cyprus: Problems and prospects

The archaeological record of prehistoric Cyprus is rich, diverse, well-published, and frequently enigmatic. Regarded by many as a bridge between western Asia and the Aegean, Cyprus and its past are frequently seen from scholarly perspectives prevalent in one of those two cultural areas. Its material culture, however, differs radically from that of either area. Apart from the early colonization episodes on the island (perhaps three during the pre-Neolithic and Neolithic), evidence of foreign contact remains limited until the Bronze Age (post-2500 B. C.). This study seeks to present the prehistory of Cyprus from an indigenous perspective, and to examine a series of archaeological problems that foreground Cyprus within its eastern Mediterranean context. The study begins with an overview of time, place, and the nature of fieldwork on the island, continues with a presentation and discussion of several significant issues in Cypriot prehistory (e.g., insularity, colonization, subsistence, regionalism, interaction, social complexity, economic diversity), and concludes with a brief discussion of prospects for the archaeology of Cyprus up to and beyond 2000.     

Emulation and Empowerment: Material, Social, and Economic Dynamics in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Virginia

The influence of emulative behavior on the material and socioeconomic transformations of the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Anglo-American world is widely debated. A study of historical archaeological sites and probate inventories in Virginia implicates emulation as one ethic operative in rural communities but also identifies a second dynamic: a tendency for many planters of divergent means to act in step with one another, responding in similar ways to new circumstances. Here termed a cultural accord, this affinity enabled some individuals who occupied middling social positions to use emulation advantageously in ways that less privileged members of the population could not.     

Remembering Gotham: Urban Legends, Public History, and Representations of Poverty, Crime, and Race in New York City

The past is never truly past, nor are historians/archaeologists privileged stewards of a city's memory. The moment ground was broken at Five Points, researchers encountered a public avidly interested in the history of New York's legendary nineteenth-century slum. From the 1840s this Manhattan neighborhood provided journalists with grist for lurid tabloid tales, creating a grim literary legacy that lingers in popular historical memory into the twenty-first century and also continues to shape public perceptions of poverty and antipoverty policies. New York's press remains steeped in memories of a crime-infested Five Points. Even as researchers uncovered nineteenth-century accounts of gangs, prostitution, and sweat-shop labor at the Five Points, our own newspapers arrived with blaring headlines drawing on nineteenth-century stereotypes of poverty, race, and place. The struggle to create alternative accounts of life in Five Points based on archaeological evidence clashed with these tenacious narratives and the class interests informing them.     

Common Recollections: Resisting Enclosure “by Agreement” in Seventeenth-Century England

Through the enclosure of upland common wastes, an upwardly mobile yeomanry and lesser gentry sought to shift the emphases of local economies toward agrarian capitalism and strove to establish tighter control over burgeoning rural industries. An examination of the township of Castleton in the Pennine uplands of Derbyshire, where the 1691 enclosure proceedings and survey still survive, demonstrates that the typical historical view of such (non-Parliamentary) enclosure agreements is highly problematic. Confronted with the loss of customary common rights, poorer Castleton tenants were compelled to enclose strips within the open arable fields in order to husband animals. By attempting to preserve routines of daily life, however, they also resisted enclosure—through the conservation of common rights and customary practices and through efforts to maintain continuity in agricultural and lead-extraction activities.     

Prehistory of Chihuahua and Sonora,Mexico

The North American Southwest includes much of Mexico as well as the southwestern United States. The area north of the international border has been studied intensively and its culture history is widely known; the portion south of the border has usually been ignored. This essay proposes a new term for the entire culture area, Northern Mexico, and provides a summary of local sequences for two states in the region, Chihuahua and Sonora. The general sequence in the U.S. Southwest (Paleo-Indian, Archaic, and Ceramic periods) also holds in northwest Mexico. Preceramic occupations are poorly known. The Ceramic period saw the rise of a number of local cultures, which varied greatly in adaptation and social complexity. The basic culture pattern of Northern Mexico is derived from that of central Mexico, but direct Mesoamerican intervention in the region was apparently limited. While the issue of Mesoamerican-Northern Mexican relationships has dominated scholarly debate for decades, the greater need is to define and explain cultural variability within and between local sequences.