STYLE IN SWIFT CREEK PADDLE ART

Abstract

Woodland period Swift Creek designs have received considerable attention in recent years. Bettye Broyles and Frankie Snow, among few others, have created a working corpus within which stylistic aspects of Swift Creek designs can be explored. Here, we focus both on “observer” models that governed acceptable visual form and on “task” models used by Swift Creek artisans to produce that form by creating paddle designs. Reconstructed procedures for several paddle designs emphasize the stepwise nature of creating art in this style. We discuss the key importance of guide points, guidelines, and creatively manipulated bandwork in Swift Creek compositions. Using this approach, we hope to demonstrate the value of reconstructed whole paddle designs in the study of layout, symmetry, design concept, and other stylistic domains. Finally, we chart the historical trajectories of selected style characteristics through time and offer suggestions for future research in this domain.     

A FUNCTIONAL ANALYSIS OF MISSISSIPPIAN CERAMIC VESSELS FROM TOWN CREEK

Abstract

Vessel shape, size, and use-alterations are used to identify vessel types and vessel functions among Mississippian ceramics from the Town Creek site in central North Carolina. Possible functions are discussed for vessel types, and broad distinctions are made regarding vessels that possibly were used for cooking, serving and eating, or storage. The composition of the overall vessel assemblage at Town Creek indicates that it is generally comparable with other Mississippian assemblages. A consideration of the distribution of vessel types by context allows some insights into the association of different activities with different parts of the Mississippian community at Town Creek, namely, that the mound area was associated with distinctive vessel assemblages.     

CORE ELEMENTS AND LAYOUT CLASSES IN SWIFT CREEK PADDLE ART

Our work here extends a study in which we identified a set of task models used by early Swift Creek artisans to produce paddle designs. Reconstructed procedures for early bandwork compositions highlighted the importance of the placement of guide points and guidelines to the final product as well as the hierarchal nature of the production sequence, leading to the realization that designs can be profitably classified by the geometry of these initial steps. In this paper, we examine two layout classes defined from observations across some of the more common core elements in the Swift Creek design corpus. We then seriate the most common of the core elements, the Omega, by virtue of variation in its visual characteristics. We draw on the stratigraphic sequence at Fairchild’s Landing (9SE14), Seminole County, Georgia, as a test of the core-element seriation and discuss developmental differences in the Omega between two prolific Swift Creek regions, the lower Chattahoochee River of southwestern Georgia and southeastern Alabama and the lower Ocmulgee and upper Satilla rivers of central and south-central Georgia, on the other.     

GROUND MOTION DOMINANT FREQUENCY EFFECT ON THE DESIGN OF MULTIPLE TUNED MASS DAMPERS

Utilising the Kanai-Tajimi and Clough-Penzien spectrums and the pseudo-excitation algorithm in the frequency domain, parametric study is performed to examine the effect of the dominant frequency of ground motion on the optimum parameters and effective-ness of multiple tuned mass dampers (MTMD) with identical stiffness and damping coefficient but with unequal mass. The examination of the optimum parameters is con-ducted through the minimisation of the minimum values of the maximum displacement and acceleration dynamic magnification factors of the structure with the MTMD. The optimum parameters of the MTMD include the optimum frequency spacing reflecting the robustness, the average damping ratio and the tuning frequency ratio. Minimisation of the minimum values of the maximum displacement and acceleration dynamic mag-nification factors, nondimensionalised respectively by the maximum displacement and acceleration dynamic magnification factors of the structure without the MTMD, is used to measure the effectiveness of the MTMD. The results indicate that in the two cases where both the total mass ratio is below 0.02 and the total mass ratio is above 0.02, but the dominant frequency ratio of ground motion is below unity (including unity), the earthquake ground motion can be modelled by a white noise. It is worth noting, however, that for the total mass ratio above 0.02, the Kanai-Tajimi Spectrum or Clough-Penzien spectrum needs to be employed to design the MTMD for seismic structures in situations where the dominant frequency ratio of ground motion is beyond unity.     

LOOKING BEYOND THE OBVIOUS: IDENTIFYING PATTERNS IN COLES CREEK MORTUARY DATA

Abstract

While the lack of grave goods has been the focus of most scholarly discussion of Coles Creek burial practices, the mortuary analyses presented here focus on recognizing correspondences among sex, age, and burial position. Using assemblages from three Coles Creek sites (Greenhouse, Lake George, and Mount Nebo), I find that while there is significant intersite variability among Coles Creek mortuary programs, certain age groups are consistently treated differently from each other and from everyone else. Thus interments were being made with deliberate care and consideration for those involved and are not nearly as haphazard and disorderly as previously thought.     

ANALYSIS OF EARLY-NINETEENTH-CENTURY MUSCOGEE CREEK FUR TRADE AT A UNITED STATES FACTORY STORE

Abstract

We conducted an analysis of economic transaction records from the Fort Wilkinson Factory Store in central Georgia in an attempt to understand trade behaviors by the Muscogee Creek people of the southeastern United States. Between February 4, 1804, and November 29, 1806, factory personnel recorded 2,168 trade transactions at Fort Wilkinson. During this period, 38,226.5 deerskins and skins, 482 hides and rawhides, and 569 furs entered the fort. In exchange for these items, the Creek Indians primarily received cloth, followed by manufactured items such as kettles, gun supplies, and consumable groceries. We analyze the month-by-month exchange trends and compare the trade-good assemblages to archaeological sites that represent Creek occupations that date to the same time period in Georgia and Alabama. Further, we assess the biases of the data and interpret the data in relation to existing historical and archaeological studies of the Muscogee Creek people.     

AN INVESTIGATION OF THE ORIGINS OF VARIATION IN PERISHABLE ARCHITECTURE AT JONATHAN CREEK

Abstract

The Jonathan Creek site in Kentucky was excavated in the early 1940s in an effort to uncover the community plan of an entire Mississippian town and mound center. Although the project terminated prematurely, the remnants of 89 structures representing a diverse array of architectural foundation styles were documented. Quantitative and qualitative analyses of multiple attributes, such as posthole diameter and spacing, wall-trench width and depth, roof supports, and floor area, are necessary to adequately parse the variation in architectural style, construct inferences about the aboveground appearance of buildings, and suggest origins for the diverse construction methods used at the site. At least some of the distinctive differences in foundation preparation would have resulted in diversity in the appearance of finished buildings. Time is not wholly adequate to explain this diversity. Technological and functional choices made by the ancient builders account for some of this variation, while social, genealogical, and ethnic differences, and possibly distinctive ritual customs and traditions among the residents, explain other sources of variation.     

浙江区域块状经济地理分布特征、绩效及其形成机制研究

浙江区域块状经济这种新型的产业空间集群组织形式的形成和发展并不是一种偶然的经济现象,而且特定历史背景、人文环境及资源压力和市场竞争条件下产生的必然经济运动的结果,是浙江人在培育市场经济过程中探索出来的一种成功发展模式。在中国的浙江,全省86个县、市中有85个县、市拥有地方特色的区域块状经济地理分布特征。按其成因和地理位置可将浙江省"区域块状经济"概括为:环杭州湾平原区位型、浙东南沿海"温州模式"型、浙中金衢盆地资源匮乏开拓型和浙西南地方资源开发型等四大特征分区;对基于产业集群的区域块状经济运行绩效的研究表明,区域块状经济的形成和发展为面广量大的中小企业构筑了一种有效的地域空间模式,对于提高区域工业的竞争力、工业产品的市场占有率、促进浙江市场的繁荣、农村工业化、城镇化发展具有十分重要的作用,与此同时,探讨了基于中小企业与大市场成功对接的浙江省区域块状经济形成机制,提出了中小企业的集群成长及其与市场的成功对接是浙江省区域块状经济形成和发展的动力机制和区域块状经济与农村工业化、城镇化互动发展模式。     

RADIOCARBON MEASUREMENT BY ACCELERATOR MASS SPECTROMETRY: AN EARLY SELECTION OF DATES

Dates from the first runs of the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit span the range from present to c. 17,000 bp, with errors (1 s.d.) from ± 100 to ± 300 years. Material dated comprises bone, wood, charcoal, seeds, organic residues in pottery, and charcoal inclusions in slag.     

IDENTIFYING THE PLANT ORIGIN OF ARTISTS' YELLOW LAKE PIGMENTS BY ELECTROSPRAY MASS SPECTROMETRY

Dyes containing flavonoids are found in yellow lake pigments used as artists' materials. Pre‐treating a sample of a flavonoid‐based lake pigment with an acidic ion exchange resin followed by reversed‐phase HPLC electrospray mass spectrometry enables the identification of key diagnostic yellow compounds, even when the pigment is bound in paint media. Reference raw plant materials of weld and buckthorn berries were also treated similarly for comparison with the lake pigments derived from these plants. This method is suitable for microsamples and thus suitable for analysis of samples that can be ethically removed from works of art in the course of their conservation. The flavonoid content is analysed and plant origins are suggested for yellow lake samples taken from Reclining Tiger by Jean‐Baptiste Oudry and the 1893 version of The Scream by Edvard Munch.     

IDENTIFICATION OF ANCIENT LACQUER FILM USING TWO-STAGE PYROLYSIS-GAS CHROMATOGRAPHY/MASS SPECTROMETRY*

Oriental lacquer has been used as a surface coating for wood, porcelain and metal, and three different types are known: Japanese (or Chinese) lacquer (urushiol-based), Vietnamese lacquer (laccol-based) and Burmese lacquer (thitsiol-based). Identification of these types in ancient coatings is very important in conservation and restoration studies. A two-stage pyrolysis-gas chromatography/mass spectrometry method is effective for the analysis of lacquer films. This is shown here using an ancient lacquer film sample from medieval material excavated at Tobarikyu (Japan), The sample was identified, by comparison with linseed oil and authentic lacquer films, as an urushiol-based Rhus vernicifera (Japanese) lacquer which includes an added oil component.