PANTELLERIAN WARE: A COMPREHENSIVE ARCHAEOMETRIC REVIEW*

Pantellerian ware is a Late Roman cooking ware whose production centre was established on the island of Pantelleria by the pioneering research of Fulford and Peacock almost 20 years ago ( Peacock 1982 ; Fulford and Peacock 1984 ). Archaeological and archaeometric studies carried out by the authors of the present contribution during the past four years have aimed to fully characterize this ceramic class. Recurrent ceramic forms, their distribution over time and space, their petrographic characteristics and their chemical identity, as well as possible raw materials and their technological properties, were considered. The present paper is a comprehensive review of this archaeometric work and aims to establish a ‘reference group’. Using a representative number of samples of Pantellerian ware that were recently discovered in the island through archaeological field surveys or surface and submarine excavations, it was possible to characterize in detail the compositional variability of this ware in terms of chemistry and petrography. Furthermore, the physical properties of this ceramic type have been defined in order to better understand its performance characteristics, mainly in response to induced thermal stress. In the meantime, the experimental mixing and tempering of locally sampled raw materials have shed light on the ancient manufacturing process and have led to an approximation of the original paste.     

Orientation and proportion in Indian traditional domestic architecture

From ancient times, the traditional architectural practice ‘Vastusastra’ is rigidly followed and practised in many parts of the Indian sub-continent and has a unique position in Indian architecture. In Indian traditional domestic architecture, a hand calculator table and an index number system are used for finding the proportion and orientation of the building. The mathematical and logical background of this traditional practice, which is not known at present, is investigated in this paper. The study reveals that there is a strong and complex mathematical background behind this traditional architectural practice.     

An Osteometric Study on the Variation in Orientation of the Lesser Trochanter in an Early Medieval Human Skeletal Assemblage and Comparison with an Individual from the Late Upper Palaeolithic

Anatomical textbooks describe the lesser trochanter in contemporary humans as being oriented posteromedially. In contrast, orientation of the lesser trochanter towards posterior was observed in some human femora from the Upper Palaeolithic, including the femur of a young adult individual from Germany (Irlich 1), radiocarbon dated to 12 500–11 200 bp (calibrated AMS age). The present study analysed the orientation of the lesser trochanter in femora originating from an early medieval skeletal assemblage (Greding, Germany) and compared the results with those for the Irlich 1 femur. Eleven landmarks, four on the proximal femur, four on the mid‐shaft and three on the distal femur, were recorded with a MicroScribe® digitizer and analysed using AutoCAD® 2010 software. Seven angles and five distances were measured. In the Greding femora, significant differences (p  < 0.05) between sexes were found for several linear measurements, while no significant sex‐related differences existed for angular measurements. For some angular variables related to the orientation of the lesser trochanter, the values for the Irlich 1 femur lay outside the range of variation of the Greding specimens, reflecting the more posterior orientation of the lesser trochanter in the Irlich 1 femur. This posterior orientation of the lesser trochanter was not associated with a particularly low degree of femoral anteversion. It is hypothesised that the differences in orientation of the lesser trochanter between the Irlich 1 femur (and other femora of Upper Palaeolithic individuals) and the femora from Greding could basically reflect differences in traction exercised by the iliopsoas muscle during infancy and childhood between the sedentary agricultural population from Greding and Upper Palaeolithic hunter‐gatherers with a mobile lifestyle. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Ordovician trilobite faunas and depositional history of the Taebaeksan Basin,Korea: implications for palaeogeography

The Taebaeksan Basin occupies the central-eastern part of the Korean peninsula and was a low-relief shallow marine carbonate shelf on which the Cambro-Ordovician Choson Supergroup was deposited. In the Taebaeksan Basin trilobites are among the most dominant fossil groups in the Lower Ordovician, but they become less important in Middle Ordovician faunal assemblages. The Early Ordovician trilobite faunas of the Taebaeksan Basin are characterised by the common occurrence of pandemic genera such as Jujuyaspis, Leiostegium, Asaphellus, Protopliomerops, Hystricurus, Apatokephalus, Shumardia, Asaphopsoides, and Kayseraspis. Biogeographically significant trilobite taxa include Yosimuraspis, Dikelokephalina, Koraipsis, and Chosenia. These Ordovician trilobite faunas, which thrived in shallow marine environments, show a remarkable similarity with faunas from North China, implying that the Taebaeksan Basin was connected through contiguous shallow waters to North China. These Sino-Korean faunas exhibit a close biogeographic connection with Australian faunas, with which they share some endemic genera, whereas they are more distantly related to the faunas of South China, South America, and North America. Based on these palaeobiogeographical features, it is suggested that in the early Palaeozoic much of the present Korean peninsula including the Taebaeksan Basin belonged to the Sino-Korean block, while part of the peninsula was derived from the Yangtze block.     

Welcome to Country … Not.

ABSTRACT It seems that every public function I attend includes a ‘welcome to country’ speech presented by a representative of a local Aboriginal group claiming traditional ownership of the land where the gathering is conducted. Indeed, while it was already becoming customary for white officials to acknowledge traditional Aboriginal ownership prior to introducing any kind of its own business in recent years, it seems to have become de rigueur since the 42nd Federal Parliament was opened with a ‘Welcome to Country’ speech from a Ngunnawal representative in February, 2008. As this paper demonstrates, welcome to country might be understood by whites as a ‘safe’ kind of inclusive gesture of recognition all the time knowing that such claims are not legally enforceable. But, as the two ethnographic examples I present in this article demonstrate, Indigenous agency, once acknowledged in performance, cannot be fully directed by the nation state to serve its own ends.     

Drinking to Mana and Ethnicity: Trajectories of Yaqona Practice and Symbolism in Eastern Fiji

This paper sets out a transformational history of yaqona use in Fiji from first contact with Europeans to present times. Trying to transcend the familiar history/structure dichotomy, two relatively separate trajectories of Fijian practice are identified, both incorporating enduring cultural premises, both logically and historically transformative. In the older of these trajectories, yaqona drinking is transformed ritually to promote or block the circulation of mana in embodied Fijian ‘lands’. In the younger pathway, by contrast, secular variants of yaqona ceremonial are invented to ethnic effect as one particular transformation of a modern structure that, against the grain of ritual practice, tends to detach ethnic Fijians from ancestral powers. It is suggested that, whilst, in appropriate spaces, contemporary ethnic objectifications of yaqona are formulated in opposition to other ethnic presences as expressions of ‘authentic’ Fijian‐ness, the underlying ritual transformations of yaqona produce a range of Fijian states that exceed this authenticity and challenge the otherwise hegemonic claims of ethnicity.     

An Early Permian brachiopod fauna of Gondwanan affinity from the Baoshan block,western Yunnan,China

The present paper describes and illustrates an Early Permian brachiopod fauna collected from two localities from the upper part of the type Dingjiazhai Formation near Youwang, 30 km south of Baoshan in the Baoshan block, western Yunnan, China. The brachiopod fauna is dominated by Stenoscisma sp. and Elivina yunnanensis sp. nov. and exhibits strong generic and some specific links with faunas from the Bisnain assemblage of Timor and the Callytharra Formation of Western Australia and, to a lesser extent, faunas from the Jilong Formation of southern Tibet, the Tashkazyk Formation of southeastern Pamir, the lower Toinlungkongba Formation of northwestern Tibet, the upper Pondo Group of central Tibet, and the Jimba Jimba Calcarenite of the Carnarvon Basin, Western Australia. Based on these correlations, a Late Sakmarian (Sterlitamakian) age is preferred for the Dingjiazhai brachiopod fauna. Two new species are proposed: Globiella youwangensis sp. nov. and Elivina yunnanensis sp. nov.     

ESTIMATION OF NEAR-SOURCE GROUND MOTION AND SEISMIC BEHAVIOUR OF RC FRAMED STRUCTURES DAMAGED BY THE 1999 ATHENS EARTHQUAKE

On September 7, 1999 an earthquake with magnitude M _W =5.9 occurred close to the city of Athens in Greece. More than 80 buildings collapsed, about 150 deaths and hundreds of injuries were reported. Soon after the event a damage investigation was carried out by two of the authors in the most heavily struck areas. The most serious damages were observed in the northern suburbs of Athens, where reinforced concrete frames and masonry buildings represent the prevalent construction systems. The hysteretic energy demands imposed on RC buildings should have been rather severe considering the structural systems characteristics and the inadequate construction details. However, over-strengths, redundancy and especially the presence of infill walls, provided a significant increase of the seismic capacity and contributed to the survival of many buildings.

The objective of the present work is to reproduce and analyse the response of typical RC frames subjected to the 1999 Athens earthquake in areas where the observed damage was particularly severe but no recordings of the ground motion were available. After a general overview of the seismotectonic environment, seismological data, observed macro-seismic intensities, structural typologies and observed building behaviour, an attempt is made to identify representative excitations in the meizoseismal area. Specifically, the required accelerograms are obtained by modifying available records so as to reproduce a given global energy content and to be consistent with the observed damage. To study the seismic response of RC models, the obtained accelerograms are used to perform nonlinear dynamic analyses.     

Landscape interpretation with augmented reality and maps to improve spatial orientation skill

Landscape interpretation is needed for navigating and determining an orientation: with traditional cartography, interpreting 3D topographic information from 2D landform representations to get self-location requires spatial orientation skill. Augmented reality technology allows a new way to interact with 3D landscape representation and thereby facilitate the orientation of oneself in respect to the environment to determine goal location. This paper analyses if AR spatial landform improves the learner’s spatial orientation skill measured with the perspective taking/spatial orientation test by paired sampled t-tests. A workshop was conducted with 123 university students (63 treatment group, 60 control group) in which students had to identify locations and routes based on the interpretation of the relief, represented by AR. Results of the workshop showed an improvement in spatial orientation skill of 20.14 degrees average gain in the treatment group. Students who were not subject to the workshop (control group) did not improve their spatial orientation skill. The possibility of using free AR three-dimensional applications and exploit the potential of tablets and smart phones, which are widespread today, makes it possible to design and implement strategies for the development of spatial skills in formal teaching in the scope of Geography in higher education.     

Chronicles of vadose zone diagenesis: cone‐shaped iron oxide concretions,Triassic Trujillo Formation,Palo Duro Canyon,Texas

Unusual cone‐shaped iron oxide concretions occur in the Late Triassic, lower fluvial sandstone member of the Trujillo Formation at Palo Duro Canyon in the Texas panhandle. In situ concretions are significant because they record both historical information about past processes that occurred within the geologic unit and present‐day information about the ability of the unit to conduct fluids. The dominant orientation of the concretions is cone‐apex up, body radiating down and out, with long axis perpendicular to bedding. Concretion morphologies are associated with the sedimentary texture and primary bedding structure of the host rock and the corresponding hydrologic regime (i.e. advection versus dispersion for iron‐transport behavior). Three lithofacies in the lower Trujillo member exhibit different cone forms. Field observations of cone orientation and morphology suggest vadose conditions for diagenetic precipitation of iron oxide cements, with timing potentially represented by the major pre‐Miocene unconformity.     

Resistance and radical democracy: freedom,power and institutions

ABSTRACT

In this article, I argue that resistance and radical democracy can be used to the good of representative democracy. I submit that resistance is about the popular power – the freedom as power – to create better institutions. I argue that the conflict and resistance that is at the core of radical democracy enables freedom and democracy and resists domination best if it is institutionalized. This counterintuitive claim is substantiated by an argument for freedom as power through representation and how the power to resist is linked to at least four domains of freedom. This builds on the work of Machiavelli, Marx and Foucault, amongst others, and insights drawn from resistance struggles across the globe. I end by proposing institutional changes to representative democracy that, I suggest, would allow us to conceive of democracy as both a form of government and a constantly destabilizing transgressive practice.     

Orientation of the Romanesque churches in the region of Val d’Aran,Spain (11th–13th centuries)

This study examines an ensemble of Romanesque churches in the region of Val d’Aran in the Spanish Pyrenees, built between the 11th and 13th centuries. Seven topographical studies performed between 2014 and 2015 examined these churches systematically using terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) as a data‐acquisition technique. The data obtained allowed for a geometrically accurate analysis of the orientation of these churches based on four Romanesque liturgies: Gemma animae (c.1120), by Honorius of Autun; Rationale divinorum officiorum (c.1150), by Jean Beleth; Mitralis de Officio (1190), by Sicard, Bishop of Cremona; and Prochiron, vulgo rationale divinorum officiorum (1291), by Guillaume Durand.     

漕控与清代地方社会秩序——以匡光文控漕事件为中心的考察

The cases of caozheng 漕政 (The government administration of the collection and transport of grain taxes by water in the former times) are present in all stages in the Qing Dynasty. The social interaction and interest dispute involve the commoners, officials, and gentries in the localities in all kinds of caozheng cases. Caozheng cases that are inspired by lofty motives and filed under the established procedure are often mingled with trumped-up charges that are pressed through illegitimate means. They are employed as conventional methods by both commoners and officials for their own interests. By virtue of an in-depth analysis of such representative cases as the lawsuit issued by Kuang Guangwen, it is plainly evident that caozheng cases happen on many occasions because the long-standing malpractices spread uncontrollably in the middle and late stages of the Qing. It is both the attitude taken by the local officials towards the management of caozheng and their rationale behind the exercise of power that always dictated how such incidents take place and come to an end and therein lies the crux of a persistent problem. The caozheng cases reflects the pervasive influence that the collection of grain taxes extends on the life of the gentries and commoners, and the far-reaching effect that the taxation exerts on the change of the social order in the localities. In essence the cases reveal, to a greater or lesser degree, the circumstances under which the national affairs of Qing are administered in society in the localities, and the tendencies that are displayed in the social order in the localities.     

Site Management: An Application to Wadilmeluk (the Valley of the Kings)

‘Value has always been the reason underlying heritage conservation. It is self‐evident that no society makes an effort to conserve what it does not value.’ ¹ 1. de la Torre and Mason, Assessing the Values of Cultural Heritage, 3–4. However, assessing the value of a cultural heritage asset as a representative sample of our tangible and intangible heritage for present and future generations is a difficult concept to deal with. It is, therefore, the aim of the researchers to help the conservation decision process by attempting to make an assessment of the values attributed to the cultural heritage assets of one of the most notable heritage sites in Egypt: the Valley of the Kings in Luxor.     

Free and Fair? Rhodesians Reflect on the Elections of 1979 and 1980

The elections of April 1979 and February 1980 were the first in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe's history to permit universal adult suffrage, allowing for black majority rule. In the first election, Bishop Abel Muzorewa's United African National Council (UANC) won an overwhelming victory, while in the second, British-supervised election, Muzorewa's party was soundly defeated and Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) won over 60% of the vote. By interviewing present and former white Rhodesians, located via Facebook and the print magazine Rhodesians Worldwide, who were witnesses to these two critical elections, this study aims to shed light on which of them was more representative of the will of the people of Zimbabwe, at least in the eyes of the country's white minority.     

‘That mad hatters tea party on the East River’: Conservative journals of opinion and the United Nations 1964–1981

During the 1960s and 1970s the Right viewed the United Nations as an institution that had lost its way. Writers for the journals of conservative opinion believed America’s complacent position toward the UN’s anti-western attitudes were representative of a nation that was no longer confident as a leader in the world. It was a course they were determined to change. The actions of National Review, Human Events and Commentary were not singularly responsible for the success or failure of American policy at the UN, but the language they employed contributed to the tone Ronald Reagan used during his presidency.     

The Post‐Mortem Pressure Distortion of Human Crania Uncovered in an Early Medieval Pohansko (Czech Republic) Graveyard

Post‐mortem distortion resulting from the pressure of overlying sediments (i.e. grave backfill) is one of the taphonomic factors capable of altering the geometry of buried and subsequently recovered skeletal remains. If pressure distortion is a frequent occurrence, it could systematically flaw the outcome of an anthropological examination. To study the patterns of post‐mortem distortion in buried crania and shape alterations associated with a specimen's in situ position, 46 male crania recovered from an Old Slavic graveyard (Pohansko, Czech Republic) were analysed together with control specimens from four modern European osteological collections (N = 207) using geometric morphometrics. The results indicate a common pattern of shape change in buried skulls associated with their in situ orientation. However, as the overall shape variation between the Old Slavic crania (which, with their tendency towards longer, narrower shapes differed markedly from the modern Czech crania) oriented in situ on their back and side reflects the duality of dolichocranial and brachycranial forms, it seems likely that the in situ positioning of the crania stemmed from their original morphology. The lack of substantial effect of the in situ orientation on the cranial morphology is associated with a larger cranial size and a tendency for sturdiness in the Old Slavic subsample. Both of these characteristics are likely to be contributing to the resistance of these crania to taphonomic alterations. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE WORKING QUALITY OF ASTURIAN JETS (SPAIN) AND THEIR STRUCTURE USING PARAMETERS DEFINED BY 1H‐NMR*

A collection of seven representative jets from Asturias (Spain) was studied. Some artisans of the Asturian jet industry established the quality criteria of the jet based on the user‐friendly properties of this material. In this work, we study the relationship between the working quality of asturian jets and their structure using parameters defined by liquid ¹H‐NMR. With this aim, certain parameters calculated from the NMR results were used to provide information about the structure of compounds extracted from jets.     

METHODS OF ENGRAVING MESOPOTAMIAN QUARTZ CYLINDER SEALS

Cylinder seals, which were produced more or less continuously for about 3000 years in Western Asia, were worked with designs in intaglio. In this paper we report the results of an investigation into the techniques used to engrave seals composed of quartz. Our observations were made with a binocular microscope and supplemented by examination of impressions with a scanning electron microscope. A range of factors was considered, including shape in plan, topography, surface texture and orientation of features. In this way four basic techniques of engraving have been recognized. They have been tentatively interpreted as micro-chipping, filing, wheel-cutting and drilling.     

High Court Review 2007–08: A Changing Bench,But Business as Usual?

This year's High Court Review analyses the major developments in the Court's composition and jurisprudence for the two-year period from 2007 to 2008, with a primary focus on the Court's role as chief interpreter of the Commonwealth Constitution, the political implications of the Court's vision of the federal compact and its interpretation of the concept of representative democracy in Australia. As an inherently political institution with considerable policy influence, the first part of the Review analyses the changing composition of the bench with reference to two new appointments made in 2008. The second half of the Review turns to developments in the Court's constitutional jurisprudence. The Court's role as an arbiter of federal-State relations is explored through two important section 51 decisions concerning the scope of the Commonwealth government's legislative power: Attorney-General (Vic) v Andrews and Thomas v Mowbray. Finally, the Review analyses the Court's construction of the Constitution as providing for a system of representative government in two cases concerning voting rights: Bennett v The Commonwealth and Roach v Electoral Commissioner.