Assessing XRF for the geochemical characterization of radiolarian chert artifacts from northeastern North America

The purpose of this paper is to emphasize the benefits of adopting non-destructive energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence (ED-XRF) as a first-order technique to determine chert whole-rock geochemistry for archaeological sourcing. Chemical signatures for the Touladi and La Martre prehistoric quarries from the lower St. Lawrence and Gaspé Peninsula region of Quebec, Canada, are determined and serve as references to test the provenance of regional chert artifacts. Chert experimental flakes, created from quarry geological hand samples, are analyzed and used to validate the method. Archaeological flakes and tools recovered from three archaeological sites are analyzed and tested against quarry samples. Geochemical diagrams and Principal Component Analysis are used to establish artifact-quarry relationships. The effects of surface weathering on the geochemical analysis of archaeological chert artifacts are presented. Sample restoration and research avenues are discussed and proposed to further enhance the robustness of future chert geochemical data sets.     

Prehistoric behavioral depression of cormorant (Phalacrocorax spp.) on the northern California coast

Resource depression is often assumed to result from the over-exploitation of a prey species leading to declines in its population, and therefore availability, to human hunters. However, two other forms of resource depression are noted in the ecological literature: behavioral and micro-habitat depression. Data presented in this paper demonstrate resource depression of cormorants (Phalacrocorax spp.), a coastally breeding and semi-pelagic bird genus, at a coastal site in northern California. Citing modern cormorant behavior and a lack of evidence for intensive rookery exploitation, it is argued that the observed resource depression resulted from changes in cormorant behavior that decreased encounter rates for human hunters. Such behavioral depression is cited as a buffer to the extirpation of prey in mainland settings.     

Huancavelica 1563–1824: History and Historiography

The colonial mines of Huancavelica in central Peru boasted unique status, as the sole significant colonial American source of mercury, the main catalyst in the production of silver. This importance notwithstanding, Huancavelica remains relatively little known, in part because its historiography lies widely dispersed among journals and edited collections. This article seeks to facilitate further research by reviewing all significant existing work on the mines (more than eighty publications in total). In doing so, it provides a new guide to the history of Huancavelica, designed primarily to highlight major areas still requiring the attention of scholars.     

An early colonial landed gentry: land and wealth in the Cape Colony 1682–1731

In the early eighteenth century a slave-owning landed gentry emerged in the Cape Colony. Although wealth was unevenly distributed in 1682 and 1705 economic conditions, which included cheap land and labour, favoured small farmers, who earned higher returns on their capital than those with some-what larger investments in farming. These conditions changed between 1705 and 1731. While prices for crops and livestock remained steady or fell slightly, costs of production rose steeply. Slaves cost more and were more widely used. Land cost more and greater efforts were needed to maintain its fertility. Large estates swallowed up unsuccessful small farms and a few were enlarged by dynastic marriages. Large-scale production yielded low returns on capital, but small farms often ceased to make profits. Those with insufficient capital to compete with established gentry in the south-west Cape might take up stock farming in frontier regions, which had long been used by wealthy freehold farmers as additional pasture for their livestock.