Staple or famine food?: ethnographic and archaeological approaches to nut processing in East Asian prehistory

Recent archaeobotanical studies in East Asia show that the use of wild food plants, particularly nuts, was important for not only hunter–gatherers but also early farmers. For example, recent archaeobotanical work has identified large quantities of nut remains from early Chinese rice farming sites dating 5,000–4,500 BC. In Japan, which introduced rice farming from China around 1,000–500 BC, archaeobotanical data have shown continued exploitation of nuts even after the introduction of rice farming. Therefore, the first appearance of farming does not appear to have immediately impacted the subsistence system, although it may have changed cultural perceptions of food plants, eventually rice replacing nuts as a staple food. To explain the cultural implications of this shift in emphasis, it is necessary to investigate people’s routine subsistence activities with reference to available ethnographic information on non-mechanised plant processing. The ethnographic data provide insights into ancient nut processing, including possible methods, tools, choices of working locations and labour scales. Conceptual modelling based on ethnographic observations of the range of nut-processing practices will also aid interpretations from newly developed methods, such as starch residue analyses. The resulting archaeobotanical, archaeological and ethnographic picture may help to further explore past social organisation and social perceptions of plant foods.     

Taxonomic characterisation of fresh Dipterocarpaceae resins by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS): providing clues for identification of unknown archaeological resins

Plant and particularly non-wood forest products have played an important role in the evolution of human cultures all over the world, as source of food but also of raw substances fulfilling material, spiritual, and medicinal requirements. Plant exudates and particularly dammar resins (Dipterocarpaceae family) were widely used in the past in Asia notably as waterproofing and caulking materials. This study focuses on the GC–MS chemical characterisation of freshly collected dammars and establishes new molecular parameters enabling discrimination between dammars and other types of plant resin, whatever their botanical origin. Such analyses provide clues for a precise identification (taxonomy, occurrence of other material in addition to the resin, alteration state) of unknown resinous material discovered in archaeological contexts. The value of our approach is illustrated by the taxonomic characterisation of two samples collected in jars from the Brunei wreck and a Chinese junk lost more than 40 km off the Sultanate of Brunei during the end of the fifteenth century or the early beginning of the sixteenth century.     

Fingerprint identification on a bog body (650 BC)

Two thousand and six hundred fifty years after the death of the “Girl of the Uchter Moor”, it was still possible to secure good-quality fingerprints from the right hand of this bog body by using photographic methods followed by image enhancement with an Automated Fingerprint Identification System. A detailed fingerprint analysis was performed, and all five fingers of “Moora's” right hand exhibited ulnar loops. Even today, this is still the most common fingerprint pattern type in Europe. It was also possible to find enough minutiae on the right thumb for secure dactyloscopic identification after more than 2,000 years. The example of “Moora" therefore demonstrates new possibilities for future fingerprint examinations of ancient bodies in archaeological as well as forensic casework.     

Multiple assessments of local properties,production, and performance in metal objects: an experimental case study from Petra,Jordan

This object-specific case study focuses on cupreous artifacts excavated from the Great Temple complex of Petra, Jordan to demonstrate how the use of compositional X-ray analyses alongside two experimental applications (ImageJ software and nanoindentation) have the potential to generate different and otherwise unobtainable information about archaeological metals. The study highlights the value of using multiple techniques as a means of resolving the ambiguities that tend to arise from interpretations of single-sited measurements on objects and from single-instrumental analyses during studies of production processes and consequent material performance. Employing different techniques on multiple localities within a sample permits the gathering of precise information about the behavior of and interrelationships between variables that affect the objects’ fabrication and use, particularly composition, structure, and hardness properties. The resulting data are interpreted in association with contextual archaeological information from Petra to consider the use-life and potential significance of these objects.     

Lithic technology and obsidian exchange networks in Bronze Age Nuragic Sardinia (Italy)

The study of the Sardinian Bronze Age (Nuragic period) and the factors which created and maintained an island-wide identity as seen through the presence of its distinctive nuraghi has received considerable attention; however, the amount of research directly related to the stone tools of the era has been relatively limited despite the wealth of knowledge it is capable of yielding. This research hopes to contribute to Sardinian archaeology through the study of ancient technology, specifically obsidian lithic technology, by combining typological information with source data gleaned from the use of portable X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy. This research also explores temporal changes in the acquisition of obsidian raw materials and the corresponding changes in how the obsidian was used. The results provide precedence for future work in Sardinia and create a model for integrating two types of analyses, sourcing and typological. By combining these results, it is possible to investigate ancient economies, exchange networks, and cultural values.     

OSL dating and lithological characteristics of loess deposits from Biały Kościół

Absolute dating using luminescence methods is widely applicable in geology, geomorphology, palaeogeography and in archaeology in establishing ages of sediments and archaeological artefacts. By creating absolute time scales for different events in the history of Earth scientists are able to reconstruct changes in climate and environment in the past, and the history of colonization and development of culture.     

分裂与延续:六朝士族文化与中华文明传承

In the Six dynasties, the clans of the scholar-official stratum not only occupied a dominant place in social and cultural life but also played an important role in maintaining Chinese civilization. As a succession of northern minorities entered the Central Plains, foreign culture became widespread and the Chinese people and culture experienced an unprecedented crisis. Thanks to the scholar-official clans who shouldered the burden of preserving Chinese culture, Chinese civilization was able to persist through the ages to become an “unbroken” civilization. These clans can be categorized in three groups according to their territorial origin: “Clans of the Wu Area” which developed in Jiangnan after the Han dynasty; “Immigrant Clans” which moved to Jiangnan from the north during the Jin dynasty and the ensuing dynasties, these being referred to jointly as “the Southern Clans”; and “the Northern Clans,” being those clans that remained in their homelands (Shandong and the Central Shaanxi Plain) during the period of ethno-national amalgamation in the north of China. Though these clans had various cultural characteristics due to different historical roots, cultural traditions and ancestry, their clan learning had a common core, i.e., the study and practice of Confucian rites as established in the Han dynasty. This formed the basis for the integration of Han with other cultures, making a sound foundation for the further development of the Chinese civilization.     

Pillar Tombs and the City: Creating a Sense of Shared Identity in Swahili Urban Space

This paper reviews published research on Swahili pillar tombs, as a specific type of tombs built of stone, by summarising records on almost fifty sites on the east coast of Africa. Dated to the 13th–16th centuries AD, the pillar tombs represented a core component of Swahili urban space. By considering their spatial setting, characteristics and comparative case studies from Africa and the Indian Ocean world, the paper reconsiders how pillar tombs might have functioned as a type of material infrastructure for creating social ties and notions of shared identity in a society that has never formally united.     

Will Historical Archaeology Escape Its Western Prejudices to Become Relevant to Africa?

A major problem facing North American approaches to historical archaeology is the exclusionary manner in which the discipline is defined. By confining historical archaeology to the era of capitalism and colonialism, we declare that the indigenous histories of many areas of the globe are of no interest to such an intellectual agenda. If we practice an historical archaeology that only valorizes the colonial experience, then what happens to history making that engaged cultures in the pre-capitalist and pre-modern era? Such approaches separate the histories of people in Africa from those of the West, and, is in effect, academic apartheid. To remedy this disjuncture, we interrogate how historical archaeology may escape the bounds of implicit racism in its denial of historicity before literacy. We suggest that breaking the chains of exclusion is the only way to realize an inclusive archaeology sensitive to all history making projects.     

Negotiation of Social Values in the World Heritage Listing Process: A Case Study on the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal,China

This paper examines the World Heritage listing process for the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal to understand the sociopolitical meanings of heritage in contemporary China. Over the past four decades, the efforts of the Chinese government have been clearly geared towards improving governance over heritage sites by designating them as state properties, which requires the selection and evaluation of cultural heritage sites on the specific political meaning based on historical, aesthetic, or scientific value. In the process of World Heritage listing of Chinese heritage sties, the model of ‘state properties’ had to be compatible with UNESCO’s understanding of ‘heritage’, as well as economic benefits of heritage. Drawing on the data collected from the process of World Heritage listing of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, this paper explores the integration of the social meanings of heritage into the ‘authorized’ values criteria, facilitating multiple uses of ‘heritage’ through collaboration among UNESCO, Chinese heritage officials, and local communities. It argues that practices of heritage that consider social meanings will integrate local communities’ understandings into political meanings of heritage on basis of central government’s interests. This paper shows how the social meanings of heritage create a dialectical relationship to enable a ‘living’ cultural process in the preservation of ‘state properties’. In addition, the social meanings of heritage allow all potential stakeholder groups to negotiate with the heritage bureaucracy, as well as strengthening the role of local interests in heritage policy.