Feasting landscapes and political economy at the Early Horizon center of Huambacho, Nepeña Valley, Peru

The present contribution examines feasting practices at Huambacho (800–200 cal. B.C.), an Early Horizon elite center of the Nepeña Valley, Department of Ancash, Peru. Feasts are approached as long-term strategies essential to the political economy of human societies. Drawing upon data from public architecture, material culture and food remains, the study closely considers feasts as political actions and investigates the organization and social meaning of these special events. At Huambacho, I contend that the diacritical aspects of feasting practices, such as the use of exclusive spaces and special paraphernalia, contributed to the dual celebration of communal identity and prosperity, and the creation and reproduction of social inequalities. The research highlights the dual centripetal and centrifugal dynamics of Early Horizon feasts and demonstrates the role of the Huambacho center in advertising the success of the local community based on new forms of production and innovative rules of commensal hospitality.     

Degradation of mud brick houses in an arid environment: a geoarchaeological model

A common assumption in Near Eastern tell archaeology is that the majority of sediments originate from degraded mud bricks. Little is known about the mechanism of mud brick wall degradation. Here we present a detailed macro- and microscopic ethnoarchaeological study of the degradation of a mud brick house and propose a comprehensive mechanism for tell formation processes in arid environments. The study took place in southern Israel by trenching a ca. 60 year old abandoned mud brick house, followed by extensive sediment sampling. Macroscopic observations showed that mud brick walls degrade by collapse of single bricks and/or collapse of intact wall parts, either inwards or outwards. In addition, infill sediments within the house and outside it, in close proximity to its walls, form alternating sedimentary layers of various colors and textures. The degraded mud brick material lost its distinctive macroscopic structure, which makes it impossible to accurately identify this material by field observations alone. Mineralogical and elemental analyses established the sources of the house infill sediments, namely mud bricks and wind blown sediments. Alternating layers mostly originate from mixing between degraded mud brick material and wind blown sediments. Micromorphological observations revealed microscopic mechanisms of mud brick degradation and include processes of mud slurry gravity flows, sediment coatings and infillings, wind abrasion of walls, small-scale puddling, and bioturbation. This study provides a working scheme for site formation of abandoned mud brick structures in arid environments. It provides a set of criteria by which it is possible to differentiate floors from post-abandonment sedimentary features and thus improves the reliability of activity area research.     

Condemned to metallum? The origin and role of 4th–6th century A.D. Phaeno mining campresidents using multiple chemical techniques

The Byzantine period (4th–7th centuries A.D.) site of Khirbet Faynan (Phaeno) was a state-run mining camp described in ancient sources as a destination for Christian martyrs and others prosecuted by the administration who were condemned to the mines (damnatio ad metallum). However, other evidence suggests that Phaeno had a much broader role and population in antiquity than that described by ancient writers. Here, strontium and oxygen isotope data on the level of migration into Phaeno were compared with elemental data on lead and copper skeletal levels to illuminate the varied exposure of local vs. non-local individuals to contaminated environments (presumably from working in mining and smelting operations). Dental enamel ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr and δ¹⁸O data from 31 individuals excavated from the Southern Cemetery identified one individual born in a region with different strontium isotope values in the bedrock yet similar oxygen isotope signatures as Faynan. Most of the primarily locally-derived Faynan residents displayed skeletal copper and lead levels exceeding those seen in comparative samples, confirming that growing up and residing in the polluted environment of Faynan led to notable bioaccumulation of heavy metals and its resulting health effects. In addition, ten individuals had extremely elevated lead and copper levels in their skeleton resulting from more intensive exposure to contaminated environments, possibly through smelting and mining activities. These data confirm the relatively localized nature of this imperial operation and that this predominantly locally-derived population had different activities that put them ask varied risk for contamination by heavy metals.     

Metallurgical analysis of copper artifacts from Cahokia

Copper artifacts from Cahokia Mounds, Illinois were analyzed from a materials science perspective to shed light on techniques used by Mississippian copper workers to deform nuggets of native copper into thin sheets. Eight small copper pieces from a copper-working site at Cahokia’s Mound 34 were subjected to metallographic examination. Replication experiments thereafter recreated features of the artifacts under controlled conditions. It is concluded that copper sheets were thinned through repeated cycles of hammering and annealing performed at temperatures achievable in an open wood fire. The welding of sheets to create multilayered objects was not observed in any artifacts and could not be accomplished experimentally. Additionally, a possible cutting method used on some artifacts was identified.     

Recovering the past from above Hibabiya — an Early Islamic village in the Jordanian desert?

Britain and the Middle East were the two areas in which the technique of aerial archaeology was pioneered in the 1920s. Overwhelmingly the latter took place in Syria where a French Jesuit priest, Antoine Poidebard, worked for a generation. Further south in Transjordan — as it then was — three men presided over a brief (1927–1929) but fruitful period: an archaeologist with a passion for the newly developing technique (O.G.S. Crawford) and two pilots of the Royal Air Force with an amateur interest in what they saw beneath their wings (Flt. Lt. P.E. Maitland and Gp/Capt L.W.B. Rees). An aerial photograph published at the time seemed to identify a ‘village’ as prehistoric. Over eighty years later and just after it was destroyed, a fresh examination and the rediscovery of some crucial dating evidence have combined to identify it as, probably, an early Islamic village on the desert fringe.     

Excavation and Study of Skeletal Remains from a World War I Mass Grave

This study presents the excavation and multidisciplinary analysis of seven skeletons recovered in a World War I Mass Grave on the mountains of the Veneto Region, Italy. While it is not a rare phenomenon to these mountainous areas involved in the First Conflict, it is exceptional, on these mountains, to find a mass grave with soldiers in primary burials. Stratigraphic excavation was the mean used for recovery, along with 3D laser scanning documentation. Every skeleton but one was found complete and in anatomical connection. Four soldiers lay in the prone position; two subjects were lying on their side. Identification of the nationality was performed for two of the subjects, who both of whom had personal effects such as a badge for military vaccinations and religious medals. What remained of their uniforms gave clues about their Italian nationality. The entomological analysis conducted on fly puparia discovered close to the bones revealed that the bodies had not been buried immediately. The skeletons were biologically profiled by sex, age, height and ancestry. An accurate study of pathology and stress markers was carried on, as well as on skeletal trauma in order to establish the type of trauma and ammunition involved. The remains belonged altogether to seven Italian male soldiers ages between 18 and 35. Various kinds of stress markers revealed occupational (enthesopathies) and metabolic stress: several signs of cribra cranii and of cribra orbitalia were registered. The study of the injuries revealed a surprising variety of types of lesions, mostly lethal: a few subjects were struck by a shrapnel grenade; one soldier was killed by a grenade explosion. Two of the soldiers were probably executed, instead: this conclusion reached on the basis of gunshot holes (9 mm) in their skulls, and by the position of the injuries. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Lessons in possession: colonial resource geographies in practice on Vancouver Island, 1859–1865

This paper considers the establishment of a major sawmill at the head of the Alberni Canal on the west coast of the colony of Vancouver Island in the 1860s and the legacy of that enterprise in producing geographies of colonial possession. I argue that the institution of industrial forestry in the colony relied upon a conception of property rights that turned on the identification of civilized and savage space, holding that only particular kinds of labour and land improvement warranted claims of ownership. This ideology found official state sanction within the regimes of Western liberal law, was mapped onto the region around Alberni by a uniquely placed individual, and was eventually made durable through the practices of everyday life at settlement sites. In these ways, I show, colonial possession relied upon precedents within British imperial culture. However, I also argue that another geography of possession was put in place along the way. By eventually adopting a scheme wherein timberlands could be brought into production without being alienated by land speculators, the state enabled the actual practice of possession in crown territory that was previously claimed through general appeals to the British imperative to overturn its wild nature. Showing that the lessons learned at Alberni were re-applied in other parts of the region, I conclude by arguing that the historical geographies of industrial forestry reinforced crown possession of much of the Pacific Northwest. Ultimately, I claim that this story demonstrates the centrality of practice to possession, thereby highlighting an analytical space that might yield fruitful insights into the intensely situated and local nature of colonial territorial control.     

Loyalty and Royalty: Gibraltar, the 1953 54 Royal Tour and the Geopolitics of the Iberian Peninsula

This article explores the 1953–54 Royal Tour and in particularthe planning and eventual reception of the Queen and her partywhen they arrived in Gibraltar. These events are consideredin terms of three overlapping contexts: the imperial, the colonialand the geopolitical. First, the Royal Tour marked not onlythe debut of a new Queen but also the realization that the BritishEmpire was beginning to fragment with the eruption of independencemovements in South Asia and the Middle East. Hence, its internationalitinerary bound the remaining empire symbolically together,but also served as a reminder of the ‘gaps’ thatwere beginning to appear. Second, the analysis considers howthe Royal Tour presented an opportunity for the local residentsof Gibraltar to ‘perform their loyalty’ to the newQueen and the British Empire. The focus on performance is significantbecause the article does not presume that ‘loyalty’is simply pre-given. A great deal of work was involved in realizingthe reception of the Queen's party in May 1954 against a backdropof a territorial dispute with Spain over the future legal statusof Gibraltar. The Royal Tour offered the possibility, therefore,of persuading the British and Spanish governments of the localresidents’ qualities including a continued loyalty tothe British/imperial Royal Family and indirectly to Britain.Third, the article underscores the significance of such loyalperformances by considering Spanish opposition to the Queen'svisit in the light of Franco's efforts to establish his country'santi-Communist credentials. The Royal Tour, and the Gibraltarleg in particular, are thus show to be an intense locus of performanceslinked to the politics of empire, colonial rights and anti-imperialism. Animated, happy faces gazing at the sights and decorations showbetter than words the true feelings of the people of the fortress-colonytowards their young, beloved Queen. One correspondent of a Britishnewspaper said that he thought the 27,000 servicemen and civilianson the Rock were so fervidly loyal that they would tear to piecesanyone discovered in their midst with evil designs, and thatwas sufficient guarantee of their Majesty's safety.¹