From riches to rags: organic deterioration at Star Carr

The 11,000-year old lake edge archaeological site of Star Carr in the Vale of Pickering of North Yorkshire is one of the most famous Mesolithic sites in Europe, and one of the earliest, dated to the period of climatic warming that immediately followed the final termination of the last ice age. One of the main reasons for this international importance is the richness of its organic artefacts, faunal assemblage and environmental data. However, recent investigations have demonstrated that these organic remains have severely deteriorated over the last 60 years due to the decay and acidification of the surrounding peat. This paper presents research into the effects on the bone (histological analysis using light and polarising microscopy, and Transmission Electron Microscopy, bulk collagen analysis, and amino acid analysis), antler (visual and metrical analysis, loss on ignition and Scanning Electron Microscopy) and wood (visual analysis, decay assessment tests and Scanning Electron Microscopy).     

Burma's historic elections

This guest editorial looks at Burma's national elections that have the promise of radically changing Burma's government after over half a century of military rule.     

Reconnaissance of the Hannibalic Route in the Upper Po Valley,Italy: Correlation with Biostratigraphic Historical Archaeological Evidence in the Upper Guil Valley,France

Controversy over the alpine route taken by the Hannibalic Army from the Rhône Basin into Italia in 218 bc (2168 cal bp ) has raged amongst classicists for over two millennia. Because Hannibal crossed the Alps, the significance for identifying the route taken by the Punic Army lies more in its potential for identifying sites of historical archaeological significance than a resolution of one of history's most enduring questions. While compelling stratigraphic, geochemical and microbiological evidence has been recovered from an alluvial floodplain mire in the upper Guil Valley, located below the Col de la Traversette (about 3000 masl) on the French–Italian border, it potentially identifies the invasion route as the one originally proposed by Sir Gavin de Beer in 1974. The dated layers in several sections, termed the MAD (mass animal deposition) beds based on disrupted/churned bedding and key/specialized biological components strongly supports de Beer's thesis that Hannibal chose the highest transit col into Italia. In addition to other physical evidence, we present here new physical, geomorphological and stratigraphic evidence, all calibrated by radiocarbon dating, that suggests Hannibal's imprint on the landscape exists in coalescing alluvial fans in the upper Po catchment of northern Italy.     

Ecomuseum Performance in Piemonte and Liguria,Italy: The Significance of Capital

Research carried out by the authors in northern Italy (see Corsane et al., ‘Ecomuseum Evaluation: Experiences in Piemonte and Liguria, Italy’, International Journal of Heritage Studies 13, no. 2 (2007): 101–16) was designed to assess how closely selected ecomuseums met the demands of ecomuseum theory. However, the discussions with ecomuseum personnel at five sites in Piemonte and Liguria also provided an opportunity to explore how these community‐based heritage projects measure their ‘success’. This research indicates that the methods of performance evaluation that are applied to most national or regional museums—criteria such as visitor numbers, the number of new collections that have been acquired, or number of educational activities delivered—have less meaning in an ecomuseum context. This work suggests that success could be measured more effectively in terms of the forms of capital that result from local people’s use of ecomuseological methods to engage with and conserve their heritage.     

Eselsohren: the Journal of History of Art,Architecture and Urbanism, 1/1, 2013

Abstract

This article first describes the prime movers surviving in three Irish distilleries, and shows how steam and water power were used in conjunction at two of them. The second section describes surviving stationary steam engines in other industries, and these are described in order of technological development, so giving an indication of the evolution of the stationary steam engine between about 1895 and 1940.     

Reclaiming the Land,Reclaiming the Indian: The La Salle Series of George Catlin

In 1847, American painter George Catlin completed a series of paintings depicting La Salle's travels through North America, ostensibly at the request of King Louis-Philippe. This article argues that the La Salle series is an unusually coherent statement by Catlin about the value of the American wilderness and Native American culture for white America. A close examination of the paintings and Catlin's writing exposes the La Salle series as a reclamation project in which Catlin sought to rescue an imagined “pure” past at contact and preserve it in paint in order to make it available and useful to the present.