Holocene fire history of black colluvial soils revealed by pyrolysis-GC/MS: a case study from Campo Lameiro (NW Spain)

The colluvial soils of Galicia (NW Spain) are records of Holocene environmental change. In spite of the omnipresence of charcoal fragments in these soils, the effect of fires on the development of the Galician landscape and the potential role of past societies are poorly understood.     

International R&D Cooperation between Low-tech SMEs: The Role of Cultural and Geographical Proximity

Although there is a considerable amount of empirical evidence on inter-firm collaborations within technology-based industries, there are only a few works focussing on R&D cooperation by low-tech firms, especially small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Providing further and new evidence based on a recently built database of CRAFT projects, this study analyses the relationship between technology and proximity in international R&D networks using HOMALS and statistical cluster techniques. The resulting typology of international cooperative R&D projects highlights that successful international cooperative R&D projects are both culturally/geographically closer and distant. Moreover, and quite interestingly, geographically distant projects are technologically more advanced whereas those located near each other are essentially low-tech. Such evidence is likely to reflect the tacit-codified knowledge debate boosted recently by the information and communication technology (ICT) “revolution” emphasized by the prophets of the “Death of Distance” and the “End of Geography”.     

The Chromatic Traveling-Salesmen Problem and Its Application to Planning and Structuring Geographic Space

The classical traveling-salesman problem involves the establishment of a tour around a set of points in a plane such that each point is intersected only once and the circuit is of minimal total length. When the length of a salesman's tour cannot exceed a specified constant, the problem becomes that of finding the fewest number of salesmen such that every city is visited by a salesman and the length of each salesman's tour does not exceed a specified constant. This is the chromatic traveling-salesmen problem. An algorithm for this problem is developed and is used to create periodic markets in parts of Sierra Leone. Fifteen rural areas were examined from Sierra Leone, and weekly market places were identified in each area. Salesmen were to be assigned to an area so that each market place was visited and each tour (or periodic ring) did not exceed forty hours. The chromatic traveling-salesmen algorithm was used to minimize the number of periodic rings needed for each area and provide the specific tour for each ring.     

Testing recipes: an experimental approach to paint production processes in Levantine rock art (Spain)

Over more than a century, several proposals have been made on the composition and technical features of the pictorial recipes used by Levantine prehistoric painters. In this paper all these proposals are surveyed and tested through systematic experiments to determine the technical affordance of pigments and binders in different pictorial recipes. Experimental results were then used as independent analytical parameters employed as diagnostic criteria to systematically study an archaeological sample of nine sites located in the Maestrazgo region (Spain) and their surroundings. Results reveal that out of 112 experimental recipes, only 16 afforded the production of paintings technically similar to Levantine rock art.     

Reviews

ARMS CONTROL AND THE ATLANTIC ALLIANCE. Karl W. Deutsch. John Wiley & Sons, 1967. Pp. 167. $5.95.

THE STRATEGY OF CIVILIAN DEFENCE. NON‐VIOLENT RESISTANCE TO AGGRESSION. Adam Roberts (ed.). Faber and Faber, 1967. Pp. 320. £Stg. 2.2.0.

INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS: A GENERAL THEORY. J. W. Burton. Cambridge University Press, reprinted 1967. Pp. 288. £Stg. 0.12.6.

GOVERNMENT AND REVOLUTION IN VIETNAM. Denis J. Duncanson. Oxford University Press for R.I.I.A., 1968. Pp. 442. $9.50.

BIG VICTORY: GREAT TASK. Vo Nguyen Giap. Introduction by David Schoenbnm. Pall Mall, 1968. Pp. xvii + 120. $6.15.

PAPERS ON MODERN JAPAN 1968. D. C. S. Sissons (ed.). Department of International Relations, Research School of Pacific Studies, ANU, 1968. Pp. 137. $2.10.

THE JAPANESE SOCIALIST PARTY AND NEUTRALISM. A STUDY OF A POLITICAL PARTY AND ITS FOREIGN POLICY. J. A. A. Stockwin. Melbourne University Press, 1968. Pp. xv + 197. $6.50.

JAPAN'S RADIO WAR ON AUSTRALIA 1941–45. L. D. Meo. Melbourne University Press, 1968. Pp. 300. $6.75.

AUSTRALIA SINCE FEDERATION. Fred Alexander. Nelson, 1967. Pp. 323; 46 illustrations and 4 maps. $4.95.

RUSSIA 1917. THE FEBRUARY REVOLUTION. George Katkov. London, Longmans, 1967. Pp. 489. $6.30.     

THE GEOMORPHIC IRRELEVANCE OF SOME DRAINAGE NET LAWS

New evidence, both theoretical and observational, is presented to show that Horton's Laws of Stream Numbers and Mean Stream Lengths represent the geomorphic application of abstract mathematical relationships. The laws follow automatically from the definition of order and must apply equally well to any branching system. The value of each of the coefficients R_b (bifurcation ratio) and R_l (ratio of mean stream lengths) is at least partly controlled by geomorphic factors, and an attempt has been made to describe the operation of these factors.     

Portuguese Blue‐on‐Blue 16th–17th Century Pottery

Blue‐on‐blue (‘berettino’) sherds have appeared in numerous production and consumption archaeological excavations in Lisbon and other archaeological sites in Portugal (dated from the mid‐16th century to the beginning of the 17th century). The abundance of this interesting faience led us to compare it with similar pottery from other well‐known production centres in Italy, namely Liguria (Savona and Albisola), Spain (the Triana kilns) and the Low Countries. Differences in the diffraction patterns of the sherds' pastes from the four countries were observed. In most samples, cobalt blue silicate (cobalt olivine) was identified in the dark blue or light blue glazes through the use of micro‐Raman spectroscopy and diffuse reflectance spectra. A remarkable difference in the calcite contents of the Lisbon and Seville pottery sherds was observed, in accordance with previous observations of high calcite contents of Seville ceramics. A comparison was also made for all of the blue‐on‐blue sherds studied here with many other 16th–17th century sherds from Lisbon using bivariate plots of K/Si versus Ca/Si. Lisbon and Seville pottery behave very differently, whereas sherds from Italy and the Low Countries occupy intermediate positions.     

Going Against the Grain: Why Do Canada and the United States Market Wheat So Differently?

At the turn of the twentieth century, private grain exchanges settled the daily prices for North American wheat. By the end of the Second World War, the Canadian and US governments had intervened significantly in these markets. The Canadian government required farmers in its western provinces to deliver their product to the Canadian Wheat Board (CWB), a single-selling-desk agency that, by then, had supplanted private wheat marketing in western Canada. Meanwhile, the United States government subsidized farm incomes with domestic-use taxes and import tariffs, but otherwise preserved private wheat marketing. In this article, I demonstrate that these disparate agricultural policies were broadly defined by immutable economic realities imposed on each country by global wheat-trade patterns and triggered by unprecedentedly severe agricultural crises. That is, amidst the precipitous fall in wheat prices in the early 1930s, each government crafted farm-support policies that reflected its domestic-consumption share of wheat production and the importance of wheat to its overall economy.