Le Poète Évêque, Le Moine, Le Financier et L’Académicien

This article aims to analyze together several kinds of XVII ^th century correspondence which usually are studied separately: business letters, devotional letters, «literary» letters sent and received within a network of friends. In order to understand a strategy of epistolary writing, these letters and the various forms of their publication including scribal publication are here considered as tools used within the social world. This strategy implies, for every writer, an effort to gain social recognition for excellence in the art of writing. Literary institutions are indeed involved here, but put to use to further careers and various other operations. We see, for example, a conflict within a religious order settled, a man of letters recognized in the eyes of the law, a pious individual making his way in society, and the shaping of a bishop’s career grounded on influential social circles. These case studies allow us to grasp how social networks function, and to understand the specific role played by men of letters.     

The Resinous Cargo of the Java Sea Wreck

A number of blocks of resinous materials were found in the cargo of a 12th‐ to 13th‐century shipwreck, discovered in the late 1980s in the Java Sea near the Indonesian islands of Sumatra and Java and excavated in 1996. These well‐preserved blocks presumably were trade materials used for religious, medicinal, cosmetic, decorative or practical purposes. Such materials, derived from plants and termed exudates, generally include frankincense, myrrh, ‘gum benjamin’, liquidambar, dragon's blood, dammar, copal and amber. The source of the cargo resin could not be determined from the site. Investigation by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy has revealed that the molecular structure corresponds to that of modern resin from the plant family Dipterocarpaceae, known in trade as dammar and closely resembling Group B copal and amber. Other molecular classes of exudates are excluded. Such materials are not present in the Middle East, which then cannot be their source. The NMR spectra differ from those of Group B samples from Australia, Papua New Guinea and Indonesia, but resemble those from India or Japan. The spectra indicate that the saline environment had a similar effect on the molecular structure to heating and aging.     

New insights into the ancient silver production of the Wallis area, Switzerland

This paper discusses the results of a study of the exploitation history of the metallogenic region of the Wallis, Switzerland. Periods of exploitation in this mining district are determined by comparisons of the lead isotope fingerprint of the mines with those of dated artefacts presumed to have a local origin based on the style of craftsmanship. The approach is based on the study of silver mines in the Wallis area and illustrated by three examples of local craftsmanship: (1) silver jewellery from the Late Iron Age, (2) a reliquary shrine from the Early Middle Ages and (3) silver coins from the Late Middle Age.     

文化相遇的方法论:以17世纪中欧文化相遇为例

本文以他者哲学为出发点,结合文化传播学的理论,研究文化相遇历史的方法论。作者首先讨论了曾应用于明末清初中欧文化相遇研究的三种不同框架:一是以传播者(即传教士)及其贡献、影响为主体的传播类框架;二是以文化传播的接受者为研究主体的接受类框架(如"中国中心观");三是创新类框架,指向接受者及其文化的形象是被文化传播者建构出来的这一符号事实;随后提出了第四种互动交流类框架,通过强调传播者、接受者互动过程的双向性,对前三类框架做出进一步的改进。作者认为,研究关注的主要焦点,应是传播者与接受者之间交换的结果:新的文化产品(一种文本、一个形象,或是社会网络)。历史研究实际上是"关于他者的艺术",通过它历史学家接受自己的身份也是被他者所塑造的。对他时、他地、他文化的文化重构不仅需要历史学家去观察,历史学家自身也要允许被观察。     

‘I can't follow you on this horde‐clan business at all’: Donald Thomson,Radcliffe ‐Brown and a Final Note on the Horde

An exchange of letters between Donald Thomson and A. R. Radcliffe‐Brown from 1948–54 not only sheds what is probably the final ray of light on Radcliffe‐Brown's views about the horde, but also shows how interpersonal relations may influence the way people deal with conflicts between their field experience and the reigning paradigm.     

'As solid as the Rock'? Place, belonging and the local appropriation of imperial discourse in Gibraltar

Although imperialism is firmly on the geographical agenda at present, rarely does the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar feature, even though it is the only remaining formal colony in Europe. Seized in 1704, Gibraltar has come to stand as a symbol of British imperial resilience, a status encapsulated by the phrase 'as solid as the Rock'. The paper explores how such a place-based imperial discourse has served to marginalize the civilian population and yet, paradoxically, has been appropriated locally to articulate a distinctive sense of belonging. More generally, the paper considers how a surviving colony such as Gibraltar, with its apparently loyal population, complicates postcolonial categories, periodizations and assumptions.     

Evidentiary truths? The evidence of anthropology through the anthropology of medical evidence

Anthropologists have become increasingly concerned about the discipline's lack of 'public engagement' with contemporary issues of late, but a key underlying problem - anthropology's unwillingness to address the nature and evidentiary status of anthropological knowledge itself - has remained largely unacknowledged. Here I approach this problem initially through an analysis of the rise of 'evidence' as a central concept in public policy and practice. Using the exemplar of 'evidence-based' medicine, I analyse anthropological responses to these evidentiary requirements, arguing that this turn to evidence can be seen in many other arenas of research and public policy and presents a fundamental challenge for the credibility and legitimacy of anthropology as a discipline. In the second part of the article comparison with anthropological work on legal issues provides a reflexive opening through which to begin to consider the nature of anthropological 'evidence' itself.     

The Artist and the Archaeologist: A Presentation in Memory of Christopher and Sonia Hawkes

The paper is an adapted version of a talk given in December 2001 at the Institute of Archaeology in Beaumont Street in dedication of a plaque and the lithograph 'Landscape of the Megaliths' by Paul Nash to the memory of the late Professor Christopher Hawkes, the founder of the Institute and first professor of European Archaeology from 1946 to 1972, and Sonia Chadwick Hawkes, Lecturer in Anglo–Saxon Archaeology from 1973 to 1994, by Christopher's son.