Ancient woodland boundaries in Europe

In Western and Central Europe, many woods are clearly separated from the surrounding countryside by permanent physical boundaries. While such boundaries are now out of use, in the past they were widespread and important landscape features. This paper argues that many woodland boundaries originate from the Middle Ages and perhaps even more from the Early Modern Period. Their existence was connected to a specific form of woodland management (coppicing) but also to ownership structures and through these to grazing regimes. With their various forms, permanent woodland boundaries served to separate woodland from the surrounding countryside both in a legal and physical sense. There are four basic types of permanent woodland boundaries: woodbanks, walls, stone rows and lynchets, all of which can still be studied in the landscape today. Because of their varied state of preservation and also because of the difficulties in creating relative chronologies, dating woodland boundaries is a very challenging task. However, even a basic typology can provide valuable information for a number of scientific disciplines, including landscape history, historical geography, archaeology and ecology. Permanent woodland boundaries are a part of European cultural heritage. They should be recognised and protected similarly to all other ancient landscape features.     

An overview of bitumen trade in the Near East from the Neolithic (c.8000 BC) to the early Islamic period

The aim of the paper is to summarise the present state of knowledge concerning bitumen trade in the Near East from the Palaeolithic (70,000 BP) to the Early Islamic period. During the Palaeolithic and Early Neolithic period, bitumen utilisation was mostly concentrated in settlements close to oil seeps. From the Ubaid 3 period, bitumen from the Mosul area became more important and was traded as far as the southern Persian Gulf. The Uruk period is a turning point for Mesopotamian history as settlements evolved into city‐states. These cities had a great need for raw materials, and this marks the beginning of large‐scale exploitation of Hit bitumen. This bitumen was traded at settlements along the Euphrates, where a large trade network was established. Hit bitumen entered the Persian Gulf at the turn of the second millennium (Dilmun period). Bitumen from Iraq (Mosul and Hit) became predominantly used in most settlements along the southern coast of the Gulf. During this period Iranian bitumen was also exported and this supply tended to increase, especially during the Partho‐Sasanian period. Dead Sea bitumen had its own exchange network, which was concentrated across present‐day Israel and Egypt where it was extensively used for mummification.     

张衡地动仪的发明、失传与历史继承

地动仪的发明和失传存在深厚的社会背景.悬挂物对地震的良好反应是诞生科学思想的物质基础.地动仪是对天然验震器的发展,张衡不仅在利用物体惯性测震上,也在检测和记录地震微弱信号上有技术创新,成功测到公元134年12月13日陇西地震.天诫观念把自然现象与社会问题混为一谈,导致张衡晚年和地动仪的悲剧.仪器可能失传于东汉末年,当时发生了洛阳大火、毁铜铸钱、京师搬迁、人口剧减和灵台被毁等极端严重的社会混乱.张衡的科学思想和实践对现代地震学的起步发挥过思想启迪作用.对地动仪的研究需要开展科学实验,学术观点的统一只能建立在科学实验的基础上.     

基于场域理论的文化遗产旅游地多维空间生产研究——以江南水乡周庄古镇为例

本文以皮埃尔点布迪厄的"场域理论"和列斐伏尔"空间的生产理论"为视角,以深度访谈和参与观察为基础,对周庄古镇从"一元同心并置结构"到"多元同心嵌套结构"转变过程中的多维空间生产进行了分析,结果表明:旅游场域形成之前的空间属于"内源性自生式本体空间",以"物理属性"为主;旅游场域形成后的空间属于"外源性嵌入式构建空间",倾向于"社会属性";旅游开发使物质空间景观化、文化空间多元化和社会空间复杂化,空间的分异和碎化趋向表明古镇社区正由"差序格局"转向"团体格局",进而表现为一种混合性"属地格局"。空间生产的动力机制主要是全球化背景下的地方怀旧情结、空间生产背后的政治力量博弈和空间生产中社区精英示范效应三种原因所致。本文指出在旅游快速发展背景下,古镇空间不是空洞的空间,空间的生产方向应该成为关注的焦点,这对理解古镇旅游空间场域的形成、生产及包容性发展具有重要导向。     

公元前五世纪雅典法令铭文十篇译注

本文所选铭文系雅典在公元前5世纪中叶颁布的部分法令,集中反映出作为盟主之邦的雅典在政治、经济及司法等诸多方面对盟邦主权的肆意践踏,是解读该时期雅典历史的重要原始资料。国外古典学界对古希腊传世铭文的释读与研究极为重视,其中较权威的选本为R·梅格斯与D·刘易斯整理的《希腊历史铭文选》,亦是本文所依据的文本。     

吐鲁番柏孜克里克石窟所出小学书残片考证

吐鲁番柏孜克里克石窟出土汉文文书中,有古小学类文本残片三件:80TB1:304,80TB1:002a和80TB1:151,在已公布的成果中,或定名有误,或未能识别.经过比勘和研究,可以确定这些写本分别是玄应<一切经音义>抄录本、可洪<新集藏经音义随函录>摘抄增订本和<切韵>的抄本.     

Recovery of DNA from archaeological insect remains: first results,problems and potential

We report the recovery of short fragments of PCR amplifiable ancient DNA from exoskeletal fragments of the grain weevil Sitophilus granarius (L.) extracted from Roman and medieval deposits in Northern England. If DNA preservation in archaeological insect remains is widespread then many applications in the spheres of evolutionary studies and archaeology can be conceived, some of which are outlined.     

Ancient DNA supports lineage replacement in European dog gene pool: insight into Neolithic southeast France

We report palaeogenetic analysis of domesticated dog (Canis familiaris) remains excavated from three archaeological sites from southeast France and dating from Middle Neolithic. Ancient DNA analysis was attempted on teeth and bone samples taken from 11 dogs. Three 266-base-pair fragments of the mitochondrial genome Hypervariable Region I (HVR-I) could be retrieved and revealed two haplotypes belonging to HVR-I lineage C. These three sequences were compared to the sequences of Swedish and Italian Neolithic dogs and permitted to confirm that clade C was largely represented all over Western Europe during this period. One haplotype defined in Neolithic French dog was observed for the first time in Canis mtDNA, underlining the loss of mitochondrial diversity in Europe since the Neolithic. Finally, these results point out mitochondrial lineage replacement in Europe, since lineage C represents only 5% of extant European dogs. Altogether, these results support the proposition that palaeogenetic studies are essential for the reconstruction of the past demographic history and the domestication process of dogs.     

Evidence for early viticulture in China: proof of a grapevine (Vitis vinifera L., Vitaceae) in the Yanghai Tombs,Xinjiang

A stem was discovered in the Yanghai Tombs, Turpan District in Xinjiang, China. Anatomical features showed it to be of grape (Vitis vinifera L.). Radiocarbon dating indicates it to be nearly 2300 years old, which would suggest that there was grape cultivation at least from that time. To date, this is the earliest physical evidence of V. vinifera cultivation in China.     

Detection of parasite eggs from a moat encircling the royal palace of Silla, the ancient Korean Kingdom

We conducted a paleo-parasitological study on soil samples from the ancient moat ruins of Weolseong palace, of the Silla Dynasty (BC 57–AD 935) of Korea. Based on the cultural remains found in the mud-soil layer, the layer was precipitated onto the floor of a moat between the 5th and 8th centuries AD. We found Trichuris trichiura eggs only in that mud-soil layer, whereas no parasite eggs were identified in the other archaeological strata of the ruins. As T. trichiura eggs are shed only in human feces, we speculated that palace toilet contents were continually drained into the moat; therefore, at a certain point in time after construction, the moat finally became a ditch around the palace. Structures in the stone embankments of the moat, possibly designed to make the water flow continuously in one direction, might reflect the Silla people's efforts to alleviate the ever-increasing problems inherent in a moat.