Notes & News

Abstract

This paper examines the British Museum unpublished records related to an Early Bronze (EB) Age pithos burial uncovered a century ago in the Inner Town at Carchemish. The grave, cursorily cited and variously dated (Chalcolithic, EB or even LBA) in the final reports, was described in some detail by Hogarth and Thompson; a precise dating is, however, possible today thanks to the information of paramount importance given by T. E. Lawrence who identified and took a picture of the associated finds, which was recently rediscovered in the Carchemish Archives. The pithos can be now ascribed to the third quarter of the third millennium BC and helps to confirm the recent theory according to which the Inner Town of Carchemish, with its massive earthen rampart, had already developed at the time of the second urbanisation in Syria and upper Mesopotamia.     

Tell el-Hesi: A type site for reevaluating so-called ‘Egyptian Governors’ Residencies’ of the south

In 1984 Eliezer Oren identified a series of structures found at 13th and 12th centuries BCE sites of southern Canaan, calling them Egyptian Governors’ Residencies. He identified Bliss’s City IV as a defining site. In 2000 Blakely identified Petrie’s Pilaster Building as a second example from Tell el-Hesi. It is now clear that Bliss’s City IV dates to the 13th century and that some of its architectural elements were salvaged after its destruction to build Petrie’s Pilaster Building in the 12th century. All of the southern examples are found in an agricultural zone of uncertainty where there is no clear likelihood of a harvestable crop in any given normal year. As it happens, the 13th and especially the 12th centuries BCE were far from normal, being a period of drought and extreme drought. Thus no crops could have been expected. This suggests the structures could not have been centres for the collection of a grain harvest tax, the accepted view. Rather, one wonders if the sites did not monitor a large pasturage.     

Latest developments in rock art recording: towards an integral documentation of Levantine rock art sites combining 2D and 3D recording techniques

This paper presents a further step in the integral documentation of prehistoric rock art, combining 2D and 3D digital recording techniques. Image processing and digital enhancement techniques are an invaluable aid to obtain high quality and accurate 2D recordings, especially when working with faint motifs or complex superimpositions. But what constitutes a real breakthrough is the possibility of combining 2D digital tracings with metric 3D models, providing a whole set of metric outputs that improve our understanding of the motifs in their context and, at the same time, can be used to deliver accurate metric reproductions.     

D’Arcy Thompson’s Legacy in Contemporary Studies of Patterns and Morphology

Abstract

D’Arcy Thompson’s views on the forms of biomaterials are assessed in the light of current thinking on biomorphology in selected areas of biology. It is clear that his guiding concepts — that biological materials are structured in response to physical forces, and that the biological and abiotic realms share many common features — remain valid. Advances in the physical and biological sciences are discussed, from quantum mechanics and molecular biology to liquid crystalline materials and macroscopic forms. These reveal Thompson’s clear-sighted view of the role of physical and mathematical sciences in biology, as well as his blind-spots.     

From Corporatism to Public Utilities: Workplace Pensions in the 21st Century

For many Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development countries, workplace pensions have been an important mechanism for supplementing state‐sponsored social security. Notwithstanding significant differences between developed economies in the significance attached to workplace pensions, provision has been typically encouraged through preferential tax policies on benefits and compensation packages. If relevant for the baby‐boom generation, it is doubtful that these arrangements will be as important for future generations. As state‐sponsored social security has been discounted in terms of promised value and entitlement, traditional workplace pensions have been closing and replaced by retirement saving instruments that are neither as lucrative nor as dependable. Retrenchment in workplace pensions has prompted governments to consider and, in some cases, develop different types of retirement savings institutions. This paper charts the decline of traditional workplace pensions, the apparent inadequacy of alternatives such as money‐purchase (defined contribution) schemes, and the rise of what are referred to as ‘public utilities’: government sponsored savings institutions designed to compensate for the decline (in coverage and promised value) of workplace pensions albeit at a more modest level than that associated with traditional defined benefit schemes. Reference is made to the experience of the USA, the UK, and Australia with passing comments of related developments in Germany and continental Europe. It is argued that the rise of public utilities in this domain is indicative of the transformation of corporate capitalism over the past 25 years and the realisation that the costs of neoliberalism may be so significant that governments have to take responsibility, once again, for underwriting retirement welfare.     

Retrospective Speculative Philosophy: Looking for Traces of Zizek's Communist Collective in Emerging Christian Praxis

Abstract

In the closing chapter of Living in the End Times, Slavoj Zizek endeavours to "look for traces of the new communist collective in already existing social or even artistic movements." This article explores what Zizek might see if he were to turn his cultural-critical gaze towards emerging Christianity, which is presented as an artistic and social, as well as religious (or irreligious), "movement." His work is increasingly used by emerging church practitioner Peter Rollins to retrospectively explain his own thought and practice. This article examines some of the ways in which Zizek's atheological speculative philosophy and John D. Caputo's theology of the event are impacting contemporary Christian praxis.     

De Bow’s Revolution: The Memory of the American Revolution in the Politics of the Sectional Crisis, 1850–1861

In January 1861 editor James D.B. De Bow advocated the secession of southern states from the union as he proclaimed to his readers that white Southerners “are mainly the descendants of those who fought the battles of the Revolution, and who understand and appreciate the nature and inestimable value of the liberty which it brought.” While editors on both sides of the Sectional Crisis over slavery in the 1850s and 60s claimed to be “custodians of the legacy of 1776” as they used the American Revolution symbolically in their rhetoric. By focusing on De Bow’s Review, a widely read and influential journal during this fight, we can gain a better understanding of the specific terms by which Southerners were encouraged to think of themselves not as rebels but as guardians of “the true American character.”     

China's Economic Policy Today: The New State Activism

A noted American authority and investigator of China's economy outlines the general features of the ongoing reorientation of Chinese economic policymaking toward increased state activism, which has gained momentum in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. An initial section of the paper describes the marketization and privatization initiatives of China's late reform period to provide a baseline against which to measure the subsequent shift toward increased state intervention and guidance in the economy. The author traces the shift in three critical policy arenas (social policy, state-owned enterprises, and industrial and technology policy) and demonstrates how state involvement in each intensified during the global financial crisis. He then proceeds to explore the implications of accelerated state activism in the future, identifying potential rewards as well as large risks. Among the latter are macroeconomic imbalances, a "softening" of budget constraints, difficulties in recognizing and terminating unsuccessful economic programs, and tensions with trading partners.     

High‐Resolution 3D Marine Seismic Investigation of Hedeby Harbour,Germany

Offshore 3D‐seismic acquisition has been a standard for high‐precision structural imaging in the oil and gas industry for many years. Recently this technique has been adapted by only a few teams to the resolution required for archaeological marine investigation. In contrast to sonar techniques, the 3D‐seismic method produces images below the sea‐floor. We investigate the harbour of the Viking age proto‐town of Hedeby in Northern Germany with the SEAMAP‐3D system. SEAMAP‐3D allows for rapid acquisition and employs an automated data processing sequence. We observe a wealth of archaeologically relevant detail and compare our results with previous work.