Holocene Palaeoclimates of Africa

Examination of climatic inferences based on palynological, geomorphic, sedimentological, and other proxy data reveals a coherent picture of a generally wet early Holocene and drier conditions, with a time-transgressive clinal change commencing ca, 4500 B.P. The large-scale climatic periods in Africa during the Late Quaternary were interrupted by abrupt oscillations and rapid transitions. The magnitude and direction of climatic changes show distinct regional variation. However, in the monsoon-domain areas, abrupt drought events occurred conspicuously at ca. 12,000–11,500, 8500, 7500, 4500, 4000–3700, and 2000 uncalibrated radiocarbon years B.P. Further investigations are required to gain a more precise chronology of these events, which appear to have been crucial for some of the most salient developments in Africa's prehistory.     

Bridging the cultures: architecture,models and computers in 1960s Cambridge

ABSTRACT

In the 1960s a unique research centre was founded in the Department of Architecture at the University of Cambridge. Before that date research in architecture was fragmentary and consisted largely of individual studies of topics in architectural history. Under the direction of Sir Leslie Martin, who had been appointed Professor of Architecture in 1956, a group of young architecture graduates embarked on a programme of research in the newly established centre for Land Use and Built Form Studies. Informed by the interest in the idea of the ‘model’ that was prevalent across the disciplines in Cambridge at this time and by using the power of the University Mathematical Laboratory’s ‘Titan’ mainframe computer, the group developed conceptual and mathematical models that operated across the range of architectural scales from building to city. This paper describes that work and sets it in the context of Leslie Martin’s role in reshaping architectural education in Britain.     

Dome Strengthening By Encircling Ties: A Monitored Experiment

This study describes a new strategy of conservation of historical monuments based on the combined use of monitoring analysis and empiric reappraisal. Over time, the mechanical behavior of domes—their lack of stability due to the horizontal thrusts generated by their self-weight—has been analyzed by architects and engineers, starting from the observation of damage. This process, which was mathematically demonstrated for the first time by the famous Viviani’s analysis of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence, has provided over the centuries a number of enhancements in dome structural conception, thus leading to the final solution, referred to as encircling tie rod intervention. Based on these premises, the experimental case of Santa Maria del Quartiere dome in Parma, Italy, is discussed herein. Indeed, it has been considered a good opportunity to present the method used in its strengthening-intervention assessment, further validated by the monitoring system installed. In this monitored in-scale experiment, the empiric classical solution to the primeval dome’s thrust finds its confirmation and offers further possibilities of recalibration during time, thus indicating structural monitoring that may be described as a possible and desirable “alternative to intervention”, in step with “minimum intervention” and “reversibility” principles.     

榆阳区明长城典型遗址的雨蚀破坏模式分析

现有的夯土遗址雨蚀病害分类方式关注的是多次降雨后遗址破坏的静态结果,以识别病害、辨明病因为主要目的。为进一步研究水土作用方式在夯土雨蚀病害发育过程中的作用,明确雨蚀病害的动态发育过程,在现场调查的基础上对榆阳区明代夯土长城的雨蚀病害进行分类、统计、分析,综合考虑侵蚀模式、雨蚀动态响应过程和劣化程度三个方面提出雨蚀破坏模式,分别为干湿破坏、冲刷破坏和降雨导致的重力侵蚀三种,三种破坏模式的提出为研究夯土遗址雨蚀和降雨间的响应关系提供新思路。     

《毛诗》经学化的过程及其特点与得失

本文主要论述三个问题：一、西汉前期,有经学的指导思想,但没有《诗经》经学的范本。即《子夏序》是不存在的,并从六个方面加以证明。二、《毛诗》经学化的过程。三、《毛诗》经学化的模式及其特点与得失。     

What Explains the Carcass Field Processing and Transport Decisions of Contemporary Hunter-Gatherers? Measures of Economic Anatomy and Zooarchaeological Skeletal Part Representation

This paper uses rationale derived from central place foraging models to explore the factors that guide the carcass processing and transport decisions of modern hunters. Using data derived from butchering experiments, I test different economic indices that purportedly reflect the field processing and transport decisions of contemporary African Hadza hunter-gatherers. The results show that no single index predicts part processing and transport for the species examined in this analysis. Processing and transport decisions are, however, patterned in ways that are consistent with theoretical predictions. While similar processes likely guide carcass treatment and transport decisions among all hunter-gatherers, different ecological, social, and historical constraints define the range of solutions to problems involving carcass treatment. In this specific example, intertaxonomic differences in carcass size and bone properties constrain how the trade-offs between field processing and transport costs are resolved. I conclude by suggesting ways in which analysts might make use of central place foraging rationale and models to explain variation in skeletal representation and abundances across time and space.

A Test of the Effectiveness of the Coimbra Method in Capturing Activity‐induced Entheseal Changes

The current paper tests the effectiveness of entheseal changes in expressing activity patterns when the former have been recorded using the new Coimbra method. Changes on the subscapularis and biceps brachii were recorded using the Coimbra method on 78 men from the documented Athens Collection. Generalised linear models were adopted with entheseal changes as dependent variable and cross‐sectional geometric properties, age and body mass as predictors. The results suggest that age is the factor most frequently affecting entheseal changes; however, its impact is not as systematic as found in previous studies. Body mass is rarely statistically significant, again contradicting earlier studies. Finally, activity proxied by cross‐sectional geometric properties is occasionally significant, but no clear pattern emerges that can associate specific entheseal morphological changes with specific directions of mechanical loading. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Models of disability,ideas of justice,and the challenge of full participation

The definitions of disability adopted in the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) necessitate an important change in the way disability is assessed and introduce a new idea of justice in relation to persons with disabilities. The article starts by reviewing the various ‘models of disability’ prevailing in the past and the respective ideas of justice underlying them. The charity model, for instance, was rooted in ideas of divine justice and human beneficence, where care for the disabled led in practice to their being segregated from the rest of society, while the medical model saw justice in terms of treatments or compensations for individual pathologies rather than of positive enablement for active living. The CRPD overturns these models and the related conceptions of justice by emphasising society's obligations towards persons with disabilities and, above all, their human right to full inclusion and participation in society. The key concepts are empowerment and capability. In Italy these concepts and this new conception of justice have started to be applied by the Osservatorio nazionale sulla condizione delle persone con disabilità, the body created to monitor the effective application of the CRPD in Italy, and they are included in the two-year action programme on disability, approved by the Italian government in October 2013.     

Prediction Models for Age‐at‐Death Estimates for Calves,Using Unfused Epiphyses and Diaphyses

For cattle (Bos taurus), age estimations using dental criteria before the eruption of the first molar (3–8 months) have large error margins. This hampers archaeozoological investigation into perinatal mortality or the putative slaughtering of very young calves for milk exploitation. Previous ageing methods for subjuveniles have focused on the length of unfused bones, but it is rarely possible to use them because they are restricted to foetuses and because of the fragmentation of bones. This paper presents new age prediction models based on length, breadth and depth of post cranial bones produced from a dataset of modern calves (n = 27). This reference collection was compiled from material of known age at death, sex and breed from collections in Britain, France, Germany and Switzerland. Linear regression models were constructed using the modern data for age prediction, and these models were then successfully tested and assessed using a Middle Neolithic assemblage of complete calves' skeletons from Bourguignon‐Lès‐Morey, France. From the assessment, the astragalus and metapodials were determined to be the most reliable bones, and the femur was the worst. Measurements of the epiphyseal and distal elements and depth measurements were the most reliable. For ages before 12 months, these models can provide ±1 month age estimates. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Re-Assessment and Reconstruction of Excavated Boats

In response to papers by John Coates and by Owain Roberts, the author re-evaluates mid- to late-20th-century reconstruction drawings and models of prehistoric sewn-plank boats Ferriby 1 and Brigg 2. He concludes that an impartial and informed group should re-examine all surviving evidence for these boats and then build a small-scale 'as-found' model of each one. After being subjected to criticism, these models could become the basis for generally-agreed reconstruction models of the original form and structure of these two boats. A similar process would be the best way ahead for the Dover sewn-plank boat.
© 2007 The Author