NEW EVIDENCE FOR IRON AGE BURIAL AND PROPITIATION PRACTICES IN SOUTHERN BRITAIN

It has been 30 years since the first scheme that categorized fragmentary Iron Age human remains in southern Britain ( Wilson 1981 ), and nearly 20 years since Cunliffe's paper ‘Pits, Preconceptions and Propitiation’ was published ( Cunliffe 1992 ). This study integrates the osteological, forensic and field evidence to identify archaeological signatures from three interrelated areas. The results show different depositional trends for five sites in Hampshire, and that the hillforts studied – Danebury (Hampshire) and Maiden Castle (Dorset) – demonstrate yet another pattern. Three main depositional practices were observed; intentional exposure, propitiatory deposits, and intentional practices, in which the body was kept whole in death, ran in parallel with each another.     

Urban and Rural Estimates of Poverty: Recent Advances in Spatial Microsimulation in Australia

This paper reports on the calculation of poverty rates for small areas in Australia using a spatial microsimulation model. The spatial microsimulation methodology used involves reweighting data from confidentialised unit record files (CURFs) from surveys conducted by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) to small area census data, also from the ABS. The method is described in this paper, and then maps of poverty using poverty rates derived from this small area estimation method are shown for the eastern coast of Australia and its capital cities. Further analysis of poverty rates in capital cities is then conducted. We find that areas of higher poverty risk can be clearly identified within Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and Brisbane. We also find that areas of high poverty are frequently ‘buffered’ by areas of moderate poverty. This is not always the case since, in some areas, we find a high poverty area neighbouring a low poverty area but, generally, there appears to be a moderate poverty ‘buffer’ in most capital cities.