Epipaleolithic/early Neolithic settlements at Qinghai Lake,western China

Transitions from terminal Pleistocene Upper Paleolithic foraging to Holocene Neolithic farming and pastoralist economic orientations in the northern Tibetan Plateau are examined from the perspective of Epipaleolithic sites located near Qinghai Lake, Qinghai Province, western China. Jiangxigou 2 is an artifact-rich, multicomponent midden site with the main period of occupation dating ca. 9000–5000 cal yr BP, containing abundant flaked stone artifacts including a substantial proportion of microlithic tools, abundant faunal remains including gazelle, deer, and sheep, and a small number of ceramics, including the oldest known on the Tibetan Plateau. Heimahe 3, on the other hand, is a brief hunter's camp dating ca. 8450 cal yr BP, with evident affinities to late Upper Paleolithic camps in the same region that date several thousand years older. The two distinctively different sites are probably nodes within a single Epipaleolithic foraging system that developed on the margins of the high Tibetan Plateau during the early Holocene, and that served as a basis for colonization of the high-altitude Plateau at that time. Jiangxigou 2 appears to be connected to early Neolithic agricultural settlements along the upper Yellow River (Huang He) drainage during the middle Holocene, and may provide insights into forager–agriculturalist interactions that lead to the development of pastoralist systems in the region.     

The Conservative Critique of the Enlightenment: The Limits of Social Engineering

The conservative, mainly Anglo-Saxon, critique of “social engineering” in Enlightenment thinking, which goes back to Edmund Burke and David Hume, among others, has recently resurfaced in the works of Michael Oakeshott, Roger Scruton, and Friedrich Hayek. This article focuses on their conservative critiques and more specifically on two common issues: the unintended negative consequences of political planning, and the institutions in civil society that act as a positive counterpart to this form of engineering.     

Chemical characterization of ancient pottery from sudan by x‐ray fluorescence spectrometry (xrf), electron microprobe analyses (empa) and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP–MS)*

Sixty‐four sherds and seven natural clays from prehistoric sites in northwestern Sudan have been submitted to petrological and chemical analysis using XRF spectrometry, EMPA and ICP–MS. According to their texture, the sherds form five different groups. The high contents of P₂O₅ (more than 0.5 wt%) discerned in 19 samples and the variation of the P₂O₅ content in two samples of the same vessel can be explained by post‐depositional processes or by the ancient organic contents (e.g., milk) of the vessel. Chemical classification of the pottery bulk suggests that vessels were made locally, as only sherds from the same area show homogeneity of data.     

Pine Nut Use in the Early Holocene and Beyond: The Danger Cave Archaeobotanical Record

Nuts of limber pine (Pinus flexilis) from Early Holocene strata in Danger Cave, Utah, are distinguishable by seed-coat sculpturing from pine nuts of single-needled pinyon (Pinus monophylla), which occur in strata dating <7000 years . Owls and other taphonomic agents may deposit pine nuts in archaeological sites, but the morphology of the pine nuts in Danger Cave strongly indicate they were deposited by human foragers who brought small quantities with them for food for at least the last 7500 years. Large-scale transport of pine nuts to Danger Cave from distant hinterlands is unlikely, however. The seamless transition from limber pine to pinyon pine nuts in the Danger Cave record suggests that foragers who had utilized limber pine as a food resource easily switched to using pinyon pine nuts when pinyon pine migrated into the region at the close of the Early Holocene.     

A Ticking Clock? Preservation and Management of Greenland’s Archaeological Heritage in the Twenty-First Century

ABSTRACT

Evaluating the rate of deterioration at archaeological sites in the Arctic presents several challenges. In West Greenland, for example, increasing soil temperatures, perennial thaws, coastal erosion, storm surges, changing microbial communities, and pioneer plant species are observed as increasingly detrimental to the survival of organic archaeological deposits found scattered along the country’s littoral zones and extensive inner fjord systems. This article discusses recent efforts by the REMAINS of Greenland project for developing a standardised protocol that defines the archaeological state of preservation, the preservation conditions, and asset value of organic deposits. Special emphasis is given to the degradation of materials such as bone and wood that are historically observed to be well-preserved in Greenland but now currently at risk. The protocol provides a baseline for monitoring future changes and will assist archaeologists in Greenland with a procedure for documenting and predicting areas of increasing vulnerability due to a warming climate.     

Book reviews

Heinz W. Arndt, The Rise and Fall of Economic Growth: A Study in Contemporary Thought. Longman Cheshire, Melbourne, 1978, pp. 161. $6.95.

Coral Bell (Ed.), Agenda for The Eighties. ANU Press, Canberra, 1980, pp.256. $12.95 (paper).

Mohammed Ayoob (ed.), Conflict and Intevention in the Third World. Croom Helm, London, and ANU Press, Canberra, 1980, pp. 261. $37.50.

Anthony Reid, The Blood of the People Revolution and the End of Traditional Rule in Northern Sumatra. Oxford University Press, Kuala Lumpur. 1979, pp. 288. $43.20.

Leslie H. Gelb with Richard K. Betts, The Irony of Vietnam: The System Worked. The Brookings Institution, Washington, 1979, pp. 387. £12.50 hardcover, £4.95 paper.

B. N. Pandey (ed.), Leadership in South Asia. New Delhi, Vikas Publishing House, 1977, pp.xxiv+731.

S.A.A. Rizvi, Iran: Royalty, Religion and Revolution. Ma'rifat Publishing House, Canberra, 1980, pp. 392. $30.00.

Amin Saikal, The Rise and Fall of the Shah, Princeton University Press and Angus and Robertson (Australia), 1980, pp. 279. US$14.50.

Hanna Batatu, The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq. Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1978. pp.1283. $94.00.

Uri Davis, Israel: Utopia Incorporated. Zed Press Ltd., London, 1977, pp.182. £5.00 (Paperback: £2.95).

Rosemary Sayigh, Palestinians: From Peasants to Revolutionaries. Zed Press Ltd., London, 1979, pp.206. £8.95 (Paperback: £2.95).

Selwyn Lloyd, Suez 1956: A Personal Account. Jonathon Cape, London, 1978, pp. 282. £6.50.

John Kane‐Berman, South Africa: The Method in the Madness. Pluto Press. London. 1979, pp. 265. £2.95.

Rene Lemarchand (ed.), American Policy in Southern Africa: The Stakes and the Stance. University Press of America, Washington, D.C., 1978, pp. 450.

Richard E. Bissell, Southern Africa in the World: Autonomy or Interdependence? Foreign Policv Research Institute. Philadelphia, 1978, pp. 67. US $4.00.

Claude Ake, Revolutionary Pressures in Africa. Zed Press Ltd., London, 1978, pp. 109. £6.50.

Robin Palmer and Neil Parsons (eds.), The Roots of Rural Poverty in Central and Southern Africa. Heinemann, London, 1977, pp.xviii + 430. £2.90.

Karl Kaiser and Hans‐Peter Schwarz (eds.), America and Western Europe: Problems and Prospects. Lexington Books, D. C. Heath and Company, Lexington, Mass., 1978, pp. 448.

Walter F. Hahn and Robert L. Pfaltzgraff Jr. (eds.), Atlantic Community in Crisis: A Redefinition of the Transatlantic Relationship. Pergamon, New York. 1979. pp. 386.

Annette Baker Fox, The Politics of Attraction: Four Middle Powers and the United States. Columbia University Press, New York, pp. 371. $US21.90.

Nikolai Sivachev and Nikolai Yakovlev, Russia and the United States. University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London, 1979, pp.301. $12.95.

L. F. Fitzhardinge, The Little Digger 1914–1952: William Morris Hughes, A Political Biography, Volume II. Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1979, pp.xx + 703. $40.

Australia and the Indonesian Revolution: by Margaret George. (M.U.P. in association with the Australian Institute of International Affairs).     

The Late Upper Paleolithic occupation of the northern Tibetan Plateau margin

The pre-Neolithic history of the Tibetan Plateau is virtually unknown. Test excavations of Late Paleolithic sites, described here, provide preliminary evidence that the initial occupation of the plateau's extreme environments was by small groups of foragers probably traveling from lower elevation plateau margins. These foragers occupied very short-term camps focused on the procurement and extensive processing of small-to-medium mammals. Five separate occupations date to 13–15,000 Cal yr BP, but limited survey data suggest mid-elevation locations may have been temporarily occupied as early as 25,000 years ago. Full-time, year-round occupation of the plateau probably did not take place until the early Neolithic advent of domesticated animals.     

The Fremont Complex: A Behavioral Perspective

The Fremont complex is composed of farmers and foragers who occupied the Colorado Plateau and Great Basin region of western North America from about 2100 to 500 years ago. These people included both immigrants and indigenes who shared some material culture and symbolic attributes, but also varied in ways not captured by definitions of the Fremont as a shared cultural tradition. The complex reflects a mosaic of behaviors including full-time farmers, full-time foragers, part-time farmer/foragers who seasonally switched modes of production, farmers who switched to full-time foraging, and foragers who switched to full-time farming. Farming defines the Fremont, but only in the sense that it altered the matrix in which both farmers and foragers lived, a matrix which provided a variety of behavioral options to people pursuing an array of adaptive strategies. The mix of symbiotic and competitive relationships among farmers and between farmers and foragers presents challenges to detection in the archaeological record. Greater clarity results from use of a behavioral model which recognizes differing contexts of selection favoring one adaptive strategy over another. The Fremont is a case where the transition from foraging to farming is followed by a millennium of adaptive diversity and terminates with the abandonment of farming. As such, it serves as a potential comparison to other cases in the world during the early phases of the food producing transition.