Using multivariate statistics and fuzzy logic system to analyse settlement preferences in lowland areas of the temperate zone: an example from the Polish Lowlands

The influence of relief, as well as other environmental features such as soils or the hydrological regime, on prehistoric settlement patterns is commonly accepted. Settlement patterns and preferences changed over time in different areas, so it is difficult to formulate general rules of human behaviour throughout history. In lowland areas of the temperate zone, which lack radical relief changes and have widespread access to water resources, specific settlement preferences and significant changes in these preferences are difficult to interpret.New methods developed to address the problem of the settlement transformations as a result of prehistoric settlement and economic processes using multivariate statistics have been adapted for the middle part of the Great Poland Lowland. In this region, data from the Polish Archaeological Record Project database have been used.Models of the dependence between geomorphological features and settlement intensity form the basis for estimating changes in prehistoric settlements. The degree of preference (or avoidance) is a nonparametric function of the number of archaeological sites observed in the area relative to the number of sites expected from a completely random pattern. The most crucial factors for settlement are distance to plateau edges, distance to water bodies, and the wetness index. The results show that the entire investigated area is more or less suitable for settlement, but the most occupied terrains are the areas near plateau edges.     

Projectile points,people, and Plains Paleoindian perambulations

Archaeologists generally agree that Paleoindian residential groups moved regularly over extremely large ranges. However, on the Great Plains, this argument depends substantially on datasets derived largely or entirely from projectile points rather than from systematic analysis of a wide range of artifacts. This paper argues that projectile points differ from most Paleoindian tools in ways that make such datasets unlikely to be reliable sources of information on range sizes. Furthermore, evidence from Paleoindian tool caches and the condition of discarded points suggest strongly that the raw material used to produce projectile points at least sometimes moved across the Plains independently of material used to make most other kinds of flaked stone tools. This, in turn, implies that not all stone used during Paleoindian times was procured by visits of whole residential groups to raw material sources, raising serious questions about the validity of widespread views of Paleoindian mobility.     

Cultural Landscapes of Britain

'Britain' and 'cultural landscape' as used here are defined. The World Heritage categorisation provides the basis for a brief review of the range of such landscapes in Britain, with specific examples being named and briefly characterised. Relict landscapes are particularly noted. 'Threats to cultural landscapes are identified as of both development and decrepitude. A short discussion of the purpose and viability of cultural landscapes in Britain, for national and global purposes, concludes by noting a number of British cultural landscapes recognisable in World Heritage terms and potentially relevant to the European Landscape Convention 2000.     

Lake levels,mobility and lithic raw material selection and reduction strategies: A Great Lakes case study

Abstract

It has recently been proposed that lowered lake levels after 4250 BP broadened opportunities for mobility and interaction patterns among hunter-gatherer populations in the Saginaw drainage and in Michigan more broadly (; ). Here, data are presented on chipped stone reduction strategies as reflected in two site assemblages in Bay City, Michigan (20BY28, 20BY387) that bridge this key point in time. The earliest Late Archaic components of these sites, occupied during the higher than modern post Nipissing recession ca. 3200 BP, are typified by on-site reduction of local cherts, often utilising a bipolar reduction strategy. Subsequent uses of the area largely shifted to lower elevations. The more recent site components contain both more diverse projectile styles, many of which can be linked with Ontario types, and higher occurrences of non-local raw materials, specifically Onondaga chert apparently arriving at the site as preforms. The last use of these sites occurred during the Late Woodland, also during lower water levels approaching modern, and reflecting the highest use of Onondaga chert. We suggest that these changes resulted from shifting mobility and exchange patterns, facilitated in part by lowered post Nipissing water levels.     

The white essential subject: race,ethnicity, and the Irish in post-war Britain

This article focuses on the history of Irish migrants in Birmingham in an attempt to enhance historical understanding of race, ethnicity and ‘whiteness’ in post-war Britain. To do so, it will look at two Birmingham histories: the Young Christian Workers’ Association’s report on the Welfare of Irish migrants in 1951, and anti-Irish violence in the aftermath of the Birmingham Pub Bombings of 1974. It will consider the extent to which Irish immigrants were victims of racism, what this meant in terms of discrimination and identity, and, in particular, how Irish experiences corresponded to that of black and Asian migrants.     

Neutron activation analysis of stone from the Chadron Formation and a Clovis Site on the Great Plains

Cryptocrystalline silicates from the Chadron Formation were widely used by prehistoric human groups in the Great Plains of North America. There are two documented quarry areas: Flattop Butte in Colorado and the White River Badlands of South Dakota. Cryptocrystalline silicates from these sources are visually indistinguishable, making it difficult to determine the sources of artefacts found at archaeological sites. In this investigation, neutron activation analysis is used to distinguish the two sources. This technique also identifies lithic material from the Clovis-age Eckles site in Kansas as being from Flattop Butte.     

Visualising everyday geographies: practices of vision through travel-time

Responding to recent debates in human geography on the need to explore more complex renderings of everyday visuality, this paper explores some of the fluid relationships between everyday visuality, materiality and mobility through practices of contemporary railway travel in Britain. Based on extensive empirical research, this paper explores three different but related visual practices experienced during the course of a railway journey. First, it looks at how sublime forms of vision emerge to produce a variety of passive embodied effects. Second, it looks at how more attentive visual practices are implicated in the temporal organisation of the journey and have the capacity to activate changes to routine. Third, it looks at how the physical materiality of the carriage interior serves to mediate the visual field in particular ways and gives rise to a series of freedoms and constraints. Whilst the visual consumption of landscapes viewed through a window is often taken to be an axiomatic part of the travelling experience, this paper demonstrates the importance of apprehending how a multiplicity of visual practices affect how perceptions of time, space and location unfold over the course of a journey.     

清代塞外围场格局与动物资源盛衰

清代的塞外围场,建于山深林茂之区,有丰富的动植物资源,地域相连,功能各异,政治军事地位十分重要。清皇室决定着围场资源的利用方式和占有形式,康乾时期不间断的军事演练式的行围对围场动物资源衰减有重要影响,嘉道停围后,骑射演武的军事功能荡然无存,但动物资源衰减依旧势不可遏。塞外围场分布格局、资源存在结构及分配形式改变,围场体系完结。     

18世纪末至19世纪中期英国在印度的“文明使命”

在"文明使命"价值观的指引下,英国人在印度扮演的角色,既是征服者和殖民者,又是统治者和开化者.他们在治理与掠夺印度的过程中,摧毁了印度原有的社会与经济结构,推进了印度社会的近代化,用强力手段将古老的印度拉进了以英国为中心的世界资本主义体系.     

Domestic fowl on Romano-British sites: inter-site comparisons of abundance

The paper compares the abundance of domestic fowl bones with those of sheep/goat and pig from published and unpublished reports on Romano-British animal bones assemblages. The samples are drawn from 68 urban, military, nucleated, villa and unromanized rural settlements. Variations in abundance of domestic fowl within and between these settlement types are noted. Some methodological problems encountered in this survey are discussed and suggestions are made about how more reliable results could be achieved. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.