Units of Archaeological Stratification

The excavating archaeologists’ methodological set ‐ excavation, recording, analysis and publication ‐ rests on the notions and principles of the stratigraphic succession of archaeological deposits. Since 1954 when Sir Mortimer Wheeler published Archaeology From the Earth, there has been a dearth of published discussion on the stratigraphie theory in archaeology. This paper examines some of the background of the stratigraphie notion in archaeology and a revised model for archaeological stratigraphy based on ‘units of stratification’ is presented. Re‐evaluations of stratigraphie configurations in archaeology arc perhaps long overdue and this article is an attempt to engender discussion on this fundamental archaeological tenet.