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Journal articles on the topic 'Early Bronze Age; Social prehistory'
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1
Goldberg, Amy, Torsten Günther, Noah A. Rosenberg, and Mattias Jakobsson. "Ancient X chromosomes reveal contrasting sex bias in Neolithic and Bronze Age Eurasian migrations." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 114, no. 10 (February 21, 2017): 2657–62. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1616392114.
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Dramatic events in human prehistory, such as the spread of agriculture to Europe from Anatolia and the late Neolithic/Bronze Age migration from the Pontic-Caspian Steppe, can be investigated using patterns of genetic variation among the people who lived in those times. In particular, studies of differing female and male demographic histories on the basis of ancient genomes can provide information about complexities of social structures and cultural interactions in prehistoric populations. We use a mechanistic admixture model to compare the sex-specifically–inherited X chromosome with the autosomes in 20 early Neolithic and 16 late Neolithic/Bronze Age human remains. Contrary to previous hypotheses suggested by the patrilocality of many agricultural populations, we find no evidence of sex-biased admixture during the migration that spread farming across Europe during the early Neolithic. For later migrations from the Pontic Steppe during the late Neolithic/Bronze Age, however, we estimate a dramatic male bias, with approximately five to 14 migrating males for every migrating female. We find evidence of ongoing, primarily male, migration from the steppe to central Europe over a period of multiple generations, with a level of sex bias that excludes a pulse migration during a single generation. The contrasting patterns of sex-specific migration during these two migrations suggest a view of differing cultural histories in which the Neolithic transition was driven by mass migration of both males and females in roughly equal numbers, perhaps whole families, whereas the later Bronze Age migration and cultural shift were instead driven by male migration, potentially connected to new technology and conquest.
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White, Joyce. "Comment on ‘Debating a great site: Ban Non Wat and the wider prehistory of Southeast Asia’." Antiquity 89, no. 347 (October 2015): 1230–32. http://dx.doi.org/10.15184/aqy.2015.109.
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Many of the components of this argument can be seen as a matter of debate; for example, the occurrence at sites in north-east Thailand of indisputably Bronze Age flexed burials contradicts Higham's contention that flexed graves represent earlier indigenous hunter-gatherer populations. The occurrence of tin-bronze artefacts in ordinary graves at other sites in north-east Thailand belies the proposed scenario that bronze was necessarily a ‘prestige valuable’ that generated a competitive milieu, particularly as the early metal artefacts at Ban Non Wat are unalloyed copper. It is my view that although the argument may initially appear convincing, it is based on selected, simplified and flawed data chosen to fit pre-determined social and chronological models.
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Whitley, James. "Objects with Attitude: Biographical Facts and Fallacies in the Study of Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Warrior Graves." Cambridge Archaeological Journal 12, no. 2 (October 2002): 217–32. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0959774302000112.
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Aegean prehistory still has to deal with the legacy of ‘Homeric archaeology’. One of these legacies is the ‘warrior grave’, or practice of burying individuals (men?) with weapons which we find both in the Late Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age in the Aegean. This article suggests that the differences between the ‘weapon burial rituals’ in these two periods can tell us much about the kind of social and cultural changes that took place across the Bronze Age/Iron Age ‘divide’ of c. 1100 BC. In neither period, however, can items deposited in ‘warrior graves’ be seen as straightforward biographical facts that tell us what the individual did and suffered in life. Rather, the pattern of grave goods should be seen as a metaphor for a particular kind of identity and ideal. It is only in the Early Iron Age that this identity begins to correspond to the concept of the ‘hero’ as described in the Iliad. One means towards our better understanding of this new identity is to follow up work in anthropology on the biography of objects. It is argued that the ‘life cycle’ of ‘entangled objects’, a cycle which ends in deposition in a grave, provides us with indispensable clues about the nature of new social identities in Early Iron Age Greece.
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Appleby, Jo. "4. Grandparents in the Bronze Age?" AmS-Skrifter, no. 26 (May 2, 2019): 49–60. http://dx.doi.org/10.31265/ams-skrifter.v0i26.209.
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Evolutionary biology and ethnographic analogy suggest that grandparenting has been critical to the development of human life history and may even explain modern human longevity. However, the roles and functions of grandparents have not previously been investigated in later prehistoric contexts. Ethnographic studies show that grandparents take on an extremely wide range of roles worldwide, whether this is teaching knowledge and skills, providing childcare, or even taking on parental roles and titles. In many cases, grandparents play a critical role in the support and socialization of children. Understanding the roles of grandparents thus has the potential to transform our understanding of prehistoric household and family structures. Through a case study of the Early Bronze Age Traisental in Austria, I explore potential methods for identification of grandparents in the past, and consider the effects of social formations on grandparenting.
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Janik, Liliana. "Seeing visual narrative. New methodologies in the study of prehistoric visual depictions." Archaeological Dialogues 21, no. 1 (May 16, 2014): 103–26. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s1380203814000129.
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AbstractThe aim of this paper is to establish how visual narratives can be used in the social context of storytelling, enabling the remembrance of events and those who participated in them in prehistory around the White Sea in the northernmost part of Europe. One of the largest complexes of fisher-gatherer-hunter art is located here, dating from the Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age (ca 6000–4000 B.P.). A number of methodological strands are brought together to aid in the interpretation of the art, combining Western art-historical and non-Western visual traditions that challenge our modern ways of seeing. The paper proposes an unconventional interpretation of this rock art, in which the prehistoric imagery is ‘translated’ via two short films creating the visual link between past and the present.
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Menšík, Petr, and Milan Menšík. "An Overview of Southern Bohemian Hilltop Settlements from Prehistory to the Late Middle Ages." Archaeologia Lituana 19 (December 20, 2018): 34–61. http://dx.doi.org/10.15388/archlit.2018.19.3.
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[full article, abstract in English; abstract in Lithuanian]
The Southern Bohemian Region belongs to regions where many hilltop settlements had been built since the Early Stone Age. However, the first fortified systems were built in the Late Bronze Age, as hilltops, mountain peaks, and promontories were fortified using complex systems of ramparts and ditches. This phenomenon thereafter continued into younger prehistoric periods, especially the Early Iron Age, resulting in the foundation of hilltops in the Early Middle Ages, starting with the 9th century and frequently continuing in the form of castles and manor houses built in the Middle Ages and the Modern Period. This paper is not only an attempt to summarize and survey the use of hilltop sites and the continuity of settlements but also an effort to state their classification, characteristics, and function considering their practical, social and symbolical roles, which can be detected in both prehistoric (sophisticated fortifications with no practical use, relocation) and medieval (show of power, the question of defence) heritage.
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Perucchetti, Laura, Peter Bray, Andrea Dolfini, and A. Mark Pollard. "Physical Barriers, Cultural Connections: Prehistoric Metallurgy across the Alpine Region." European Journal of Archaeology 18, no. 4 (2015): 599–632. http://dx.doi.org/10.1179/1461957115y.0000000001.
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This paper considers the early copper and copper-alloy metallurgy of the entire Alpine region. It introduces a new approach to the interpretation of chemical composition data sets, which has been applied to a comprehensive regional database for the first time. The Alpine Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age each have distinctive patterns of metal use, which can be interpreted through changes in mining, social choice, and major landscape features such as watersheds and river systems. Interestingly, the Alpine range does not act as a north-south barrier, as major differences in composition tend to appear on an east-west axis. Central among these is the prevalence of tin-bronze in the western Alps compared to the east. This ‘tin-line’ is discussed in terms of metal flow through the region and evidence for a deeply rooted geographical division that runs through much of Alpine prehistory.
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Higham, Charles Franklin, Thomas F. G. Higham, and Katerina Douka. "THE CHRONOLOGY AND STATUS OF NON NOK THA, NORTHEAST THAILAND." Journal of Indo-Pacific Archaeology 34 (December 31, 2014): 61. http://dx.doi.org/10.7152/jipa.v34i0.14719.
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<p> </p> <p><em>Excavations at Non Nok Tha, in Northeast Thailand in 1965-1968 revealed for the first time in Southeast Asia, a stratigraphic transition from the Neolithic into the Bronze Age. Based on conventional charcoal radiocarbon determinations, early reports identified fourth millennium bronze casting. The proposed length of the prehistoric sequence, and the division of the Neolithic to Bronze age mortuary sequence into at least 11 phases, has stimulated a series of social interpretations all of which have in common, a social order based on ascriptive ranking into at least two groups which saw increased hierarchical divisions emerge with the initial Bronze Age. This paper presents the results of a new dating initiative, based on the ultrafiltration of human bones. The results indicate that the initial Neolithic occupation took place during the 14th century BC. The earliest Bronze Age has been placed in the 10th centuries BC. These dates are virtually identical with those obtained for the sites of Ban Chiang and Ban Non Wat. Compared with the elite early Bronze Age graves of Ban Non Wat, Non Nok Tha burials display little evidence for significant divisions in society.</em></p>
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Sanjuán, Leonardo García, Miriam Luciañez Triviño, Thomas X. Schuhmacher, David Wheatley, and Arun Banerjee. "Ivory Craftsmanship, Trade and Social Significance in the Southern Iberian Copper Age: The Evidence from the PP4-Montelirio Sector of Valencina de la Concepción (Seville, Spain)." European Journal of Archaeology 16, no. 4 (2013): 610–35. http://dx.doi.org/10.1179/1461957113y.0000000037.
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Because of its great potential to provide data on contacts and overseas trade, ivory has aroused a great deal of interest since the very start of research into Iberian late prehistory. Research recently undertaken by the German Archaeological Institute in Madrid in collaboration with a number of other institutions has provided valuable contributions to the study of ivory in the Iberian Copper Age and Early Bronze Age. One of the archaeological sites that is contributing the most data for analysing ivory from the Copper Age in southern Iberia is Valencina de la Concepción (Seville), which is currently the focus of several debates on the development of social complexity. This article contributes to this line of research by providing new, unpublished evidence and by examining the significance of ivory craftsmanship in commercial, social, and ideological terms. It also assesses in greater detail the prominent part played by luxury ivory items as an expression of social status and power.
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Baldi, Johnny Samuele. "Within small things. Reflections on techno-social boundaries between prehistory and recent past during a Lebanese fieldwork." Matérialiser la frontière, no. 3 (December 14, 2020): 7–20. http://dx.doi.org/10.35562/frontieres.405.
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The village of Qleiaat, in the Mount Lebanon, has recently been the centre of archaeological activities aimed at studying late prehistoric and Early Bronze Age vestiges. But from the very beginning this research has also tried to investigate with purely archaeological means the remains of the recent past of the village, especially the pithoi used in the 19th-20th centuries for food storage, and the ruins left by violent clashes that took place in Qleiaat at the end of the Lebanese civil war. Through a reflection on the possibility of reconstructing physical frontiers starting from the archaeology of fossil techniques, this paper applies to a recent case-study an approach used until now only for prehistoric material culture. The aim is to recognize the frontier between the militias having clashed in Qleiaat in 1988-1990 on the basis of the chaînes opératoires of the pithoi.
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Molloy, Barry P. C. "Hunting Warriors: The Transformation of Weapons, Combat Practices and Society during the Bronze Age in Ireland." European Journal of Archaeology 20, no. 2 (January 9, 2017): 280–316. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/eaa.2016.8.
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Warfare is increasingly considered to have been a major field of social activity in prehistoric societies, in terms of the infrastructures supporting its conduct, the effects of its occurrence, and its role in symbolic systems. In the Bronze Age many of the weapon forms that were to dominate battlefields for millennia to come were first invented—shields and swords in particular. Using the case study of Ireland, developments in Bronze Age warfare are traced from the Early to the Late Bronze Age. It is argued that during this period there was a move from warfare that made use of projectiles and impact weapons to warfare that used both defensive and cutting weapons. This formed the basis for a fundamental reorganization in combat systems. This in turn stimulated change in the social organization of warfare, including investment in material and training resources for warriors and the development of new bodily techniques reflecting fundamental changes in martial art traditions. Metalwork analysis of bronze weapons and experimental archaeology using replicas of these are used to support this position. The article explores how developments in fighting techniques transformed the sociality of violence and peer-relations among warriors and proposes that these warriors be regarded as a category of craft specialist exerting significant social influence by the Late Bronze Age.
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Rebay-Salisbury, Katharina. "3. Personal Relationships between Co-buried Individuals in the Central European Early Bronze Age." AmS-Skrifter, no. 26 (May 2, 2019): 35–48. http://dx.doi.org/10.31265/ams-skrifter.v0i26.208.
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People were usually buried in single, individual graves in Early Bronze Age Austria and the surrounding areas, but there are some exceptions. In burials of two or more people, it is often the way that bodies were placed in relation to each other that suggests familiarity, if not family. This paper reviews the social relations expressed through co-burials, and aims to better understand relationships between couples, siblings, or parents and children. The chapter particularly highlights mother-child relationships and presents graves of pregnant women and graves of women and children buried together, in order to understand how such individuals were treated by their societies in death. Ages and age gaps between co-buried individuals reveal the most likely ages for life-transitions such as first motherhood and the addition of new family members. The analysis compares evidence from two different, but contemporary cultural groups (Únětice and Unterwölbing) to shed light on prehistoric gender relations, family structures and social organisation through the lens of the burial record.
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Chapman, John, and Robert Shiel. "Social Change and Land Use in Prehistoric Dalmatia." Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 59 (1993): 61–104. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0079497x00003753.
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The Neothermal Dalmatia Project is an Anglo-Yugoslav collaborative project whose aims are to define and explain changes in physical environment, settlement pattern and social structure in north Dalmatia over the last 12 millennia. The Project's fieldwork included archaeological field survey, analytical survey, trial excavation of Neolithic, Copper Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age and Roman sites, soil and land use mapping, ethnographic survey of modern villages and hamlets and palaeoenvironmental reconstructions (pollen, sediments, sea-level change, etc.). Within the long-term constraints of a limestone-dominated study region, the short-term events and medium-term agrarian and demographic cycles of the Dalmatian social groups have been studied in an inter-disciplinary manner. In this article, an attempt is made to examine the environmental and archaeological data within the frameworks of four explanatory models: the Land Use Capability (LUC) Model, the Cyclic Intensification–Deintensification (CID) Model, the Communal Ownership of Property (COP) Model and the Arenas of Social Power (ASP) Model. In the LUC model, reconstructions of past land use capabilities are used to derive postdictions of the most likely settlement patterns for successive periods (Neolithic–Roman); a high degree of postdictive success is met. In the CID model, Bintliff's model of cyclic variations in agricultural intensification and private land-holding is refined and tested against survey and excavation data. In the COP model, Fleming's model of communal land ownership is tested against similar data, with contrasting results. Finally, the ASP model is used to explain the expanded range of arenas of social power which develops from a place-based worldview in the early farming period. The conjoint use of these four explanatory models, which operate at different scales of duration, provides a broader basis for understanding changes in the prehistory of north Dalmatia in the Neothermal period than had previously been constructed.
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Hansen, S. "Technical and Social Innovations: A New Field of Research." Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 47, no. 3 (September 21, 2019): 27–37. http://dx.doi.org/10.17746/1563-0110.2019.47.3.027-037.
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The grand narrative of cultural developments claims that all technical achievements in prehistory stemmed from urban centres in Mesopotamia and Egypt. But current studies, for instance on the oldest wagons, have opened up space for alternative working hypotheses and models: modern radiocarbon dating of complexes that revealed the cited innovations, e.g. the oldest wagons, functional metal tools, and an advanced copper metallurgy, which predate their fi rst appearance in Mesopotamia, questions the role of this region in the development of technology. Possibly Mesopotamian cities operated rather as a melting pot of numerous innovations obtained from different areas, which were then re-combined and placed into a different context. The North Caucasus, in particular the Early Bronze Age Maykop culture, is an exemplary candidate for such an interactive process in technical developments. The Maykop culture has been known in research for 120 years, and its genesis is supposed to have originated in Mesopotamia. This is an archaeological narrative meant to explain the high technical state of the Maykop culture. In the light of the new chronology based on a relatively small number of radiocarbon dates, a re-examination and alternative models are necessary. It is obvious that this culture developed a highly innovative potential in metalworking and sheep breeding and fulfi lled an important function as mediator in knowledge transfer between the Eurasian steppe and Upper Mesopotamia. Recent aDNA studies support this view.
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Muhly, Polymnia. "Furniture from the shaft graves: the occurrence of wood in Aegean burials of the Bronze Age." Annual of the British School at Athens 91 (November 1996): 197–211. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0068245400016476.
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Certain wooden fragments from tomb V at Mycenae are identified as parts of two small tripod tables, which constitute the best-preserved furniture from the prehistoric Aegean. As the epigraphic, iconographic, and archaeological evidence demonstrates, wooden furniture was not common in the Aegean area and belonged chiefly to prosperous persons, who rarely provided it to the dead. Statistically rare, though more widely known, are the wooden structures used from the end of MM III to the LH/LM III A2 period for burials, nearly all richly endowed (with weapons, metal vessels, ornaments, even with furniture). In tombs with multiple burials the dead person, placed on a bed or a bier, is isolated and raised above the others. Burial in a coffin, of whatever material, constitutes a means of individualizing the dead: the wooden coffin has additional value. Thus these modes of burial are explained as one of the customs adopted during the New Palace and Early Mycenaean period, in order to demonstrate the social and economic status of the prominent dead.
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Booth, Thomas J., Joanna Brück, Selina Brace, and Ian Barnes. "Tales from the Supplementary Information: Ancestry Change in Chalcolithic–Early Bronze Age Britain Was Gradual with Varied Kinship Organization." Cambridge Archaeological Journal 31, no. 3 (February 11, 2021): 379–400. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0959774321000019.
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Large-scale archaeogenetic studies of people from prehistoric Europe tend to be broad in scope and difficult to resolve with local archaeologies. However, accompanying supplementary information often contains useful finer-scale information that is comprehensible without specific genetics expertise. Here, we show how undiscussed details provided in supplementary information of aDNA papers can provide crucial insight into patterns of ancestry change and genetic relatedness in the past by examining details relating to a >90 per cent shift in the genetic ancestry of populations who inhabited Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age Britain (c. 2450–1600 bc). While this outcome was certainly influenced by movements of communities carrying novel ancestries into Britain from continental Europe, it was unlikely to have been a simple, rapid process, potentially taking up to 16 generations, during which time there is evidence for the synchronous persistence of groups largely descended from the Neolithic populations. Insofar as genetic relationships can be assumed to have had social meaning, identification of genetic relatives in cemeteries suggests paternal relationships were important, but there is substantial variability in how genetic ties were referenced and little evidence for strict patrilocality or female exogamy.
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Bikoulis, Peter. "Revisiting prehistoric sites in the Göksu valley: a GIS and social network approach." Anatolian Studies 62 (November 13, 2012): 35–59. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0066154612000026.
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AbstractUsing a variety of quantitative approaches, interactions between prehistoric sites in the Göksu valley and south-central Anatolia are modelled within their wider multi-regional and diachronic socio-economic networks to assess the prominence and influence of communities in south-central Anatolia from the Late Chalcolithic to the end of the Early Bronze Age (c. 4200–2000 BC). Since the 1950s, some have understood the valley as significant in terms of movement and communication through the Taurus mountain chain that divides the southern Anatolian plateau from the Mediterranean coast. This view is called in to question through the application of geospatial and computational methods, namely least cost pathway and social network analyses. Archaeologists use least cost pathway analysis to model movement in the past. Similarly, social network analysis is used to model contact and interaction in the past. The approach adopted in this paper seeks to combine the two methods to investigate social structure and the nature of interaction in late prehistoric south-central Anatolia. The results suggest that views of the Göksu valley as the primary or a prominent means of connecting the southern Anatolian plateau and the Mediterranean coast may need to be reassessed.
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Kocak, Ozdemir, and Omur Esen. "ROUTE DETERMINATION OF HISTORICAL ROADS BY LOCATION OF PREHISTORIC SETTLEMENTS: NORTH OF LAKE EBER." International Journal of Heritage, Art and Multimedia 4, no. 13 (June 15, 2021): 11–20. http://dx.doi.org/10.35631/ijham.413002.
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Prehistoric settlements are prominent among the most important representatives of the cultural heritage in Turkey. These settlements are important for understanding the social, cultural, and economic conditions of the people who had lived in the past. As a matter of fact, these ancient settlements (mounds) and their locations to each other are taken as a basis in understanding the prehistoric routes. In this study, a route is identified beginning from the settlements in the north of a lake called Eber Gölü, which is located in the western part of Turkey. In this project, the study methods of Ancient History, Archaeology and Geodesy, and Photogrammetry Engineering are used. According to that, first old settlements are identified, three-dimensional maps of these settlements are created and dating is carried on based on the ceramics (sherds) that are found on the settlements. All of this data is then overlapped. Successive settlements are observed in the east-west direction in the north of Lake Eber. These settlements reach a large mound called Üçhöyük in the westernmost part. In the east, it extends in different directions. Findings dating back to the 5th millennium BC (Chalcolithic Age) were found in these mounds. It is understood that the ceramics among these finds reflect a common tradition. This also supports the connection between these settlements. It is also possible to see some of these settlements from other settlements by the naked eye. Thus, it can be thought that the settlements in the north of the aforesaid lake have been in contact with each other since the prehistoric period. It can also be said that this relationship started in the Chalcolithic Age, continued during the Early Bronze Age, Middle Bronze Age, Iron Age, Hellenistic Period, and Roman Period, because it is determined that the findings (especially sherds) belonging to these periods are very similar.
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Santos Cancelas, Alberto. "Religiones castreñas contra el estado." Vínculos de Historia. Revista del Departamento de Historia de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, no. 8 (June 20, 2019): 15. http://dx.doi.org/10.18239/vdh_2019.08.01.
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RESUMENNuestro conocimiento sobre las religiones protohistóricas se encuentra prejuiciado por categorías de pensamiento presentistas y el recurso a fuentes posteriores. Para lograr una caracterización mínima de la fenomenología de tales manifestaciones se propone una aproximación a partir de los materiales de la Edad del Hierro, con atención a los problemas y metodologías de la arqueología, que privilegie el estudio de casos particulares frente a la generalización céltica. A través del ejemplo de la cultura castreña, se examinará qué elementos constituyeron objeto de atención ritual y sobredimensión simbólica para una sociedad de la Edad del Hierro.PALABRAS CLAVE: Cultura Castreña, Edad del Hierro, protohistoria, ritual, arqueologíaABSTRACTOur knowledge of protohistoric religions is prejudiced by presentist ways of thinking and recourse to later sources. To achieve a minimum characterization of the phenomenology of such manifestations, I propose an approach based on Iron Age materials, being careful of the archaeological problems and methodologies, and favouring particular case studies rather than Celtic generalizations. Through the example of Castreño culture, I will examine which elements might have been the object of ritual attention and symbolic oversizing in an Iron Age society.KEY WORDS: Castro culture, Iron Age, Protohistory, ritual, archaeologyBIBLIOGRAFÍAAlmeida, C. A. F. (1980) “Dois Capacetes e tres copos, em Bronze, de Castelo de Neiva”, Gallaecia, 6, 245-257.Alonso Burgos, F. (2014): Estructura social y paisaje simbólico: las comunidades astures y el imperio romano. Tesis doctoral inédita, Universidad Complutense de Madrid.Angelbeck, B. y Grier, C. 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(2001) “O Mundo Funerario da Idade do Ferro do Norte de Portual: algumas questões”, Proto-história da Península Ibérica. Actas do 3º Congresso de Arqueología Peninsular, 5, pp. 43-61.Blas Cortina, M. A. (1983): “La prehistoria reciente de Asturias”, Estudios de arqueología Asturiana, 1.Blas Cortina, M. A. y Villa Valdés, A. (2007): “La presencia no accidental de un Hacha de talón en un fondo de hogar en el castro de Chao de Samartín (Grandas de Salime, Asturias)”, en Celis Sánchez, J., Delibes de Castro, G., Fernández Manzano, J. y Grau Lobo, L. El hallazgo leonés de Valdevimbre y los depósitos del Bronce Final Atlántico en la península Ibérica, León, Diputación de León, 280-289.Brück, J. y Fotijn, D (2003) “The myth of the chief: prestige goods, power, and personhood, in the European Bronze Age”, The Oxford Handbook of the European Bronze Age. Oxford University Press. Oxford, 197-205.Carballo Arceo, X. y Rey Castiñeiras, J. (2014): “O depósito de Máchados de talón de Cabeiras (Arbo, Galiza) no contexto da Bacia Baixa do río Miño”, en Bettencourt, A. M. S., Comendador Rey, B. y Aluai Sampaio, H., Corpos e metáis na fachada atlántica da Iberia. Do Neolítico a Idade do Bronze. Braga, Citcem, 103-120.Clastres, P. (1984), Socity Against the State, New York, Zone books.Currás, B (2014): Transformaciones sociales y territoriales en el Baixo Miño entre la Edad del Hierro y la integración en el Imperio Romano, Tesis doctoral inédita, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela.Esparza Arroyo, A. (1986) Los castros de la Edad del hierro del Noroeste de Zamora. Zamora: Instituto de Estudios Zamoranos de Florian de Ocampo.Fabian, J. (1983): Time and the Other. How anthropology makes its object, Columbia.Fanjul Peraza, A. y Marón SUÁREZ, C. (2006): “La metalurgia del Hierro en la Asturias Castreña. Nuevos datos y estado de la cuestión”, Trabajos de Prehistoria, 63, 113-131.Fernández Rodríguez, C. (2006): “Os recursos de orixe animal: primeiros datos e avaliación preliminar”, en Aboal Fernández, R. y Castro Hierro, V. (coords.), O Castro de Montealegre, Moaña, Pontevedra, Noia, Toxosoutos, 325-340.García Quintela, M. V. (1999): Mitología y mitos de la Hispania prerromana III. Madrid: Akal.García Vuelta, O. (2002) “Técnicas y evolución, fabricación y materias primas en los torques”, en Rodero Riaza, A. y Barril Vicente, M. (coords.), Torques. Belleza y poder. Madrid, Museo Arqueológico Nacional, 31-47.González García, F. J. (2006): “El noroeste de la península ibérica en la Edad del Hierro: ¿una sociedad pacífica?”, Cuaderno de Estudios Gallegos, 53 (119), 131-155.González García, F. J., Parcero, C., Ayán Vila, X. (2011): “Iron Age societies against the state. An account on the emergence of the Iron Age in the NW Iberian Peninsula”. en T. Moore y X. L. Armada Pita (eds.): Atlantic Europe in the first Millenium BC. Crossing the Divide, Oxford, Oxbow books, 285-262González Ruibal, A. (2006-07): “Galaicos, poder y comunidad en el Noroeste de la Península Ibérica (1200 a.C.-50 d.C.)” Brigantium boletín do museo arqueolóxico da Coruña, 18-19.González Ruibal, A., Rodríguez Martínez, R. y Ayán Vila, X. (2010): “Encounters in the ditch: ritual and middle ground in an Iron Age hillfort in Galicia (Spain)”, Bolletino di archeologia on line, volume special, 25-31.Gledhill, J. (2000): Power and its desguises, Anthropological Perspectives on Politics, London, Pluto Press.Hidalgo Cuñarro, J. M. (1992-1993): “Nuevas cerámicas romanas de importación del Castro de Vigo (Campaña de 1987)”, Castrelos, 5-6, 41-70.Hingley, R. (2009): “Esoteric knowledge? Ancient Bronze Artifacts from Iron Age Contexts”, Proceedings of Prehistoric Society, 75, 143-165Ladra, L. (2005): “Dous novos torques achados en Vilar do Monte (San Fiz de Reimondez, Sarria, Lugo)”, Anuario Brigantino, 28, 27-38.— (2006) “Un novo torques achado na croa de Bardaos (Tordoia, A Coruña)”, Anuario Brigantino, 29, 39-52.Martin, M. (1988): “O povoado fortificado de Lagos, Amares”, Cadernos de Arqueología, Monografías, 1.Maya, J. L y Cuesta, F. (2001): “Excavaciones arqueológicas y estudio de los materiales de La Campa de Torres”, en Maya González, J. L y Cuesta Toribio, F. (dirs.), El Castro de la Campa de Torres. Periodo Prerromano. Gijón, Ayuntamiento de Gijón, 11-277.Meijide Cameselle, G. y Acuña Castroviejo, F. (1989): “Piezas de la Edad del Bronce en el Museo de la Tierra de Melide”, Cuaderno de Estudios Gallegos, 28 (103), 7-34.Merrifield, R. (1987): The Archaeology of ritual and magic, London, Routledge.Nunes, S. A., y Ribeiro, R. A. (2001): “Uma estrutura funeraria da Idade do Ferro em contexto habitacional no castro de Palheiros – Murça NE de Portugal”, Protohistória da Península Ibérica. Actas do 3º Congresso de Arqueología Peninsular, 5, 23-43.Parcero Oubiña, C. (1997): “Documentación de un entorno castreño: Trabajos Arqueológicos en el Área de Cameixa, Ourense”, Trabajos en arqueología del paisaje, 1, 2-26.Parcero Oubiña, C., Ayán Vila, X., Fábrega Álvarez, P. y Teira Brión, A. (2007): “Arqueología, paisaje y sociedad”, en González García, J. (coord.), Los pueblos de la Galicia céltica, Madrid: Akal, 131-257.Parcero Oubiña, C. y Criado Boado, F. (2013): “Social change, social resistance. A long term approach to the process of transformation of social landscapes in the NW Iberian Peninsula”, en Cruz Berrocal, M., García Sanjuán, L. y Gilman, A. (coords.), The Prehistory of Iberia: Debating Early Social Stratification and the State. London: Routledge, 249-266.Peña Santos, A. de la (1985-86): “Tres años de excavaciones arqueológicas en el yacimiento galaico-romano de Santa Tegra (A Guarda, Pontevedra)”, Pontevedra Arqueológica, 2, 157-189.— (1992): Castro de Torroso (Mos, Pontevedra). Síntesis de las memorias de las Campañas de excavaciones 1984- 1990, Santiago de Compostela, Xunta de Galicia.Quesada Sanz, F. (1997): El armamento Ibérico. Estudio tipológico, geográfico, funcional, social y simbólico de las armas en la Cultura Ibérica (Siglos VI-I a.C.), Montagnac, Éditions Monique Mergoil.Rodríguez Corral, J. y Alfayé, S. (2009): “Espacios liminales y prácticas rituales en el noroeste peninsular”, Actas de paleohispánica, 9, 107-111.Ruíz-Gálvez Priego, M. L. (1980): “Consideraciones sobre el origen de los puñales de antenas gallego-asturianos”, Actas do seminario de arqueología do Noroeste peninsular, 1, 85-112.Santos Cancelas, A. (2015): “La memoria de las piedras. El pasado presente en los guerreiros Castreños”, Antesteria, 4, 167-186.— (2016b): “Muchas teorías y pocas fuentes: religiones castreñas”, en Cisneros, I., Herrera, J. y Lanau, P. (eds.), Problemas y limitaciones en el estudio de las fuentes. Actas de las I jornadas doctorales en Ciencias de la Antigüedad, Zaragoza 18 de Septiembre de 2015, 15-28.— (2017) Ritos, memoria e identidades Castreñas, Tesis doctoral inédita, Universidad de Zaragoza.— (e.p.): “Cambio Cultural e hibridación religiosa: el caso castreño”, Archivo Español de Arqueología.Sastre, I. (2011): “Social inequality during the Iron Age: Interpretation Models”, en T. Moore and X. L. Armada Pita (eds.): Atlantic Europe in the first Millenium BC. Crossing the Divide, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 264-284.— (2008): “Community, identity and conflict. Iron Age Warfare in Iberian Northwest”, Current Antropology 49, 1021-1051.Sastre, I. y Sánchez Palencia, F. J. (2013): “Non-hierarchical approaches to The Iron Age societies: Metals and inequality in the Castro Culture of The Northwestern Iberian Peninsula”, en M. Cruz Berrocal, L. García-Sanjuán, y A. Gilman (eds.): The Prehistory of Iberia. Debating social stratification and the State, London, Routledge 292-310.Suárez Otero, J. (2007): “Hachas de talón decoradas: un fósil de la ritualidad en torno a la producción metalúrgica del Bronce Final Atlántico”, en Celis Sánchez, J., Delibes de Castro, G., Fernández Manzano, J. y Grau Lobo, L. (eds.), El hallazgo leonés de Valdevimbre y los depósitos del Bronce Final Atlántico en la península Ibérica, León, Diputación de León, 290-297.Villa Valdés, A. y Cabo Pérez, L. (2003): “Deposito funerario y recinto fortificado de la Edad del Bronce en el castro de Chao de Samartín: Argumento para su datación”, Trabajos de prehistoria, 60 (2), 143-151.Woolf, G. (2011): Tales of the barbarians: ethnography and the empire in the RomanWest, Sussex, Wiley-Blackwell.
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Isbell, William H. "Mortuary Preferences: A Wari Culture Case Study from Middle Horizon Peru." Latin American Antiquity 15, no. 1 (March 2004): 3–32. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/4141562.
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AbstractMortuary practices reveal a great deal about the social organization of prehistoric cultures and their landscape of places. However, tombs are favored targets for looters, making it difficult to determine original burial practices. Very little was known about Wari burial during the Middle Horizon (A.D. 500–1000), even though Wari was an imperial, early Bronze Age culture with a spectacular urban capital in highland Peru. Excavations at the secondary Wari city of Conchopata produced remains of more than 200 individuals, from disturbed and undisturbed contexts. These burials as well as information from other sites permit an initial description of ideal patterns of Wari mortuary behavior. The forms abstracted reveal graves ranging from poor and ordinary citizens to royal potentates, supporting inferences of hierarchical political organization. It is also clear that the living accessed graves of important people frequently, implying some form of ancestor worship. However, unlike the later Inkas, Wari ancestors were venerated in their tombs, located deep within residential compounds and palaces.
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Higham, Charles. "The Long and Winding Road that Leads to Angkor." Cambridge Archaeological Journal 22, no. 2 (May 23, 2012): 265–89. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0959774312000261.
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In the late sixteenth century, Portuguese missionaries encountered a vast city at Angkor. Abandoned for 150 years, it had been partially restored as a Buddhist piligrimage centre but many of the monuments had been given over to the forest. They wondered about its origins. Some suggested that it was the work of Trajan, others of Alexander the Great. Following the establishment of the French colonial empire in Southeast Asia three centuries later, and in the absence of any information on prehistoric societies, the civilization of Angkor was seen as the result of Indianization, whereby Indian religions, architecture, writing and language were adopted by the indigenous inhabitants. This article presents the results of twenty years of research in the upper Mun Valley of northeast Thailand, an area that was part of the Kingdom of Angkor and seat of the dynasty of two of its greatest kings, Suryavarman II and Jayavarman VII. For the first time, the entire prehistoric cultural sequence from late hunter-gatherers to the end of the Iron Age has been documented and dated. We find that after the ingress of rice farmers from southern China in the mid second millennium BC, there were two surges in social complexity. Both were coincidental with the availability of new exotic goods through exchange. The first took place in the initial Bronze Age, in the eleventh century BC, and was followed by several centuries of relative poverty in mortuary practices. The second took place in the late Iron Age and led directly to the foundation of powerful chiefdoms from which can be traced the genesis of early civilizations in Southeast Asia, including that of Angkor.
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Papadopoulos, John K. "Minting Identity: Coinage, Ideology and the Economics of Colonization in Akhaina Magna Graecia." Cambridge Archaeological Journal 12, no. 1 (April 2002): 21–55. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0959774302000021.
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This article focuses on the early coinage of the Akhaian cities of South Italy — Sybaris, Kroton, Metapontion, Kaulonia, Poseidonia — against the backdrop of colonization. Minting an early and distinctive series of coins, these centres were issuing coinage well before their ‘mother-cities’, a phenomenon that has never been fully appreciated. With its origins in a colonial context, the Akhaian coinage of Magna Graecia not only differs from that of the early coin-minting states of the Greek mainland, it offers a case study that challenges long-held assumptions and potentially contributes to a better understanding of the origins of coinage. It does so by suggesting that coinage is much more than a symbol of authority and represents considerably more than just an abstract notion of sovereignty or hegemony. The images or emblems that the Akhaians of South Italy chose for their coins are those current in the contemporary cultural landscape of the historic Akhaians, but at the same time actively recall the world of the heroic Akhaians of the Bronze Age by referring to prehistoric measures of value. More than his, the vicissitudes of colonial and indigenous history in parts of South Italy in the Archaic period were not merely reflected in coinage, the coins themselves were central to the processes of transformation. By boldly minting — constructing — their identity on coinage, the Akhaians of South Italy chose money in order to create relations of dominance and to produce social orders that had not existed before.
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Britnell, William, Jenny Britnell, Timothy C. Darvill, Stephen Greep, Elizabeth Healey, Hilary Howard, Gillian Jones, et al. "The Collfryn Hillslope Enclosure, Llansantffraid Deuddwr, Powys: Excavations 1980–1982." Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 55, no. 1 (1989): 89–134. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0079497x00005351.
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The report on partial rescue excavations of the Collfryn enclosure between 1980–82 presents a summary of the first large-scale investigation of one of the numerous semi-defensive cropmark and earthwork enclosure sites in the upper Severn valley in mid-Wales. Earlier prehistoric activity of an ephemeral nature is represented by a scattering of Mesolithic and Late Neolithic or early Bronze Age flintwork, and by a pit containing sherds of several different Beaker vessels. The first enclosed settlement, constructed in about the 3rd century bc probably consisted of three widely-spaced concentric ditches, associated with banks of simple dump construction, having a single gated entranceway on the downhill side. It covered an area of about 2.5 ha and appears to have been of a relatively high social status, and appropriate in size for a single extended-family group. This was subsequently reduced in about the 1st century bc to a double-ditched enclosure, by the recutting of the original inner ditch and the cutting of a new ditch immediately outside it. The habitation area between the 3rd and 1st centuries bc probably focused on timber buildings in the central enclosure of about 0.4 ha, whose gradually evolving pattern appears to have comprised between 3–4 roundhouses and 4–5 four-posters at any one time. Little excavation was undertaken between the outer ditches of the first phase settlement, but these are assumed to have been used as stock enclosures. A mixed farming economy is suggested by cattle, sheep/goat and pig remains, and remains of glume wheats, barley and oats. Industries included small-scale iron and bronze-working. The Iron Age settlement was essentially aceramic, although there are significant quantities of a coarse, oxidized ceramic probably representing salt traded from production centres in the Cheshire Plain. The entranceway was remodelled in about the late 1st or early 2nd, century AD by means of a timber-lined passage linked to a new gate on the line of the inner bank. There is equivocal evidence of continued occupation within the inner enclosure continuing until at least the mid-4th century AD, possibly at a comparatively low social level, associated with domestic structures of uncertain form sited on earlier roundhouse platforms, and including some four-posters and possible six-posters. Drainage ditches were dug across parts of the site during the Medieval and post-Medieval periods, which were associated with various structures, including a corn-drying kiln inserted into the inner enclosure bank in the 15th century.
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Mansrud, Anja, and Inger Marie Berg-Hansen. "Animist Ontologies in the Third Millennium BCE? Hunter-Gatherer Persistency and Human–Animal Relations in Southern Norway: The Alveberget Case." Open Archaeology 7, no. 1 (January 1, 2021): 868–88. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/opar-2020-0176.
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Abstract This article aims to contribute novel data and perspectives into the long-standing debate about economic strategies in the fourth and third millennium in South Norway, by introducing novel results from a Pitted Ware coastal site in Agder County, southern Norway. The analysis of artifactual and faunal assemblages as well as lipid analysis from ceramics indicate a varied subsistence economy with terrestrial hunting, gathering, and specialized marine fishing strategies, targeting Atlantic bluefin tuna and seals. These procurement strategies were maintained throughout the middle and into the late Neolithic period (c. 3300–2200 BCE). No unequivocal evidence of cultivation was documented before the early Bronze Age, around 1700 BCE. This article maintains that exploring and explaining long-time continuity, and the environmental, cultural, and social mechanisms, which underwrite enduring traditions, remains a pertinent issue in Neolithic archeology. To broaden our understanding of the causes underlying cultural persistence, we need to move beyond a view of foraging peoples as either ecologically adapted or as economically optimized and employ a perspective that acknowledges the fundamental importance of human–animal relations in prehistoric lives and worldviews. Drawing on insights from relational anthropology and multi-species archaeology, we maintain that an animist ontology endured among the Pitted Ware groups and endorsed the foraging persistency characterizing the third millennium in Southern Norway.
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Díaz-Guardamino, Marta, Leonardo García Sanjuán, David W. Wheatley, José Antonio Lozano Rodríguez, Miguel Ángel Rogerio Candelera, Michał Krueger, Marta Krueger, Mark Hunt Ortiz, Mercedes Murillo-Barroso, and Veronica Balsera Nieto. "Rethinking Iberian ‘warrior’ stelae: a multidisciplinary investigation of Mirasiviene and its connection to Setefilla (Lora del Río, Seville, Spain)." Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences 11, no. 11 (September 11, 2019): 6111–40. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12520-019-00909-1.
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Abstract Iberian ‘warrior’ stelae have captured the imagination of researchers and the public for more than a century. Traditionally, stelae were considered ‘de-contextualised’ monuments, and research typically focused on the study of their iconography, paying little or no attention to their immediate contexts. As a result, despite the large number of these stelae known to date (c. 140) and the ample body of literature that has dealt with them, fundamental questions remain unanswered. This paper aims to demonstrate the potential of a multidisciplinary and contextual approach to push forward the research agenda on these monuments through a case study. Firstly, we introduce the Mirasiviene stela and the methods deployed for its investigation, which include a variety of digital imaging techniques, petrography, pXRF, intensive survey and multiscalar spatial analysis. Secondly, we discuss the results in relation to three main topics: stela biography, social practices and landscape context. Comparisons to the well-known nearby Bronze Age and Iron Age site of Setefilla are made throughout the discussion. Ultimately, this paper makes a case for the stelae of Mirasiviene and Setefilla being polyvalent monuments made by local artisans, that served both as landmarks and memorials in connection with dense late second and early first millennium BCE settlement patterns in the region. Probably linked to elites, ‘houses’ or kin groups of this time, stelae were set in symbolically charged places, liminal spaces nearby water, burials and pathways, attracting a range of ritual activities throughout the centuries. The study of the newly discovered Mirasiviene stela shows that multidisciplinary, cutting-edge non-destructive archaeology can shed significant new light on these prehistoric monuments, thus providing a glimpse of what in our opinion is a paradigm shift in the research of similar monuments throughout Europe.
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Legarra Herrero, Borja. "Recent developments in the study of Early Bronze Age Crete (Early Minoan period)." Archaeological Reports 65 (November 2019): 87–110. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s057060841900005x.
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The production and publication of new research on the Cretan Early Bronze has accelerated tremendously in recent decades. This article aims to present the highlights and main trends of the last 15 years: the sites, excavations, research projects and main publications. Moreover, it explores how the new data interlink with the extremely large body of information available from more than 100 years of archaeological studies on Crete. The aim of such a review is to identify patterns of research, popular themes and the strengths and weaknesses of the data recovered, and to consider the place of Early Bronze Crete in current trends in the fields of Mediterranean Prehistory and archaeology more broadly.
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Cosmopoulos, Michael B. "Reconstructing Cycladic Prehistory: Naxos in the Early and Middle Late Bronze Age." Oxford Journal of Archaeology 17, no. 2 (July 1998): 127–48. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1468-0092.00055.
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J. Hudson, Mark. "Towards a prehistory of the Great Divergence:." Documenta Praehistorica 46 (December 6, 2019): 30–43. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.46-2.
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This essay argues that the primary socio-economic formations of premodern Japan were formed in the Bronze Age via processes of ancient globalisation across Eurasia. Multi-crop cereal agriculture combining rice, millet, wheat and barley with a minor contribution from domesticated animals spread from Bronze Age Korea to Japan at the beginning of the first millennium BC. This agricultural system gradually expanded through the archipelago while engendering new economic niches centred on trade, raiding and specialised fishing. From the fifth century AD the horse became widely used for warfare, transport and overseas trade. While alluvial rice farming provided staple finance for the early state, it is argued here that the concept of the ‘maritime mode of production’ better explains economic processes in the nonstate spaces of Japan until the early seventeenth century. Despite this diversity in socio-economic formations, the post-Bronze Age globalisation of food in Japan appears to have been delayed compared to many other regions of Eurasia and to have been less impacted by elite consumption. Further research is required to confirm this suggestion and the essay outlines several areas where archaeological research could contribute to debates over the ‘Great Divergence’ and the economic development of the modern world.
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J. Hudson, Mark. "Towards a prehistory of the Great Divergence:." Documenta Praehistorica 46 (December 6, 2019): 30–43. http://dx.doi.org/10.4312/dp.46.2.
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This essay argues that the primary socio-economic formations of premodern Japan were formed in the Bronze Age via processes of ancient globalisation across Eurasia. Multi-crop cereal agriculture combining rice, millet, wheat and barley with a minor contribution from domesticated animals spread from Bronze Age Korea to Japan at the beginning of the first millennium BC. This agricultural system gradually expanded through the archipelago while engendering new economic niches centred on trade, raiding and specialised fishing. From the fifth century AD the horse became widely used for warfare, transport and overseas trade. While alluvial rice farming provided staple finance for the early state, it is argued here that the concept of the ‘maritime mode of production’ better explains economic processes in the nonstate spaces of Japan until the early seventeenth century. Despite this diversity in socio-economic formations, the post-Bronze Age globalisation of food in Japan appears to have been delayed compared to many other regions of Eurasia and to have been less impacted by elite consumption. Further research is required to confirm this suggestion and the essay outlines several areas where archaeological research could contribute to debates over the ‘Great Divergence’ and the economic development of the modern world.
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Forenbaher, Stašo. "Radiocarbon dates and absolute chronology of the central European Early Bronze Age." Antiquity 67, no. 255 (June 1993): 218–56. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0003598x00045336.
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It is more than forty years now since the first radiocarbon dates began the reconciliation of conventional and absolute chronologies for later prehistory. This pioneering radiocarbon chronology for the Bronze Age sequence in Central Europe brings that process nearer to a close, by filling the last major gap in the radiocarcbon chronology of the European continent.
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Shennan, Stephen. "Cost, benefit and value in the organization of early European copper production." Antiquity 73, no. 280 (June 1999): 352–63. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0003598x0008830x.
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How can archaeologists evaluate the ‘cost of production’ in prehistory? Stephen Shennan explores ethnographic examples, Ricardo's Law of Comparative Advantage and archaeological evidence from the eastern Alps in a stimulating discussion of Bronze Age production and exchange.
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Haughton, Mark. "Seeing Children in Prehistory: A View from Bronze Age Ireland." Cambridge Archaeological Journal 31, no. 3 (February 9, 2021): 363–78. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0959774321000032.
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Despite growing strength in recent decades, an archaeology of childhood has often been overlooked by those studying prehistory. This is concerning because communities are enlivened by their children, and conversations with and about children often provide a critical arena for the discussion of aspects of societies which prehistorians are comfortable addressing, such as social structure, identity and personhood. Through an exploration of childhood as expressed in the Earlier Bronze Age burials from Ireland, this article demonstrates that neither written sources, artistic depictions nor toys are necessary to speak of children in the past. Indeed, an approach which tacks between scales reveals subtle trends in the treatment of children which speak to wider shared concerns and allows a reflection on the role of children in prehistory.
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Allen, Carol, and David Hopkins. "Bronze Age Accessory Cups from Lincolnshire: Early Bronze Age Pot?" Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 66 (2000): 297–317. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0079497x00001833.
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Sixteen accessory or pygmy cups of the Early Bronze Age front Lincolnshire are illustrated and discussed for the first time: many were previously unpublished. The possible origins of the cups are considered and it is suggested that they had organic counterparts in domestic use more suitable for the lifestyle of the early 2nd millennium BC. The use of grog tempered fabrics is considered, leading to the concept of ritual use of the cups in traditional rites connecting society with its past. In the Early Bronze Age it seems very likely that the use of pottery was restricted to special occasions, and the cups in particular were used for drinking and smoking sessions, recognisable as part of both modern and past social gatherings and ceremonies.
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Bulatovic, Aleksandar. "The phenomenon of prehistoric ritual pits: Several examples from the central Balkans." Starinar, no. 65 (2015): 7–35. http://dx.doi.org/10.2298/sta1565007b.
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In recent years, the phenomenon of pits with special deposits, i.e. ritual pits, seems to have, once again, attracted attention both in Europe and in the Balkans. In the central Balkans, scientific literature related to this topic is still deficient, hence one of the objectives of this paper is to change the current state and rekindle interest in the study of this form of manifestation of the spiritual culture of prehistoric man. It appears that one of the oldest reasons for sacrificial offerings is primal, instinctive fear. The fear of the transience of life or of death compelled our ancient ancestors to make some sort of ?agreement? with the surrounding forces, bestowing particular sacrifices onto them. Sacrifice represents one of the rituals of prehistoric communities which could have been performed in a number of ways and in different circumstances. One of these are offerings placed in pits, in the form of specific objects, food, drink or living beings sacrificed to higher powers and accompanied by certain symbolic actions, for the purpose of gaining their favour or help. When interpreting pits, what should further be considered is that the fundamental difference between a discarded object and an object used for a ritual purpose lies in the fact that the object of ritual character is still meaningful to man, performing a symbolic function, unlike the former, whose role is lost after being disposed of. Aritual object, an item or a living being sacrificed in a pit, is no longer of common, worldly significance (food, drink, tools, etc.), but rather possesses a symbolic, sacral meaning, intended for higher powers, to propitiate and appease them, that is to create some form of the oldest religious communication. Not only is it difficult to identify the pits used for ritual purposes in the course of fieldwork, but it is even more challenging to interpret them and practically impossible to accurately reconstruct the actions performed during the rituals. Many authors who concern themselves with this topic concur that the context of a pit and the objects within it, the choice of offerings and their symbolism, along with the pit?s stratigraphy and other patterns observed in it, are in fact the features that make it distinct, i.e. ritual. Similar pits are known throughout history and their descriptions can be found in ancient written sources, as well as identified in the field, with certain differences, stretching back all the way into deep prehistory. This paper presents several newly discovered ritual pits in the central Balkans from the Eneolithic, Bronze and Iron Age, and additionally mentions some of the previously published pits from the area and its near and more distant surroundings. In the course of recent investigations conducted at the site of Bubanj, two ritual pits were recorded in the Early Eneolithic horizon of the Bubanj-Hum I culture. Next to the first, shallower (up to 0.2 m), oval shaped pit, of around 2.5 m long and 1.7 m wide, an oven was noted, while the pit was filled with whole vessels, parts of grindstones, chipped and polished stone tools, baked clay, animal bones, etc. (Figs. 1, 2; Pl. I). Two smaller hollows were noted in the northern part of the pit, while several postholes, which might have supported some kind of roof or shelter construction, were detected somewhat deeper in the subsoil, around the oven and the pit. Below this pit, a smaller one was noted, around 0.7 m deep and with a base diameter of about 1.2 m, filled with yellow, sandy, refined soil. The bottom of the pit was dug to the level of the subsoil and levelled. The second ritual pit from Bubanj was considerably deeper (around 1.5 m) and approximately 1.7 m in diameter, with baked walls and filled with red ashy soil. It contained fragmented or whole vessels, chipped stone tools, a part of an altar, an air nozzle (tuy?res), a polished stone axe, tools made of horn, a fragment of a grindstone, pebbles, house daub and animal bones (Fig. 3; Pl. II). Part of the inventory had been burnt, particularly in the lower section of the pit. This paper also mentions the Late Eneolithic pit from Vinca, containing eight whole vessels in an inverted position (Fig. 4; Pl. III), as well as the Bronze Age complexes from Kokino Selo and Pelince, in northern Macedonia (Figs. 5, 6), comprising several dozen pits, commonly with a broken stone construction, in which whole vessels, along with tools made from chipped and polished stone, baked clay or bone and large amounts of daub were discovered. In the Iron Age, the number of ritual pits significantly increased in all of Europe and, from this period, two pits from the area surrounding Vranje are presented - one with mixed contents (the skulls, without the lower jaw, of at least six male wild boars, as well as the skulls, lower jaws, right pelvic bones and shoulder blades of at least six deer, along with parts of grindstones, pottery and daub fragments and a chipped stone tool) and the other with a complete skeleton of a young female horse, a baked clay weight and chipped stone flaking debris (Figs. 7, 8; Pl. IV).1 The pits were dated, by means of conventional C14 dating, to the period from the mid-6th to the mid-4th century BC.2 By comparing and analysing a large number of pits from the central Balkans and the neighbouring areas, it was observed that ritual pits, as a form of an ancient, primitive religiosity, had already emerged in the Palaeolithic and endured in Europe throughout the entire prehistory, despite various natural and social changes that occurred during this extended period. The pits proved to have been located both outside inhabited areas, as well as in settlements (even under houses), either individually or clustered, and in some cases also constituting entire complexes, with protective architecture in the form of a roof or a shelter (Bubanj, Ohoden). The surface areas occupied by the complexes, along with the dimensions and shapes of the pits, the stratigraphy of their contents, their architecture and many other elements vary considerably, even within a single complex. It is for this reason that it is not possible, at this moment in time, at least without very detailed and comprehensive analysis, to discern some regularities or patterns which could, with any certainty, be considered reliable. This primeval custom, therefore, cannot be linked to any particular period, culture or region, but was entirely dependent on the state or level of the spiritual consciousness of an individual or a community. This religious idea started to decline during the Roman domination and vanished entirely at the time of Christianity.
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Yener, K. Aslihan. "Bulgarmaden: Thoughts about iron, Bolkardağ and the Taurus mountains." Iraq 72 (2010): 183–91. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0021088900000644.
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It has long been suspected that the use of iron predated the so-called meteoric and smelted iron of the later stages of prehistory. Certainly small objects of iron such as awls and pins are found from the Chalcolithic period onwards and the rightly famous iron swords from Alaca Höyük demonstrate skills in making larger weapons in the Early Bronze Age. I document the use of iron ore for hammers and maces at Early Bronze Age sites in the Taurus Mountains and early Chalcolithic Tell Kurdu in the Amuq valley. This intensive understanding of materials and their properties led, millennia later, to the ability to smelt terrestrial iron.
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Steinberg, John M. "Ploughzone sampling in Denmark: isolating and interpreting site signatures from disturbed contexts." Antiquity 70, no. 268 (June 1996): 368–92. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0003598x00083332.
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Are sites in lowland Europe destroyed when they are ploughed many times? In north Denmark, many Neolithic and Early Bronze Age sites are now reduced to just lithic scatters, but distinctive ‘site signatures’ persist. A lithic economic prehistory from the ploughsoil is possible and instructive.
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Mallory, Jim. "The saving of Navan." Antiquity 61, no. 231 (March 1987): 64–66. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0003598x00072501.
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Navan, Co. Armagh, is one of the major ritual sites of Irish and of European prehistory. Its 2.5 square km encompass the bronze- and iron-age Navan ‘fort’, the bronze-age ritual pond of the King's Stables, the bronze-/iron-age Haughey's fort, and the iron-age ritual lake of Loughnashade – and, surely, other sites not yet detected. It figures largely in the early history of Ireland as the ancient capital of Ulster. For years, a limestone quarry has been eating into the archaeological landscape; its erosion was finally halted last year, thanks to the vigour with which the Friends of Navan fought the archaeological case. Here, one of the founder Friends sets out the issues, and what kind of victory was won.
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Sestieri, Anna Maria Bietti. "Italy in Europe in the Early Iron Age." Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 63 (1997): 371–402. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0079497x00002498.
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In the field of European recent prehistory it is generally agreed that, from the Early Orientalising period, Etruria played a central role in long distance trade, also acting as a link between the Aegean and east Mediterranean and trans-Alpine Europe. A widely acknowledged implication is that this primary status of the Etruscans among the indigenous peoples of Italy was a secondary effect of the Greek and Phoenician colonisation in the central Mediterranean. It is the aim of this paper to show that, as early as the Late Bronze Age, Etruria emerged as a complex territorial, political, and economic entity and was able to participate in an interregional network of trade reaching as far as northern Germany and the Aegean. By the beginnings of the Italian Iron Age, this region was organised as a federation of early states, with important extensions in the southern Po plain, along the Adriatic coast, and in Campania.
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Cherry, Haydon. "Digging Up the Past: Prehistory and the Weight of the Present in Vietnam." Journal of Vietnamese Studies 4, no. 1 (2009): 84–144. http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/vs.2009.4.1.84.
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This essay argues that prehistory in Vietnam has been powerfully shaped by the contemporary social and political circumstances in which it has been produced, both during the French colonial period and in the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. It argues that in both periods the degree of professionalism in the field and the prevailing political ideology shaped the kind of prehistory produced. The discussion focuses particularly on the Bronze Age culture of Đông Sỏn and its link to the Hùng kings and their kingdom of Văn Lang.
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Dever, William G., and Douglas L. Esse. "Subsistence, Trade, and Social Change in Early Bronze Age Palestine." Journal of the American Oriental Society 112, no. 3 (July 1992): 495. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/603091.
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Morris, Sarah P. "Dairy Queen. Churns and milk products in the Aegean Bronze Age." Opuscula. Annual of the Swedish Institutes at Athens and Rome 7 (November 2014): 205–22. http://dx.doi.org/10.30549/opathrom-07-12.
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This article assembles examples of an unusual vessel found in domestic contexts of the Early Bronze Age around the Aegean and in the Eastern Mediterranean. Identified as a “barrel vessel” by the excavators of Troy, Lesbos (Thermi), Lemnos (Poliochni), and various sites in the Chalkidike, the shape finds its best parallels in containers identified as churns in the Chalcolithic Levant, and related vessels from the Eneolithic Balkans. Levantine parallels also exist in miniature form, as in the Aegean at Troy, Thermi, and Poliochni, and appear as part of votive figures in the Near East. My interpretation of their use and development will consider how they compare to similar shapes in the archaeological record, especially in Aegean prehistory, and what possible transregional relationships they may express along with their specific function as household processing vessels for dairy products during the third millennium BC.
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Leighton, Robert. "Rock-cut Chamber Tombs and the Reproduction of Locality in Later Sicilian Prehistory." Cambridge Archaeological Journal 30, no. 2 (December 9, 2019): 295–311. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0959774319000635.
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This article explores the archaeology of place and memory from the standpoint of research on large cemeteries of chamber tombs cut out of the rock in southern Sicily. Burials of this kind were integral to the configuration of major settlements dating from the Early Bronze Age to the Iron Age (c. 2200–600 bc) and are a distinctive feature of Sicilian cultural landscapes. Rock-cut tombs at the four key sites of Castelluccio, Thapsos, Pantalica and Cassibile, representing successive phases of the Bronze and Iron Ages, are discussed in relation to terrain and layout. One aim is to identify recurrent principles of spatial organization, while drawing attention to settlements as structured environments with complex ritual geographies. Changes in tomb form are discussed with reference to variations in funerary practices over time. I conclude that cultural traditions in this region were sustained in part by the prominence of funerary architecture and by re-engagement with older sites in later periods through acts of re-use and remembrance.
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Higham, Charles. "The Bronze Age of Southeast Asia: New Insight on Social Change from Ban Non Wat." Cambridge Archaeological Journal 21, no. 3 (September 20, 2011): 365–89. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0959774311000424.
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The expansion of copper-base metallurgy in the mainland of Eurasia began in the Near East and ended in Southeast Asia. The recognition of this Southeast Asian metallurgical province followed in the wake of French colonial occupation of Cambodia and Laos in the nineteenth century. Subsequently, most research has concentrated in Thailand, beginning in the 1960s. A sound chronology is the prerequisite to identifying both the origins of the Bronze Age, and the social impact that metallurgy may have had on society. This article presents the revolutionary results of excavations at the site of Ban Non Wat in northeast Thailand within the broader cultural context of Southeast Asian prehistory, concluding that the adoption of copper-base metallurgy from the eleventh century BC coincided with the rise of wealthy social aggrandizers.
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Higham, Charles Franklin, Thomas Franklin Higham, and Katerina Douka. "DATING THE BRONZE AGE OF SOUTHEAST ASIA. WHY DOES IT MATTER?" Journal of Indo-Pacific Archaeology 43 (December 19, 2019): 43. http://dx.doi.org/10.7152/jipa.v43i0.15411.
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<p class="BasicParagraph"><em>We have dated human bone, freshwater shell, charcoal and rice grains from key sites in mainland Southeast Asia in order to establish the chronological scaffolding for later prehistory (ca 2500 BC-AD 500). In a recent report on the metal remains from the site of Ban Chiang, however, this chronology has been challenged. Here, we respond to these claims and show that they are unfounded and misleading. We maintain the integrity of the Bayesian-modelled radiocarbon results that identify the arrival of the first rice and millet farmers in mainland Southeast Asia towards the end of the 3rd millennium BC, with the first evidence for the casting of bronze by about 1100 BC. Social change that followed the establishment of metallurgy was rapid and profound. </em></p>
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Pásztor, Emília. "The significance of the Sun, Moon and celestial bodies to societies in the Carpathian basin during the Bronze Age." Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union 5, S260 (January 2009): 127–34. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s1743921311002213.
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AbstractCelestial events often exerted a great or even decisive influence on the life of ancient communities. They may provide some of the foundations on which an understanding of the deeper meaning of mythologies, religious systems and even folk tales can be based. These influences are reflected and may be detected in the archaeological material as well. There is good evidence that celestial (especially solar and perhaps lunar) phenomena played a particularly important rôle in the worldview of prehistoric Europe. To reveal the social and ideational significance of concepts relating to the celestial bodies in the prehistory of the Carpathian Basin, complex investigations on orientations of houses and graves, prestige archaeological finds and iconography have been accomplished. The results indicate ideological and/or social changes, which developed into a likely organized ideological system in large part of Central Europe including the Carpathian Basin by the Late Bronze Age. It might also be the first period in prehistory when people became really interested in celestial phenomena.
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Foulds, Elizabeth. "Personal ornaments in prehistory: an exploration of body augmentation from the Palaeolithic to the Early Bronze Age." Archaeological Journal 177, no. 2 (March 16, 2020): 476–77. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00665983.2020.1736825.
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Jennifer M. Webb and David Frankel. "Cultural Regionalism and Divergent Social Trajectories in Early Bronze Age Cyprus." American Journal of Archaeology 117, no. 1 (2013): 59. http://dx.doi.org/10.3764/aja.117.1.0059.
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Rosen, Arlene Miller. "The Social Response to Environmental Change in Early Bronze Age Canaan." Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 14, no. 1 (March 1995): 26–44. http://dx.doi.org/10.1006/jaar.1995.1002.
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Cheung, Christina, Zhichun Jing, Jigen Tang, and Michael P. Richards. "Social dynamics in early Bronze Age China: A multi-isotope approach." Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 16 (December 2017): 90–101. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jasrep.2017.09.022.
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Cassidy, Lara M., Rui Martiniano, Eileen M. Murphy, Matthew D. Teasdale, James Mallory, Barrie Hartwell, and Daniel G. Bradley. "Neolithic and Bronze Age migration to Ireland and establishment of the insular Atlantic genome." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113, no. 2 (December 28, 2015): 368–73. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1518445113.
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The Neolithic and Bronze Age transitions were profound cultural shifts catalyzed in parts of Europe by migrations, first of early farmers from the Near East and then Bronze Age herders from the Pontic Steppe. However, a decades-long, unresolved controversy is whether population change or cultural adoption occurred at the Atlantic edge, within the British Isles. We address this issue by using the first whole genome data from prehistoric Irish individuals. A Neolithic woman (3343–3020 cal BC) from a megalithic burial (10.3× coverage) possessed a genome of predominantly Near Eastern origin. She had some hunter–gatherer ancestry but belonged to a population of large effective size, suggesting a substantial influx of early farmers to the island. Three Bronze Age individuals from Rathlin Island (2026–1534 cal BC), including one high coverage (10.5×) genome, showed substantial Steppe genetic heritage indicating that the European population upheavals of the third millennium manifested all of the way from southern Siberia to the western ocean. This turnover invites the possibility of accompanying introduction of Indo-European, perhaps early Celtic, language. Irish Bronze Age haplotypic similarity is strongest within modern Irish, Scottish, and Welsh populations, and several important genetic variants that today show maximal or very high frequencies in Ireland appear at this horizon. These include those coding for lactase persistence, blue eye color, Y chromosome R1b haplotypes, and the hemochromatosis C282Y allele; to our knowledge, the first detection of a known Mendelian disease variant in prehistory. These findings together suggest the establishment of central attributes of the Irish genome 4,000 y ago.