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This book focuses on second half of the twentieth century, for strange things have been happening in the church. It…
aim is to show something of the origins and use of the vestments themselves, and to traces the development of their decoration in the context of the arts.
Techno-logic & Technology: A Paleo-history of Knapped Lithic Objects
By Éric Boëda. 2023
Techno-logic & Technology is an ambitious effort to develop a new framework for studying the development of stone tool technology, with…
the goal of integrating humanity’s earliest and longest-lasting technology into a comprehensive questioning of the interaction between humanity and the material world. Michael Chazan provides a translation of Éric Boëda's authoritative work Techno-logique and Technologie, which draws on the latter's career of research on stone tool assemblages from archaeological sites in Europe, the Middle East, China, and South America, together with a theoretical apparatus influenced by the work of Gilbert Simondon. This book presents a major challenge to all archaeologists studying ancient technology to reconsider how they think about artifacts and how to approach the question of progress through time in human technology. Lithic analysis is a highly empirical field of study that rarely has an impact on issues of broad theoretical interest, and Boëda’s book is a welcome exception. As well as providing contextualising information within the text, the translator Michael Chazan, himself a Paleolithic archaeologist specializing in stone tool technology, includes an interview with the author to help equip the reader to engage with this challenging text. Chiming with the growth of interest in the work of Gilbert Simondon in the English-speaking world, this book is an important resource for Palaeolithic archaeologists and lithic specialists. It will also be of interest to researchers in material culture studies, technology studies, and human evolution.
The Aztec Economy (Elements in Ancient and Pre-modern Economies)
By Frances F. Berdan. 2023
The Aztec Economy provides a synthesis and updated examination of the Aztec economy (1325–1521 AD). It is organized around seven…
components that recur with other Elements in this series: historic and geographic background, domestic economy, institutional economy, specialization, forms of distribution and commercialization, economic development, and future directions. The Aztec world was complex, hierarchical, and multifaceted, and was in a constant state of demographic growth, recoveries from natural disasters, political alignments and realignments, and aggressive military engagements. The economy was likewise complex and dynamic, and characterized by intensive agriculture, exploitation of non-agricultural resources, utilitarian and luxury manufacturing, wide-scale specialization, merchants, markets, commodity monies, and tribute systems.
X Marks the Spot: The Story of Archaeology in Eight Extraordinary Discoveries
By Michael Scott. 2023
'If you love Indiana Jones, this is the real thing' DAN SNOW'A thrilling investigation' SUZANNAH LIPSCOMB'Alive with the spirit of…
adventure' SIR RANULPH FIENNESThrough eight sensational stories of discovery, Professor Michael Scott traces the evolution of modern archaeology from colonial expeditions to today's cutting-edge digs, unearthing traps, curses and buried treasure along the way. We uncover why different periods and places have caught our attention and imaginations at different times. We meet the characters, some celebrated and some forgotten, who found world-famous discoveries like the Rosetta Stone, the Terracotta Warriors and Machu Picchu. We investigate ancient human footprints, stunning shipwrecks, mythical princesses and surprising rituals as keyholes to the wonders of past civilisations. And we unravel how archaeological finds have often become emblems of modern fascinations and dilemmas.Crossing millions of years, trekking from the jungles of South America to the frozen highlands of Central Asia, X Marks the Spot reveals how much the discovery of our past is intertwined with the concerns of our present and why X never, ever marks the spot.'Fascinating' GREG JENNER'An essential read for anyone with even a fleeting interest in exploring the past' JANINA RAMIREZ
X Marks the Spot: The Story of Archaeology in Eight Extraordinary Discoveries
By Michael Scott. 2023
'If you love Indiana Jones, this is the real thing' DAN SNOW'A thrilling investigation' SUZANNAH LIPSCOMB'Alive with the spirit of…
adventure' SIR RANULPH FIENNESThrough eight sensational stories of discovery, Professor Michael Scott traces the evolution of modern archaeology from colonial expeditions to today's cutting-edge digs, unearthing traps, curses and buried treasure along the way. We uncover why different periods and places have caught our attention and imaginations at different times. We meet the characters, some celebrated and some forgotten, who found world-famous discoveries like the Rosetta Stone, the Terracotta Warriors and Machu Picchu. We investigate ancient human footprints, stunning shipwrecks, mythical princesses and surprising rituals as keyholes to the wonders of past civilisations. And we unravel how archaeological finds have often become emblems of modern fascinations and dilemmas.Crossing millions of years, trekking from the jungles of South America to the frozen highlands of Central Asia, X Marks the Spot reveals how much the discovery of our past is intertwined with the concerns of our present and why X never, ever marks the spot.'Fascinating' GREG JENNER'An essential read for anyone with even a fleeting interest in exploring the past' JANINA RAMIREZ
X Marks the Spot: The Story of Archaeology in Eight Extraordinary Discoveries
By Michael Scott. 2023
A thrilling and adventurous new history of discovery that takes us on a global tour of the most fascinating archaeological…
finds of all time.Uncovering the physical remains of our past is a quintessential human itch; the pursuit of every society from the ancients through to today. But the stories behind archaeological exploration and discovery - what we look for when, what we end up finding, and what we then do with it - tell us as much about ourselves today as they do about the past.Through eight sensational stories of discovery, Professor Michael Scott traces the evolution of modern archaeology from colonial expeditions to today's cutting-edge digs, unearthing traps, curses and buried treasure along the way. We uncover why different periods and places have caught our attention and imaginations at different times. We meet the characters, some celebrated and some forgotten, who found world-famous discoveries like the Rosetta Stone, the Terracotta Warriors and Machu Picchu. We investigate ancient human footprints, stunning shipwrecks, mythical princesses and surprising rituals as keyholes to the wonders of past civilisations. And we unravel how archaeological finds have often become emblems of modern fascinations and dilemmas.Crossing millions of years, trekking from the jungles of South America to the frozen highlands of Central Asia, X Marks the Spot reveals how much the discovery of our past is intertwined with the concerns of our present and why X never, ever marks the spot.'If you love Indiana Jones, this is the real thing. Michael Scott celebrates the fusion of scholarship and adventure in a book full of both.' DAN SNOW(P) 2023 Hodder & Stoughton Limited
The Materiality of Numbers: Emergence and Elaboration from Prehistory to Present
By Karenleigh A. Overmann. 2023
This is a book about numbers – what they are as concepts and how and why they originate – as…
viewed through the material devices used to represent and manipulate them. Fingers, tallies, tokens, and written notations, invented in both ancestral and contemporary societies, explain what numbers are, why they are the way they are, and how we get them. Overmann is the first to explore how material devices contribute to numerical thinking, initially by helping us to visualize and manipulate the perceptual experience of quantity that we share with other species. She explores how and why numbers are conceptualized and then elaborated, as well as the central role that material objects play in both processes. Overmann's volume thus offers a view of numerical cognition that is based on an alternative set of assumptions about numbers, their material component, and the nature of the human mind and thinking.
Archaeology of Louisiana: A Novel
By Mark A. Rees. 2010
Archaeology of Louisiana provides a groundbreaking and up-to-date overview of archaeology in the Bayou State, including a thorough analysis of…
the cultures, communities, and people of Louisiana from the Native Americans of 13,000 years ago to the modern historical archaeology of New Orleans. With eighteen chapters and twenty-seven distinguished contributors, Archaeology of Louisiana brings together the studies of some of the most respected archaeologists currently working in the state, collecting in a single volume a range of methods and theories to offer a comprehensive understanding of the latest archaeological findings. In the past two decades alone, much new data has transformed our knowledge of Louisiana’s history. This collection, accordingly, presents fresh perspectives based on current information, such as the discovery that Native Americans in Louisiana constructed some of the earliest-known monumental architecture in the world—extensive earthen mounds—during the Middle Archaic period (6000–2000 B.C.) Other contributors consider a variety of subjects, such as the development of complex societies without agriculture, underwater archaeology, the partnering of archaeologists with the Caddo Nation and descendant communities, and recent research in historical archaeology and cultural resource management that promises to transform our current appreciation of colonial Spanish, French, Creole, and African American experiences in the Lower Mississippi Valley. Accessible and engaging, Archaeology of Louisiana provides a complete and current archaeological reference to the state’s unique heritage and history.
The Caddos and Their Ancestors: Archaeology and the Native People of Northwest Louisiana
By Jeffrey S. Girard. 2018
Taking an archaeological perspective on the past, Jeffrey S. Girard traces native human habitation in northwest Louisiana from the end…
of the last Ice Age, through the formation of the Caddo culture in the tenth century BCE, to the early nineteenth century. Employing the results of recent scientific investigations, The Caddos and Their Ancestors depicts a distinct and dynamic population spanning from precolonial times to the dawn of the modern era.Girard grounds his research in the material evidence that defined Caddo culture long before the appearance of Europeans in the late seventeenth century. Reliance solely on documented observations by explorers and missionaries—which often reflect a Native American population with a static past—propagates an incomplete account of history. By using specific archaeological techniques, Girard reveals how the Caddos altered their lives to cope with ever-changing physical and social environments across thousands of years. This illuminating approach contextualizes the remnants of houses, mounds, burials, tools, ornaments, and food found at Native American sites in northwest Louisiana. Through ample descriptions and illustrations of these archaeological finds, Girard deepens understanding of the social organization, technology, settlement, art, and worldviews of this resilient society. This long-overdue examination of an often-overlooked cultural force provides a thorough yet concise history of the 14,000 years the Caddo people and their predecessors survived and thrived in what is now Louisiana.
The History of Chinese Ceramics (China Academic Library)
By Lili Fang. 2023
Adopting the perspective of anthropology of art and combining it with global academic insights, this book helps the readers to…
recognize that “history is, in great measure, the record of human activity which spreads from the local to the regional, from the regional to the global, and from the global to the universal.” Readers will learn that China was not only the first country to create porcelain, but also the first to export it to the world, both the products and its techniques. Therefore, the history of Chinese ceramics reflects the history of Chinese foreign trade on the one hand and depicts the expansion of Chinese ceramic techniques and cultures on the other. In addition to ceramics types, molds, decoration, and techniques, the book analyzes the spiritual impacts and aesthetic conceptions embodied in the utensils of daily use by the Chinese literati. Therefore, it reaches the conclusion that ideological systems and not technological systems are what bring about social revolutions. In addition, the book is richly illustrated with pictures of earthenware and finely glazed pieces from later periods.
The History of Chinese Ceramics (China Academic Library)
By Lili Fang. 2023
Adopting the perspective of anthropology of art and combining it with global academic insights, this book helps the readers to…
recognize that “history is, in great measure, the record of human activity which spreads from the local to the regional, from the regional to the global, and from the global to the universal.” Readers will learn that China was not only the first country to create porcelain, but also the first to export it to the world, both the products and its techniques. Therefore, the history of Chinese ceramics reflects the history of Chinese foreign trade on the one hand and depicts the expansion of Chinese ceramic techniques and cultures on the other. In addition to ceramics types, molds, decoration, and techniques, the book analyzes the spiritual impacts and aesthetic conceptions embodied in the utensils of daily use by the Chinese literati. Therefore, it reaches the conclusion that ideological systems and not technological systems are what bring about social revolutions. In addition, the book is richly illustrated with pictures of earthenware and finely glazed pieces from later periods.
Pushing Boundaries in Southwestern Archaeology: Chronometry, Collections, and Contexts (Proceedings of SW Symposium)
By Stephen E. Nash, Erin Baxter. 2022
Pushing Boundaries in Southwestern Archaeology draws together the proceedings from the sixteenth biennial Southwest Symposium. In exploring the conference theme,…
contributors consider topics ranging from the resuscitation of archaeomagnetic dating to the issue of Athapaskan origins, from collections-based studies of social identity, foodways, and obsidian trade to the origins of a rock art tradition and the challenges of a deeply buried archaeological record. The first of the volume’s four sections examines the status, history, and prospects of Bears Ears National Monument, the broader regulatory and political boundaries that complicate the nature and integrity of the archaeological record, and the cultural contexts and legal stakes of archaeological inquiry. The second section focuses on chronological “big data” in the context of pre-Columbian history and the potential and limits of what can be empirically derived from chronometric analysis of the past. The chapters in the third section advocate for advancing collections-based research, focusing on the vast and often untapped research potential of archives, previously excavated museum collections, and legacy data. The final section examines the permeable boundaries involved in Plains-Pueblo interactions, obvious in the archaeological record but long in need of analysis, interpretation, and explanation. Contributors: James R. Allison, Erin Baxter, Benjamin A. Bellorado, Katelyn J. Bishop, Eric Blinman, J. Royce Cox, J. Andrew Darling, Kaitlyn E. Davis, William H. Doelle, B. Sunday Eiselt, Leigh Anne Ellison, Josh Ewing, Samantha G. Fladd, Gary M. Feinman, Jeffrey R. Ferguson, Severin Fowles, Willie Grayeyes, Matthew Guebard, Saul L. Hedquist, Greg Hodgins, Lucas Hoedl, John W. Ives, Nicholas Kessler, Terry Knight, Michael W. Lindeman, Hannah V. Mattson, Myles R. Miller, Lindsay Montgomery, Stephen E. Nash, Sarah Oas, Jill Onken, Scott G. Ortman, Danielle J. Riebe, John Ruple, Will G. Russell, Octavius Seowtewa, Deni J. Seymour, James M. Vint, Adam S. Watson
Pushing Boundaries in Southwestern Archaeology: Chronometry, Collections, and Contexts (Proceedings of SW Symposium)
By Stephen E. Nash, Erin Baxter. 2022
Pushing Boundaries in Southwestern Archaeology draws together the proceedings from the sixteenth biennial Southwest Symposium. In exploring the conference theme,…
contributors consider topics ranging from the resuscitation of archaeomagnetic dating to the issue of Athapaskan origins, from collections-based studies of social identity, foodways, and obsidian trade to the origins of a rock art tradition and the challenges of a deeply buried archaeological record. The first of the volume’s four sections examines the status, history, and prospects of Bears Ears National Monument, the broader regulatory and political boundaries that complicate the nature and integrity of the archaeological record, and the cultural contexts and legal stakes of archaeological inquiry. The second section focuses on chronological “big data” in the context of pre-Columbian history and the potential and limits of what can be empirically derived from chronometric analysis of the past. The chapters in the third section advocate for advancing collections-based research, focusing on the vast and often untapped research potential of archives, previously excavated museum collections, and legacy data. The final section examines the permeable boundaries involved in Plains-Pueblo interactions, obvious in the archaeological record but long in need of analysis, interpretation, and explanation. Contributors: James R. Allison, Erin Baxter, Benjamin A. Bellorado, Katelyn J. Bishop, Eric Blinman, J. Royce Cox, J. Andrew Darling, Kaitlyn E. Davis, William H. Doelle, B. Sunday Eiselt, Leigh Anne Ellison, Josh Ewing, Samantha G. Fladd, Gary M. Feinman, Jeffrey R. Ferguson, Severin Fowles, Willie Grayeyes, Matthew Guebard, Saul L. Hedquist, Greg Hodgins, Lucas Hoedl, John W. Ives, Nicholas Kessler, Terry Knight, Michael W. Lindeman, Hannah V. Mattson, Myles R. Miller, Lindsay Montgomery, Stephen E. Nash, Sarah Oas, Jill Onken, Scott G. Ortman, Danielle J. Riebe, John Ruple, Will G. Russell, Octavius Seowtewa, Deni J. Seymour, James M. Vint, Adam S. Watson
European Memory in Populism: Representations of Self and Other (Critical Heritages of Europe)
By Ayhan Kaya, Chiara De Cesari. 2020
European Memory in Populism explores the links between memory and populism in contemporary Europe. Focusing on circulating ideas of memory,…
especially European memory, in contemporary populist discourses, the book also analyses populist ideas in sites and practices of remembrance that usually tend to go unnoticed. More broadly, the theoretical heart of the book reflects upon the similarities, differences, and slippages between memory, populism, nationalism, and cultural racism and the ways in which social memory contributes to give substance to various ideas of what constitutes the ‘people’ in populist discourse and beyond. Bringing together a group of political scientists, anthropologists, and cultural and memory studies scholars, the book illuminates the relationship between memory and populism from different angles and in different contexts. The contributors to the volume discuss dominant notions of European heritage that circulate in the public sphere and in political discourse, and consider how the politics of fear relates to such notions of European heritage and identity across and beyond Europe and the European Union. Ultimately, this volume will shed light on how notions of a shared European heritage and memory can be used not only to include and connect Europeans, but also to exclude some of them. Investigating the ways in which nationalist populist forces mobilize the idea of a shared, homogeneous European civilization, European Memory in Populism will be of interest to scholars and students in the fields of European studies, heritage and memory studies, migration studies, anthropology, political science and sociology. Chapters 1, 4, 6, and 10 of this book are freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-No-Derivatives 4.0 license.
Ancient Greek Housing
By Lisa C. Nevett. 2023
The temples and theatres of the ancient Greek world are widely known, but there is less familiarity with the houses…
in which people lived. In this book, Lisa Nevett provides an accessible introduction to the varied forms of housing found across the Greek world between c. 1000 and 200 BCE. Many houses adopted a courtyard structure which she sets within a broader chronological, geographical and socio-economic context. The book explores how housing shaped - and was shaped by – patterns of domestic life, at Athens and in other urban communities. It also points to a rapid change in the scale, elaboration and layout of the largest houses. This is associated with a shift away from expressing solidarity with peers in the local urban community towards advertising personal status and participation in a network of elite households which stretched across the Mediterranean. Instructors, students and general readers will welcome this stimulating volume.
A Lost Mediterranean Culture: The Giant Statues of Sardinia's Mont'e Prama (Columbiana)
By Faedda, Barbara; Carta, Paolo. 2023
Thousands of shattered limestone pieces came to light in 1974 at the Mont’e Prama site in western Sardinia. They have…
been reassembled into dozens of striking, colossal statues that reward close study by archaeologists, historians, conservators, and restorers. The giant statues and the individual tombs in this monumental necropolis—sculpted by a powerful Mediterranean civilization—make Mont’e Prama a uniquely rich representation of a culture’s values and traditions in the Bronze Age and the Iron Age.This is the first English-language book to explore Mont’e Prama’s limestone statues—among the most important archaeological discoveries of the past fifty years and the source of fresh discoveries even today. It is written by the people who are leading the excavation and restoration of these treasures; researching the artifacts and their context; and presenting the eerie faces, towering bodies, and sprawling site to the world. A Lost Mediterranean Culture takes the reader through the details of the various discoveries at Mont’e Prama, recounting the history of scholarship on the artifacts and describing the landscape, the context, and the meticulous restoration efforts. It also addresses the illicit trafficking of Sardinian cultural property.Lavishly illustrated with photographs and other figures that showcase fine details, A Lost Mediterranean Culture offers fresh information for specialists and captivates a wider audience with the beauty of these massive sculptures.
Food Provisioning in Complex Societies: Zooarchaeological Perspectives
By Benjamin S. Arbuckle, Levent Atici. 2022
Through creative combinations of ethnohistoric evidence, iconography, and contextual analysis of faunal remains, this work offers new insight into the…
mechanisms involved in food provisioning for complex societies. Contributors combine zooarchaeological and historical data from global case studies to analyze patterns in centralization and bureaucratic control, asymmetrical access and inequalities, and production-distribution-consumption dynamics of urban food provisioning and animal management. Taking a global perspective and including both prehistoric and historic case studies, the chapters in the volume reflect some of the current best practices in the zooarchaeology of complex societies. Embedding faunal evidence within a broader anthropological explanatory framework and integrating archaeological contexts, historic texts, iconography, and ethnohistorical sources, the book discerns myriad ways that animals are key contributors to, and cocreators of, complex societies in all periods and all places. Chapters cover the diverse sociopolitical and economic roles wild animals played in Bronze Age Turkey; the production and consumption of animal products in medieval Ireland; the importance of belief systems, politics, and cosmologies in Shang Dynasty animal provisioning in the Yellow River Valley; the significance of external trade routes in the kingdom of Aksum (modern Sudan); hunting and animal husbandry at El Zotz; animal economies from two Mississippian period sites; and more. Food Provisioning in Complex Societies provides an optimistic roadmap and heuristic tools to explore the diverse, resilient, and contingent processes involved in food provisioning. The book represents a novel and productive way forward for understanding the unique, yet predictably structured, provisioning systems that emerged in the context of complex societies in all parts of the world. It will be of interest to zooarchaeologists and archaeologists alike. Contributors: Joaquin Arroyo-Cabrales, Fiona Beglane, Roderick Campbell, Kathryn Grossman, Patricia Martinez-Lira, Jacqueline S. Meier, Sarah E. Newman, Terry O'Connor, Tanya M. Peres, Gypsy C. Price, Elizabeth J. Reitz, Kim Shelton, Marcus Winter, Helina S. Woldekiros
War Stories: Reading Plains Indian Biographic Rock Art
By David Kaiser, James D. Keyser. 2023
Plains Indian biographic rock art can be “read” by those knowledgeable in its lexicon. Presented is a lexicon of imagery,…
conventions, and symbols used by Plains Indians to communicate their warfare and social narratives. The reader is introduced to Plains Indian “warrior” art in all media, biographic art as picture writing is explained, and the lexicon is described, providing a pictographic “dictionary,” and explains conventions and connotations. Finally, it illustrates four key examples of how these narratives are read by the observer. Familiarity with the lexicon will enable interested scholars and laypersons to understand what are otherwise enigmatic rock art drawings found from Calgary, Alberta through ten U.S. states, and into the Mexican state of Coahuila.
Iconicity of the Uto-Aztecans: Snake Anthropomorphy in the Great Basin, the American Southwest and Mesoamerica
By Tirtha Prasad Mukhopadhyay, Alan Philip Garfinkel. 2023
Uto-Aztecan iconic practices are primarily conditioned by the consciousness of the snake as a death-dealing power, and as such, an…
animal that displays the deepest fears and anxieties of the individual. The attempt to study a snake simulacrum thus constitutes the basic objective of this volume. A long, all-embracing iconicity of snakes and related snake motifs are evident in different cultural expressions ranging from rock art templates to other cultural artifacts like basketry, pottery, temple architecture and sculptural motifs. Uto-Aztecan iconography demonstrates a symbolic memorial order of emotional valences, as well as the negotiations with death and a belief in rebirth, just as the skin shedding snake reptile manifests in its life cycle.
The Palgrave Handbook of Social Fieldwork
By Nasir Uddin, Alak Paul. 2023
This handbook offers epistemologically and ontologically important personal accounts of academic and professional researchers having long-term intensive, comprehensive and ethnographic…
fieldwork in various social settings and versatile regional contexts across the globe. The accounts are cross-disciplinary including anthropology, sociology, geography, political sciences, gender studies, forestry and environmental studies, economics, and international relations. They are also trans-regional, covering the globe including South Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and North America. The book offers a comprehensive portrait of multifaceted challenges that social researchers experience while doing fieldwork in various social settings. The accounts provide both challenges of doing fieldwork in the 21st century and the ways how to address/redress them in the field by complying with the codes of ethics, and the politics of fieldwork. Readers will benefit from the handbook by understanding methodological issues from both disciplinary relevance and regional specificity across time and spaces.