Nazarbayev University
Sociology and Anthropology
Accurate interpretation of the cause and timing of bone breakage is essential for understanding the archaeological record. However, many variables potentially influencing break morphology have yet to be systematically explored. Focusing... more
Accurate interpretation of the cause and timing of bone breakage is essential for understanding the archaeological record. However, many variables potentially influencing break morphology have yet to be systematically explored. Focusing primarily on hammerstone breakage, we introduce new analytical methods for comparing fracture angles using the absolute values of the angle from 90°. We systematically control for intrinsic variables such as taxon, skeletal element, limb portion and skeletal age. We also compare experimental assemblages of femora broken by hammerstone and spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta). We show that fracture angles are influenced by breakage plane, skeletal element and limb portion. While the latter two have been suggested before, this is the first time the differences have been quantified. We suggest that researchers stratify their assemblages by these variables if they are using fracture angles in analyses. At the assemblage level, hyenas created more oblique fracture angles on oblique breaks than did hammerstones.
Paleoanthropology Society Meetings Poster: The Lower Paleolithic site of Dmanisi is known for its well preserved fossil fauna, including specimens attributed to Homo erectus, and associated lithic material. This study examines the... more
Paleoanthropology Society Meetings Poster: The Lower Paleolithic site of Dmanisi is known for its well preserved fossil fauna, including specimens attributed to Homo erectus, and associated lithic material. This study examines the depositional context of this archaeological material and the implications for carnivore-hominin interaction during the initial diffusion of hominins outside of Africa. Through studying bone orientations, articulations, and spatial distributions, we found that the majority of archaeological material within the excavation unit of Block 2 is either in or very near its original depositional location, which supplements previous taphonomic and geologic interpretations (Tappen et al., 2007). The distributions of stone and bone differ based on stratigraphic layer. Taphonomic sub-assemblages of bone (e.g. cut-marked bone, tooth-marked bone, etc.) follow the overall distribution of the faunal material, indicating no spatially distinct activity areas, with the exception of a large concentration of coprolites in one relatively bone free area.
Textiles are powerful indicators of technology and contact, as the authors show for the peoples of the Bronze Age central Asian steppes. In this case the textiles are mainly missing, but have left their imprints on the surface of the... more
Textiles are powerful indicators of technology and contact, as the authors show for the peoples of the Bronze Age central Asian steppes. In this case the textiles are mainly missing, but have left their imprints on the surface of the inside of pots, captured when otherwise redundant cloths were used to paddle or jacket the clay before hardening and firing. A good supply of old cloths seems to have been part of potters’ equipment and some were used several times. The authors analyse and date the fibres and weaves to give an indication of changing cultural context through the Bronze Age.
- by Michael D Frachetti and +1
- •
"Archaeological research in Central Eurasia is exposing unprecedented scales of trans-regional interaction and technology transfer between East Asia and southwest Asia deep into the prehistoric past. This article presents a new... more
"Archaeological research in Central Eurasia is exposing unprecedented scales of trans-regional interaction and technology transfer between East Asia and southwest Asia deep into the prehistoric past. This article presents a new archaeobotanical analysis from pastoralist campsites in the mountain and desert regions of Central Eurasia that documents the oldest known evidence for domesticated grains and farming among seasonally mobile herders. Carbonized grains from the sites of Tasbas and Begash illustrate the first transmission of southwest Asian and East Asian domesticated grains into the mountains of Inner Asia in the early third millennium BC. By the middle second millennium BC, seasonal camps in the mountains and deserts illustrate that Eurasian herders incorporated the cultivation of millet, wheat, barley and legumes into their subsistence strategy. These findings push back the chronology for domesticated plant use among Central Eurasian pastoralists by approximately 2000 years. Given the geography, chronology and seed morphology of these data, we argue that mobile pastoralists were key agents in the spread of crop repertoires and the transformation of agricultural economies across Asia from the third to the second millennium BC."
Archaeological research in Central Eurasia is exposing unprecedented scales of trans-regional interaction and technology transfer between East Asia and southwest Asia deep into the prehistoric past. This article presents a new... more
Archaeological research in Central Eurasia is exposing unprecedented scales
of trans-regional interaction and technology transfer between East Asia and
southwest Asia deep into the prehistoric past. This article presents a new
archaeobotanical analysis from pastoralist campsites in the mountain and
desert regions of Central Eurasia that documents the oldest known evidence
for domesticated grains and farming among seasonally mobile herders.
Carbonized grains from the sites of Tasbas and Begash illustrate the first transmission
of southwest Asian and East Asian domesticated grains into the
mountains of Inner Asia in the early third millennium BC. By the middle
second millennium BC, seasonal camps in the mountains and deserts illustrate
that Eurasian herders incorporated the cultivation of millet, wheat, barley
and legumes into their subsistence strategy. These findings push back the
chronology for domesticated plant use among Central Eurasian pastoralists
by approximately 2000 years. Given the geography, chronology and seed
morphology of these data, we argue that mobile pastoralists were key agents
in the spread of crop repertoires and the transformation of agricultural
economies across Asia from the third to the second millennium BC.
of trans-regional interaction and technology transfer between East Asia and
southwest Asia deep into the prehistoric past. This article presents a new
archaeobotanical analysis from pastoralist campsites in the mountain and
desert regions of Central Eurasia that documents the oldest known evidence
for domesticated grains and farming among seasonally mobile herders.
Carbonized grains from the sites of Tasbas and Begash illustrate the first transmission
of southwest Asian and East Asian domesticated grains into the
mountains of Inner Asia in the early third millennium BC. By the middle
second millennium BC, seasonal camps in the mountains and deserts illustrate
that Eurasian herders incorporated the cultivation of millet, wheat, barley
and legumes into their subsistence strategy. These findings push back the
chronology for domesticated plant use among Central Eurasian pastoralists
by approximately 2000 years. Given the geography, chronology and seed
morphology of these data, we argue that mobile pastoralists were key agents
in the spread of crop repertoires and the transformation of agricultural
economies across Asia from the third to the second millennium BC.
- by Lynne M. Rouse and +3
- •
This article presents new archaeological research on the ritual and domestic life of pastoralists at the Bronze Age campsite Tasbas, Kazakhstan. We reconstruct the hitherto unrecorded economy of high mountain pastoralists who lived at the... more
This article presents new archaeological research on the ritual and domestic life of pastoralists at the Bronze Age campsite Tasbas, Kazakhstan. We reconstruct the hitherto unrecorded economy of high mountain pastoralists who lived at the site from the mid-3rd to early 1st millennium B.C. We argue that within the broad dynamics of mountain pastoralism there is local variability as shown through multi-season residence, farming, and craft production. In bringing together multiple data sets to address how the site was used we 1) show that ceramics were locally produced with similar manufacture technology across eight centuries — which breaks significantly from the canonical cultural history and large-scale migration paradigms that have defined the regional archaeology for decades; 2) identify a new tradition of cremation ritual (3rd millennium B.C.), and; 3) present the earliest evidence (3rd millennium B.C.) for the local use of domesticated grains and then farming (2nd millennium B.C.) in northern Central Asia. We provide a unique case study to bear on debates concerning the relationship between long-term regional stability and technological innovations among early central Eurasian pastoralists.
Edited by P. Nick Kardulias. Pp. xviii + 291, figs. 37. University Press of Colorado, Boulder 2015. $70. ISBN 978-1-60732-342-6. This volume offers readers a broad collection of works that detail the complexity and variation of herding... more
Edited by P. Nick Kardulias. Pp. xviii + 291, figs. 37. University Press of Colorado, Boulder 2015. $70. ISBN 978-1-60732-342-6. This volume offers readers a broad collection of works that detail the complexity and variation of herding and animal husbandry systems across the globe. The book is dedicated to the memory of Professor Mark Shutes, a key organizer and contributor of the volume who passed during the early phases of its planning. The original idea for the volume was developed in 1999 (from papers presented at the Annual Meeting of the Central States Anthropological Society, and the Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association); the volume came to fruition with contributions from several new authors in 2015. The book uses historical, archaeological, and ethnographic approaches to identify shared and distinctive characteristics of societies that make a living from domesticated animals. Following Kardulias' introduction, which summarizes the history of studies in pastoralism since the 1970s and the key aims and major themes of the volume, are five chapters covering Central Asia and five chapters on Africa, North America, and Europe. The closing chapter (Hall) outlines where the book might contribute to the field of pastoral studies (e.g., world-systems analysis), along with suggestions for future studies on the role of pastoralists in shaping macro-social change. The Central Asian contributions include archaeological, ethnographic, and ethnoarchaeological approaches to Iron Age Kazakhstan (Chang), Asia in general (Kradin), modern-day Pakistan (Sidky), Bronze/Iron Age Mongolia (Johannesson), and medieval Uzbekistan (Negus Cleary). Ensuing chapters focus on relatively modern societies of Cameroon (Moritz), North America (Kuznar), Ireland (Shutes), and Greece (Kardulias). Foremost, the volume aims to identify unifying features of herd-oriented economies to be used as a basis for future comparative studies. The authors provide detailed ethnographic, archaeological, and historical accounts of different economic strategies that pastoralists perform, as well as how they manage their herds, organize labor, divide resources, and shape social relationships. In doing so, they demonstrate the complexity of pastoral systems across the globe. Authors outline the activities of specialized mobile herders (Kradin), nomadic polities (Johannesson), groups engaged in mixed subsistence and seasonal transhumance (Sidky), sedentary specialized dairy farmers (Shutes), remote island herders (Kardulias), and part-time ranchers (Kuznar). The wide variety in topics hints at the ambitious nature of the book, which aims to locate core elements of this complex economic strategy. The papers in the volume examine pastoralism within an ecological framework and consider both the biological and cultural elements that contribute to the development of pastoral systems and group organization. Shutes emphasizes the importance of flexibility in social relationships where an ongoing need for resource and labor sharing in specialized dairy farming ensures group solidarity. Several other papers consider how pastoralists combine economic strategies to minimize risk in the face of larger social processes and pressures. Whether this economic flexibility is brought about through ecological stress (Sidky), political corruption (Moritz), or colonial interference (Kuznar), the authors collectively adopt a fairly positive tone for the future survival of pastoralism, even if the changes it undergoes in the face of external forces can be severe and render it almost unrecognizable in a contemporary world. Other contributors provide examples of how mobile pastoral societies convey power and status through materiality and monumentality. Johannesson locates political maneuvering efforts of nomadic powers in Mongolia through the changing placement and construction of burial forms through time. Negus Cleary surveys the spatial patterning of fortified sites of ancient Uzbekistan and suggests some were the work of nomadic groups.
Archaeologists collaborating with material scientists at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) as part of the Making of Ancient Eurasia (MAE) Project have developed formal methodological standards for the assemblage-based digital radiographic... more
Archaeologists collaborating with material scientists at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) as part of the Making of Ancient Eurasia (MAE) Project have developed formal methodological standards for the assemblage-based digital radiographic (DR) analysis of archaeological pottery. While analog radiography of pottery (X-radiography, Xeroradiography, etc.) has functioned as a common disciplinary tool for some time, inaccessibility, obsolescence, and significantly enhanced functionality have made DR instrumen-tation increasingly attractive and vital. This article presents the theoretical underpinnings, technique development, and resultant protocols that allow digital radiography to analyze very large assemblages and provide quantitative data sets that act as true counterparts to geochemical and mineralogical ones. As a technique of structural pottery evaluation, DR is particularly suited to the analysis of ceramic paste preparation and vessel formation, providing lines of evidence that can flesh out neglected portions of the chaîne op eratoire, augment existing geochemical or typological classifications, and help more deeply characterize various potting traditions. Such datasets are most useful to scholars interested in harnessing the ability of the pottery " life cycle " to shed light on economic life, learning frameworks, and human social differences and group identities. The technical capacities and analytical potential of DR are demonstrated through several test analyses of ancient Chinese pottery, to be followed by more extensive case studies in draft. Prospects for closely related, three-dimensional X-ray computed tomographic approaches are also discussed.
Adunqiaolu Beijing 0 km 2000 N Bronze Age social and cultural interconnec-tions across the Eurasian steppe are the subject of much current debate. A particularly significant place is occupied by the Andronovo Culture or family of... more
Adunqiaolu Beijing 0 km 2000 N Bronze Age social and cultural interconnec-tions across the Eurasian steppe are the subject of much current debate. A particularly significant place is occupied by the Andronovo Culture or family of cultures. Important new data document the most easterly extension of Eurasian Bronze Age sites of Andronovo affinity into western China. Findings from the site of Adunqiaolu in Xinjiang and a new series of radiocarbon dates challenge existing models of eastward cultural dispersion, and demonstrate the need to reconsider the older chronologies and migration theories. The site is well preserved and offers robust potential for deeper study of the Andronovo culture complex, particularly in the eastern mountain regions.
Adunqiaolu Beijing 0 km 2000 N Bronze Age social and cultural interconnec-tions across the Eurasian steppe are the subject of much current debate. A particularly significant place is occupied by the Andronovo Culture or family of... more
Adunqiaolu Beijing 0 km 2000 N Bronze Age social and cultural interconnec-tions across the Eurasian steppe are the subject of much current debate. A particularly significant place is occupied by the Andronovo Culture or family of cultures. Important new data document the most easterly extension of Eurasian Bronze Age sites of Andronovo affinity into western China. Findings from the site of Adunqiaolu in Xinjiang and a new series of radiocarbon dates challenge existing models of eastward cultural dispersion, and demonstrate the need to reconsider the older chronologies and migration theories. The site is well preserved and offers robust potential for deeper study of the Andronovo culture complex, particularly in the eastern mountain regions.
- by Alison Betts and +2
- •
62.8 million researchers use this site every month. Ads help cover our server costs.