bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The emergence of Bronze Age chariots in eastern Europe
Authors: Kuznetsov P.F.
Published: January 2015

The author presents new radiocarbon dates for chariot burials found in the region between Europe and the Urals, showing them to belong to the twentieth-eighteenth centuries BCE. These early dates, which pre-empt the appearance of the war chariot in the Near East, are transforming the ancient history of Eurasia and the early Mediterranean civilisations, pointing to the Volga-Ural area as an important centre of innovation for early Europe.
The first specialised copper industry in the Iberian peninsula: Cabezo Juré (2900-2200 BC)
Authors: Nocete F.
Published: January 2015

A new research project has revealed a fully specialised copper industry in south-west Iberia at the beginning of the third millennium BC. The settlement is rife with hierarchy: on the slopes of the hill copper-workers smelt and cast and have their own residential zone, while an incipient aristocracy occupies a small fortification at the summit and commands all the imports and means of transport. The author sees this social system as endemic to the new industry.
Bones chewed by canids as evidence for human excarnation: a British case study
Authors: Smith Martin
Published: January 2015

Excarnation – the exposure of a corpse for stripping and possible dispersal by birds and animals – is a burial rite known from ethnographic analogy. Detecting its occurrence in the past is another matter. Here the author proposes the marking of bones by dogs and other canids as evidence of excarnation, using a British Neolithic case study.
Evidence for cave marking by Palaeolithic children
Authors: Sharpe Kevin , Van Gelder Leslie
Published: January 2015

Amongst the numerous images found on the walls of Palaeolithic caves, fluted lines, made by fingers dragged through a skin of wet clay remain some of the most intriguing. In their study of images at Rouffignac, the authors undertook experiments with a range of modern subjects who replicated the flutings with their hands. Comparing the dimensions of the experimental flutings with the originals, they conclude that the patterns on the roof of Chamber A1 at Rouffignac were made by the fingers of children aged between 2 and 5 years old. Given the current height of the chamber, such children would have needed to be hoisted aloft by adults. Who knows what lessons in art or ritual were thereby imparted to the young persons…
Tracking animals using strontium isotopes in teeth: the role of fallow deer (Dama dama) in Roman Britain
Authors: Sykes Naomi J. , White Judith , Hayes Tina E. , Palmer Martin R.
Published: January 2015

Using strontium isotope measurements on the teeth of fallow deer found at Fishbourne, the authors argue that these elegant creatures were first introduced into Britain as a gift to the Romanised aristocracy. Kept and bred in a special enclosure at the palace, they provided more than a status symbol and gastronomic treat: the fallow deer was an emblem of Empire.
Figures, figurines and Colin Renfrew
Authors: Klejn Leo S.
Published: January 2015

Are modern artworks really comparable in any serious way to ancient monuments? Has Colin Renfrew changed sides in the conflict of reason with intuition in modern archaeology? Leo Klejn thinks so. Colin Renfrew responds, below.
The Iron Age ritual building at Uppåkra, southern Sweden
Authors: Larsson Lars
Published: January 2015

Six years ago we reported the discovery of a central place at Uppåkra in southern Sweden which promised to be unusually rich and informative (Hårdh 2000). At 40ha it already stood out as the largest concentration of residual phosphate in the whole province of Scania, with surface finds of Roman and late Iron Age metalwork (second-tenth century AD). Following this thorough evaluation, the project moved into its excavation phase which has brought to light several buildings of the first millennium AD, among them one that has proved truly exceptional. Its tall structure and numerous ornamented finds suggest an elaborate timber cult house. This is the first Scandinavian building for which the term ‘temple’ can be justly claimed and it is already sign-posting new directions for the early middle ages in northern Europe.
The world recreated: redating Silbury Hill in its monumental landscape
Authors: Bayliss Alex , McAvoy Fachtna , Whittle Alasdair
Published: January 2015

A classic exposition of the difficulties of dating a major monument and why it matters. Silbury Hill, one of the world's largest prehistoric earth mounds, is too valuable to take apart, so we are reliant on samples taken from tunnels and chance exposures. Presenting a new edition of thirty radiocarbon dates, the authors offer models of short- or long-term construction, and their implications for the ritual landscape of Silbury and Stonehenge. The sequence in which monuments, and bits of monuments, were built gives us the kind and history of societies doing the building. So nothing matters more than the dates…
Grape-pressings from northern Greece: the earliest wine in the Aegean?
Authors: Valamoti S.M. , Mangafa M. , Koukouli-Chrysanthaki Ch. , Malamidou D.
Published: January 2015

Houses burnt down at the Neolithic site of Dikili Tash in northern Greece preserved the remains of wild grapes and figs. The charred shapes showed that there was a pile of grape pips with skins – clear evidence for the extraction of juice. The authors argue that the juice was probably used to make wine – towards the end of the fifth millennium BC the earliest so far from the Aegean. The occupants of the houses also had two-handled cups, providing another clue to consumption of a special kind.
The transition to farming in eastern Africa: new faunal and dating evidence from Wadh Lang'o and Usenge, Kenya
Authors: Lane Paul , Ashley Ceri , Seitsonen Oula , Harvey Paul , Mire Sada , Odede Frederick
Published: January 2015

The exploratory investigation of two sites in Kenya throws new light on the transition from a ‘stone age’ to an ‘iron age’. The model of widespread cultural replacement by Bantu-speaking iron producers is questioned and instead the authors propose a long interaction with regional variations. In matters of lithics, ceramics, hunting, gathering, husbandry and cooking, East African people created local and eclectic packages of change between 1500BC and AD500.
The Aurignacian in the Zagros region: new research at Yafteh Cave, Lorestan, Iran
Authors: Otte M. , Biglari F. , Flas D. , Shidrang S. , Zwyns N. , Mashkour M. , Naderi R. , Mohaseb A. , Hashemi N. , Darvish J. , Radu V.
Published: January 2015

The Yafteh cave in Iran has an intact Aurignacian sequence over 2m deep. First explored by Frank Hole and Kent Flannery in the 1960s, its strata and assemblage are here re-evaluated at first hand by a new international team. The authors show that the assemblage is genuine Aurignacian and dates back to about 35.5K uncal BP. They propose it as emerging locally and even as providing a culture of origin for modern humans in West Asia and Europe.
Networks and nodal points: the emergence of towns in early Viking Age Scandinavia
Authors: Sindbæk Søren M.
Published: January 2015

Did towns return to early medieval Europe through political leadership or economic expansion? This paper turns the spotlight on a particular group of actors, the long-distance traders, and finds that they stimulated proto-towns of a special kind among the Vikings. While social and economic changes, and aristocratic advantage, were widespread, it was the largely self-directed actions of these intrepid merchants which created what the author calls ‘the nodal points.’ One can think of many other periods and parts of the world in which this type of non-political initiative may well have proved pivotal.
Formation and destruction of pastoral and irrigation landscapes on the Mughan Steppe, north-western Iran
Authors: Alizadeh Karim , Ur Jason A.
Published: January 2015

CORONA satellite photography taken in the 1960s continues to reveal buried ancient landscapes and sequences of landscapes – some of them no longer visible. In this new survey of the Mughan Steppe in north-western Iran, the authors map a ‘signature landscape’ belonging to Sasanian irrigators, and discover that the traces of the nomadic peoples that succeeded them also show up on CORONA – in the form of scoops for animal shelters. The remains of these highly significant pastoralists have been virtually obliterated since the CORONA surveys by a new wave of irrigation farming. Such archaeological evaluation of a landscape has grave implications for the heritage of grassland nomads and the appreciation of their impact on history.
An interpretation of the Nebra disc
Authors: Pásztor Emília , Roslund Curt
Published: January 2015

The Nebra disc is one of the most sensational European discoveries of the decade. It appears to carry symbols of the sun, moon and stars wrought in gold on a flat bronze disc just over a foot across (320mm). It is not only very strange, but, famously, appears to be winking, initially raising the suspicion that it may be a hoax. Scholars have, however, claimed it firmly for the Bronze Age, and the debate now moves to the matter of its meaning. Here the authors offer a subtle interpretation that sees it as the shamanistic device of a local warrior society.
Beating ploughshares back into swords: warfare in theLinearbandkeramik
Authors: Golitko Mark , Keeley Lawrence H.
Published: January 2015

Armed with a number of powerful arguments, the authors invite us to face up to the evidence for violence in early Neolithic Europe.Linearbandkeramik(LBK) people first attacked the hunter-gatherers they encountered and then entered a period of increasingly violent warfare against each other, culminating in an intense struggle in the area of central and western Germany. The building of fortifications, physical mutilation and cannibalism, while no doubt enacted with ritual airs, nevertheless had their context and purpose in the slaughter of enemies.
What linked the Bell Beakers in third millennium BC Europe?
Authors: Linden Marc Vander
Published: January 2015

In this important new review the author shows that neither trade nor migration can account for the distribution of Bell Beakers and the associated artefacts and burial practices in Europe. The materials were generally local and rooted in local know-how. However recent stable isotope results show small-scale population changes associated with the arrival of Beaker practice. The distribution of Bell Beakers could thus reflect the movement of marriage partners.
Urbanism on the margins: third millennium BC Al-Rawda in the arid zone of Syria
Authors: Castel Corinne , Peltenburg Edgar
Published: January 2015

The Fertile Crescent of the Ancient Near East is well known for its early cities in irrigated farming regions. Here the authors describe the recent discovery and investigation of a planned, circular, mid/late–third millennium BC city beyond the limit of rain-fed cultivation in the arid zone of inner Syria. Founded on the initiative of an unknown power and served by pastoralists and cultivators, the research at Al-Rawda demonstrates how environmental constraints were overcome in order to establish and sustain new centres in demanding regions at a time of maximum urbanisation.
Ottoman bows – an assessment of draw weight, performance and tactical use
Authors: Karpowicz Adam
Published: January 2015

The Ottoman fighting bow emerged in Europe from a long eastern tradition of using high velocity projectiles to hunt and fight on horseback. The author compares its performance (favourably) with the longbow and explains how the tactics employed with this singular artefact accounted for Ottoman success in battle.
The state of theocracy: defining an early medieval hinterland in Sri Lanka
Authors: Coningham Robin , Gunawardhana Prishanta , Manuel Mark , Adikari Gamini , Katugampola Mangala , Young Ruth , Schmidt Armin , Krishnan K. , Simpson Ian , McDonnell Gerry , Batt Cathy
Published: January 2015

The ancient Sri Lankan city of Anuradhapura is currently the subject of one of the world's largest and most intensive archaeological research projects. Having traced its growth from an Iron Age village to a medieval city, the research team now moves to the task of modelling the surrounding landscape. Three seasons of fieldwork have located numerous sites of which the most prominent in the urban period are monasteries. Here is a clue about how the early urban hinterland was managed which has implications well beyond Sri Lanka.
Defining a culture: the meaning ofHanseaticin medieval Turku
Authors: Immonen Visa
Published: January 2015

This paper explores the influence of merchants operating out of Germany in medieval Turku by comparing the evidence of documentary reports and the quantity and distribution of imported pottery. The documents make it clear that German merchants were present in the town and generally keep themselves aloof from the local citizens. But the pottery tells a different and more subtle story of interaction and involvement in which all parties are potential drivers. The author calls into question the ethnic and exploitative models for a Hansa culture, preferring a post-colonial interpretation that allows us to see the formation of cultures that are hybrid and local in context.
Compound-specific stable carbon isotopic detection of pig product processing in British Late Neolithic pottery
Authors: Mukherjee Anna J. , Berstan Robert , Copley Mark S. , Gibson Alex M. , Evershed Richard P.
Published: January 2015

By extracting lipids from potsherds and determining the δ13C of the most abundant fatty acids, degraded fats from ruminant animals, such as cattle, and non-ruminant animals, such as pigs, can be distinguished. The authors use this phenomenon to investigate Late Neolithic pig exploitation and find that the pig ‘signature’ was more frequently found among residues from Grooved Ware than other prehistoric pottery types.
New finds of Upper Palaeolithic decorative objects from Předmostí, Czech Republic
Authors: Farbstein Rebecca , Svoboda Jiříp
Published: January 2015

Two new examples of decorative art have turned up at the Gravettian site of Předmostí, dating to the twenty-sixth to twenty-fifth millennium BP: rectilinear grid patterns are executed on one side of flat bones, probably of reindeer. The authors speculate that the two pieces may have come from a single larger decorated object. The grids themselves join a growing repertoire of patterns known from Upper Palaeolithic society, but their role remains enigmatic: counting, calendars or ornament? Art or science?
Rethinking Erlitou: legend, history and Chinese archaeology
Authors: Liu Li , Xu Hong
Published: January 2015

Erlitou is one of the most important settlements in early China, a prime site for the investigation of early cities and states. Traditionally, it has been described, dated and explained in terms of dynastic succession – the dynasties of the Xia and the Shang being the ethnically-distinct actors and prime movers that made history here. In a brilliant analysis, the authors decouple the semi-legendary textual histories from the up-to-date archaeological sequence at Erlitou itself. This article strikes a blow for archaeological reasoning that will be felt far beyond the Yellow River.
Monument 3 from La Blanca, Guatemala: a Middle Preclassic earthen sculpture and its ritual associations
Authors: Love Michael , Guernsey Julia
Published: January 2015

Beside one of the earliest Preclassic pyramids in Guatemala the authors discovered a large basin fashioned in clay and shaped like a quatrefoil. The use of the quatrefoil theme on other carvings reveals its association with water and its symbolic role as the mouth of an underworld. Excavations in an adjacent mound exposed an affluent community, rich in figurines. This juxtaposition of monuments and residence at La Blanca shows a society of 900-600 BC in which ritual and the secular power were well integrated.
Ammonite fossil portrayed on an ancient Greek countermarked coin
Authors: McMenamin Mark A.S.
Published: January 2015

The image on a Greek coin of the second-first century BC is identified as an ammonite fossil and linked to the eponymous Ammon, the Egyptian ram-headed god.
Cultivated wetlands and emerging complexity in south-central Chile and long distance effects of climate change
Authors: Dillehay Tom D. , Quivira Mario Pino , Bonzani Renée , Silva Claudia , Wallner Johannes , Le Quesne Carlos
Published: January 2015

Lands in south-central Chile, long thought to have been marginal until the Spanish conquest, are here shown to have been developing complex societies between at least AD 1000 and 1500. Part of the motor was provided by coastland cultivation on raised platforms, here identified and surveyed for the first time. The authors date the field systems and suggest that they were introduced by farmers from the north seeking wetlands in the face of increasing aridity in the central Andes and southern Amazon.
Waist-to-hip ratios of Jomon figurines
Authors: Hudson Mark J. , Aoyama Mami
Published: January 2015

The authors show that the Jomon clay figurines made by hunter-gatherers use imagery that emphasises a narrow waist and full hips, showing that a female construct was part of the symbolism of these possibly shamanistic objects. In creating these figurines, prehistoric people were no doubt turning a recognition of health and fertility into more cultural icons. Admirers of the female form will be interested to learn that preference for the fuller, curvaceous ‘hourglass’ shape ‘has probably been the norm over much of human evolution’.
Rome and Mesopotamia – importers into India in the first millennium AD
Authors: Tomber Roberta
Published: January 2015

Ever since Wheeler's triumphant discovery of Roman pottery at Arikamedu in the 1940s, it has been appreciated that the east coast of India was in reach of the Roman Empire. Tracking down the finds of Roman pottery on the Indian sub-continent reported since then, the author discovered that many of the supposed Roman amphorae were actually ‘torpedo jars’ from Mesopotamia. Here the areas of influence of these two great imports, probably of wine, are mapped for the first time.
Dating the onset of cereal cultivation in Britain and Ireland: the evidence from charred cereal grains
Authors: Brown Alex
Published: January 2015

When does Neolithic life begin in Britain? The author gathered up the current evidence for radiocarbon-dated first use of cereals, distinguishing between dates from charcoal in contexts with cereals, and dates from the charred grains themselves. The charred grains begin to appear around 4000 cal BC and become prominent in settlements between 3800 and 3000 cal BC. This correlates well with the appearance of megalithic tombs (3800-3500 cal BC) and argues for a relatively rapid adoption of the Neolithic package during an experimental phase of two centuries, 4000-3800 cal BC. The early cereals reported in the pollen record (from 5000 BC) are attributed to wild species.
Detecting seasonal movement from animal dung: an investigation in Neolithic northern Greece
Authors: Valamoti Soultana Maria
Published: January 2015

Neolithic northern Greece has both tell sites and extended ‘flat’ sites, with an implication that people lived differently and may have managed their animals differently on each type of site. The author investigates these differences using characteristic plant assemblages deriving from animal dung. She finds that samples from tells are rich in processed crops and wild seeds, indicating grazing on and off the fields near home. But those from the flat sites were rich in chaff and contain no wild seeds, indicating the absence of animals out grazing on the hills when the wild plants are in seed. These were seemingly two alternative categories of Neolithic farmer, the one organising grazing differently from the other.
Fashion versus reason – then and now
Authors: Bentley R. Alexander
Published: January 2015

Analogies between modern practice and prehistoric material culture are becoming increasingly useful for archaeologists, including those interested in branding studies, for example (e.g. Wengrow, in press) and at formal research centres such as the AHRC Centre for the Evolution of Cultural Diversity and the Santa Fe Institute. Studies of modern cultural change – at a level of detail that most archaeologists can only dream about – can lead to related insights about prehistoric culture change through time. Modern fashion analysis can be methodologically similar to testing, for example, the degree to which certain prehistoric transitions reflect demographic change (e.g. Shennan 2000; Henrich 2004). How much of the Upper Palaeolithic ‘revolution’ in cave art is due to increases in population in western Europe? Although the data are trickier to obtain, the goal is basically the same – subtract what is considered background (e.g. population size) fromwhat is of interest to the researcher (e.g. instances of particular art motifs). In Neolithic Germany, for example, pottery designs can be treated as the ‘fashions’ and numbers of longhouses are used to estimate population size (e.g. Shennan & Wilkinson 2001; Bentley & Shennan 2003).
Water supply and history: Harappa and the Beas regional survey
Authors: Wright Rita P. , Bryson Reid A. , Schuldenrein Joseph
Published: January 2015

Introducing the methods of archaeoclimatology, the authors measure the relative locus of the monsoons, the intensity of winter rains and the volume of water in the rivers in the Upper Indus, in the region of Harappa. They also note the adoption of a multi-cropping agricultural system as a possible strategy designed to adjust to changing conditions over time. They find that around 3500 BC the volume of water in the rivers increases, and the rivers flood, implying annual soil refreshment and the consequent development of agriculture. By contrast, from around 2100 BC the river flow begins to fall while the winter rains increase. This time-bracket correlates nicely with the brief flourishing of Harappa. The locally derived evidence from Harappa combined with the Beas survey data provide a model for understanding the abandonment of settlements in the Upper Indus and possibly the wider civilisation.
Post-mortem mutilations of human bodies in Early Iron Age Kazakhstan and their possible meaning for rites of burial
Authors: Bendezu-Sarmiento J. , Francfort H.-P. , Ismagulova A. , Samashev Z.
Published: January 2015

The authors find numerous cut-marks on human bones from an Early Iron Age cemetery in Kazakhstan and review a wide range of possible explanations. They discount cannibalism and find that the cuts and fractures fit best with a range of ritual mutilations known to ethno-archaeologists of the Altai region
A context for the Luzira Head
Authors: Reid Andrew , Ashley Ceri Z.
Published: January 2015

The Luzira head, a pottery figure discovered in a Ugandan prison compound in 1929, has remained curiously anonymous ever since. New archaeological work on the northern shores of (Lake) Victoria Nyanza has defined a formative period of political centralisation at the end of the first millennium AD. The authors show that this period of early to late Iron Age transition is where this remarkable object and related figurative material belongs. This has implications both for the formation of kingdoms in Uganda and for the story of African art more generally.
The first direct evidence for the production of Maya Blue: rediscovery of a technology
Authors: Arnold Dean E. , Branden Jason R. , Williams Patrick Ryan , Feinman Gary M. , Brown J. P.
Published: January 2015

Maya Blue is a colour that is more than a pigment; it had roles in status, ritual and performance, being daubed onto pots and people before sacrifice. Here researchers use experimental and historical evidence to discover how it was made, including direct scientific analysis of Maya Blue on a pot thrown into the sacred well at Chichén Itzá. The results indicate that the formation of the colour was actually part of the ritual.
Contact between the Norse Vikings and the Dorset culture in Arctic Canada
Authors: Park Robert W.
Published: January 2015

Instances of cultural interaction between Norse and native American have long been accepted. But current archaeological research recognises that the indigenous peoples of the north were themselves diverse and had diverse histories. Here the author shows that the culture of one of them, the Dorset people, owed nothing to the Norse and probably had no contact with them.
Parietal art discovered at Arene Candide Cave (Liguria, Italy)
Authors: Mussi Margherita , Bahn Paul , Maggi Roberto
Published: January 2015

The authors have discovered small oval panels of parallel lines in the famous Ligurian cave of Arene Candide, and show that it must be art of the Epigravettian period, c. 11-10000bp (uncalibrated).
Correlation of annual precipitation with human Y-chromosome diversity and the emergence of Neolithic agricultural and pastoral economies in the Fertile Crescent
Authors: Chiaroni Jacques , King Roy J. , Underhill Peter A.
Published: January 2015

Examining the beginnings of agriculture in the ‘Fertile Crescent’, this research team has compared the distribution of rainfall with the distribution of Y-chromosome haplogroups. The extended families signalled by J1 and J2 haplogroups seem to have had different destinies in the era of agro-pastoralist experiment: J2 were the agricultural innovators who followed the rainfall, while J1 remained largely with their flocks. Acknowledging the fuzzy edges of such mapping, the authors nevertheless escort us into new realms of the possible for the early history of peoples.
Symbolic language in Torres Strait, NE Australia: images from rock art, portable objects and human scars
Authors: Brady Liam M.
Published: January 2015

The Torres Strait is often in the research literature – unsurprisingly since it is not only a key area for early settlement but one where ancient and modern practice resonate. Rock art is a prominent archaeological source for the region – but not the only one. In this study the author shows how rock art interconnects with imagery on portable artefacts and scarification – scarring patterns on skin – to define cultural zones of the last few centuries in territories occupied by both horticulturalists and hunter-gatherers.
Artefacts, skulls and written sources: the social ranking of a Celtic family buried at Münsingen-Rain
Authors: Müller Felix , Jud Peter , Alt Kurt W.
Published: January 2015

An examination of the skeletons from the well-known La Tène cemetery of Münsingen-Rain shows that they represent members of a high ranking group, and that they were closely related. These new findings prompt the authors to examine the written documents that refer to nobility in the Roman and Celtic world.
Response
Authors: Pérez S. Celestino , López-Ruiz C.
Published: January 2015

The authors kindly agreed to respond to these comments.
Should archaeology be in the service of ‘popular culture’? A theoretical and political critique of Cornelius Holtorf's vision of archaeology
Authors: Kristiansen Kristian
Published: January 2015

Kristian Kristiansen takes issue with Cornelius Holtorf's vision of a people-driven archaeology; and the popular context replies in kind.
Isotope evidence for the diet of the Neanderthal type specimen
Authors: Richards Michael P. , Schmitz Ralf W.
Published: January 2015

Stable isotopes extracted from two hominins and a range of animals from the original Neanderthal site shows these Middle Palaeolithic people to have been hunters predominately on a meat diet. Comparison with other specimens further south suggests this diet – deer, but no fish or plants – to be something of a behavioural norm, whatever the latitude and plant cover.
Iron Age beehives at Tel Reḥov in the Jordan valley
Authors: Mazar Amihai , Namdar Dvory , Panitz-Cohen Nava , Neumann Ronny , Weiner Steve
Published: January 2015

Beehives were discovered in a densley built area in the Iron Age city of Reḥov (tenth-ninth century BC). They consisted of hollow clay cylinders, each with a little hole at one end (for the bee) and a removable lid at the other (for the bee keeper). These beehives, the earliest found in the Near East, were identified by analogy with examples pictured on Egyptian tombs and in use by traditional peoples. The suggested identification was confirmed by chemical analysis.
Direct dating of pottery from its organic residues: new precision using compound-specific carbon isotopes
Authors: Berstan R. , Stott A.W. , Minnitt S. , Ramsey C. Bronk , Hedges R.E.M. , Evershed R.P.
Published: January 2015

Techniques for identifying organic residues in pottery have been refined over the years by Professor Evershed and his colleagues. Here they address the problem of radiocarbon dating these residues by accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) which in turn dates the use of the pot. Fatty acids from carcass and dairy products cooked in the pot were isolated from early Neolithic carinated bowls found at the Sweet Track, Somerset Levels, England, and then dated by AMS. The results were very consistent and gave an excellent match to the dendrochronological date of the trackway. The method has wide potential for the precise dating of pottery use on sites.
The application of declassified KH-7 GAMBIT satellite photographs to studies of Cold War material culture: a case study from the former Soviet Union
Authors: Fowler Martin J.F.
Published: January 2015

Forty years after they were originally acquired for intelligence purposes, declassified US photographs from the KH-7 GAMBIT photo reconnaissance satellite programme, together with contemporary declassified intelligence reports, are being used to shed light on Cold War sites in the former Soviet Union. The method should have a great future for understanding the changes to the landscape in Europe over the last 60 years. The material impact of the Cold War was no less fundamental than other wars hotter in nature.
Middle Palaeolithic bitumen use at Umm el Tlel around 70 000 BP
Authors: Boëda Eric , Bonilauri Stéphanie , Connan Jacques , Jarvie Dan , Mercier Norbert , Tobey Mark , Valladas Hélène , Sakhel Heba al , Muhesen Sultan
Published: January 2015

The authors identify natural bitumen on stone implements dating to 70 000 BP. It is proposed that this represents residue from hafting, taking the practice back a further 30 000 years from the date previously noted and published in Nature. The bitumen was tracked to a source 40km away, using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry and carbon isotopes.
The golden leaves of Ur
Authors: Tengberg M. , Potts D.T. , Francfort H.-P.
Published: January 2015

The famous headdress of Pu-abum at Ur is an object of great beauty. But the authors show that the gold leaves of the headdresses and diadems of her court circle can tell an even richer story. Identifying among them the leaves of the sissoo tree, they show that its symbolic usage celebrated a wide range of properties, from medicine to furniture. These were properties appreciated not only in Mesopotamia but in eastern Iran and the Indus Valley, home to the sissoo tree as well as to neighbouring civilisations.
An update on Teotihuacan
Authors: Cowgill George L.
Published: January 2015

AtAntiquity's invitation the author offers this account of recent research and current objectives at the famous ancient Mesoamerican city of Teotihuacan. After a century of investigation, archaeologists are beginning to see something of the composition and preoccupations of one of America's first urban societies, and how it began, flourished and ended.
Inside and outside the dry stone walls: revisiting the material culture of Great Zimbabwe
Authors: Chirikure Shadreck , Pikirayi Innocent
Published: January 2015

‘Any study of Great Zimbabwe has to rely a great deal on re-examining and re-assessing the work of early investigators, the men who removed all the most important finds from the ruins and stripped them of so much of their deposits’ (Garlake 1973: 14). The authors have here done us a great service in reviewing the surviving archaeological evidence from this world famous site. They challenge the structuralist interpretation – in which different parts of the site were allocated to kings, priests, wives or to circumcision rituals – and use the architectural, stratigraphic and artefactual evidence accumulated over the years to present a new sequence. The early enclosures on the hill, the Great Enclosure and the valley enclosures now appear as the work of successive rulers, each founding a new residence and power centre in accord with Shona practice.
Monumentality and the development of the Tongan maritime chiefdom
Authors: Clark Geoffrey , Burley David , Murray Tim
Published: January 2015

On Tongatapu the central place of the rising kingdom of Tonga developed in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries AD. Marked out as a monumental area with a rock-cut water-carrying ditch, it soon developed as the site of a sequence of megalithic tombs, in parallel with the documented expansion of the maritime chiefdom. The results of investigations into these structures were achieved with minimum intervention and disturbance on the ground, since the place remains sacred and in use.
Where the wild things are: aurochs and cattle in England
Authors: Lynch Anthony H. , Hamilton Julie , Hedges Robert E.M.
Published: January 2015

The aurochs was a type of wild cattle not extinct in Europe until the mid-second millennium BC – so they must have co-existed for centuries with the domestic cattle which were to supplant it. Here the authors use stable isotope analysis to show what form that co-existence took: the domestic cattle grazing on the pasture, and the aurochs lurking in the forests and wet places.
Airborne lidar and historic environment records
Authors: Challis Keith , Kokalj Ziga , Kincey Mark , Moscrop Derek , Howard Andy J.
Published: January 2015

The authors assess the potential contribution of lidar surveys to national inventories of archaeological resources (‘Historic Environment Records’), and compare the relative costs and sensitivity of lidar and aerial photography.
The archaeology of Islam in Britain: recognition and potential
Authors: Petersen Andrew
Published: January 2015

What did the British know about Islam before the modern period? The author reviews evidence which shows that there was contact with, and appreciation of, Muslim culture from almost the time of the Hegira in the seventh century. This appreciation varied and was reflected in different choices of material culture: coinage, ceramics and architecture, in successive periods from the eighth century to the nineteenth.
Practising archaeology at a time of climatic catastrophe
Authors: Mitchell Peter
Published: January 2015

The term 'catastrophe' in my title is not chosen idly, but reflects the now well-established fact that Earth is experiencing (anthropogenic) climate change at a rate and scale unparalleled in human history (IPCC 2007a). Dramatic events such as the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 are so unexpected that one retains a clear memory of precisely when and where one learned of them. Regrettably, climate change is subtler, its effects slower, its consequences less immediately obvious. Yet something of the same is true. In my own case, I vividly recall the moment when I first grasped what it might mean. At the 1993 Kimberley meeting of the Southern African Society for Quaternary Research (SASQUA), a presenter commented that her palaeoenvironmental research, which reached back through the Holocene, might, perhaps, be relevant to modelling future climatic change. Back came the comment from another participant that the Holocene climatic 'optimum' was far from relevant; a bestcase analogue might instead be the conditions prevailing during the Pliocene, 5.3-1.8 million years ago.
Can a museum explain imperialism?
Authors: James N.
Published: January 2015

Empires produced some of the ancient world's grandest monuments. No doubt that helps to account for successive major exhibitions recently mounted at the British Museum.The First Emperor: China's Terracotta Armyclosed in April 2008, having drawn more visitors than any other sinceTreasures of Tutankhamunin 1972 (British Museum 2008: 66). There followed, from July to October, impressive and intriguing pieces on Hadrian, the Roman Emperor of the second century AD. The attention to large political systems is timely (James 2008: 201). Twenty-five years ago, Donald Horne (1984: 252) went so far as to declare that 'in the popularisations … of the huge storehouse of … artifacts … that are such an extraordinary feature of our age. … we may find the only real potential for giving substance to human liberation'. Is this feasible in practice; and, if so, is a state museum with business sponsorship a likely place to find such enlightenment? Studying the archaeology inHadrian, withThe First Emperoras a foil, enabled us to assess these questions.
Aerial archaeology in Jordan
Authors: Kennedy David , Bewley Robert
Published: January 2015

The authors have provided some of Antiquity's most stunning frontispieces since we introduced them in 2006. We asked them to show how aerial archaeology has developed in Jordan over some 90 years, tell us about the techniques and approaches used and its potential here and in other desert and mountainous lands.
River valleys and foothills: changing archaeological perceptions of North China's earliest farms
Authors: Liu Xinyi , Hunt Harriet V. , Jones Martin K.
Published: January 2015

Early farming in northern China featured the cultivation of two species of millet, broomcorn and foxtail. Although previously seen as focused on the Yellow River, the authors show that the earliest agriculture is actually found in the foothills of the neighbouring mountain chains, where drier and better drained locations suited millet cultivation, particularly broomcorn. In this they echo new thoughts on the locale of early agriculture in south-west Asia, on the hilly flanks of the Fertile Crescent rather than in the valleys of the Nile or the Euphrates.
Recent archaeometric research on ‘the origins of Chinese civilisation’
Authors: Jing Yuan , Campbell Rod
Published: January 2015

We are very pleased to present a summary account of the People's Republic of China's project on the Origins of Chinese Civilization. It has focused on Late Neolithic and early Bronze Age sites of the Central Plains – the cultural heartland of the first three dynasties of Xia, Shang and Zhou. Particularly notable is the emphasis of methodology which was driven almost entirely by the archaeological sciences.
A year at Stonehenge
Authors: Pitts Mike
Published: January 2015

You didn't need to be an archaeologist in 2008 to know that things were happening at Stonehenge. For years controversial plans to improve the Stonehenge environs (costed at £600m) had dominated media and much academic debate, but in November 2007 the British government announced that it couldn't afford them (Pitts 2008a). The plans were dropped (much cheaper changes are now being implemented to make Stonehenge look nice for the 2012 Olympics: English Heritage 2008). There are new broadcasts and press stories featuring the stones every year, but 2008 was different. As road protests diminished, real archaeologists took the stage.
Symmetry and humans: reply to Mithen's ‘Sexy Handaxe Theory’
Authors: Hodgson Derek
Published: January 2015

In reply to Machin's criticism of Kohn and Mithen's (1999) 'Sexy Handaxe Theory' in a recent Antiquity debate (Machin 2008: 761-6), Mithen (2008: 766-9) states that sexual selection is still relevant to the symmetry of Acheulean handaxes because this provides the only theory that can account for the various features typical of such artefacts. This conclusion may be misconceived, however, due to the conflation of the various factors relating to symmetry, attractiveness, and health. Crucially, recent studies have not found a genetic link based on sexual selection for physical traits based on symmetry. For example, Koehler et al. (2002) established that there was no difference in preference for the symmetry of male faces by females nearing conception compared to those females taking contraceptives. Similarly, Rhodes et al. (2001) found that, although there might be a link between facial symmetry and perceived health, there was no correlation between facial symmetry and actual health.
How to make sense of treasure
Authors: James N.
Published: January 2015

Treasures in themselves are fetishes. Only the admirer can make 'treasure' of a find in isolation; but to wonder about it as treasure opens apt questions about why the thing was valued, by whom and under what conditions. It was worrying, then, when the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge University's art collection, took in an exhibition of striking ancient finds returning to the Georgian National Museum from the USA (Smithsonian Institution and New York University). For the usual focus on the intrinsic qualities of fine art sits awkwardly with archaeological concern for context. The Fitzwilliam did tend to isolate the exhibits; but, here, that yielded an advantage as well as a difficulty.
Extraordinary Early Magdalenian finds from El Mirón Cave, Cantabria (Spain)
Authors: González Morales Manuel R. , Straus Lawrence Guy
Published: January 2015

The authors describe three splendid and newly discovered objects from the Upper Palaeolithic in northern Spain: an engraved scapula, a possible spearthrower and a decorated stone pendant. As well as adding to the corpus of iconic artefacts from the period, these new finds have the special virtue of being meticulously excavated and recorded in context.
The oldest and longest enduring microlithic sequence in India: 35 000 years of modern human occupation and change at the Jwalapuram Locality 9 rockshelter
Authors: Clarkson Chris , Petraglia Michael , Korisettar Ravi , Haslam Michael , Boivin Nicole , Crowther Alison , Ditchfıeld Peter , Fuller Dorian , Miracle Preston , Harris Clair , Connell Kate , James Hannah , Koshy Jinu
Published: January 2015

The Jwalapuram Locality 9 rockshelter in southern India dates back to 35 000 years ago and it is emerging as one of the key sites for documenting human activity and behaviour in South Asia. The excavated assemblage includes a proliferation of lithic artefacts, beads, worked bone and fragments of a human cranium. The industry is microlithic in character, establishing Jwalapuram 9 as one of the oldest and most important sites of its kind in South Asia.
Flint and metal daggers in Scandinavia and other parts of Europe. A re-interpretation of their function in the Late Neolithic and Early Copper and Bronze Age
Authors: Skak-Nielsen Niels V.
Published: January 2015

We are honoured to present this pivotal paper by a senior Danish scholar (born in 1922) that promises to revise many views of Late Neolithic and Bronze Age Europe. Prehistoric daggers found in graves in Scandinavia and beyond have long been interpreted as weapons wielded by warriors, giving the whole period a rather belligerent flavour. In a radical re-interpretation, the author demonstrates that their use was most probably for the despatch of cattle or other livestock, and the dagger is thus the implement of sacrifice and the symbol of its office.
The Xiongnu settlements of Egiin Gol, Mongolia
Authors: Wright Joshua , Honeychurch William , Amartuvshin Chunag
Published: January 2015

The Xiongnu people have long been considered an archetypical nomadic group, characterised archaeologically mainly from their tombs – which have reinforced the stereotype. Thanks to a sophisticated survey project, the authors are able to reveal the Xiongnu's economic complexity. Although primarily pastorialists they practiced cultivation and their ceramics reveal a settlement hierarchy which chimes with the broader social and settlement system of the region.
Pottery production and Islam in south-east Spain: a social model
Authors: Carvajal López José Cristóbal
Published: January 2015

Studying the pottery produced in the Granada region between the eighth and eleventh centuries AD, the author describes a changing discourse of Roman and Islamic forms. This in turn can be held to reflect the changing social relations between conquerors and conquered.
Dante's heritage: questioning the multi-layered model of the Mesoamerican universe
Authors: Nielsen Jesper , Reunert Toke Sellner
Published: January 2015

Ancient Mesoamericans are generally thought to have imagined the universe stacked in vertical layers, not unlike the cosmic layers of Dante's Comedy. Dismantling this model, our authors show it to be based upon a post-conquest European-Aztec hybrid. This penetrating critique tracks the history of the hybrid cosmos from its first appearance through its resilient repetition until today.
The roots of provenance: glass, plants and isotopes in the Islamic Middle East
Authors: Henderson J. , Evans J. , Barkoudah Y.
Published: January 2015

Glass – one of the most prestigious materials of the early Islamic empire – was traded not only as vessels and bangles but as raw glass blocks. One of its raw materials, plant-ash, was also traded. This means that tracking the production of this precious commodity is especially challenging. The authors show that while chemical composition can relate to vessel type, it is a combination of chemical compositions with strontium and neodymium isotope ratios that is most likely to lead to (a geological) provenance for its manufacture. The materials used by the glassmakers were local sand and plant ashes. Reported here is the first application of the method to the glass made at the primary glass making centre of al-Raqqa, Syria in an environmental context.
John Evans, Joseph Prestwich and the stone that shattered the time barrier
Authors: Gamble Clive , Kruszynski Robert
Published: January 2015

It all began in a railway carriage. Two businessmen, travelling to the Kingston Assizes in Surrey, nodded to each other as strangers do, but did not strike up a conversation. They were expert witnesses appearing for different sides in the Croydon Water Question; a legal test case that boiled down to who owned the undergroundwaters of London (Mather 2008: 83–4). Joseph Prestwich (Figure 1a), the older by 11 years, represented the water suppliers. As the train rattled along under full steam he would have seen landmarks from his pioneering geology of the London Basin. But water was not his business. His family ran a profitable wine importers. Geology, however, was his passion.
Small agencies and great consequences: Darwin's archaeology
Authors: Evans Christopher
Published: January 2015

Recent years have seen renewed interest in Darwinian concepts as an inspiration for evolutionary theory in archaeology (for example Barton & Clark 1997; Hart & Terrell 2002). This is not, however, the thrust of this paper, whose aims are more historiographic than programmatic. It will not focus upon Darwin's 'big book',The Origin… of 1859 (or evenThe Descent… of 12 years later), but rather his last volume, the wonderfully curiousThe formation of vegetable mould through the action of wormsof 1881 (hereafterWorms).
Illustrating ‘savagery’: Sir John Lubbock and Ernest Griset
Authors: Murray Tim
Published: January 2015

Much has been written about the extraordinary impact of Darwinism during the mid- to late nineteenth century, expressed in the scholarship of 'reception studies' (see for example Ellegård 1958; Glick 1988; Numbers & Stenhouse 1999). A significant focus has been on developing an understanding of the impact of Darwinian thinking on just about every aspect of Victorian society, particularly on literature, science, politics and social relations (see for example Beer 1983; Frayter 1997; Lorimer 1997; Moore 1997; Paradis 1997; Browne 2001). A great deal of attention has also been paid (by historians and philosophers of science) into the specifics of how the Darwinian message was disseminated so quickly and so broadly. Here the interest lies in the links between the rhetoric of scientific naturalism and the politics of the day, be it Whig-Liberal or Tory (see for example Clark 1997; Barton 1998, 2004; Cliffordet al.2006). A consequent interest lies in the ways in which science was popularised in Victorian Britain (see especially Lightman 1997, 2007).