bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Use of Bone Implements in the Old Palaeolithic Period
Authors: Breuil Abbeé H.
Published: August 2016

T was Boucher de Perthes and some of his precursors who originated the idea of an age of worked stone : previously the only stone implements recognized as such were polished axes, arrowheads and a few particularly well-made flint knives. On the other hand it is generally agreed that, besides worked stone, which as a rule is all that has survived, fossil man must have used wood for many of his weapons and implements ; though with the exception of a pointed stake from Clacton (preserved in peat with remains of Elephas antiquus) nothing made of this material is known until we come to the neolithic piledwellings. Mainly as the result of the excavations of Lartet and Christy in the Dordogne (1863) it was learnt that hard animal substances such as bone, ivory and deer's horn, which were preserved by the limestone matrix of caves and rock-shelters had also played a large part in the industrial activities of man. This already advanced industry must have been far removed in time from the first utilization of bone, for it shows a technique that is highly developed—a technique in which the splitting of bone is first associated with and then superseded by sawing with gravers and smoothing with scrapers. There can be no doubt therefore that the stilettos, spear-heads, etc., of the Later Palaeolithic period must have had more ancient prototypes of worked bone. In fact the only Middle Palaeolithic examples known today of bone-working by means of attrition and scraping are few in number—rib-bones sharpened by rubbing, occasional awls similarly sharpened—and the two large spear-points from the Upper Mousterian of Castillo (Spain) and La Quina (Charente, France).
The Thracian Rider and St. George
Authors: Kazarow Gawril
Published: August 2016

The Thracians were a deeply religious people; this is attested not merely by ancient writers but also by the many votive monuments found in the former Thracian provinces, dating chiefly from the second to the fourth centuries. Rostovtzeff was justified in remarking some years ago that ‘in the Roman period, Thrace experienced a religious renaissance; in cities and villages there sprang up hundreds of shrines of Greek type, which were filled with votive offerings after the Greek pattern; yet the Thracians worshipped their divinities in native fashion, and kept their festivals with mystic-orgiastic ritual’.
The City Walls of Nicaea
Authors: Schneider Alfons Maria
Published: August 2016

The village of İznik, north-east of Brussa, and far from all traderoutes, is today the mere ghost of what was once an important city. It is quite hidden within the ancient circumvallation, and occupies scarcely a third of the former area of the town. The wall itself, one of -the most impressive and best-preserved Byzantine monuments of Asia Minor, forms an irregular polygon (plan, FIG. I). The lacus Ascanius washes it on the west, while the other sides are bordered by a green, well-wooded plain, gradually giving place on the north-east to the slopes of Elmali dagh. A charming view of the village and walls can be abtained from a small knoll about 300 metres east of the city, with the lake shimmering in the distance and the fields shaded with cypresses, planes, walnut and other fruit-trees. The description of Catullus still holds good (Nicaeaeque ager uber aestuosae, 46.5): nature here is inexhaustible, and gives in abundance of the finest fruits to anyone who tills the earth. From May to October the weather is nearly always good, and in the height of summer the heat can be unbearable. Certainly the air is no longer pure and healthy as it was in Byzantine days; neglected water-courses and pools of subterranean water have brought malaria in their train. Nor is the sea alive with boats, for there is no fishing. Yet within recent years an improvement has taken place in those conditions which gave older travellers reason for feeling melancholy or annoyance, and it begins to look as if the village were slowly awakening from its long sleep.
New World Origins
Authors: Clark J. Grahame D.
Published: August 2016

The dictum of Clark Wissler that ‘New World culture is [thus] a kind of pyramid whose base is as broad as the two Americas and whose apex rests over Middle America’ is one of those brilliant generalizations which at once sum up the conclusions already reached, and point the way to further progress.

From the vantage of today one may agree with A. V. Kidder (22, p. 145) that American archaeologists have been unduly neglectful of the broad base of their pyramid. Yet itwould be churlish to blame them when the apex was so enticing, so rich, so bizarre and above all so enigmatic. Indeed, when men first descried the peaks of Maya, Mexican and Peruvian achievement, it seemed hard to connect them with the lowly foot- hills of cultural attainment familiar in the temperate latitudes of the western hemisphere. Until the underlying unity of civilization in the New World was recognized, its pyramidal structure could hardly be appreciated; in default of this it is easy to understand how archaeologists tended to neglect cultures, which, however interesting they may appear to us from the historical angle, must have appeared to them as intrinsically poor and dull. Then again it was only on the edges of the pyramid that the foundation layer was visible; elsewhere it was buried under a superstructure, massive in proportion to its attractiveness.
Mirrors
Authors: Schweig Bruno
Published: August 2016

A Story from Corea called ‘The Magic Mirror’ tells us that a young peasant went from his village to the capital in order to sell his products and to buy some commodities. Passing a shop-window he was struck by having seen somebody in the window who could not have been anybody else but his twin-brother. He was amazed at this because his brother was living in another town. He stood still and gazed, and now he was sure that it was his twin-brother, because when he smiled at him he smiled back. ‘I must have this magic’, he thought. So he entered the shop and asked whether he could buy this strange thing in which was to be seen his counterpart. The shopkeeper wrapped it up and remarked laughingly: ‘Be careful not to crack it, so that your brother will not get lost’. The peasant took it home, but before he could unpack it to show his family he was called away on urgent business.
Some South Pembrokeshire Cottages
Authors: Fox Cyril
Published: August 2016

In 1937 the writer described in ANTIQUITY a series of cottages—the dwellings of crofters—in Llanychaer and adjacent parishes of northern Pembrokeshire. These were two-roomed stone structures with a central doorway on one side: the door opened into the living room where the most striking sight was the great open fireplace at the gable end, the chimney structure of which projected into the room. A number of such dwellings has recently been examined in a coastal district of the same county to the south of Milford Haven, in Castle-martin parish. These show variations in the character and plan of the open fireplace, which are of interest, and probably also of cultural significance; they also provide fresh evidence of the hearth-dairy association manifested at Llanychaer.
The Portuguese and the Indian Ocean : a review
Authors: Sanceau Elaine
Published: August 2016

It was from the Portuguese that Europe first learned something about India. Their 16th century literature abounds in information on the subject. Duarte Barboza, Tomé Pires, Castanheda, João de Barros, Gaspar Correa even, though he says that he will only write about the exploits of his countrymen, have each one given to the world many interesting facts regarding the ethnology, the customs and beliefs, and some account of the history of that baffling sub-continent which Portugal, of European nations, was the first to observe at close quarters.
The British Museum and British Antiquities
Authors: Kendrick Thomas
Published: August 2016

In the year 1849 a Trustee of the British Museum, Mr W. R. Hamilton, at that time a man of 73 noted for his great interest in archaeology, particularly that of Greece and Egypt, was giving evidence before a commission enquiring into the affairs of the Musuem. ‘Have you’, he was asked, ‘ever turned your attention to the question of extending and improving the collection of British antiquities in the British Museum as distinct from all others?’ ‘I have not’, answered Mr Hamilton.
George Reisner: An Impression
Authors: Crowfoot J. W.
Published: August 2016

It is more than thirty years since I first met George Reisner. He was then in the prime of life, a short sturdily-built man with a mass of straight black hair, I a closely clipped moustache and a determined chin. He was wearing spectacles with very powerful lenses and, as usual, had a pipe in his mouth. His fingers were short and stubby and it was rather terrifying to see him manipulating some delicate antiquity. There was nothing Germanic about him except his name—he was born in Indianapolis of a family which had migrated from Europe, I believe, in the Napoleonic era. Nor was there anything obviously academic; he looked and talked like a forceful 100% American of the breed of Theodore Roosevelt, strong, open and friendly. He used to say, probably with truth, that he might have made a fortune in business if he had not chosen a different career.
Water in Antiquity
Authors: Clark Grahame
Published: August 2016

The basic importance of food in the daily lives both of individuals and of communities, and the all-pervading influence upon outlook and social structure exercised by the methods adopted to ensure its adequate supply have become more and more widely recognized among students of ancient society during recent years (1). Rather less attention has yet been paid to water (2), that other necessity of life, bound up so intimately with the distribution and density of human settlement, and linked at the same time with man’s exploitation of his physical environment. Yet water-supply merits the closest attention, not only of those who approach prehistory from a functionalist point of view, but of all those whose studies are in the last resort based on archaeological material. In the first place, the connexion between human settlement and sources of water offers a cardinal clue to the location of ancient sites; in the second, the dampness of wells and springs has made for conditions favourable to the preservation of objects, organic as well as inorganic, which in the course of time have found their way into their recesses; and in the third, the veneration in which sources have been held has fostered from time immemorial the deposition in their waters of offerings as welcome to the archaeologist as to the spirits themselves.
Life in Anglesey 2000 years ago. An Early Iron Age Discovery
Authors: Fox Cyril
Published: August 2016

A Collection consisting of some 90 objects of bronze and iron which touches life and art in Celtic antiquity at more points than any deposit hitherto found in Wales was discovered in 1943 a few miles from Holyhead, Anglesey. It has now become the property of the National Museum of Wales at Cardiff, the principal donor being Mr Evan R. Hughes, of Holyhead.

The collection includes weapons—fragmentary swords and daggers and spears; indestructible elements of vehicles—iron tyres, nave-hoops, bollard and linch-pins; and of harness—terrets, loop and numerous bridle-bits; things of social and economic interest—gang-chains for captives, currency bars, sickle, and fragmentary cauldron (or waterclock); of ceremonial interest—the central portion of a bronze trumpet, a wand of ash-wood decorated with spiral bronze ribbon; personalia—the bronze mounts of a wooden casket. All the objects were found in peat; many were deeply stained with vivianite, being associated with animal bones—of horse, ox, pig, sheep and dog.
The Rebuilding of London
Authors: Wheeler R. E. M.
Published: August 2016

Those who witnessed the fires of London in 1940 were occupied with other thoughts and acts than the contemplation of the past. Today remoter skies are aglow, and the quiet and cavernous places of London where busy offices once stood are already planned and regimented for reconstruction. No doubt, as often enough in the past, London will gain functionally if not artistically in the process; the new buildings will be higher and deeper than their predecessors, with air-conditioned basements carried far down into the native clay.
The Place of Archaeology in British Education
Authors: Fox Aileen
Published: August 2016

In ANTIQUITY, September 1943, Grahame Clark put forward an eloquent plea for the study of man as a basic feature of education throughout the world—to create an overriding sense of human solidarity such as can come only from consciousness of common origins ; this alone, in his opinion, can ensure the Survival of civilization. He deliberately deferred consideration of practical details and concentrated on setting out ˋthe vast design ˊ covering education, like the Beveridge social insurance scheme, from the cradle to the grave. It is my purpose in this article to consider more closely what part British archaeology is fitted and ready to play in education in this country in the future. For if archaeology is to take its rightful place in school curricula, if it is to be in demand in Universities (where archaeologists mainly must be trained) and in centres of adult education, its role must be clearly defined and understood by archaeologists and educationists alike. Certain misconceptions must be cleared away-for example that archaeology is synonymous with prehistory, or the study of flints or potsherds-that it is a special subject, something ˋ extra ˊ like music or drawing in the old fashioned academy. Let it once be realized that it is essentially a method of recovering, studying and re-creating the past, a method that is open to all to use, and it will fall into place within the framework of our educational system. It will naturally be a method that is most used by other branches of knowledge concerned with the past, Classical studies, English Literature (1), and above all History.
The Early Plan and Town Houses of Silchester (Calleva Atrebatum)
Authors: Fox Aileen
Published: August 2016

The 1938–9 excavations at Calleva, of which Mrs Aylwin Cotton's report has recently appeared (1), show how much more can be learnt about a Romano-British town when modern scientific excavation technique is used to supplement the efforts of earlier antiquaries. George Fox, St. John Hope and Mill Stephenson (to whom all honour) achieved the complete plan, labouring from 1890–1908 each year for months at a time at the total excavation of the hundred acres within the city walls. Now Mrs Cotton by selective excavation and a study of stratigraphy has built up the outline chronology so urgently required : thus we have now both a Map and a Time-Chart for this city. Mrs Cotton's report shows that the original Roman city extended up to the outer earthwork, hitherto thought to be of pre-Roman construction, covering an area of some 230 acres (2), and that the walls with a slightly earlier bank behind them are a contraction of the latter half of the 2nd century A.D. (3) The evidence was clear ; the metal of the streets and layers of dark occupation soil of Hadrian-Antonine date continued under the bank (4)) and the streets continued on the same alignment in the space between the wall and outer earthwork (5). Of the street plan Mrs Cotton observes (6) inter alia that the chessboard ‘ is singularly rectangular ’ and that ‘ it did not exist, at any rate in its later form when the Bath Building in Insula XXXIII was built about the reign of Nero ’. It was these two comments and their footnotes that sent me searching the shelf with Archaeologia ranged heavily along it, and that prompted this article.
The Dumb and the Stammerers in Early Irish History
Authors: Butler Hubert
Published: August 2016

Primitive peoples judge other races strictly by the yardstick of their own virtues and capacities. Those, who do not conform to their customs, are mad or stupid. Those, who cannot communicate with them, are dumb or have an impediment in their speech. If they are obliged to admit that the foreigner with all his defects can do certain things remarkably well, they are more likely to ascribe this to magic than to superior but distinctive capacities. When the newcomers are, like the Spaniards in the New World, the Europeans in the Pacific, so dazzlingly accomplished that it is hard to disparage them, the natives welcome them as supernatural beings more readily than as a more developed race of men. They will change their gods more willingly than their good opinion of themselves as the norm of humanity. The Greek word for people whom they could not understand was βὰρβαρoι or ‘stammerers’, the Russian word for the Teutons, with whom communication was difficult, was ‘nyemets’ or ‘dumb’. A variant of this word was used by all the other Slavonic peoples. Many less familiar instances of this practice could be collected. These names were retained for centuries after the idea that mankind was divided into many races equally but differently equipped had become familiar.
The Excavations at Cairnpapple Hill, West Lothian 1947–8
Authors: Piggott Stuart
Published: August 2016

In ANTIQUITY 1948, p. 35, a brief account was given of the first season’s work on a Bronze Age sanctuary and burial site on Cairnpapple Hill, near Torphichen in West Lothian. With the co-operation of the Ancient Monuments Department of the Ministry of Works, excavations were continued in the summer of 1948. The site was completely stripped, and revealed a complex series of structures indicated by the sockets of once-standing stones or by stones still extant. It will be laid out and conserved by the Department as an Ancient Monument under guardianship. The following account of the main results of the 1947–8 excavations is intended as a preliminary to the full excavation report, which will appear in due course in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, who financed the first season’s work.

Cairnpapple Hill, the summit of which is within the 1000 feet contour, is a part of the Bathgate Hills, which form a compact block of high land between the main road to Stirling on the north and from Glasgow to Edinburgh on the south. On the summit, the site before excavation was chiefly distinguished by the grass-grown cairn which gives its name to the hill, but most maps and the earlier antiquarian literature indicated a ‘fort’ on the same site. Field-work in 1946 had shown that the cairn stood eccentrically within a low roughly circular earthwork (the ‘fort’) which on surface showing was almost certainly a member of the ‘Henge Monument’ class of structure. The site was confused by an octagonal turf dyke which had been made round the cairn in the late 18th or early 19th century to enclose a plantation of trees, now vanished.
Kingship and the Gods: a Review
Authors: Mallowan M. E. L.
Published: August 2016

Every schoolboy knows that King Rimush of Agade was struck down in a Palace revolt-some say pierced to death by sharp bodkins, others that his skull was smashed by heavy stone tablets. And it is now almost common knowledge that Bur-Sin died of a pinched shoe-it may have been following on a septic foot contracted at Eridu, when he was pacing the sand in the precincts of his unfinished Ziggurat. No less undignified was the death of Sin-iddinam of Larsa, crushed to death in his Palace by the fall of a staircase. But who ever heard of a Pharaoh so ludicrously stricken? There lies the difference between the Egyptian and Mesopotamian concept of monarchy. The Pharaoh was a god and the son of a god, made in the image and likeness of Horus, son of Osiris: it is true that was mortal, as was more than one of the ancient gods, but his mortality lay lightly u him because when the time came for his end upon earth he was predestined to rebirth as Osiris. In the Tigris-Euphrates valley a king, whatever else he might be, was pre-eminently a man, even if only a little lower than the angels, and even the mighty Sargonid Kings of Assyria, could on occasion receive and accept a rebuke from their subjects. Indeed the Assyrian kings, whom we are accustomed to think of as arrogant warriors, were no less the slaves of the society they served than the humblest members of their realm.
Written and Unwritten Records
Authors: Casson Stanley
Published: August 2016

Archaeology has, for its own good or ill,
caught the popular mind. A generation ago the
average person was quite unable to divest his mind
of the idea that an archaeologist must have a long
white beard, large spectacles and a pathetic
enquiring look on his face: it was equally
suspected that, when roused, he would burst into a
paroxysm of rage if his views were doubted. There
was, in fact, a good deal of truth in this popular
conception, for in the first half of the 19th
century what then passed as archaeology was
largely a hobby reserved for the aged and the
retired who, by virtue of curious minds and an
inquiring nature, spent their leisure in probing
the ancient sites of the past, and collecting
ancient relics and ‘curios’. Some less aged men,
but nevertheless men of leisure, made very
important contributions to knowledge, such as
Boucher de Perthes, a French customs officer, who
in the '50's was the first to identify
palaeolithic implements; or Harrison of Ightham, a
Kentish villager, who, with great insight
identified, not long after Boucher de Perthes, a
still earlier phase of the stone implement
industry, the so-called Eolithic. But for the most
part the elderly white-bearded men did in fact
represent the activities of the student of
Antiquity, both in England and elsewhere. Then,
slowly, it was seen that there was a difference
between the Archaeologist and the Antiquary : that
the former was a student of one of the branches of
humanist study which can serve, in the historic
periods, to add enormously to historic knowledge,
and in the prehistoric periods to formulate
chronology and create a history recorded not by
written records, but by archaeological facts. But
the power of the written word, reinforced by the
tremendous prestige associated with Holy Script,
has given such kudos to what was written that
records not consisting of words were considered by
scholars as trash. Archaeologists were called,
until quite recent years, ‘collectors of pots and
pans’, men unworthy to rank with those who in the
quiet of their studies had spent long hours
emending and correcting the ancient literary
records of literary men. To make an emendation in
the text of a Greek manuscript was held by many to
be a far greater achievement than to have
recovered two hundred years of unrecorded history,
even if the emendation was a pure invention of the
emendator.
The Kensington Stone
Authors: Moltke Erik
Published: August 2016

In 1898 a Swedish-American farmer, Olaf Ohman, cut down an aspen tree on his farm. He found enveloped in its roots a large flat stone which he only just managed to get out without ruining his axe. When his ten year old son had brushed some of the dirt from the stone, Ohman discovered that one of the faces and one of the edges were covered with strange engraved figures. It was soon decided that these had something to do with runes. This is where the saga of the Kensington stone begins: from Ohman's farm to a shop window in Kensington, to Prof. O. J. Breda in Minneapolis, to Prof. George O. Curme, back to Ohman's farm condemned as a blatant forgery. Here it lay despised as ‘a stepping stone near his granary for eight years, without further notice’. It was ‘rediscovered’ by Hjalmar Holand, bought by him, and he devoted his life (three large books and innumerable articles) to attempting to prove that the inscription was genuine. Finally in its Jubilee year 1948 it was given the place of honour in the National Museum at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington as one of the finest pre-Columbian monuments of America.
Prehistoric America: comments on some C14 dates
Authors: Bushnell G. H. S.
Published: August 2016

Antiquity has recently received some information* of great value in connexion with radiocarbon dating from the advisory committee on the subject set up by the American Anthropological Association and the Geological Society of America. It consists of an historical foreword, a corrected list of dates, a number of reports on specific problems, a summary and a bibliography, partly in typescript and partly on microfilm. The list differs little from the printed one which was distributed to a number of interested people in September 1950, though it contains a few additions and corrections, and the real importance of the material now received lies in the reports and the summary.
Radiocarbon dating results from the Old World
Authors: McBurney C. B. M.
Published: August 2016

The latest complete list of radiocarbon readings received from America brings the total number of dated sites and objects to upwards of 160. Of these 120 are from localities in the New World, and their archaeological implications have been reviewed by G. H. S, Bushneil in the last number of ANTIQUITY; the object of the present article is to do the same for the 40 odd results available from the Old World.
Mound Surveys
Authors: Lloyd Seton
Published: August 2016

During recent years, writers in this Journal and elsewhere have been much concerned with forms of archaeological field-research which do not in themselves involve actual excavation. The purpose of this article is to draw attention to one in particular of these : namely the regional surveys of mounds which, in the Middle East, have gained so much usefulness and significance during the past two decades. Reference will be made to the complementary relationship between surface-explorer and excavator, especially insofar as it would appear to have been emphasised by a recent instance of their collaboration. This was in the case of a mound-survey in southern Anatolia, undertaken by Mr J. Mellaart, sometime Scholar of the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara, which led to the discovery of the site called Beycesultan and its excavation by the same Institute in the spring of 1954.
Graffiti of Ships at Tarxien, Malta
Authors: Woolner Diana
Published: August 2016

In May 1956, while visiting the megalithic temples of Tarxien, which stand on high ground less than a mile from the inner creeks of Grand Harbour, massed graffiti of ships were observed on two adjacent uprights in the ‘Third Temple’.
The Brummagem Philhellene
Authors: Wace A. J. B.
Published: August 2016

You will not find the name of the Philhellene George Fanshawe Chubb in the Dictionary of National Biography, although that does include a purely mythical Philhellene Kirkman Finlay. Though he lost his life in the cause of Greece, Chubb is never mentioned by Finlay, Trikoupes, Gordon, or by any other historian of the Greek Revolution. He appears, like Melchizedek, to have had no ancestors and no posterity, and whether he was really a native of Birmingham or not we cannot tell. We know nothing about his family or his education or his profession, or indeed anything at all about him till he became a Philhellene.
Carausius: his Mints and his Money System
Authors: Mattingly Harold
Published: August 2016

CARAUSIUS, our British Emperor, has not been too badly served by commentators. He first attracted the wayward and erratic genius of Stukeley, (I) then, after a long C interval, the solid and devoted labours of Webb. (2) Of Stukeley little can be retained beyond a handful of brilliant guesses. Webb, on the other hand, has laid the foundations of a ‘ Corpus ’ of the coinage and has succeeded in stating most of the problems of the reign and solving many of them. But still there is room for a history of Carausius, in which the very scanty literary evidence shall be reinforced by the evidence of the coins, when the pure gold has been extracted from the masses of rough ore. There is perhaps not a very great deal to add to Webb's materials, but a great deal of sorting remains to be done. Included in his lists are many coins of a more or less barbarous character—ancient, but the product of no regular mint. Inside each mint, the order of mint-marks must be established and the types classified under them ; only so can we venture to interrogate the types for their meaning. Here is a task of great interest and promise for a young scholar. No disparagement of Webb's fine work is implied. Books as good as his ought to have progeny.
The Classical Rhinoceros
Authors: Gowers William
Published: August 2016

By the term ‘classical rhinoceros’ I mean the rhinoceros which was known to the Greek and Roman world during the five and a half centuries between 300 B.C. and A.D. 250, which was shown from time to time at Alexandria under the Ptolemies and later on appeared regularly in the arena at Rome taking part in fights with other beasts and with men. Although the Indian rhinoceros seems occasionally to have been exhibited at Rome, at any rate in the early years of the Empire, I believe that the rhinoceros usually shown there came from Africa, and I have tried to analyse such evidence as is available to show firstly what species it was and secondly what part of Africa it came from.

There are, of course, two quite distinct kinds of African rhinoceros, the square-mouthed and the prehensile-lipped, popularly known respectively as the White and the Black Rhinoceros. Until recently their scientific names were Rhinoceros simus and Rhinoceros bicornis, but systematists have now separated them into two genera, calling the former Ceratotherium simum and the latter Diceros bicornis ; denying to both the title of Rhinoceros which they reserve for the Indian rhinoceros and its near Asiatic relatives. For the sake of simplicity and brevity I shall retain the old names and call them simus and bicornis.

The popular misnomers of ‘white’ and ‘black’ are a legacy from the South African Dutch of the 17th century, who called simus ‘wit renaster’ and bicornis ‘zwart renaster’. They were not very particular about exact shades of colour and probably meant no more than that one species usually appeared much lighter than the other. The natural colour of both appears much the same to an observer a little distance away. The hide of simus may be slightly lighter. Perhaps the most accurate definition is given by Roosevelt and Heller who say that the true colour of simus is smoke-grey while that of bicornis is dark clove-brown.
Moas and Man. (PART II). THE WAIRAU MOA-HUNTER SITE
Authors: Duff Roger
Published: August 2016

By reviewing the bearing on Maori culture history of the excavation of Moa-hunter sites in New Zealand the previous chapter serves as an introduction to this account of the Wairau site, which is the most important Moa-hunter site yet recorded.

So haphazard is the progress of archaeology in New Zealand that although this camp occupies more than 15 acres and is situated on an accessible beach about seven miles from the town of Blenheim, it was not discovered until 1939. It was first ploughed about 1922, when the tenant, Mr C. Eyles, was surprised at the number of bones uncovered. Being unfamiliar with moa bones, he believed the larger bones were those of the bullocks formerly employed to cart wool along the boulder bank, and the smaller to be human. Presumably miscellaneous artifacts were also revealed by the plough but only a number of stone adzes were recognized and retrieved. Of these the only one saved is a massive example of Type 1, A one of the most distinctive Moa-hunter types.

The site was not identified as of Moa-hunter age until some seventeen years later, when Jim Eyles, the thirteen-year old grandson of the former tenant, decided to emulate the spasmodic activities of local collectors who occasionally visited the site in search of ‘Maori curios’. He opened up a trench on the edge of a convenient mound and immediately found the first of seven burials each, as subsequently established, with a moa egg grave offering.
‘Ape-Men’ of South Africa
Authors: Clark W. E. Le Gros
Published: August 2016

In 1925, Professor Dart of the Witwatersrand University described the well-known Taungs skull (Australopithecus). He pointed out that, in spite of the obviously ape-like proportions of the brain, there were certain features (particularly in the dentition) in which this fossil primate resembled Man more closely than do any of the known anthropoid apes. In general, other anatomists agreed that this certainly was so, but some regarded the resemblances as little more than interesting examples of parallelism having no particular reference to the origin of the human family (Hominidae). In 1936 and the following years, Dr R. Broom, F.R.S., of the Transvaal Museum, discovered many more remains of similar ape-like creatures, including teeth, portions of skulls and jaws, and parts of the limb skeleton. Incidentally, he believed these remains to represent two types closely related to Australopithecus but generically distinct, and he gave them the names Plesianthropus and Paranthropus. Whether this generic distinction will be accepted as valid is a subject of controversy. Actually, however, it is (for the moment) a matter of no great importance, for it is agreed that they all certainly belong to the same group, the Australopithecinae. Dr Broom's account of his discoveries (which were made at Sterkfontein and Kromdraai—not far from Johannesburg) was published in 1946. It became clear from his description and illustrations that the hominid traits of the Australopithecinae were even more remarkable than many anatomists had supposed. So much was this the case, indeed, that some of those who had shown a cautious reserve towards the Taungs skull now expressed their conviction that these extinct primates were by no means merely “ anthropoid apes ”. On the contrary, they agreed that they provided evidence of the utmost importance for problems of human evolution. But although this now became widely accepted, one or two critics continued to combat it with rather unusual (and also rather puzzling) vehemence. Meanwhile, unperturbed by these minor protests regarding his earlier discoveries, Dr Broom was quietly working away at his excavations at Sterkfontein, and in 1947 he came upon an astonishingly rich collection of Australopithecine remains closely packed together in a small and circumscribed locus of dense limestone. This new material proved to be much more complete and perfectly preserved than anything hitherto found in the area, and included several skulls or parts of skulls, many teeth, and an exceptionally fine specimen of a pelvic bone.
Inyanga: a preliminary report
Authors: Summers Roger
Published: August 2016

Inyanga is a district in Southern Rhodesia whose monuments were brought to the notice of readers of ANTIQUITY a short while ago. A Fund raised by private subscription mainly from Rhodesian sources has recently sponsored excavations in this district and at the conclusion of the second season's work it seems desirable to make a preliminary report. The excavations were directed by the writer who was fortunate in having the very skilful assistance of the Colony's Inspector of Monuments, Mr K. R. Robinson. Unfortunately no amateurs were able to assist us.
The Cult of Sul-Minerva at Bath
Authors: Croon J. H.
Published: August 2016

The process commonly called Interpretatio Romana, by which in ancient times a barbarian deity was identified with some Roman god or goddess, was admittedly of a locally very different nature. To quote an example: In Southern Gaul we find a whole series of Celtic deities connected with hot healing springs, Bormo, Grannus, Belenus, Nisincius, all in due course identified with Apollo. It seems obvious that the function of healing provided the link or association between the native deity and the Roman god. With this sole function their properties were not exhausted. But the fact that there are traces of fertility-aspects, that they were nearly always associated with a female consort or mother, etc., is a thing apart; there is no indication that these characteristics influenced the identification. Neither did the connection with hot springs, as far as I can see. We hear of an Apollo Thermios in Lesbos and at Thermon in Aetolia; in the Aegean island he was at any rate a patron of hot springs. Likewise, there were cults of Apollo near hot springs in Anatolia. But there are no indications whatever that these beliefs influenced the Roman Apollo.
The Circumpolar Stone Age
Authors: Gjessing Gutorm
Published: August 2016

IF one looks at a world map, or better still at a globe, one sees that Asia can easily be thought of as the central part of the world from which all other parts radiate-the Americas as well as Europe and Africa-whilst Indonesia and Melanesia provide a fairly good land bridge to Australia. In considering the Polar Regions it is important to realise that the Behring Strait has never been a barrier between the Asiatic and American continents. Eskimo live on a narrow strip of land on the Asiatic side, as well as along the coasts of the American Arctic, whilst those on the Diomede Islands in the middle of the strait up to recent times would sail in their skin boats to both Asia and Alaska in the summer, and travel thence by dog-sled in winter, Trade between the two continents has always been of considerable importance.
The Evolution of Society
Authors: Childe V. Gordon
Published: August 2016

With the general acceptance of the doctrine of organic evolution continuity between human history and natural history was also accepted. The latter became just the latest chapters in a single historical record with archaeology bridging the gap between the record of the rocks and the written record. The content of these latest chapters may be termed social evolution, and the Darwinian mechanisms of variation, adaptation, selection and survival may be invoked to elucidate the history of man as well as that of other organisms. But while the use of these terms may emphasize the continuity of history, it may also cause confusions and, in fact, misled some early anthropologists and archaeologists when they tried uncritically to apply Darwinian formulae to human societies or artifacts.
Seuthopolis
Authors: Dimitrov Dimiter P.
Published: August 2016

The site of the Thracian city of Seuthopolis lies about 8 km. to the west of Kazanluk, in the famous Valley of Roses, between the Balkan Range and the Sredna Gora Mountains. A spacious terraced area was formed by the erosion of the River Toundja (the ancient Thracian Tonsus); this is bounded to the north and east by a sloping plateau, on the site of the villages of Koprinka and Dounavtsi; and to the south, the steep slopes of the heights (site of the village of Morozovo (formerly Gorno Cherkovishté), the last of the Sredna Gora foothills, dropped down to the river banks. The last and lowest step of this terraced area projects deep into the bends of the Toundja to the south, forming a peninsula, or tongue of land, the banks of which are 4 to 5 m. in height; to the west and south it is bounded by the River Toundja, and to the east the Golyama Varovitsa or Chiflikchiiska River, a small, but always swiftly flowing tributary of the Toundja, guards its approaches. The Thracian city of Seuthopolis was situated precisely on this spot, called ‘Chiflika’ (The Farm), on the left bank of the River Toundja, defended from the west, south and east by natural barriers of water (PLATE IX).
A New Bronze Sword from Cyprus
Authors: Catling Hector
Published: August 2016

This new sword comes from the collection of Mr Evangelos Loizou of Famagusta, and has been brought to my attention by my former colleague Dr Vassos Karageorghis of the Cyprus Museum. The sword (PLATE XVI (a)) was given to Mr Loizou’s father by a villager of Enkomi some years ago, and almost certainly comes from the famous Late Bronze Age city and cemetery site a few hundred metres west of the village. It could well have come from a grave. The sword lacks the extreme tip; one edge is chipped. Apart from superficial corrosion it is in excellent condition.

The preserved length is 0.47 m.; the handguard is 0.05 m. wide, and the length of the hilt, 0.10 m. The greatest width of blade (below handguard) is 0.035 m. The rivets diminish in length from pommel to handguard in the range 0.023–0.018 m. There are two rivets in the handgrip and six in the handguard. The pommel ears are prominent, but there is no spur. The hiltplates were made of some perishable material, but, as often, their outline can be restored from the ‘shadow‘ left by the corrosion pattern on the handguard. The junction of blade and handguard is more angular than on any other Mediterranean example known to me; also unusual is the even taper of the blade from handguard to tip in place of edges normally either parallel, or even slightly swelling.
Worsaae and British Antiquities
Authors: Wilkins Judith
Published: August 2016

J J. A. Worsaae’s recorded words during his travels in the British Isles in 1846-7 indicate that he neither underestimated the significance of his visit, nor lacked confidence in the tenability of the ideas he expressed. His previous journeys in Norway, Sweden and Germany were a useful preparatory experience. Notwithstanding his youth and his high spirits, Worsaae must have appreciated his influential position as the exponent in Britain of ‘an entirely new enquiry into the history of the earliest state of the European nations, by means of the antiquities alone’. The discovery of ‘a stone period, in the history of Europe’ was, he declared, the first achievement and the vindication of the method.
The Last Decade in New Zealand Archaeology. Part II
Authors: Golson J. , Gathercole P. W.
Published: August 2016

Clearly this is a major problem in New Zealand culture history. One of the present writers has recently outlined the problem and assembled the archaeological materials available for its solution, using excavated evidence for the Moa-hunters and, in the absence of dependable archaeological data, inferring the Maori culture traits relevant to the comparison from a variety of sources, mainly descriptions, drawings and collections made by Europeans in the early days of contact. The result has been to isolate the common elements, point out the distinguishing ones, and define the areas of our present ignorance.

The latter include, besides the question of agriculture already discussed, that of warfare. Though none of the evidences to be expected for this—weapons, defensive arrangements, or cannibalism—has been found in unequivocal Moa-hunter contexts, it must be admitted that the search has been restricted. Fortified sites (pa) are a prolific feature of the North Island cultural landscape, but very few have been properly excavated. The results of such investigations as have been made are hardly conclusive, and although the argument favouring Moa-hunter fortification in the Bay of Plenty cannot now be sustained, it would be well to keep the question open. The absence of weapons from Moa-hunter sites is a factor of some importance in this argument, but the Polynesian armoury was rendered almost exclusively in wood, and only stone or bone weapons of the patu type (FIG. 8) will be commonly found in archaeological deposits. Limited excavations on six undeniably fortified sites in the Auckland province have, however, failed to uncover a single weapon. The only piece of positive evidence for Moa-hunter weapons is the Horowhenua bone patu (FIG. 7) associated in a grave with a rare type of amulet, definitely known to the Moa-hunters though not necessarily distinctive of them.
The Palace of Minos
Authors: Gardner Percy
Published: August 2016

When I acceded to the suggestion of the Editor of ANTIQUITY that I should write a review of the third volume of Sir Arthur Evans’ great work on the palace at Cnossus I was aware of the difficulty of the task I was undertaking. It would of course be quite impossible in a brief article to give any notion of the vast operations which the author has carried through with infinite skill and patience, revealing to us the character of a most curious civilization in Crete, the very existence of which was not suspected until the excavations of Schliemann at Mycenae gave us data. In 1877 I was so much interested by these revelations of the spade that I went to Greece to investigate them, and at Athens Sir Charles Newton and I were shown all the treasures of Mycenae. Newton’s article on them in the Edinburgh Review; and mine in the Quarterly Review, introduced them to English archaeologists, greatly to Schliemann’s satisfaction, as he was openly accused at that centre of scandal, Athens, of having had the rich treasures made by local goldsmiths. And Stephani, perhaps the most learned archaeologist living, was claiming them as the buried spoil of the barbarian invaders of the Roman Empire.

Look on this picture and on that! By slow degrees Evans has succeeded in recovering in a great measure the architecture, the art, the manners and customs, the physical type, the religion, of the great civilization of which that revealed at Mycenae was but a late offshoot, a civilization contemporary with the mighty empires of the East, and in some ways more interesting than any of them, since it is more European, more in the line of our civilization and progress.
The Dawn: and an Epilogue
Authors: Piggott Stuart
Published: August 2016

A YEAR before the first number of ANTIQUITY appeared, its founder reviewed a new publication for the Antiquaries Journal. ‘This book,’ he began, ‘is the most important of its kind that has hitherto been published…. Never before has the whole field of European origins been surveyed by a specialist who can also generalize, who writes clearly and intelligibly, and who is apparently familiar with all European languages. Its publication brings us appreciably nearer to the ultimate goal of our study.’

Crawford saw that Gordon Childe’s The Dawn of European Civilization, in its first edition of 1925, marked the beginning of a new era in archaeological studies in this country. I suspect that he was one of the very few British prehistorians at that time who realized the fact and appreciated the implications. More than thirty years later a revised sixth edition has been published, appearing almost simultaneously with the tragic news of the author’s death in his native Australia. For a full generation The Dawn, as we have all affectionately called it, has been with us, the indispensable reference-book for student, teacher and interested layman, our Ariadne-clue in the labyrinth of Neolithic and earlier Bronze Age Europe.
Our Academic Discipline Is Making Us Sicker
Authors: Magelssen Scott
Published: August 2016

That's right, sicker. At least insofar as sick is a social construct (more on that later). I'm speaking specifically about declining mental health, and for this short essay I focus on our most emergent of theatre and performance-studies scholars: our graduate students. Few of us would disagree that there has always been a significant amount of depression and anxiety among our masters and doctoral students. Recent studies, however, find that more grad students are reporting significant mental health issues today than in any past generation. Perhaps these higher numbers are simply a matter of different and better diagnosing. More likely, those entering graduate programs today have more stressors outside academia: family responsibilities, financial concerns, and culture-related anxiety (more minorities and other historically disenfranchised groups and international students are entering graduate programs than ever before). Moreover, the increase in treatments in the past decades has enabled more students with a history of mental health issues to make it to higher education. It's not the purpose of this short piece to suss out the kinds of student in our programs more likely to be mentally and emotionally distressed. Instead, I look at what we should be doing not to make it worse for the students we have in the years ahead, actions that will benefit the field as a whole and all of us individually.