Showing papers in "Journal of World Prehistory in 2009"
TL;DR: A wealth of recent studies, not previously synthesised, suggest that the peninsular littoral offered a rich resource base for thousands of years of human occupation in the region, and also that Arabia witnessed some of the world's earliest seafaring and maritime exchange activities, and played a role in Bronze Age maritime trade that has often been underestimated as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The Arabian Peninsula occupies a critical position at the intersect of several major Old World landmasses. Inland aridity and a major coastal perimeter have long made maritime activities critical to Arabia’s cultural trajectory. A wealth of recent studies, not previously synthesised, suggest not only that the peninsular littoral offered a rich resource base for thousands of years of human occupation in the region, but also that Arabia witnessed some of the world’s earliest seafaring and maritime exchange activities, and played a role in Bronze Age maritime trade that has often been underestimated. Maritime activities were closely linked to developments in agriculture, which not only fuelled trade and exchange, but were also impacted on by the dispersal of domesticates along early maritime corridors. While regional specialisation has to some degree prevented consideration of the maritime prehistory of the peninsula as a whole, it is clear that there are interesting parallels, as well as important differences, between cultural trajectories in different parts of the peninsula.
205 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors synthesize the more recent evidence and weigh interpretations of processes that led to the widespread fundamental changes witnessed during the late fifth to early fourth millennium BC in the Levant.
Abstract: In the southern Levant, the late fifth millennium to mid-fourth millennium BC—traditionally known as the Chalcolithic period—witnessed major cultural transformations in virtually all areas of society, most notably craft production, mortuary and ritual practices, settlement patterns, and iconographic and symbolic expression. A degree of regionalism is evident in material culture, but continuity in ceramic styles, iconographic motifs, and mortuary practices suggests a similar cultural outlook linking these sub-regions. Luxury items found in group mortuary caves provide good evidence for at least some inequality in access to exotic materials. The level of complexity in social organization, however, is still debated. Divergent interpretations of Chalcolithic socio-economic organization suggest that, with the large amount of new information now available, a reevaluation of the debate is due. In this article we synthesize the more recent evidence and weigh interpretations of processes that led to the widespread fundamental changes witnessed during the late fifth to early fourth millennium BC.
126 citations
TL;DR: The authors traces the beginnings of metallurgy in the eastern half of the African continent, focusing on three regions: (1) Egypt and Nubia; (2) the Great Lakes region of Central and East Africa; and (3) southern Africa.
Abstract: This article traces the beginnings of metallurgy in the eastern half of the African continent, focusing on three regions: (1) Egypt and Nubia; (2) the Great Lakes region of Central and East Africa; and (3) southern Africa. Metallurgy was not practiced much beyond the Nile valley until the first millennium BC, when copper, bronze and iron metallurgy began in Ethiopia and Eritrea, and iron metallurgy in the Great Lakes region. The expansion of agricultural societies carried iron metallurgy south, reaching its southern limit in South Africa by c. 300 cal AD. Copper was also smelted in southern Africa, but its use was restricted to pendants, bracelets, wire and other items of jewelry. In stark contrast to the metallurgical sequence in the Nile Valley, there was no production of tin, lead, gold or silver in central or southern Africa before these regions were linked to the Islamic world system after c. 800 AD.
94 citations
Abstract: In the four decades since the discovery that a discrete Bronze Age preceded the Iron Age in mainland Southeast Asia, much has been learned about the dating, technology, production, organization, and use of bronze metallurgy in the region, particularly in prehistoric Thailand. Although independent invention of copper smelting in Southeast Asia has not been considered likely by most regional archaeologists since the 1980s, the source of copper-base technology and the mechanisms of adoption remain poorly understood. Arguments claiming that the primary stimulus for the appearance of copper-base metallurgy in Southeast Asia came from early states in the Central Plain of China have dominated recent discussions, but anthropological approaches to technology transmission, adoption, and adaptation have yet to be systematically explored. After summarizing the current evidence for early bronze metallurgy in Thailand, this paper proposes an alternative to the predominant Sinocentric view of the source for Southeast Asian bronze technology. It will be proposed on both chronological and technological grounds that the first bronze metallurgy in Southeast Asia was derived from pre-Andronovo late third millennium BC Eurasian forest-steppe metals technology, and not from the second millennium, technologically distinctive, elite-sponsored bronze metallurgy of the Chinese Erlitou or Erligang Periods. Hypotheses for a transmission route and a research agenda for resolving debates on bronze origins in Southeast Asia are offered.
88 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the origins of the use and production of metals in Iran are compared with a cursory overview of the lowland model (the "Levantine Paradigm") in order to highlight these differences.
Abstract: Models for the development of metallurgy in Southwest Asia have for a long time been focussed on research carried out in the lowland regions of the Levant and Mesopotamia. These models do not take into account the different developmental trajectories witnessed in the resource-rich highlands of Anatolia, the Caucasus, and Iran. In this paper, the beginnings of the use and production of metals in Iran will be juxtaposed with a cursory overview of the lowland model (the ‘Levantine Paradigm’) in order to highlight these differences. By synthesizing data from a number of current research projects exploring the early metallurgy of the Iranian Plateau, this paper demonstrates how at least one of the highland regions of Southwest Asia was at the very forefront of technological innovation from the seventh through the second millennium BC.
82 citations
TL;DR: A recent survey of the origins of West African metallurgies can be found in this paper, which calls for more sophisticated explanations away from the single non-African source hypothesis.
Abstract: The debate on West African metallurgies cannot be properly understood without reference to the colonial template that featured Africa as the receiving partner in all crucial social, economic, and technological development. The interesting debate that took place in West Africa during the Colonial Period was more meta-theoretical than factual. These conflicting glosses, despite their lack of empirical foundations, have constrained the nature of archaeological research and oversimplified the dynamics of the many facets of technological innovation. The relative boom in archaeological research that took place from the 1960s onwards resulted in an exponential growth of factual information. Challenging evidence has emerged from Niger, Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Gabon, Togo, and Senegal. The picture that emerges from this survey calls for more sophisticated explanations for the origins of West African metallurgies away from the single non-African source hypothesis.
69 citations
TL;DR: The authors suggest that metallurgy emerged independently in a core area and then spread to peripheral areas by way of political expansion and cultural diffusion over many millennia, and that metheurgy was also homegrown.
Abstract: Metallurgy has been taken as essential to the development of Chinese civilization. Archaeological study has been particularistic and evolutionary, tied to traditional Chinese historiography, and modern Marxist models of social development. Modern studies suggest that metallurgy emerged independently in a ‘core’ area and then spread to ‘peripheral’ areas by way of political expansion and cultural diffusion over many millennia, and that metallurgy was also homegrown. New excavations suggest: multiple early centers of production; that the Chinese case belongs to a regional context; that native sources of ores were significant; that metals were used in several pre-state level societies.
63 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a comparative case study of early metallurgy in the Southern Ural Mountains of the Russian Federation has been presented, with a particular focus on prehistoric developments in a region including northern Kazakhstan and the Russian Russian Federation.
Abstract: This paper evaluates conventional scholarship surrounding early metallurgy in the Eurasian steppe zone, with a particular focus on prehistoric developments in a region including northern Kazakhstan and the Southern Ural Mountains of the Russian Federation. Traditionally, the emergence of metallurgy in this region has been viewed either as peripheral to core developments in Mesopotamia, Europe and the Near East, or as part of a much larger zone of interaction and trade in metals and metal production technologies. Such views have deflected scholarship from pursuing questions concerning metallurgical production, consumption, trade and value, and their connection to local diachronic socio-economic change. This paper examines these key issues through recent research programs in the steppe region, and in so doing offers an important comparative case study for early metallurgy. It is suggested that in order to develop a better understanding of early mining, metallurgy and socio-economic change in the central steppe region, new theoretical and methodological approaches are needed that highlight the unique characteristics of early mining communities and their relationships to micro-regional resources and concomitant local, in addition to long-distance, trade dynamics. These issues are discussed in light of current field research by the authors and their Russian colleagues on the Middle Bronze Age Sintashta development (2,100–1,700 BC) in the Southern Ural Mountains.
41 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a discussion of copper use in old copper, Hopewellian, and Mississippian traditions is presented, focusing on the complex relations among levels of technological sophistication in the manipulation of the material itself, the often elaborate and meaning-laden contexts in which artifacts were used, and the relative social complexity of the cultures that supported copper procurement, transformation, and use.
Abstract: The creative ways in which native North American peoples of the Eastern Woodlands utilized copper throughout prehistory present provocative contrasts to models of Old World metallurgical development. Archaeological approaches that incorporate laboratory methods into investigations of indigenous metalworking practice have brought new insights and raised new questions about the development and use of techniques, sources of materials, and the social dynamics of copper consumption. This paper integrates the results of these studies into a discussion of copper use in Old Copper, Hopewellian, and Mississippian traditions that focuses on illuminating the complex relations among levels of technological sophistication in the manipulation of the material itself, the often elaborate and meaning-laden contexts in which artifacts were used, and the relative social complexity of the cultures that supported copper procurement, transformation, and use. It is suggested that ‘technological style’ approaches will assist archaeologists in efforts to flesh out culture-specific aspects of its consumption.
40 citations
TL;DR: The shell middens of Brittany provide the last evidence of a Mesolithic way of life along the French Atlantic facade as mentioned in this paper, showing that the dependence on the sea seen in the Late Mesolithic seems to be a consequence of a long-established exploitation system.
Abstract: The shell middens of Brittany provide the last evidence of a Mesolithic way of life along the French Atlantic facade. This is partly a result of Holocene marine transgressions that prevent easy access to earlier coastal settlements. Nevertheless, the dependence on the sea seen in the Late Mesolithic seems to be a consequence of a long-established exploitation system. Stable carbon and nitrogen isotope signatures in human bone reflect a dominance of marine protein, while the zooarchaeological components of shell middens show a high species richness of exploited marine resources. Paleoenvironmental reconstruction suggests that more or less the whole range of resources exploited was accessible in the immediate vicinity of the sites. Seasonal aspects of the utilised and potentially available subsistence resources, along with stable isotope and lithic data, raise the possibility of restricted mobility for these populations, within relatively limited territories. The impression of extreme dependence of these coastal populations on the seashore might have been a key factor in their final disappearance, whether this is viewed as replacement or acculturation. Indeed, the Mesolithic communities of Brittany could have been caught between rising sea-levels and the arrival of Neolithic communities from the east and the south.
35 citations
TL;DR: The earliest metal objects and metal production practices appeared in Western Europe during the fourth and third millennia BC as discussed by the authors, and the acquisition of metal objects as exotica by communities appears to have led eventually to the movement of people possessing metallurgical expertise.
Abstract: The earliest metal objects and metal production practices appeared in Western Europe during the fourth and third millennia BC. The presence of earlier dates for copper, gold, silver, and lead, as well as arsenical copper and tin-bronze alloys in Central and Eastern Europe implies that there is no evidence for the independent invention of metallurgy in Western Europe. Instead, the acquisition of metal objects as exotica by communities appears to have led eventually to the movement of people possessing metallurgical expertise. However, the metals, production techniques and object forms used in each region reflect local standards seen in other materials. This implies a process of incorporation and innovation by the communities involved rather than a straightforward or inevitable adoption. The presence of metal may have created new networks of communication and exchange but, due to its small scale, there is no evidence for any metallurgical revolution.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigated Chalcolithic metallurgy in the southern Levant and the dynamics of production in the Nahal Mishmar Hoard, a collection of cast metal goods, some quite ornate, found in a cave high in the cliffs of the Judean Desert.
Abstract: Several decades after the discovery of the spectacular Nahal Mishmar Hoard (a collection of cast metal goods, some quite ornate, found in a cave high in the cliffs of the Judean Desert) many important questions about Chalcolithic metallurgy in the southern Levant remain unanswered. What is the origin of the materials used? Where were the final goods produced and what were the dynamics of production? In fact, new questions have also arisen as recent discoveries force us to reconsider previous interpretations of Chalcolithic metallurgy and the societies within which it evolved. Such will be the focus of this paper.
TL;DR: The diffusion of metallurgy from the Near East to the rest of Eurasia has been a topic of considerable interest for over a century as discussed by the authors, with a number of prominent scholars arguing that the technological knowledge necessary to transform ores into metal was too complex to have been invented twice.
Abstract: The ‘beginnings of metallurgy’ has been a topic of considerable interest for over a century. Due to the relatively good preservation of metal artifacts and the modern values attached to metals, metal artifact typologies often served as the very basis for prehistoric sequences during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. In many ways, it was V. Gordon Childe (1930, 1944) who placed metallurgical technology at the forefront, arguing as he did for the roles of ‘itinerant metal smiths’ and bronze production in the rise of social elites and complex societies (cf. Wailes 1996). Childe (1939) was also one of the first to systematically argue for the diffusion of metallurgy from the Near East to the rest of Eurasia. This diffusionist perspective was adopted by a number of prominent scholars of ancient metallurgy, notably Wertime (1964, 1973a, b), Smith (1977), Muhly (1988), and Chernykh (1992), who all felt that the technological knowledge necessary to transform ores into metal was too complex to have been invented twice. Criticism of the ex oriente lux paradigm came first from Europe, where Renfrew (1969, 1973, 1986) used radiocarbon dates to demonstrate that early European metallurgical sites were in fact older than similar sites in the Near East. Not surprisingly, other objections to the diffusionist perspective were raised by scholars working in areas far removed from the Middle East, including in China (e.g., Barnard 1961, 1993), in Africa (e.g., Trigger 1969), and most especially in the New World (e.g., Lechtman 1979, 1980). However, even important cross-regional volumes on early metallurgy (e.g., Wertime and Muhly 1980; Maddin 1988; Hauptmann et al. 1999), which have demonstrated most effectively that metallurgy did not follow a single developmental trajectory in every society, have done little to quell the predominance of diffusionist models and other Childean theories of elite dominance, core–periphery dynamics, and specialized craftspeople. With this in mind, invitations were sent to fifteen scholars of early metallurgy who had previously demonstrated an ability to combine archaeometrical analysis, archaeological
TL;DR: In this paper, the role of metals in the economic and social networks of the Indus tradition is examined in terms of patterns of use and technological style, and the authors conclude that there is no evidence for elite control of metal production, and that access to metals was relatively widespread.
Abstract: We review the existing data sets for the production and consumption of copper-base objects at Indus sites, outline a working typology for metal objects, and provide new data from on-going analytical work on the copper assemblage from Harappa. The role of metals in the economic and social networks of the Indus tradition is examined in terms of patterns of use and technological style. We note that Indus metalsmiths apparently relied more on procurement of metal ingots or scrap than on primary ingot production through smelting, which would have affected other aspects of Indus metallurgy. Object production did not involve elaborate forms, but may have involved complex alloying. Finally, we conclude that there is no evidence for elite control of metal production, and that access to metals was relatively widespread.
TL;DR: Mesoamerican metallurgy furnishes an intellectual challenge in the development of world metallurgies: the evidence indicates that it was introduced from outside after state level societies had been flourishing in many areas as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: Mesoamerican metallurgy furnishes an intellectual challenge in the development of world metallurgies: the evidence indicates that it was introduced from outside after state level societies had been flourishing in many areas. Two questions thus emerge: one concerns its origins, the second concerns what peoples did with this entirely new, unknown material. The evidence thus far indicates that metalworking knowledge and techniques were introduced from northern South America, which focused on lost-wax casting, as well as from the central Andes, where cold work from an initial cast blank was a predominant feature of that technology. Here I summarize what we know to date about the tradition that developed in the west, including some very new on-going research.
TL;DR: In South India early metal artifacts, usually associated with megalithic sites, include both copper and iron as mentioned in this paper, although in some cases copper artifacts predate those made of iron, there is no evidence of an extensive metallurgical tradition based on copper and its alloys.
Abstract: In South India early metal artifacts, usually associated with megalithic sites, include both copper and iron. Although in some cases copper artifacts predate those made of iron, there is no evidence of an extensive metallurgical tradition based on copper and its alloys. Typological studies have had limited success in explaining the megalithic sites and the production and consumption of metal, while other approaches have not explicitly addressed the social contexts of metal production. While there emerge some suggestive patterns from the archaeometallurgical evidence to date, understanding the role of metal production and consumption in megalithic contexts means reevaluating traditional paradigms about the nature of these sites and about how metal technologies develop.