Showing papers on "Assemblage (archaeology) published in 1984"

Stochastic or Deterministic Regulation of Assemblage Structure? It May Depend on How the Assemblage is Defined

Abstract: The relative importance of deterministic versus stochastic processes in structuring communities i of current interest o ecologists (Connor and Simberloff 1979; Sale 1980a; Gilpin and Diamond 1982; Matthews 1982). As summarized by Grossman et al. (1982), the determinist chool of thought maintains that assemblages are generally at equilibrium (or in succession) and that species avoid competitive xclusion through biologically accommodative processes such as resource partitioning, predation on competitive dominants, or nonlinear competitive hierarchies. The persistence of assemblage structure is thought o be a characteristic property of nonsuccessional deterministic systems (Grossman 1982a). Grossman et al. (1982) characterize the stochastic school as maintaining that the physicochemical environment is rarely stable enough to allow an equilibrium and thus species abundances are determined largely through differential responses to unpredictable environmental changes rather than through biological interactions. Because of this unpredictability, assemblage structure is not persistent. While recognizing that it would be simplistic to suggest hat assemblages are regulated solely by one process, Grossman et al. (1982) believe that many communities appear to be dominated by species which respond primarily to one mechanism. To test their ideas regarding assemblage persistence and community structuring mechanisms, Grossman et al. (1982) examined a long-term time-series of seine collections in a midwestern stream (Otter Creek, Vigo County, Indiana) and concluded that fish assemblages in streams are regulated mainly by abiotic (stochastic) processes. While we do not necessarily disagree with the conclusions of Grossman et al., we would like to comment on several aspects of their analysis. Our major concern is that the apparent role of stochastic versus deterministic processes in structuring assemblages may depend on how one defines the assemblage. Of particular importance are the number and types of taxa included as part of the assemblage. This is essentially a problem of scale in community analysis and is relevant o other studies which attempt o characterize communities a either stochastic or deterministic. Another concern is whether the observed fluctuations inspecies abundances are real or an artifact of the sampling scheme. The apparent role of stochastic versus deterministic processes in structuring assemblages will be strongly influenced by the number and types of species considered part of the assemblage. Grossman et al. (1982) defined the fish assemblage in Otter Creek as the 10 most abundant species within each season. Ten appears to have been an arbitrary choice. Would their conclusions have been different ifthey had chosen a different number of species to define the fish assemblage? To answer this question, we examined how their measure of commu-

Gainey Site: Variability in a Great Lakes Paleo-Indian Assemblage

Abstract: Ongoing excavations at the Gainey fluted point site have revealed many clusters of tools and debitage within an area of approximately three acres. In this essay the patterning of two clusters is discussed. Also, a general description of the flaked stone industry for the site as a whole is given.

Estimation of the size of molluscan larval settlement using the death assemblage

Abstract: The death assemblage is an important source of information about temporal variability in community composition. The living community and the short-term death assemblage have been studied at a sandy-bottom station in the Laguna Madre, Texas. Abundance peaks of living species are usually followed by long-term abundance increases of the same species in the death assemblage. This phenomenon provides a tool for investigating between-sampling-occasion events in the preservable component of the living community. Given a six-week sampling regimen, approximately 90% of all individuals settle, live and die during the period between consecutive sampling occasions and are not collected alive. Thus, larval settlements are consistently underestimated by about 90% from data on the living community. Comparisons of year-to-year variability in settlement and survivorship of settled individuals in the youngest age classes may be considerably in error. Better estimations of actual settlement and survivorship can be made from the death assemblage provided that the rate of taphonomic loss can be quantified. The rate of taphonomic loss can be expressed as the species' half-life, the time required for the destruction of 50% of the individuals that were added to the death assemblage following settlement. Half-lives for the smallest size classes in the death assemblage at this site are about 100 days.

Functional variability within an assemblage of endscrapers

Abstract: In light of the issue concerning artifact form and function archaeologists recently have been interested in examining patterns of use-wear within and across morphologically discrete types. To this end, assemblages and morphologically distinct artifact types have been shown to display varying degrees of functional specificity. Further, it has been found that the results of analyses pertaining to specific morphological types for a given assemblage cannot be generalized for the same morphological types across assemblages (either spatially and/or temporally).In this study, a low-magnification microwear analysis is conducted on an assemblage of 67 late prehistoric/early historic, Northwest Alaskan Inupiat Eskimo endscrapers. Based upon ethnographic observations and considerations of edge angles, Eskimo endscrapers traditionally have been associated with hide working activities. Through the microwear analysis I have documented a wider range of functional variation in these endscrapers than hide processi...

Graptolite biostratigraphy of early land plants from victoria, australia

Abstract: SUMMARY After a complete re-examination and reappraisal of all the plants and graptolites at the two critical localities of Limestone Road and Ghin Ghin, it is concluded that the overwhelming evidence indicates that the Lower Plant Assemblage of the Yea District, Victoria, Australia is Silurian (Ludlow) in age and that the earliest Baragwanathia longifolia Lang & Cookson occurs some 10Ma earlier than the unquestionably Devonian occurrences of the same species in the Upper Plant Assemblage in the same region.

Analytical approaches to the manufacture and useof bone artifacts in prehistory

Abstract: Mesolithic and Neolithic bone artifacts were analyzed with the aim of contributing knowledge regarding technological achievements, food procurement and processing, personal adornment and other aspects of social behavior. Part I presents the methodology involving the integration of data obtained through experimental replication, surface traces, metric analysis, ethnographic analogy, and archaeological context. Replicative experiments were performed to reconstruct manufacturing techniques and test functional hypotheses. Surficial topography was examined using a scanning electron microscope for the identification of manufacturing and use traces. Five key measurements were devised for evaluating gross morphology and working surfaces of artifacts. Where applicable, ethnographic analogy was employed as a source for hypotheses about artifact function. Archaeological context was studied to reveal distributional and associational patterns that might contribute evidence pertaining to the use of bone artifacts and their temporal development. Emphasis was placed on comparing data derived from the various methods to determine whether the y supported or refuted one another. Interpretations were formulated on the basis of documented patterns rather than isolated events and, whenever possible, from multiple analytical techniques. Part II demonstrates the general applicability of these methodological approaches through three case studies selected to maximize diversity of cultural affiliation, environmental conditions, temporal duration, preservational factors, and sample size. The first case study is a large, well-preserved collection from the Mogollon-Pueblo village of Point of Pines in the American Southwest. The assemblage is derived from a settlement of brief duration situated in a prairie environment. The second is a medium-sized collection from Tell Abu Hureyra in northern Syria with a long sequence from the Mesolithic through Ceramic Neolithic. The third case study consists of two small samples from Ulu Leang and Leang Burung, rock shelters in Indonesia which offer an interesting contrast in settlement t ype and environment from the two open air sites.

The Micro-Endscraper: A New Tool Type of the Chalcolithic Period

Abstract: Although certain aspects of the material culture of the Chalco lithic period have been known for more than fifty years, the flint assemblages of this time-span have been studied only sporadically. The large samples of flint artifacts recovered in the large-scale excavations of Teleilat Ghassul and the Beer Sheva sites have been only briefly described or totally ignored. The flint assemblages of T. Ghassul were published in Ghassul I-II by Neuville (1934) and Mahan (1940). Probably the richest sample, the assemblage from this site is described by Neuville without specifying the frequencies of the various artifact types. Whereas for the potsherds, "en raison de son importance" (Ghassul 1:55),their provenance was mentioned, the "less important" flint artifacts were treated as a unit, ignoring their distribution in time and space. For the Beer Sheva Chalcolithic sites, which must have yielded thousands of flint artifacts, only a preliminary description of a small sample from l:Iorvat Beter is available (Yeivin 1959). Since many of these implements were thrown away, these pieces are not available for further study. Of the flint assemblages of Bir Safadi and Bir Abu-Matar (Perrot 1968) nothing is yet published. The Besor sites near Tell el-Far'ah (S) yielded rich flint assemblages, but these were published a long time ago (BP II). To summarize, the flint assemblages of the Chalcolithic sites from the southern half of Israel and from T. Ghassul, i.e. the largest, richest and best preserved sites, are inadequately known; the information is either partial, outdated or missing entirely. During the past three decades, advanced methods for the analysis of flint artifacts have been applied to the local Stone Age flint assemblages. The result has been a much better understanding of the Palaeolithic cultural development and distribution. However, these methods have barely been applied to the study of Chalcolithic assemblages. The large quantities of pottery sherds found at these sites are still generally considered to be more "informative" than their flint artifacts. Recent studies of the known assemblages from the Tell el-Far'ah area by Roshwalb (1981) and new assemblages from northeastern Sinai by Gilead (Oren and Gilead 1981) have shown that the flint artifacts are significant components of the material culture and merit serious attention. The systematic collection of these artifacts, sifting of deposits for the recovery of the minute elements in the assemblage and an attribute analysis of the finds are essential for the proper understanding of the material culture. A further contribution towards a better understanding of the Chalco lithic flint assemblages is provided below in presenting a new tool type: the micro-endscraper.

Nature, affinities and significance of metavolcanic rocks in the Outokumpu assemblage, eastern Finland

Abstract: PARK, A.F., 1983: Nature, affinities and significance of metavolcanic rocks in the Outokumpu assemblage, eastern Finland. Bull. Geol. Soc. Finland 56, Part 1—2, 25—52. The rock association of serpentinite—chrome-silicate skarn—dolomitequartz rock—black schist in the Outokumpu region, in which polymetallic sulphide ore deposits occur, has been compared to an ophiolite. However, despite evidence that the orebodies have a sea-floor exhalative origin, volcanogenic rocks have only been described recently. Evidence is now presented that, in the Losomäki district, the volcanogenic rocks include pillow lavas, vesicular lava, agglomerate and tuff with autoclastic breccia. These original features indicative of a volcanogenic derivation are restricted to low strain enclaves in amphibole—chlorite (± garnet) schists, amphibole—epidote schists, zoisite—amphibole (+ chlorite) rocks and hornblende—plagioclase—quartz rocks, previously mapped as »skarn». These banded amphibolites and greenschists show evidence of repeated deformation and recrystallisation under P—T conditions pertaining successively to amphibolite and greenschist facies conditions, and grade into rocks retaining distinctive volcanogenic features. At Losomäki they constitute about 30 % of the outcrop of the serpentinite—skarn—dolomite—quartz rock — black schist assemblage, referred to as the Outokumpu assemblage. Comparable rocks occur in the same assemblage elsewhere in the Outokumpu region. Even though original volcanogenic features survive, complete metamorphic reconstitution means that the original compositions have to be deduced. Possible pseudomorphs after skeletal olivine (?spinifex) occur in some pillow cores, suggesting komatiitic affinities. Whole-rock chemistry indicates extensive alteration before the first metamorphic reconstitution; leaching of alkalis, iron, nickel, cobalt, chromium and base metals is implied, presumably in a marine environment. Some trace element ratios appear to remain well constrained, particularly Ti:Zr, Zr:Y and Ti:Y. On discriminant function diagrams affinities are suggested with primitive tholeiites of island arcs or back-arc basins; other features suggest similarities to the komatiite—tholeiite association of Archaean greenstone belts. The environment of eruption, as indicated by the relict morphology and field relations of the pillow lavas and related volcanoclastic deposits, appears to have been under shallow water on the seafloor. The geochemical parameters suggest that the tectonic setting was in an island-arc or back-arc basin and not on the deep ocean floor.

Zooarchaeological Analysis of Raw-Material Selection by a Saxon Artisan

Abstract: Bone was a common raw material for artifact manufacture from Upper Palaeolithic times. For certain classes of artifacts selection for particular bones is necessary. Because bones vary according to biological processes, one can analyze raw-material selection in biological terms using Zooarchaeological methods. Analysis of an assemblage containing waste from a Saxon bone-worker's workshop in southern England demonstrates strong preferences for particular bones of particular species, and also demonstrates that selection for bones from animals of particular ages and sex occurred. The effects of this selection on the unmodified faunal assemblage are discussed, and inferences on other aspects of the local economy are made.

Panel assemblage for housing : some form and construction explorations for small buildings

Abstract: This thesis examines the consequences of building homes in a factory and explores viable construction alternatives using factorymade panels. The exploration considers panelized systems of dwelling construction and its ability to adapt to a variety of site conditions while providing a wide range of spatial options to the inhabitants. Thesis Supervisor: Marucie K. Smith Title: Professor of Architecture

The effect of place

Abstract: The effect of space cannot be demonstrated simply by relying on the dialectic of nature and culture but only careful analysis. The complexity of the problem is exemplified by discussing the diversity of perception attaching to the iron and steel assemblage, at Mondeville near Caen, where each group — managers, workforce, wives and local people — have different images of the assemblage, giving it a composite identity. Usage permits a classification of place into five types: production, habitation, exchange, play and power. Social space consists of associations of places. In ‘simpler’ societies all types of usage are present at or near one site; in the countryside and in old European towns usages are separate but closely located. With industrial urban societies, with high personal mobility, places with different usage are widely separated. Associated with this third type of association are landscapes of high uniformmity — banal and undifferentiated. Space thus bears the imprint of society. The effect of space is more a social product than a spatial product.

Taxonomic Richness, Diversity, and Assemblage Size

Abstract: This chapter discusses the difficulties involved in measuring richness and diversity in the archaeological setting. Faunal assemblage richness is tightly correlated with the size of the retrieved sample—the number of identified specimens—and this fact must be taken into account whenever richness is analyzed. In studies of taxonomic richness, analysis is focused on the number of taxa, often species, which have contributed to a faunal assemblage, and on comparing assemblages on the basis of the number of taxa they contain. Taxonomic richness has frequently been addressed in the archaeological literature. Smith, for instance, utilized species richness as a basic analytic device in his study of the use of vertebrates by Middle Mississippi people in the southeastern United States. Species richness is highly variable across strata within both Gatecliff Shelter and Hidden Cave; therefore, the chapter discusses this variability to the kinds of accumulation mechanisms that constructed the faunal assemblages of those sites, and to changes in past environments.

Prehistoric Cultures in the Marv Dasht Plain, Iran.

Abstract: The earliest sedentary cultures in the Marv Dasht plain were revealed through the excavations at Tape Djari A, B and Tall-i Mushki by the Tokyo Univ. Iraq-Iran Archaeological Expedition in 1959 and 64. The cultural assemblage of Tape Djari B has not yet been cleared and we are now checking and studying the objects.The pottery of Djari B shows in its technic some differences from that of Mushki, especially in using thick over-coating. But the fundamental cultural contents of Djari B are common to the preceding phase and we should like to call them “Mushki-Djari complex”. This belongs to the Zagros Neolithic Cultures and is dated to the 2nd half of the 7th millennium B. C.After a hiatus of the whole 6th millennium B. C., a new tradition came there from Susiana in the early 5th millennium B. C. This hiatus seems to show the decline of the early mixed-farming cultures in the Zagros.