The Archaeological Process: An Introduction
... Para ele, cada vez mais é preciso que a Arqueologia, e as ciências de modo geral, abrace a diversidade metodológica e teórica; permitindo que a "interpretação" do passado esteja aberta para outros olhares e vozes, sem com isso abandonar a necessária coerência e plausibilidade entre dados, contextos e interpretações. Como discutido por Hodder (1999) Em outras palavras, sob a égide desta abordagem busca-se reconhecer que os relatos a respeito do passado e do patrimônio desempenham um importante papel na formação de identidades de grupos e indivíduos; e, assim sendo essas pessoas devem ter direito de formular a sua interpretação alternativa sobre seu passado e patrimônio cultural. Para tanto, Hodder (1999) ressalta a necessidade de envolver a comunidade local na definição, preservação e divulgação do patrimônio cultural. ...
... Como discutido por Hodder (1999) Em outras palavras, sob a égide desta abordagem busca-se reconhecer que os relatos a respeito do passado e do patrimônio desempenham um importante papel na formação de identidades de grupos e indivíduos; e, assim sendo essas pessoas devem ter direito de formular a sua interpretação alternativa sobre seu passado e patrimônio cultural. Para tanto, Hodder (1999) ressalta a necessidade de envolver a comunidade local na definição, preservação e divulgação do patrimônio cultural. De acordo com o autor, este é um movimento decisivo na tentativa de inserir a produção do conhecimento em estruturas mais democráticas e éticas. ...
This article seeks to reflect on the potential of participatory inventories as instruments to expand the concept of heritage and promote an ecology of knowledge. For that, we present how the participatory inventory that has been developed in the municipality of São Raimundo Nonato - Pi has helped in the construction of other perspectives on the cultural heritage of the municipality, enabling the construction of collaborative narratives about them. The collected data indicate that the identification of goods with “heritage value” by our collaborators tends to be based on aspects of their family and affective trajectory, being this an element to be considered in the elaboration of policies and actions of definition, valorization and heritage protection.
... Existen múltiples publicaciones que exploran la importancia de la reflexividad y el trabajo de campo arqueológico (Berggren & Hodder, 2003;Criado-Boado, 2016;Gonzalez-Ruibal, 2006;Hamilakis & Anagnostopoulos, 2009;Hodder, 1999Hodder, , 1999Politis, 2001;Yarrow, 2003 entre otros), siendo la gran mayoría sobre temas relacionados a la excavación y la puesta en valor de sitios, todos unidos bajo la premisa de que dichos trabajos son con poblaciones que tienen un nexo con el pasado que estudia la arqueología. ...
... Existen múltiples publicaciones que exploran la importancia de la reflexividad y el trabajo de campo arqueológico (Berggren & Hodder, 2003;Criado-Boado, 2016;Gonzalez-Ruibal, 2006;Hamilakis & Anagnostopoulos, 2009;Hodder, 1999Hodder, , 1999Politis, 2001;Yarrow, 2003 entre otros), siendo la gran mayoría sobre temas relacionados a la excavación y la puesta en valor de sitios, todos unidos bajo la premisa de que dichos trabajos son con poblaciones que tienen un nexo con el pasado que estudia la arqueología. ...
En este artículo se presentan los primeros trabajos de prospección arqueológica para la localidad de las Piedras Blancas, en el Departamento Ambato, Catamarca. Ubicado en las estribaciones finales de la cumbre del Ambato, esta localidad apenas fue nombrada en la arqueología regional, por lo que nuestros objetivos estuvieron guiados para dar un primer panorama sobre los asentamientos de las poblaciones prehispánicas, teniendo como objetivo primario empezar a entender la lógica del uso del paisaje en las cumbres del Ambato. La metodología de campo fue guiada por la técnica de prospección por sendas, recorriendo las quebradas desde el fondo de valle hasta punta de cumbre, utilizando además sistemas de información geográfico. Tomando como marco teórico la arqueología del paisaje y la antropología reflexiva, consideramos que estas aportan herramientas importantes para entender el paisaje desde una perspectiva local. En cuanto a los resultados obtenidos, logramos relevar 38 sitios arqueológicos hasta niveles altitudinales elevados (superando los 3800 msnm), lo que nos permite pensar en que esta zona de la cumbre del Ambato estuvo ampliamente habitada para el primer milenio de la era.
... Los cambios paradigmáticos que surgieron, en las décadas de los setenta y ochenta, en los distintos campos de conocimiento como la geografía, antropología, ecología, sociología, historia, ciencia política, arte y literatura, entre otros (Corbin y Ledrun 2001;Daniels 1989;Giddens 1979;Daniels y Cosgrove 1988;Harvy 1977;Peet 1977, Shanks y Tilley 1998Thrift 1979Thrift , 1994 tuvieron un impacto profundo en la forma de concebir el paisaje-entorno (Cosgrove y Daniels 1988;Hodder 1999Hodder , 2001Hodder y Hutson 2003;Johnson 2007;Johnson 1998;Knapp 1997;Peet y Thrift 1989;Soya 1989;Thomas 2007). Si bien existe físicamente lo que se llama "entorno", éste se aprecia y se construye como paisaje cuando se sumerge el ser humano en el lugar [place] o en espacio (Casey 1966;Corbin y Lebrun 2001: 39;Johnson 2007: 3-4). ...
La cuenca del Alto Lerma es reconocida por sus humedales, volcanes, bosques circundantes y el gran río Lerma. Desde hace alrededor de 3000 años hasta la actualidad, los pobladores de esta región han venido interactuando con su entorno lacustre. Resultado de esta milenaria convivencia se tiene por su particular forma de comprender el paisaje, término que, con el paso del tiempo, ha ido diversificándose de acuerdo con las perspectivas teóricas específicas. En el presente texto, a partir del paisaje concebido como un constructo social-histórico, se relatan los vaivenes de las interacciones entre los grupos lacustres y sus humedales desde los tiempos prehispánicos hasta apenas hace unas décadas. Mediante un proceso de constantes negociaciones entre ellos, se fue construyendo una percepción particular del paisaje. A veces, éste manifiesta su carácter dinámico, mientras que, en otras, parece pervivir sin cambios perceptibles. Todo cambio en la percepción del paisaje puede ser efímero puede ser efímero, pero, también, puede perdurar y provocar una transformación profunda o una resiliencia ante ella. En este complejo proceso, la gente va tejiendo su razón de existencia e identidad. Así, el verdadero significado del paisaje lacustre que va creando una historia particular se encuentra en un péndulo precario entre el ser humano y los humedales. Si el paisaje es un constructo socialmente condicionado, se presume, entonces, que, a lo largo de la historia del valle de Toluca, la construcción del paisaje lacustre ha tenido múltiples facetas, en ocasiones, provocadas por los episodios ambientales y, en otras, por las causas antrópicas.
... An essential part of archaeological data, in fact, is related to spatial information describing and classifying historical evidence, thanks in part to the increasing use of GIS software for collecting, entering, processing, cataloguing and editing such datasets. Indeed, they make it possible to implement advanced connections between graphical and textual data [27] while facilitating the correlation of information that, otherwise, would remain isolated and unhelpful to the overall understanding of the excavation under analysis [28], [29]. ...
This paper presents the contents of a geodatabase developed from the outcomes of survey operations carried out, in several stages since 2015, within the archaeological context of the Roman city of Aquinum, in southern Lazio. The proposed geodatabase integrates traditional topographic surveying techniques with total station, GPS and GNSS geodetic receivers with photogrammetric surveys and terrestrial laser-scanner (TLS) measurements, including the realization of HBIM (Historical Building Information Modeling) models, to investigate some specific historical-archaeological evidence useful to understand the Roman and medieval urban structure of the city. The processing and management of the metric and information datasets were entrusted to a GIS platform, implemented in the opensource Quantum-GIS software, to optimize the flowchart of the acquisition/processing process and to realize an intra-site Web-GIS useful for the visualization and dissemination of the results. The methodological-operational approach applied in the research activities highlights the fundamental contribution that the technological innovations of geomatics can provide for the construction of elaborate knowledge concerning cultural heritage, also becoming the base for the elaboration of more complex and detailed analyses. In this case, for example, the HBIM digital model of the Church of Santa Maria of Libera was also used for an in-depth study in the field of structural engineering, as input to model the masonry vaults of the aisles of the church and assess their structural safety through the analysis methodology denominated "Thrust Network Analysis (TNA)." In addition, the high-precision 3D models developed from detailed photogrammetric measurements of the archaeological fragments and human remains found in the excavation areas made it possible to create interesting "visual digital products" that are immediately understandable even for non-experts, and thus particularly useful for wide-ranging knowledge dissemination.
... É necessário referencial teórico e comparação com outros locais para entender a cultura que deu origem a esse monumento, como os povos que o fizeram se enquadram em um processo muito maior de neolitização, qual sua visão de mundo e como enxergavam a religião, por exemplo. Como qualquer ciência, a arqueologia não deve apenas buscar o acúmulo de conhecimento, mas também a crítica a si mesma, de forma a alavancar os debates (Hodder, 1999 (Trigger, 1984). ...
Este artigo tem como objetivo comparar duas páginas de blogs que versam sobre o sítio arqueológico Göbekli Tepe de forma pseudoarqueológica. Para tanto, primeiro será feita uma fundamentação sobre o método arqueológico e a pseudoarqueologia, de modo a conceituar o último termo; em seguida, analisaremos pontos que aproximam e distanciam as fontes quanto ao seu modo de convencimento do leitor e a presença de ideias colonialistas.
... In the real world, archaeological practice (and most humanities research) is messy and therefore this process is fuzzy and recursive. It takes the form of a hermeneutic spiral [125], which from the perspective of computational algorithms are loops between data, information and knowledge. These loops involve solving computationally irreducible processes that cannot be handled by LLM-based AI chatbots alone ( Fig. 1: I). ...
Historical emphasis on writing mastery has shifted with advances in generative AI, especially in scientific writing. This study analysed six AI chatbots for scholarly writing in humanities and archaeology. Using methods that assessed factual correctness and scientific contribution, ChatGPT-4 showed the highest quantitative accuracy, closely followed by ChatGPT-3.5, Bing, and Bard. However, Claude 2 and Aria scored considerably lower. Qualitatively, all AIs exhibited proficiency in merging existing knowledge, but none produced original scientific content. Interestingly, our findings suggest ChatGPT-4 might represent a plateau in large language model size. This research emphasizes the unique, intricate nature of human research, suggesting that AI's emulation of human originality in scientific writing is challenging. As of 2023, while AI has transformed content generation, it struggles with original contributions in humanities. This may change as AI chat-bots continue to evolve into LLM-powered software. Highlights • The article evaluates the scientific writing skills of six AI chatbots in the humanities and archaeology. • The AI chatbots compared are: ChatGPT-3.5, ChatGPT-4, Bard, Bing Chatbot, Aria, and Claude 2. We also tested two ChatGPT-4 plugins: Bing and ScholarAI. • ChatGPT-4 outperforms the other chatbots in quantitative accuracy , but is unable to "pass an undergraduate exam" in humanities. • The study demonstrates the limited potential of AI in generating original scientific contributions, underscoring the unique value of human researchers. • The growth in the size of large language models appears to have reached a plateau. • As the size of language models like ChatGPT stabilises, it is important to understand their capabilities and limitations in the academic environment. Citation: Lozić, E.; Štular, B.; ChatGPT v Bard v Bing v Claude 2 v Aria v human-expert. How good are AI chatbots at scientific writing?.
... Reports have also been criticised for being boring, chronicling rather than narrating the investigation they are describing (Lucas, 2019), and far from 'exciting, or indeed thought-provoking reading' (Hamilton, 1999, p. 5). They have also been arraigned for being cleaned-up of guesswork, iterations and debates (Hodder, 1999). Their style is often formal and they commonly use passive voice to an extent that an investigation might appear to be attributable to 'archaeology' (as an actor) rather than to individual archaeologists (Huvila, 2017). ...
This chapter inquires into how two specific types of epistemic artefacts —traces and ingredients —work together and against each other in conveying understanding of past knowledge-making activities. The discussion draws from an analysis of Swedish and French archaeological investigation reports and from how they, as traces and ingredients, contribute to knowing-in-practice in multiple parallel ways as a part of archaeological practice—literally in practice. Traces and ingredients have different epistemic opportunities and limitations to act as records of the past and goads to action even if many traces can act as ingredients and vice versa albeit with certain limitations that are useful to be aware of. Being aware of how an epistemic artefact works in an epistemic sense—for example as a trace or an ingredient—can help to use them accordingly to what they are capable of, to avoid uses that go against their potential, and to develop better ones.
... During active archaeological excavation, interpretation is emergent as excavators progressively uncover contexts. Understandings evolve and are revised as relationships between constituent elements (features, artifact distributions, etc.) may be grasped within a larger whole as an excavation unfolds (Hodder, 1999). Project directors are often more limited in their tactile engagement with excavation matrices and features in the field, as they rely on excavator observations while maintaining a panoramic view across individual excavation operations. ...
Thanks to currently available very high-resolution three-dimensional (3D) models via photogrammetric techniques as a primary method of archaeological documentation, constructing immersive, high-fidelity simulacra is imminently possible. This paper considers how the scale at which the human body interacts with immersive digital models is especially important for understanding the affordances and ergonomics of past things and places. The implications of this isometry between archaeological objects of analysis and emerging capabilities to interact with them through digital surrogates in the present are manifold. By enabling interaction with objects and contexts in immersive virtual space, such observational experiences create in silico engagements that are repeatable, distributable, and collaborative. In particular, it is the collaborative capacity of this technology that this paper explores using online immersive virtual reality (iVR). Collaborative online iVR is used in this research as a key instrument for enhancing understanding and reinterpreting the digital records of two archaeological sites under excavation in Peru. The case studies analyzed show a variety of cultural, geographic, and temporal contexts in the Andean region, which illustrates the broad potential of iVR for archaeological hermeneutics. Through iVR frameworks, the authors engage with embodied reconsiderations of Catholic ritual spaces within a planned colonial town in the southern Peruvian highlands and the pre-Columbian site of Huaca Colorada on the north coast. Synchronous scalar experiences that privilege the affordances of architectural space within digital models create opportunities for embodied experience and collaborative dialogue. A fundamental argument is the capacity to digitally inhabit these places and manipulate materials holds subtle as well as profound epistemological and hermeneutic implications for archaeological knowledge construction.
... In the real world, archaeological practice (and most humanities research) is messy, and therefore, this process is fuzzy and recursive. It takes the form of a hermeneutic spiral [113], which, from the perspective of computational algorithms, are loops between data, information, and knowledge. These loops involve solving computationally irreducible processes that cannot be handled by LLM-based AI chatbots alone (Figure 1: I). ...
Historically, mastery of writing was deemed essential to human progress. However, recent advances in generative AI have marked an inflection point in this narrative, including for scientific writing. This article provides a comprehensive analysis of the capabilities and limitations of six AI chatbots in scholarly writing in the humanities and archaeology. The methodology was based on tagging AI-generated content for quantitative accuracy and qualitative precision by human experts. Quantitative accuracy assessed the factual correctness in a manner similar to grading students, while qualitative precision gauged the scientific contribution similar to reviewing a scientific article. In the quantitative test, ChatGPT-4 scored near the passing grade (−5) whereas ChatGPT-3.5 (−18), Bing (−21) and Bard (−31) were not far behind. Claude 2 (−75) and Aria (−80) scored much lower. In the qualitative test, all AI chatbots, but especially ChatGPT-4, demonstrated proficiency in recombining existing knowledge, but all failed to generate original scientific content. As a side note, our results suggest that with ChatGPT-4, the size of large language models has reached a plateau. Furthermore, this paper underscores the intricate and recursive nature of human research. This process of transforming raw data into refined knowledge is computationally irreducible, highlighting the challenges AI chatbots face in emulating human originality in scientific writing. Our results apply to the state of affairs in the third quarter of 2023. In conclusion, while large language models have revolutionised content generation, their ability to produce original scientific contributions in the humanities remains limited. We expect this to change in the near future as current large language model-based AI chatbots evolve into large language model-powered software.
... This process is analogous to Heidegger's or Gadamer's 'hermeneutic circle,' which, when applied within archaeology, aims to arrive at more coherent explanations of phenomena over time in an iterative manner (Campanaro 2021). This is a process where explanations are (re-)evaluated by the amount of data that are accounted for by one hypothesis relative to another at a given time (Hodder 1999), a core tenet of inductive sciences that extends back to Whewell's 'Consilience.' Our predictions provide illustrative examples of the application of EES theory to our understanding of the paleoanthropological record. ...
It has been argued that enhanced phenotypic plasticity and life-history variability, in addition to a greater adaptive dependence on social learning, behavioral flexibility, and niche construction, are characteristics of the hominin lineage that accommodated both environmental variation and the colonization of new environments. The extended evolutionary synthesis (EES) integrates these and other mechanisms of adaptability, incorporating development and intergenerational effects, inclusive inheritance, and niche construction. Over the past decade we have gained considerable resolution in our understanding of spatio-temporal variation in fossil hominin phenotypic variation, material culture and behavior, and a refined understanding of the intergenerational and developmental mechanisms driving phenotypic diversity within our species. This paper reviews evidence for phenotypic and behavioral diversity within the genus Homo to evaluate the hypothesis that our evolution was characterized by a shifting distribution of adaptation across different systems described by the EES. We define and apply a model that we term 'distributed' adaptation, where mechanisms of both plasticity and culture serve to accommodate environmental variability in ways that are more rapid than genetic adaptation, thus distributing selection across a range of adaptive systems. Adaptation that is distributed towards physiological and cultural mechanisms allows for more rapid adaptability in stochastic environments and buffers the genome against selective sweeps that generally involve a reduction in genetic diversity and potential future adaptability. Predictions of distributed adaptation throughout hominin evolution are proposed in relation to: (a) biology and morphology, (b) habitual behavior, and (c) feedback between behavioral change and biology. To evaluate these predictions in relation to (a) we consider evidence for shifts in phenotypic plasticity and morphological variation, including the emergence of body and brain size variation, limb proportions, skeletal robusticity, regional variation in plasticity and canalization within the body, and how these relate to environmental factors and dispersals. Predictions of behavioral change (b) are considered in light of the emergence of markedly increased spatial and environmental variation in archaeological assemblages in the late Middle and Late Pleistocene as indicators of local adaptability, cognition, and niche construction. Finally, we consider the relationships between dispersals, material culture, and morphological plasticity in response to cultural change in relation to (c). Current evidence suggests a mosaic pattern of the evolution of distributed adaptation and selection within our genus. In early Homo there is evidence of phenotypic diversification and increasing plasticity that precedes evidence of increased cognitive, behavioral, and cultural variation among Middle and Later Pleistocene Homo. This can be interpreted as representing a shift towards the distribution of adaptation, first onto mechanisms based on phenotypic plasticity, and later onto cognition, cultural buffering of environmental stress, and enhanced niche construction.
... Etter hvert tok postprosessuelle arkeologer til orde for en revurdering og en revitalisering av generelle metodiske problem (Hodder 1997, 1999, Sørgaard 2001. En av ideene bak Hodders utgravninger på Çatalhöyük i Tyrkia var nettopp at forskningen overtid skulle hjelpe til med utviklingen av en egen postprossesuell metode (Hodder 1996:6). ...
... This is perhaps more in line with reflexive post-processual thinking, which has long called for innovation and democratisation within the interpretative process (see e.g. Shanks and Tilley 1992;Shanks and McGuire 1996;Hodder 1997;1998;1999;2000;Chadwick 2001;Berggren and Hodder 2003) and perhaps is in accord with more recent calls for slower, more reflexive, digital workflows and digital systems that embrace the complexity of the archaeological record (see Perry and Taylor 2018). In this sense, transparency of process can be seen as an ethical responsibility of the archaeologist and given how pivotal the stratigraphy is to the interpretation of single context excavation data, one can make the case that there is an ethical imperative for the 'raw' stratigraphic data to be available, and a scientific responsibility (Popper 2002) for the 'analysis' data in archives to be made more 'FAIR' and open (FAIRO) in order to lay bare, and evidence, our thinking. ...
Stratigraphic data and relationships form the backbone of all the related archaeological records from each excavated site and are essential for integrated analysis, wider synthesis and accessible archiving of the growing body of archaeological data and reports generated through the commercial archaeological sector in the UK and internationally. The stratigraphic record, usually in the form of a stratigraphic matrix, with associated relationships and data, acts as a primary, if not the primary 'evidence' for how, and in what order, the site was excavated. As such the stratigraphic matrix can be the key mechanism that enables anyone less familiar with the site, to re-visit and re-use the excavation records, understand what data is most relevant for addressing certain research questions, or problems encountered, and piece together the underlying details of how the excavator(s) arrived at their interpretations. However such records are often only held on paper or as scanned image copies (as PDFs) of matrix diagrams that cannot easily be re-used with all the associated data. This article presents outcomes from The Matrix project (AHRC AH/T002093/1) that address the current problems caused by the lack of standardized approaches to digital archiving of archaeological data using the case study of stratigraphic and phasing data.
... Este tipo de proyectos, de forma indirecta tienden a excluir a los grupos locales (Endere, 2007) y no toma en cuenta que los arqueólogos no son los únicos a quienes les interesa el pasado (Layton, 1989). Se debe entender que la arqueología, como disciplina social, es producto de las constantes interacciones y negociaciones (Hodder, 1999) y, por lo tanto, es necesario trabajar de forma constante con las comunidades (McDavid, 2014). Si bien, al día de hoy en gran parte de los proyectos existen códigos de ética, estos obligan a que se tenga un retorno social, y no existe así voluntad propia de trabajo conjunto o coparticipativo con comunidades locales, más allá de sus posturas teóricas. ...
La patrimonialización se ha convertido, en muchos casos, en un medio para la obtención de recursos económicos a futuro, sobre todo ligados al turismo. Generalmente se acompaña de un análisis técnico llevado a cabo por profesionales entendidos en la materia. Si bien, las políticas nacionales apelan a la toma de decisiones de las poblaciones locales en relación al tema patrimonial el esquema se torna muchas veces vertical, donde la decisión final sobre lo que “es” patrimonio la detenta el profesional. De esta forma, el poblador local solamente es visto como la persona que otorga los permisos de investigación y su firma aval. Sin embargo, en los últimos años esta figura ha ido cambiando poco a poco, y las poblaciones locales han comenzado a darse cuenta del valor arqueológico que alberga su territorio. En el presente trabajo pretendo mostrar dos ejemplos de cómo se gestionó el trabajo arqueológico y de conservación gracias a las iniciativas de las poblaciones locales, específicamente del Municipio de Jesús de Machaca y de la comunidad de Ispaya Grande. A partir de las experiencias personales, entrevistas y charlas informales, trato de acercarme a las percepciones que tienen los pobladores locales sobre su pasado. Tanto en Jesús de Machaca como en Ispaya Grande existen diferentes preocupaciones, formas de llevar a cabo sus proyectos y sobre todo el valor que le otorgan los pobladores locales a los sitios arqueológicos, que van más allá de lo material.
... The cultural diversity and plurality of the research team was championed in the project's multivocality, not only in the published outcome but in the research process as well. Multiple voices or multivocality includes the voices of not only academics and researchers but also those of illiterate or community members with limited education with a view to not only including scientific but also indigenous knowledge (Hodder, 1999). The importance of this lies in its transformative impulse as it challenges the hegemony of the mainstream and "offers an entry point for listening to the voices at the margins" (Dutta, 2011:7). ...
This article critically examines the conventional researcher-researched relationship thatempowers the researcher over the researched. The orthodoxy of objectivity – claimed to locatethe researchers as neutral observer – is here argued to be a power relation that has an excludingeffect where subject communities are concerned. By means of an archaeological case study thatincluded mapping and interpretation of ancient rock engravings we offer a new way of negotiatinginterpretations. This new way involved four members from a Bushman community who helped usnavigate spiritual, ontological and environmental dimensions in making sense of rock art.
... Relatively, in 1999, in his book "The Archaeological Process: An Introduction" Ian Hodder had mentioned the benefits of the interactive booklet of data from archaeological reports (Hodder, 1999 publication and online dissemination of excavation reports, specially withinside the domain area of academic archaeology are nevertheless missing (Berggren and Hodder, 2003). In the Çatalhöyük example, Stratigraphic Units are the basic recording element of an archaeological site, which ideally represent a single identifiable depositional event and can be divided into several general categories (e.g. ...
Digital curation in cultural heritage organisations has become more and more established as empirical research for tools, techniques, skills, and standards for making curators able to manage the related digital data. It supports specific applications in diverse contexts of cultural heritage management. This thesis addresses the archaeological domain, a particular challenge since projects span from the planning of the excavations to the analysis of the findings, their interpretation, and the display of the results in a final exhibition. Further, in archaeology, digital curation must account for the relationship between physical materials and their digital twins. Our approach formulates a comprehensive definition of digital curation for the archaeological domain and devises a unified model based on the semantic organisation of the data. The methodology that is employed in this study is to i) abstract a general model for digital curation from the analysis of cultural heritage domains with a particular focus on archaeology ii) validate the model on some case studies in the archaeological field, and iii) apply the model to an archaeological project, with a preliminary evaluation of the approach and the suggestions of about the merge of the semantic encoding of archaeological data with a transdisciplinary approach.
... The specifics of archaeological inference, e.g., [51], are not often outlined in articles such as ours. In this case, however, it is necessary because academic passions on the question of the migration of the Slavs have long been running high, and the methods of inference are often scrutinized. ...
The rapid expansion of the Slavic speakers in the second half of the first millennium CE remains a controversial topic in archaeology, and academic passions on the issue have long run high. Currently, there are three main hypotheses for this expansion. The aim of this paper was to test the so-called “hybrid hypothesis,” which states that the movement of people, cultural diffusion and language diffusion all occurred simultaneously. For this purpose, we examined an archaeological Deep Data set with a machine learning method termed time series clustering and with emerging hot spot analysis. The latter required two archaeology-specific modifications: The archaeological trend map and the multiscale emerging hot spot analysis. As a result, we were able to detect two migrations in the Eastern Alps between c. 500 and c. 700 CE. Based on the convergence of evidence from archaeology, linguistics, and population genetics, we have identified the migrants as Alpine Slavs, i.e., people who spoke Slavic and shared specific common ancestry.
... Archaeological investigations have been relying more and more on reflexive methodologies [15]. Nowadays, making sense of archaeological investigations starts its journey in the excavation site and continues up to museum curatorial practices, accompanied by labels in exhibitions and records in digital repositories and archives. ...
In recent years, the transdisciplinarity of archaeological studies has greatly increased because of the mature interactions between archaeologists and scientists from different disciplines (called “archaeometers”). A number of diverse scientific disciplines collaborate to get an objective account of the archaeological records. A large amount of digital data support the whole process, and there is a great value in keeping the coherence of information and knowledge, as contributed by each intervening discipline. During the years, a number of representation models have been developed to account for the recording of the archaeological process in data bases. Lately, some semantic models, compliant with the CRMarchaeo reference model, have been developed to account for linking the institutional forms with the formal knowledge concerning the archaeological excavations and the related findings. On the contrary, the archaeometric processes have not been addressed yet in the Semantic Web community and only an upper reference model, called CRMsci, accounts for the representation of the scientific investigations in general. This paper presents a modular computational ontology for the interlinked representation of all the facts related to the archaeological and archaeometric analyses and interpretations, also connected to the recording catalogues. The computational ontology is compliant with CIDOC-CRM reference models CRMarchaeo and CRMsci and introduces a number of novel classes and properties to merge the two worlds in a joint representation. The ontology is in use in “Beyond Archaeology”, a methodological project for the establishing of a transdisciplinary approach to archaeology and archaeometry, interlinked through a semantic model of processes and objects.
In this conclusive chapter, we recapitulate and discuss the most valuable and crucial topics addressed in the previous chapters of the volume. In particular, we examine pottery from various perspectives: pottery as a transformative technology, the new trajectories in pottery studies, pottery as a means of culinary traditions, its ontological meaning, and its multiple symbolic, social, and cultural purposes. We tackle global denominators within local narratives and highlight how transformative technologies have the potential to create radical changes in the way human populations live and interact with each other. Ultimately, we conclude the chapter with our reflections and expectations for the future of worldwide pottery research among foragers.
Neolithic Spaces, volumes 1 and 2, detail a large-scale synthetic survey of the Neolithic sites (villaggi trincerati – ditched villages) of the Tavoliere Plain, southeast Italy. Volume 1 details research at regional, inter-site and intra-site scales, and explores the social use of landscape and ‘taskscapes’ at both 'domestic' and 'ritual' sites. The work combines innovative and traditional survey methods, surface survey and mapping, and approaches for understanding the human experiential aspects of ‘dwelling’ (phenomenology/sensory archaeology). The techniques developed and associated data are relevant to all archaeological and landscape studies. Drawing primarily on the sensory data garnered during the project, but also other sources, Chapter 8 focuses on the details of life in and around the villaggi.
The present upload comprises an uncorrected proof of the published version. There are no differences in page, figure, table and appendix numbering between it and the final published version. It may however include mispellings and other uncorrected typos.
Neolithic Spaces, volumes 1 and 2, detail a large-scale synthetic survey of the Neolithic sites (villaggi trincerati – ditched villages) of the Tavoliere Plain, southeast Italy. Volume 1 details research at regional, inter-site and intra-site scales, and explores the social use of landscape and ‘taskscapes’ at both 'domestic' and 'ritual' sites. The work combines innovative and traditional survey methods, surface survey and mapping, and approaches for understanding the human experiential aspects of ‘dwelling’ (phenomenology/sensory archaeology). The techniques developed and associated data are relevant to all archaeological and landscape studies. Chapter 4 describes the Project's methodologies, and includes appendices detailing the results of various on-site visibility, sound and olfactory experiments.
The present upload comprises an uncorrected proof of the published version. There are no differences in page, figure, table and appendix numbering between it and the final published version. It may however include mispellings and other uncorrected typos.
This chapter presents archaeology in its most commonly-recognised guise: as a fieldwork discipline, concerning the search for and retrieval of material from the past that is then analysed to create knowledge of that past. The chapter discusses the significance of the elements that go to make up a programme of archaeological fieldwork and the roles it plays in defining the field and the development of individuals as archaeologists. While excavation is well-recognised as the pre-eminent archaeological technique, this chapter also emphasises that archaeologists do more than excavate, discussing the significance of documentary study and survey work. It explores the exploratory nature of archaeology, and how archaeologists as explorers served to assist in European colonisation of others’ territories and spread European ideology about the nation state.
This final chapter serves to emphasise the main themes of the work as a whole and to make the final argument—that archaeology is important. It examines how the notion of ethics informs and drives all aspects of archaeological practice. It revisits the idea of archaeology as a field of philosophical ideas that can inform us of not only the past but of presents and futures and how to engage with the material universe. It explores the truly global nature of archaeology and that it never stands still—it is a discipline constantly reinventing itself. All these aspects combine to make archaeology a field that matters.
This chapter considers archaeology as a realm of social and collective action. It considers how archaeologists come together to form associations while maintaining wide diversity, archaeology as a profession, and the creation and significance of the global archaeological community. It examines—returning to issues first raised in Chaps. 1 and 3—how the archaeological community is constructed to include particular kinds of people and exclude others, and the different ways in which outsiders are seen. It reveals the wider role of archaeology in modern society.
In recent years, concerns have been repeatedly raised in multiple academic disciplines about the ideological textures and imbrications of quantification. Taking to heart these concerns (which animate other contributions to this volume), I argue that classicists and ancient historians stand to benefit considerably from developing a robust ethics of quantification. I ask two guiding questions: (1) Does quantification in ancient history have an ethics? (2) Is it necessary to develop such an ethics? After a brief exposition of Wendy Espeland and Mitchell Stevens’ list of those properties that attach to quantification, I address the risks of not quantifying, or of side-eyeing quantification, in Part I; the limits and rewards of quantification, in Part II; and, as a concluding number, the hypnotic effects of quantification and data generation, in Part III.
Stratigraphic data form the backbone of archaeological records from excavated sites and are essential for the integrated analysis and wider interpretation of artefacts and sites. Accessible archiving of this data is therefore vital for understanding and revisiting such interpretations. Here, the authors highlight the need for more consistent digital records of stratigraphic and associated temporal relationships derived during post-excavation analysis phasing activities. They argue for the distillation of best practice in post-excavation procedures and the application of consistent and persistent terminology to make this fundamental archaeological data sustainably FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable) and ‘Open’ across present-day geopolitical and spatiotemporal boundaries.
A menudo, los llamados recintos de fosos neolíticos y calcolíticos de la península ibérica (IV-III milenios a. C.) han sido interpretados como fortificaciones. Sin embargo, escasean los estudios específicos sobre el particular. En este trabajo, se intenta contribuir al debate a través de analogías con fortificaciones históricas y prehistóricas bien conocidas. Se efectúa el análisis detallado, desde una perspectiva poliorcética, de dos recintos fosados calcolíticos: Xancra (Cuba, Beja, Portugal) y El Casetón de la Era (Villalba de los Alcores, Valladolid, España). Los resultados del estudio sugieren que las líneas concéntricas de fosos que conforman dichos sitios muestran ciertas optimizaciones orientadas a la defensa. No obstante, al mismo tiempo, como fortificaciones ambos exhiben numerosas características no canónicas. En la discusión se plantean dos posibles explicaciones. Según la primera, la ineficiencia de su diseño se debe a la ignorancia por parte de sus constructores de algunos de los principios más elementales de la poliorcética. Según la segunda, la elección de su lugar de emplazamiento, así como su diseño arquitectónico, se llevaron a cabo con otros propósitos además del puramente militar, o por encima de este.
The 1927 Jericho earthquake caused widespread damage across Palestine and Transjordan, both ruled at the time by Britain. The worst-hit city was Nablus, where the Old City’s historic buildings became a field for conflict. Drawing on G. Gordillo’s differentiation between ruins and rubble and his analysis of colonial anxiety, power, and oppression, this article considers local and colonial reactions and competition over the material heritage of Nablus, particularly in the city’s Samaritan Quarter and the Crusader wall of the Great Mosque. Entangled in these are definitions of antiquity and ideas of archaeological value for the Ottoman and British rulers of Palestine. Decisions made and contested in Nablus and Jerusalem highlight the fine line between ruin and rubble, the mechanisms by which the mandatory administration sought to tame the built environment and indigenous communities of Nablus, and the way their confrontations reverberated in the city’s rebellious history and insurrectionary future.
ABSTRACT Transmission of archaeology and prehistory to wider audiences, also known as dissemination of research results, is the cardinal procedure for archaeologist with a high degree of specialization to narrow the gap between them and society, and to update the discipline´s role, in the sense of showing to our fellow citizens the importance of knowing the past as much as knowing the discussion that takes place in the intellectual process. In spite of the major role that this stage of the archaeological work should be playing, we are witnessing how dissemination is being left behind as a research activity, thus losing track of the questions raised within contemporary societies regarding their own material culture, progress, technology, weaponry, tools, fashion, life styles or sacred items. Dissemination has become a common ground for leisure and lack of rigor. Some specialists, unaware of the situation, tend to feed society back with the clichés generated by this same society which casts into the archaeological discourse nothing but reiterative and glib approaches. We have realize, throughout a process of designing and developing dissemination activities revolving prehistoric archaeology, how relevant is to pay attention to this stage of the archaeological work and how necessary is to relect on the relationship between specialists and profanes. This is key not only to create an accurate, unavoidably complex, picture of the archeological and prehistoric record, but also to call for awareness on the fact that the notion of prehistoric archaeological past the public has, is very likely to transform, in permanent dialogue as it is, the theoretical foundations of the discipline.
Archaeology is centrally concerned with the tension between material remains in the present and a reconstructed past. This tension is captured by the concept of a trace, namely a contemporary phenomenon that references the past through some sort of epistemic intervention. Traces are deceptively complex in terms of both their epistemology and their ontology and hence worthy of detailed exploration. In particular, archaeological traces not only concern the past per se but also possess a latent quality of as yet unrealized signification. This gives archaeological traces a future orientation that is rarely considered in discussions of archaeological epistemology.
Πρακτικά Πρώτης Επιστημονικής Συνάντησης Έκτακτων Αρχαιολόγων
Purpose
By reconsidering the concept of the historic environment, the aim of this study is to better understand how heritage is expressed by examining the networks within which the cultural performances of the historic environment take place. The goal is to move beyond a purely material expression and seek the expansion of the cultural dimension of the historic environment.
Design/methodology/approach
Conceptually, the historic environment is considered a valuable resource for heritage expression and exploration. The databases and records that house historic environment data are venerated and frequented entities for archeologists, but arguably less so for non-specialist users. In inventorying the historic environment, databases fulfill a major role in the planning process and asset management that is often considered to be more than just perfunctory. This paper approaches historic environment records (HERs) from an actor network perspective, particularizing the social foundation and relationships within the networks governing the historic environment and the environment's associated records.
Findings
The paper concludes that the performance of HERs from an actor-network perspective is a hegemonic process that is biased toward the supply and input to and from professional users. Furthermore, the paper provides a schematic for how many of the flaws in heritage transmission have come about.
Originality/value
The relevance here is largely belied by the fact that HERs as both public digital resources and as heritage networks were awaiting to be addressed in depth from a theoretical point of view.
https://www.archaeopress.com/Archaeopress/DMS/761FFC127E4843098EFBF93DECA7B7CB/9781789692242-sample.pdf
Dějiny lidských populací (změny v počtu obyvatel a jejich původu) jsou jednou z domén biologické antropologie, resp. archeogenetiky. Za poslední desetiletí došlo k významnému rozvoji molekulárně-genetických a biostatistických postupů, jejichž prostřednictvím bylo možné rekonstruovat demografické změny minulých populací v nejrůznějších částech světa. V době, kdy se genetické postupy při rekonstrukci pravěku utvářely, jsme vycházeli z limitovaného množství vzorků a studia jen části lidské genetické variability. Dnes se ocitáme v éře genomiky, a měli bychom tedy mluvit spíše o archeogenomice, která pracuje s nepoměrně větším počtem dat a dosahuje mnohem spolehlivějších výsledků. Nepochybujeme ale o tom, že v následujícím období se bude rekonstrukce populačních dějin ještě přepisovat a doplňovat, např. i díky novým poznatkům v oblasti epigenomiky a mikrobiomu. V tomto příspěvku bychom chtěli přiblížit přístupnou formou současné výsledky genetických studií pravěku Evropy, jež spolu s kulturními dějinami vytvářejí ucelenější obraz naší sdílené, ale nikým nezapsané minulosti.
Çukuriçi Höyük 4. Household Economics in the Early Bronze Age Aegean is a pioneering interdisciplinary account of households and socio-political organization in Aegean prehistory, written by a socio-cultural anthropologist embedded in a team of prehistoric archaeologists. Sabina Cveček applies methods of historical anthropology to address key issues in discussing households and socio-political organization at the dawn of the Bronze Age Aegean and beyond. By navigating through the “dwelling perspective” at two prehistoric mound sites, namely Çukuriçi Höyük in western Anatolia (Turkey) and Platia Magoula Zarkou in Thessaly (Greece), Cveček scrutinizes the conflicting relations between metanarratives and site-based archaeological contexts, complemented by historical ethnographic accounts. This unique interdisciplinary contribution will appeal not only to specialists in Aegean prehistory and historical anthropologists, but also to scholars in the social sciences and humanities. It may inspire scholars to recognize the unparalleled value of archaeological materiality in addressing non-state imagined communities, alongside historical, ethnographic, and other written sources.
If archaeology is the examination of historical conditions with reference to a surviving material residue, then one way in which these conditions might be characterized is as the different ways they had enabled the development of different forms of humanness. The historical construction of this diversity is discussed here as the ways that the relationships between humans and things had been performed. This means that the practice of archaeology must question the recent desire to adopt a flat ontology that defines archaeology as the ‘discipline of things’. It is argued that it was by means of the performances established between humans and their various objects of concern that different forms of human life were able to define themselves. The implications of this argument for the practice of archaeology are explored.
The construction of formal measurement systems underlies the development of science, technology, economy and new ways of understanding and explaining the world. Human societies have developed such systems in different ways, in different places and at different times, and recent archaeological investigations highlight the importance of these activities for fundamental aspects of human life. Measurement systems have provided the structure for addressing key concerns of cosmological belief systems, as well as the means for articulating relationships between the human form, human action, and the world. The Archaeology of Measurement explores the archaeological evidence for the development of measuring activities in numerous ancient societies, as well as the implications of these discoveries for an understanding of their worlds and beliefs. Featuring contributions from a cast of internationally renowned scholars, it analyses the relationships between measurement, economy, architecture, symbolism, time, cosmology, ritual, and religion among prehistoric and early historic societies.
Multivocality has been clearly and in detail present in social science reflection since the impact of the so-called linguistic turn and nowadays it has also presence in the qualitative inquiry current discussion. To explore how multivocality can be a practice of qualitative inquiry for social justice is the goal of this contribution. It is a global picture of epistemic violence that has subjugated knowledge and practices along with executing genocides and exterminations of otherness to build societies without social, epistemic, and cognitive justice that my goal is to unveil the horizon of modern social sciences to get a better understanding of the new ways of knowledge construction committed to the emancipation of those dominant hegemonic social practices that have made possible the existence of human misery and social, epistemic, and cognitive injustices. So, I will examine the concept of multivocality within social theory to bring it into play with the social justice, epistemic violence, and epistemicide contemporary discussions. Doing so will make its current position within qualitative inquiry practices more transparent. Putting rebellious, creative, poetic, performative, and subversive imaginations into play to discover another social order is what animates me now: building a world in which many worlds exist, building a world with multivoicedness and vari-voicedness inside; many voices without hierarchies or domination or extermination between them. In this paper I will try to delve into the background of our scientific and humanistic knowledge to understand our real political commitment to emancipation, freedom, and social and epistemic justice; however, I will only concentrate on what I assume are the consequences of applying Bakhtin’s concept of multivocality to qualitative research in its pursuit of social and epistemic justice.
p>In this thesis a deep understanding of the principles of pottery manufacturing has been placed at the centre of the search for learning strategies in a prehistoric context. Learning strategies are argued to be culturally and socially specific. They, therefore, have an important role to play in understanding broader social mechanisms.
By developing a new methodology that encompasses a wide range of technological observations it has been possible to document technological signatures of production. Moreover, by combining this close observation of technological signatures of production with an equally profound understanding of the nature of the skill acquisition it has proven possible to assess degrees of skill related to specific vessel groups. Skill starts with the way in which discursive knowledge it turned into procedural knowledge through the repetitive enactment of a skill. This in turn leads to repeated processes of production and specific classes of pots that share the same socially constituted technological signatures.
Arising from this approach it has been possible to explore the very different roles that individual vessel groups play in articulating social dynamics. Moreover, it has been possible to identify the possibility of two arenas of skill, of a formal and less formal one, each related to particular institutional practices. A formal skill arena is argued to be linked to a highly prescribed learning strategy that safeguards the continuity of elite and specialist pottery vessels. This is turns protects the articulation of rank through the visual display of an elite category of material culture. Meanwhile, an informal arena of skill is argued to be linked to the expression of kinship relations. In this informal arena of skill a less structured regime results in a limited opportunity to gain the incremental acquisition of procedural knowledge. This results in a static and, therefore, lower investment of skill in this learning arena.</p
The ancient Egyptian language possesses 4 basic color terms; painting uses 7 and later 9 polychrome colors. These sets correspond to Stages Ilia, V, and VII (incomplete) of the Berlin and Kay encoding sequence for language, and support the theory of 11 “basic perceptual color categories.” The categories are probably available only through progressive differentiation. The use of color in pictorial representation fits an “active” rather than a “response” model for this expansion. The separation of color use and color terminology has significant cognitive implications.