No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the authors.
To binarize or not to binarize: Relational data and the construction of archaeological networks
Abstract
Over the last several years, network methods and models from the social and physical sciences have gained considerable popularity in archaeology. Many of the most common network methods begin with the creation of binary networks where links among some set of actors are defined as either present or absent. In most archaeological cases, however, the presence or absence of a specific kind of relationship between actors is not straightforward as we must rely on material proxies for assessing connections. A common approach in recent studies has been to define some threshold for the presence of a tie by partitioning continuous relational data among sites (e.g., artifact frequency or similarity data). In this article, using an example from the U.S. Southwest, we present a sensitivity analysis focused on the potential effects of defining binary networks from continuous relational data. We show that many key network properties that are often afforded social interpretations are fundamentally influenced by the assumptions used to define connections. We suggest that, although network graphs provide powerful visualizations of network data, methods for creating and analyzing weighted (non-binarized) networks often provide a better characterization of specific network properties.
... The incomplete nature of archaeological data holds significant challenges for the implementation of SNA methods for understanding the past (Brughmans 2013;Mills 2017;Peeples 2017;Roberts et al. 2021). Various solutions have been proposed, but the common theme is the use of statistical validation to assess possible biases or errors in the data being analyzed (Östborn and Gerding 2014;Peeples and Roberts 2013). Östborn and Gerting (2014) discuss the need for statistical rigor in network analyses in archaeology, and advocate for a random permutation approach to randomly reshuffle data to evaluate observed patterns from randomly dispersed datasets. ...
... Increased variability indicates higher risk of sampling error. Degree centrality for a node is defined as the total number of direct connections in which that node is involved (Peeples, 2017;Peeples and Roberts, 2013). In other words, it is a measure of a node's overall importance in a network based on how many connections it has. ...
... In other words, it is a measure of a node's overall importance in a network based on how many connections it has. Betweenness centrality is defined as the number of shortest paths between pairs of nodes in a network involving the target node divided by the total number of shortest paths in the network as a whole (Peeples, 2017;Peeples and Roberts, 2013). In other words, it measures how closely connected a single node is to other nodes in the network. ...
People on Madagascar have coped with environmental change for millennia. Present-day environmental change, however, is negatively impacting the livelihoods and sustainability of coastal communities on Madagascar. As a result of increasing climate-driven impacts on livelihoods and economic development initiatives, community settlement strategies are shifting towards increased sedentism. This dissertation investigates settlement patterns of mobile foraging populations, their drivers, and ecological effects in Late Holocene Madagascar. Specifically, I investigate environmental links to settlement patterns via remotely sensed environmental and archaeological data and radiocarbon chronology from identified archaeological deposits. While most studies of settlement distribution focus on socioecological drivers, in this project I also devote attention to the ecological legacy effects of human settlement by looking at the geochemical and spectral properties of archaeologically inhabited areas. In this way, this dissertation seeks a holistic understanding of settlement distribution in Southwest Madagascar extending from its driving forces to its long-lasting effects on ecological systems. Using a predictive modeling protocol rooted in ideal distribution models from human behavioral ecology, I use machine learning algorithms to extract culturally significant environmental variables from Sentinel-2 satellite images. These data then aid in exploring the degree to which resource distribution is correlated with settlement density, whether Allee effects account for settlement patterns, and the resulting ecological impact of foraging activity on the Malagasy landscape over thousands of years. Identified cultural deposits are visited during ground investigations to survey and excavate different areas to acquire temporal information (e.g., 14C dates, ceramics, etc.). Based on this newly generated archaeological settlement record, these data are incorporated into spatial point process models (PPMs), a form of regression analysis, of archaeological settlements to investigate the relationship between environmental conditions and settlement distributions. PPMs help to reveal external ecological relationships as well as dispersive or cohesive properties between archaeological points. Finally, using an automated remote sensing procedure employing a combination of Sentinel-2 and PlanetScope imagery and random forest models, I quantify the extent of cultural niche construction resulting from foraging communities in the Velondriake Marine Protected Area in southwest Madagascar since the Late Holocene. Altogether, this dissertation demonstrates that foraging communities in Late Holocene Madagascar settled the landscape according to the principles of an ideal free distribution with Allee effects, meaning that a strong mix between environmental and social factors, including active landscape modification (or niche construction) drove settlement choice. Specifically, the presence of freshwater sources, community defense, and social cohesion were among the most significant drivers of settlement patterns, followed by marine resource access (i.e., coral reefs). Additionally, it appears that almost 20% of the Velondriake region has been anthropogenically modified, demonstrating that foraging communities leave quantifiable and long-lasting impacts on ecological systems. Over the last millennium, communities in the Velondriake region have maintained close social connections, which have shifted geographically over the last several hundred years. Settlements appear to reflect a variety of long-term and seasonal occupations that exploited a variety of marine habitats including coastal coral reefs, oceans, and mangrove forests.
... To facility social network analysis, the Brainerd-Robinson (BR) coefficient of similarity was calculated based on the identified compositional groups from HCA. The Brainerd-Robinson coefficient, which creates weighted network data to allow for more nuanced interpretations of network characteristics, serves as a proxy for exploring the inter-kiln compositional similarities (Brainerd, 1951;Cowgill, 1990;Peeples and Roberts, 2013;Robinson, 1951). The result of the BR coefficient of similarity, which is a similarity matrix of the 19 kiln sites ranging between 0 (indicating complete dissimilarity) and 200 (indicating complete similarity), was used to measure the edge weight among kiln sites. ...
... Eigenvector centrality, which counts the number of nodes adjacent to a given node but weights each adjacent node by its centrality, can provide a good characterization of a kiln's overall position within the network. These centrality measures were calculated based on weighted measures, which treat higher link weights as less costly to traverse (Opsahl et al., 2010;Peeples and Roberts, 2013), to examine which kiln was more influential and was in a better position to control technological information flows through the network. Node-level centrality measures were also used to calculate network-level centralization indices to examine the extent to which entire nodes are concentrated (Freeman, 1978;Peeples and Roberts, 2013). ...
... These centrality measures were calculated based on weighted measures, which treat higher link weights as less costly to traverse (Opsahl et al., 2010;Peeples and Roberts, 2013), to examine which kiln was more influential and was in a better position to control technological information flows through the network. Node-level centrality measures were also used to calculate network-level centralization indices to examine the extent to which entire nodes are concentrated (Freeman, 1978;Peeples and Roberts, 2013). ...
Compositional analysis of Chinese porcelain often uses the production region as an analytical unit, whereas the
possible compositional similarities and differences between different production loci within the region have
rarely been considered. This research assesses the worth of conducting chemical composition analysis at the
micro level and evaluates the effectiveness of combining laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry
(LA-ICP-MS) with portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF) in characterizing compositional variation below
the level of the production region. It focuses on porcelain production of the Song and Yuan dynasties (960–1368
CE) at Dehua, Fujian, China, where dozens of large-scale kilns produced enormous amounts of porcelains for
export. A total of 19 kiln sites from five villages at Dehua were analyzed in this research. Results from both LAICP-
MS and pXRF show that there are two distinct production groups at Dehua—Gaide and Longxun-Sanban.
Geological differences and different ceramic-making traditions might both contribute to the distinct separation
of the two compositional groups. Results from social network analysis further suggest that there are strong
inter-kiln compositional similarities within the same production subregion, but kiln sites in the same village are
more closely connected than those outside the village. These results demonstrate that the change of analytical
scale in compositional analysis can provide more nuanced insights into the organization of production and the
patterns of interaction between different production loci within the broader production region. In addition, this
research shows that pXRF, though not as accurate as LA-ICP-MS, is capable of finding compositional patterning
within a small region of ceramic production.
... These similarities are based on the relative percentages of all apportioned wares. To define the scale of similarity among sites, we use a rescaled version of the Brainerd-Robinson coefficient (following Mills et al. 2013a;Peeples and Roberts 2013) where the similarity (S) between sites a and b is defined as: ...
... This procedure is common in many recent archaeological network analyses (Golitko et al. 2012;Hart and Engelbrecht 2012;Mills et al. 2013a, c;Peeples and Haas 2013;Peeples 2011). Rather than defining ties above or below some threshold similarity value as either present or absent, we interpret the raw similarity scores between pairs of sites as the weights of all relations between pairs of sites (see Opsahl et al. 2010;Peeples and Roberts 2013), which is to say the ties are created from continuous instead of binarized data. The relations are undirected. ...
... In order to do this, we created binary networks by defining all pairs of sites characterized by a similarity score of at least 0.75 (75 % of ceramic ware counts in common) as present (1) and all weaker connections as absent (0; see Mills et al. 2013a). Although it is almost always preferable to rely on non-binarized data where possible (Peeples and Roberts 2013), the comparison of E-I indices for continuous (weighted) and binary networks allows us to identify differences in external and internal relations based on comparisons of the strongest ties (binary data) against the combined sum of the weaker and stronger ties (non-binary data), which can serve to highlight the importance of the weaker ties. Lastly, the R scripts used to calculate the standard and normalized E-I indexes can be found at http://www.archaeologysouthwest.org/pdf/e-i_index_script.txt. ...
Archaeologists have regarded social networks as both the links through which people transmitted information and goods as well as a form of social storage creating relationships that could be drawn upon in times of subsistence shortfalls or other deleterious environmental conditions. In this article, formal social network analytical (SNA) methods are applied to archaeological data from the late pre-Hispanic North American Southwest to look at what kinds of social networks characterized those regions that were the most enduring versus those that were depopulated over a 250-year period (A.D. 1200–1450). In that time, large areas of the Southwest were no longer used for residential purposes, some of which corresponds with well-documented region-wide drought. Past research has demonstrated that some population levels could have been maintained in these regions, yet regional scale depopulation occurred. We look at the degree to which the network level property of embeddedness, along with population size, can help to explain why some regions were depopulated and others were not. SNA can help archaeologists examine why emigration occurred in some areas following an environmental crisis while other areas continued to be inhabited and even received migrants. Moreover, we modify SNA techniques to take full advantage of the time depth and spatial and demographic variability of our archaeological data set. The results of this study should be of interest to those who seek to understand human responses to past, present, and future worldwide catastrophes since it is now widely recognized that responses to major human disasters, such as hurricanes, were “likely to be shaped by pre-existing or new social networks” (as reported by Suter et al. (Research and Policy Review 28:1–10, 2009)).
... For ceramic assemblages, each artifact may be classified into a ware or type category based on the artifact's physical characteristics and/or design, with raw data giving each site's sherd counts of those categories (Mills et al., 2013b). The measured similarity of categorical distributions at pairs of sites produces a symmetric network of the sites, in which measured similarities are interpreted as network tie weights (see Peeples and Roberts, 2013;Mills et al., 2013a;Peeples and Haas, 2013). Most research to date has calculated tie weights via archaeology's Brainerd-Robinson statistic (Brainerd, 1951;Robinson, 1951) or the equivalent dissimilarity index (Duncan and Duncan, 1955), also equivalent to city block distance between two sites' assemblage profiles. ...
... Most research to date has calculated tie weights via archaeology's Brainerd-Robinson statistic (Brainerd, 1951;Robinson, 1951) or the equivalent dissimilarity index (Duncan and Duncan, 1955), also equivalent to city block distance between two sites' assemblage profiles. Transforming the continuous weights into traditional binary-present or absent-ties risks loss of information, but many network measures such as node centrality can still rely on the weighted ties (Mills et al., 2013b;Peeples and Roberts, 2013). ...
... While network analyses provide insight into the topography of connections and can minimise some of the statistical limitations, such as the problem of control for multiple comparisons (given that assessment is performed at the level of the network rather than for each individual connection), network analyses only consider the transformed binary relations. That is, network analyses may not characterise the specific network properties accurately, given that connectivity strength is a continuous measure, and network analyses only consider binary relationships between electrodes / regions (Peeples & Roberts, 2013). Therefore, as with most processing and analysis choices, it is important to consider the aim, hypothesis, and specific research question(s) before deciding whether to incorporate network theory. ...
... electrodes are often further simplified by transforming graded matrices with continuous values into binary values (i.e., 1 = connectivity present; 0 = connectivity absent;Peeples & Roberts, 2013). There are several ways in which EEG-connectivity can be binarized, including Cluster Span Threshold (CST;Smith et al., 2015), and Minimum Spanning Trees (MST;Stam et al., 2014); these techniques are used to determine which connections belong in the network metrics and which do not. ...
Brain connectivity can be estimated through a wide number of analyses applied to electroencephalographic (EEG) data. However, substantial heterogeneity in the implementation of connectivity methods exist. Heterogeneity in conceptualization of connectivity measures, data collection, or data pre-processing may be associated with variability in robustness of measurement. While it is difficult to compare the results of studies using different EEG connectivity measures, standardization of processing and reporting may facilitate the task. We discuss how factors such as referencing, epoch length and number, controls for volume conduction, artefact removal, and statistical control of multiple comparisons influence the EEG connectivity estimate for connectivity measures, and what can be done to control for potential confounds associated with these factors. Based on the results reported in previous literature, this article presents recommendations and a novel checklist developed for quality assessment of EEG connectivity studies. This checklist and its recommendations are made in an effort to draw attention to factors that may influence connectivity estimates and factors that need to be improved in future research. Standardization of procedures and reporting in EEG connectivity may lead to EEG connectivity studies to be made more synthesisable and comparable despite variations in the methodology underlying connectivity estimates.
... The measured similarity can be considered a weight on the tie between two sites. Although this continuous information could be transformed somehow into the presence or absence of a tie between the sites, such transformation risks losing meaningful information (Peeples and Roberts, 2013). Studies of ceramic networks have used such binarization to create network displays, while still using the weighted ties in their analyses (Mills et al., 2013a(Mills et al., , 2013b. ...
... A more fundamental issue is whether the analyst will use the measured similarity between sites as the tie weights or instead binarize the similarities in some way, creating an unweighted network in which ties are either present or absent. Peeples and Roberts (2013) suggested that even if such binarization helped in producing a legible graphical display of an assemblage network, it would be best to conduct analyses on the original weighted network data, not the binarized network. If analysis instead also included such a binarization step, it could affect the bootstrap's ability to assess sampling variability in network measures. ...
Archaeologists are increasingly interested in networks constructed from site assemblage data, in which weighted network ties reflect sites’ assemblage similarity. Equivalent networks would arise in other scientific fields where actors’ similarity is assessed by comparing distributions of observed counts, so the assemblages studied here can represent other kinds of distributions in other domains. One concern with such work is that sampling variability in the assemblage network and, in turn, sampling variability in measures calculated from the network must be recognized in any comprehensive analysis. In this study, we investigated the use of the bootstrap as a means of estimating sampling variability in measures of assemblage networks. We evaluated the performance of the bootstrap in simulated assemblage networks, using a probability structure based on the actual distribution of sherds of ceramic wares in a region with 25 archaeological sites. Results indicated that the bootstrap was successful in estimating the true sampling variability of eigenvector centrality for the 25 sites. This held both for centrality scores and for centrality ranks, as well as the ratio of first to second eigenvalues of the network (similarity) matrix. Findings encourage the use of the bootstrap as a tool in analyses of network data derived from counts.
... Brokerage is a related theory, defined by Stovel and Shaw [19] as "one of a small number of mechanisms by which disconnected or isolated individuals (or groups) can interact economically, politically, and socially." Peeples and Haas [20] provide the most explicit application of brokerage to archeology, noting that there are a variety of possible outcomes for people in broker positions depending on the nature of the information and resources being shared. Cultural variables may tamp down or elevate people who use the information or resources, with implications for the persistence of nodes over time. ...
In the context of a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation, inter-regional international cooperation is facing fierce competition and sustainable development pressure in domestic, geopolitical, and global industrial chains and that a rational division of labor and coordination of cooperative innovation subjects, key technology nodes, and technology subgroups are of great importance to improve and upgrade the industrial and supply chain cooperation of China–Japan–ROK, as well as to enhance the efficiency of cooperation and innovation. This study uses the patented technical cooperation and innovation dual network structure analysis model and social network analysis (SNA) to analyze the dual network relationship and evolution characteristics of patent technology cooperation and innovation at different stages, based on data from 5912 invention patents applied by China, Japan, and ROK. We find that the China–Japan–ROK patent technology collaboration network is unmatched in size, and the areas of cooperation are expanding on a daily basis. However, the network’s innovation activities have not yet stabilized, and there is still room for collaborative innovation among enterprises to grow and evolve. Multinational corporations in Japan and South Korea have occupied the network’s core position at various times, forming seven key innovation groups with high-tech enterprises such as Samsung Display, Samsung Electronics, Hyundai Motor, NEC, and LEKIN as core nodes. Patents such as H01L, G02F, H04N, H01M, and G02B dominate the key technology nodes and technology subgroups, indicating that high-tech patents such as electronic information technology, semiconductors, displays, and automobile manufacturing are the primary areas of cooperation and innovation between China, Japan, and South Korea.
... The properties of networks are further complicated by the way in which the observed similarity is interpreted archaeologically. Discrepancies usually exist among the comparisons of the quantitative similarity, the subjective observation of the similarity and the archaeological interpretation of the similarity 37,38 . In this context, the typological analysis of ceramics, as well as stone and bronze artifacts in the past few decades in Tibetan archaeology provide a pertinent source for the assessment and interpretation of the results presented above. ...
Tibetan cultures reflect deeply rooted, regional interactions and diverse subsistence practices across varied high-altitude environments of the Tibetan Plateau. Yet, it remains unclear how these cultural relationships and social interactions took shape through time and how they were influenced by ecologically oriented behavioral strategies (e.g. mobility) emerging in prehistory. Recent applications of network analysis provide novel tools to quantitatively measure shared forms of material culture, but there have been fewer attempts to couple social network analysis with fine-grained geospatial modelling of prehistoric human mobility in Tibet. In this study, we developed an integrated high-resolution geospatial model and network analysis that simulates and correlates subsistence-based mobility and ceramic-based cultural material connectivity across the Tibetan Plateau. Our analysis suggests that (1) ecologically driven patterns of subsistence-based mobility correspond geographically with Bronze and Iron Ages settlement patterns across the Tibetan Plateau; (2) diverse material interaction networks among communities within western and central Tibet and trans-Himalayan connectivity across the broader Inner Asian Mountain Corridor can be linked to modeled differences in regional networks of subsistence mobility. This research provides ecological and archaeological insights into how subsistence-oriented mobility and interaction may have shaped documented patterns of social and material connectivity among regional Bronze and Iron Age communities of the Tibetan Plateau, prompting a reconsideration of Tibet's long-term cultural geography.
... While almost all extant studies use a threshold for visualization purposes, there remains debate over the value of omitting edges for purposes of applying formal measures to similarity networks. While Peeples and Roberts (2013) argue for retaining all edges during formal analysis, Golitko et al. (2019) suggest that measures should be applied at a variety of threshold values to identify structural trends that remain consistent as lower weight edges are removed. ...
Network research has recently been adopted as one of the tools of the trade in archaeology, used to study a wide range of topics: interactions between island communities, movements through urban spaces, visibility in past landscapes, material culture similarity, exchange, and much more. This Oxford Handbook is the first authoritative reference work for archaeological network research, featuring current topical trends and covering the archaeological application of network methods and theories. This is elaborately demonstrated through substantive topics and case studies drawn from a breadth of periods and cultures in world archaeology. It highlights and further develops the unique contributions made by archaeological research to network science, especially concerning the development of spatial and material culture network methods, and approaches to studying long-term network change. This is the go-to resource for students and scholars wishing to explore how network science can be applied in archaeology through an up-to-date overview of the field.
... This provides not only the most effective visualization of network structure but also valuable, generalized information on the degree of similarity between assemblages used in each network and the overall strengths of network ties. Whereas network graphs are produced using binarized data, as Peeples and Roberts (2013) have demonstrated, the underlying matrices of valued similarity scores should be used to calculate network metrics, including cohesion measures and node centralities. For this reason, all of the network measures described below were calculated using weighted data-or the actual Brainerd-Robinson values for each matrix, not binarized data. ...
Social, political, and economic institutions covary with one another in heterogenous ways across space and time. Social Network Analysis (SNA) offers a set of analytical tools and conceptual frameworks that have allowed for formal comparisons of interactions, affiliations, and relationships in reconstructing historical trajectories of institutional change. Although archaeologists have made full use of a range of metrics that describe the structural variation of social networks, formal approaches to analyzing the covariance of networks, and the institutions that structured networks in the past, remain undertheorized. In most cases, descriptive metrics are compared between networks built from different datasets or networks separated in time. Using quadratic assignment procedure (QAP) correlations to compare matrices of archaeological data, I draw on a ceramic dataset of approximately 350,000 sherds from the Southern Appalachian region to investigate how decisions related to manufacture choice and to stylistic design covaried with one another between roughly AD 800 and 1650. I explore how material attributes may or may not vary independently of one another and what that means for our analyses of the institutions they reflect. The results contribute to broader comparative analyses of institutional change and perennial discussions of social evolution.
... The measure of centrality can be stated as the importance or prominence of a node in directing and receiving different types of flows through a network. This is referred to as a node-level property, but most centrality measures can also be aggregated to define the centrality of the entire network (a graph-level measure of centrality concentration among actors) (Peeples & Roberts, 2013). In the research, the degree and betweenness centrality are used. ...
Today, the Fortore River is the geographic and administrative boundary between the regions of Molise and Apulia. In the past decade, scholars have debated Fortore’s role during the pre-Roman and Roman periods, specifically focusing on how this physical boundary may have influenced the interaction and connectivity between Samnium (modern-day Molise) and Daunia (modern-day northern Apulia). Both ancient literary sources and archaeological finds indicate the situation is complicated, and it is challenging to locate the geographical and cultural borders, especially in the pre-Roman period. This article suggests a model to understand the past interaction between the two modern-day areas of Macchia Valfortore (Molise) and Carlantino (Apulia). These sites were in the proximity of the Fortore River, and an investigation of material culture in both locations revealed a complex and diverse society between the sixth century BC and the first century BC. The small-scale spatial networks constructed help to explain the interchange dynamics between the two districts and, furthermore, how each of them related to the ancient road system. The case study demonstrates, moreover, how a not conventional archaeological approach may also highlight the prominence of river connections for economic and social development.
... Burial is unlikely to conceal Early Period (1150-450 BP) ceramics disproportionately because archaeological and palaeontological deposits in Velondriake are primarily found on deflated sand surfaces that span hundreds to thousands of years (Clarke Mills et al. (2013), we then calculated centralisation measurements (degree, eigenvector and betweenness) using our binarised networks and resampled our datasets. Centralisation reflects the degree of centrality of all nodes within a network and provides an indication of the overall strength of centrality in a network (Freeman 1978;Peeples & Roberts 2013). Additionally, we subsampled the data into 10 per cent intervals and calculated the rank-order correlation (Spearman's ρ) of the overall sample and each sub-sample (Costenbader & Valente 2003) to evaluate the errors in the dataset that may arise from sampling issues (see OSM). ...
Palaeoenvironmental data indicate that the climate of southwestern Madagascar has changed repeatedly over the past millennium. Combined with socio-political challenges such as warfare and slave raiding, communities continually had to mitigate against risk. Here, the authors apply social network analysis to pottery assemblages from sites on the Velondriake coast to identify intercommunity connectivity and changes over time. The results indicate both continuity of densely connected networks and change in their spatial extent and structure. These network shifts coincided with periods of socio-political and environmental perturbation attested in palaeoclimate data and oral histories. Communities responded to socio-political and environmental risk by reconfiguring social connections and migrating to areas of greater resource availability or political security.
... The Jaccard coefficient is the most appropriate similarity coefficient to use for the presence/absence of archaeological data because it is not affected by the shared absence of a particular trait and therefore reduces the sampling error inherent in datasets that do not contain a representative sample (Habiba et al. 2018). Higher Jaccard coefficient scores indicate greater similarities between nodes that are represented by giving greater weight to links (Peeples & Roberts 2013). This allows for the strength of connections between locations/agents to be included in network analysis and visualisation. ...
Processual models of the early state envisioned hierarchical societies with stable social and political structures. More recent research, however, has questioned this vision. Here, the authors explore Middle Horizon (AD 700–1000) Wari state iconography to provide an example of early state social and political organisation from the Central Andes. Social network analysis (SNA) of human figures (‘agents’) depicted in Wari art identifies links between individual agents, as visualised on objects and between the objects’ findspots. The results suggest that the Wari state was more heterarchical than previously imagined. Similar applications of SNA could be used to explore the iconographic evidence of other early, pre-literate states around the world.
... In the US Southwest specifically, network approaches have made use of the available archaeological data (e.g., Bork et al. 2015;Mills et al. 2015Mills et al. , 2018, but no network research has made similar use of the substantial documentary record available for the Southwest. Ties between sites and nodes in these networks are weighted based on the similarity of the assemblages from the connected sites (Peeples and Roberts 2013). In these archaeological approaches, similarity between archaeological sites is taken as a proxy for strength or frequency of interaction between individuals who lived in those communities (Golitko and Feinman 2015: 213). ...
Archaeologists working from a postcolonial framework are increasingly examining how the politics of Indigenous societies in North America structured European colonialism on the continent. Understanding the cultural landscapes of Indigenous societies is one part of this process, and the logics of colonial attempts to organize and control this space is a necessary counterpoint in the dialectic of colonial encounters. Social network analysis (SNA) can be applied to both Indigenous and colonial social organizations to understand how network organization influenced colonial encounters. As a case study, we compare the imagined colonial organization of early seventeenth-century Spanish missionization among the Pueblos of New Mexico with eighteenth-century missionization in the Pimería Alta of Arizona and Sonora. Network analysis is applied to documentary evidence to evaluate the idealized structure of Spanish mission systems in both regions as missionaries imagined it. The network qualities of missionary orders proved extremely resilient. Basic network qualities remained, enduring revolts and bureaucratic changeover. The results highlight how a simple and replicable structure was an adaptation to the unpredictable colonial borderlands. These case studies offer a template for the study of cultural landscapes through SNA and modeling the hidden mechanisms of colonialism.
... Also, within this increasing context of network analysis in archaeology, there are studies that discuss the methodological and even the epistemological challenges of the application of networks in the archaeological field [8,9,18]. ...
We present a study on the rock art of northern Patagonia based on network analysis and communities detection. We unveil a significant aggregation of archaeological sites, linked by common rock art motifs that turn out to be consistent with their geographical distribution and archaeological background of hunter-gatherer stages of regional peopling and land use. This exploratory study will allow us to approach more accurately some social strategies of visual communication entailed by rock art motif distribution, in space and time.
... The archaeological evidence is taken into consideration when weighting the edges, an approach that is part of an ongoing discussion about the special nature and requirements of archaeological networks (Peeples and Roberts, 2013). In our case, the weighting is based on the theoretical concept of cultural distance. ...
In the past numerous concepts of urbanity have been discussed and a variety of criteria for towns have been developed. They include size, population, legal aspects, way of life, structural and functional approaches. However, since the mentioned criteria cover only a part of the phenomenon and partly use fixed and arbitrary thresholds, they are not sufficient for analysis. We turn to an understanding of urbanity as a process that creates and shapes the scenery of the buildings and people and that is mainly driven by complexity. In this sense, we understand urbanity as a process of adaptation to changing conditions or contexts in a complex settlement system, which is triggered by size, attracted by exemplary solutions and characterized by the emergence of new structures. In this paper we address the issue of relative centrality as proposed by Christaller in the urbanity process as well as centrality within a network sciences approach. Our aim is to interweave different concepts of urbanity, centrality, interaction and connectivity, combining different concepts and research traditions as well as expanding them, resulting in a collection of different terminological frameworks. In the context of adaptation, urbanity is relative in the sense that different places may have gained better or worse adaptation under different conditions. The urbanity process is always shaped by the threat of too much complexity and too little connectivity. Above all, it is a certain surplus of connectivity that characterizes urbanity. This surplus is mapped by the variant of centrality proposed by Christaller. While Christaller's models can be transferred into network sciences frameworks, Christaller does not offer an adequate centrality measure. Therefore, his concept of centrality cannot be transferred correctly without being translated carefully into the network research context. In this article, we argue why this is necessary and explain how it can be done. In this paper the above concept will be applied to the Early Iron Age Princely Seats with a special focus on the Heuneburg. In order to represent similarities and interaction between different nodes a very limited part of the material culture can be used. For this purpose we use fibulae which allow for fairly accurate dating and hence ensure a narrow time slice for the network analysis. Using Fibulae the research will be limited to a certain social segment, which we refer to as "middle class." This paper is intended to deal with the rather complex issue of urbanity using more simple approaches such as network analysis. In this context, we pursue a tight integration of theory and methodology and we consider certain conceptual Nakoinz et al. Iron Age Urbanity issues. This paper has two main results. Firstly, we develop a consistent approach in order to apply social network centrality measures on geographical networks. Secondly, we will analyse which role the above mentioned middle class played in the course of urbanity processes.
... The goal is to identify the cultural entities that were connected (nodes such as individual households, settlements, mid-sized centres) and to examine flows of information and resources between these entities. Social network analyses (SNA) highlight similarities between site types or concentrations of site types, whether in architectural styles, site density, or artefact frequencies, as a means of defining flows of information and resources (Ostborn and Gerding, 2014;Peeples and Roberts, 2013). These interrelationships are then placed within a broader context (Mills, 2015), through regional settlement pattern analysis or other means (modelling, simulations). ...
Theory in the Pacific, the Pacific in Theory explores the role of theory in Pacific archaeology and its interplay with archaeological theory worldwide.
The contributors assess how the practice of archaeology in Pacific contexts has led to particular types of theoretical enquiry and interest, and, more broadly, how the Pacific is conceptualised in the archaeological imagination. Long seen as a laboratory environment for the testing and refinement of social theory, the Pacific islands occupy a central place in global theoretical discourse. This volume highlights this role through an exploration of how Pacific models and exemplars have shaped, and continue to shape, approaches to the archaeological past. The authors evaluate key theoretical perspectives and explore current and future directions in Pacific archaeology. In doing so, attention is paid to the influence of Pacific people and environments in motivating and shaping theory-building.
Theory in the Pacific, the Pacific in Theory makes a significant contribution to our understanding of how theory develops attuned to the affordances and needs of specific contexts, and how those contexts promote reformulation and development of theory elsewhere. It will be fascinating to scholars and archaeologists interested in the Pacific region, as well as students of wider archaeological theory.
... The basic structure of any network in SNA consists of points (nodes or edges) joined by lines (links). Relationships can be studied using several measures such as centrality (e.g., degree, betweenness or eigenvector centrality), density or connectedness (see Peeples and Roberts 2013), or modularity (Mithen 1994). These formal properties are essential for discerning how various types of phenomena, past or present, are related (see Knappett 2013), and their structure. ...
AN ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION OF: Kayeleigh Sharp, for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in Anthropology, presented on April 12, 2019, at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.
TITLE: RETHINKING THE GALLINAZO: A NORTHERN PERSPECTIVE FROM THE MID-ZAÑA VALLEY, PERU
MAJOR PROFESSOR: Dr. Izumi Shimada
The long-standing tradition of grave lot analysis and tomb excavation in Peru began over a century ago. By emphasizing funerary monuments and artistically appealing artifact collections, however, the patterned lifeways that characterize groups like the Gallinazo on the north coast of Peru have long been overlooked. Traditionally, the Gallinazo (or Virú Valley polity) have been credited only with a small set of hand-modeled pottery forms and high-quality negative-paint finewares which led to the Virú polity’s designation as the Negative-Paint Culture or Cultura Negativa. Several competing views from different valleys have developed over the past several decades. From the characterization of the Gallinazo as the first multi-valley state in the Andes to a mere substratum of Mochica society to more recent view as a pan-north coast utilitarian tradition or non-cultural entity, these views are inadequate when applied to evidence from the Lambayeque region. The snapshot of quotidian life from the Zaña Valley that I present here challenges several longstanding assumptions and conceptions about the people who manufactured and used the broadly defined art style known as Gallinazo and adds a productive new line of evidence for resolving long-standing debates.
The focus of this research is the Zaña Valley, Lambayeque region, north coast Peru. This area is home to the best-known funerary monuments and largest urban centers of the first millennium, which are the sites of Sipán and Pampa Grande. The Songoy-Cojal site sits on the north bank of the Zaña River nearby. Songoy-Cojal is linked to the once major site of Sipánii Collique which lies along a pre-Hispanic canal 18 kilometers to the northwest. 14 kilometers due north of Songoy-Cojal is the temporally overlapping northern, Moche V (Late Moche) capital at Pampa Grande which is accessible through several roads and pathways. The Huacas Songoy monument is strategically positioned on a prominent point that overlooks the entire Zaña Valley and intervalley corridors. Combined with other lines of irrigation, mineralogical and craft production evidence, it is suggested that Songoy-Cojal and people living there held some importance in the region during the first millennium of the Common Era. Although originally characterized as a site of Mochica cultural affiliation, however, Songoy-Cojal is strongly Gallinazo as well.
This investigation tests the validity of the assumption that Gallinazo and Mochica coexistence is characterized by interrelated social asymmetries that functioned as social counterweights that fostered long-term interdependencies. Indications of such types of axes of differentiation is found in complex administrative systems known as the time of Spanish conquest and in asymmetrical moiety organization at Pampa Grande. In general, and based on multiple lines of evidence, it is possible to suggest that people living at Songoy-Cojal during the eighth century were more than simple commoners acting in isolation were. In fact, this investigation shows that users and manufacturers of pottery objects in the Gallinazo style were people who likely lived and worked alongside those who built and used the funerary monuments at Sipán and identified as the Mochica, and may have constituted an important part of the workforce performing labor-tax duties at Pampa Grande. Long-term social relations were maintained through complementary economic systems focusing on mining, irrigation and multicraft production industries, a phenomenon that I define as economical complementarity.
Although originally considered to be an early civilization with dates ranging from 200 BCE to 350 or 400 CE, new radiocarbon dating of Cojal samples show that the residential and multi-craft producing sector of the site endured much later. The updated temporal and regional vision of quotidian life at a Gallinazo-Mochica community in the mid-Zaña Valley challenges traditional view of this group and opens new dialogues about the inner-working complexities of the Gallinazo. In stark contrast to the overly simplistic vision their decorative art style implies, particularly in relation to the Mochica, this group played an important complementary economic role in the Lambayeque region during the first millennium of the Common Era.
... Community detection analysis has been performed only on 1-mode weighted networks of buildings to determine clusters of buildings that show a tighter material connectivity between themselves compared to buildings that belong to other groups. Generally, networks are not binarized since weights of ties provide the research with extremely important information regarding the intensity or possibly duration of connection (Peeples and Roberts, 2013). ...
Vast in scale and densely inhabited, Late Neolithic Near Eastern megasites have been variously considered in relation to urbanity. Often viewed as failed experiments on the path to proper urbanism or proto-urban sites, these settlements reveal few signs of hierarchical social stratification despite their large size; as such, they represent a challenge for the understanding of early processes of community formation and social integration. Drawing upon a wide range of data and using socio-material network analysis as a methodological tool, this paper explores the way the late Neolithic site of Çatalhöyük was organized internally and specifically the way individual houses were embedded in the wider social fabric of the site. This study sheds light on the nature of the networks of social engagement and affiliation that emerge in the Holocene within large early agricultural communities and the way such networks were manifested.
... Specifically, we calculated the Brainerd-Robinson (B-R) similarity coefficient (Brainerd, 1951;Robinson, 1951) for every possible pairwise combination of rooms in each network. This B-R measure ranges from 0 (no similarity) to 200 (perfect similarity) and provides a useful means for assessing patterns of similarity among nominal categories (e.g., Mills et al., 2013bMills et al., , 2015Peeples and Roberts, 2013;Plog, 1976). These similarity coefficients for each pair of rooms was then translated into a network graph for each subset of the dataset. ...
The Chaco World, centered on the San Juan Basin of New Mexico, in the Southwestern U.S.A., was organized largely around ritual activities, including the use and deposition of a wide range of rare and unusual objects. The great houses of Chaco Canyon were foundational in the development of these ritual activities. Biographical or assemblage-oriented approaches are well suited to studying ritual behavior and have been successfully applied to understanding religious ritual at Chacoan great houses, especially the site of Pueblo Bonito. While formal network analyses (and traditional statistical analyses) are typically used to evaluate relationships between archaeological sites, we argue that network analysis also has great utility in expanding existing biographical approaches to Chacoan ritual. Applying network methods to a network of general artifact classes (like turquoise or pipes) from different room contexts within Pueblo Bonito helps to understand the co-associations of objects grouped together through common use or deposition, likely in the course of ritual activities. These co-associations help expand our knowledge of ritual behavior within Pueblo Bonito, indicating distinctions between architectural spaces based on specialized ritual practices. This analysis also has important implications for Chacoan social organization, supporting existing arguments for a Chacoan house society model.
... Several recent studies have focused on the properties and key features of similarity networks (affiliation networks) that are quite common in archaeology but relatively rare in network studies in general. For example, Peeples and Roberts (2013) used ceramic similarity networks from the U.S. Southwest to explore the sensitivity of several common node-level and global network metrics to the creation of binary networks from weighted data. They suggest that under many common circumstances it is preferable to calculate such descriptive statistics from the full weighted network rather than binarized versions that are more useful for visualization. ...
Formal network analyses have a long history in archaeology but have recently seen a rapid florescence. Network models drawing on approaches from graph theory, social network analysis, and complexity science have been used to address a broad array of questions about the relationships among network structure, positions, and the attributes and outcomes for individuals and larger groups at a range of social scales. Current archaeological network research is both methodologically and theoretically diverse, but there are still many daunting challenges ahead for the formal exploration of social networks using archaeological data. If we can face these challenges, archaeologists are well positioned to contribute to long-standing debates in the broader sphere of network research on the nature of network theory, the relationships between networks and culture, and dynamics of social networks over the long term.
Networks are increasingly used to describe complex archaeological data in terms of nodes (the entities of the system) and edges (representing relationships like distance or similarity between each pair of nodes). Network analysis can then be applied to express local and global properties of the system, including structure (e.g. modularity) or connectivity. However, the usually high amount of missing data in archaeology and the uncertainty they cause make it difficult to obtain meaningful and robust results from the statistical methods utilised in the field of network analysis. Hence, we present in this paper manual and computational methods to 1) fill gaps in the settlement record and 2) reconstruct an ancient route system to retrieve a network that is as complete as possible. Our study focuses on the sites and routes, so-called hollow ways, in the Khabur Valley, Mesopotamia, during the Bronze and Iron Age as one of the most intensively surveyed areas worldwide. We were able to identify additional sites that were missing from the record as well as develop an innovative hybrid approach to complement the partly preserved hollow way system by integrating a manual and computational procedure. The set of methods we used can be adapted to significantly enhance the description of many other cases, and with appropriate extensions successfully tackle almost any archaeological region.
Personal ornaments, and especially those made of lithic materials, are an important part of the archaeological record, as they provide valuable insights into various aspects of past human societies. In the Caribbean islands’ Ceramic Age, lapidary artifacts exhibit remarkable abundance and diversity in terms of both raw materials and typology. Robust analysis of extensive datasets enables to address the questions of spatial and temporal distribution and diversity of lithic beads and pendants during this period. I demonstrate that the Early and Middle Ceramic periods exhibit higher raw material and typological diversity compared to later periods. Mineralogical and typological similarities are shown to be greater between sites attributed to the same period than between geographically close sites. The lapidary production during the Saladoid differs significantly between the continent and the archipelago. Some indications pointing to the Isthmo-Colombian area are proposed, which will require further research to enhance our understanding to the same level as that of the Caribbean islands, enabling advanced comparisons.
Ritual plays an important integrative function in the creation, maintenance, and transformation of human society. The shared experience of ritual establishes strong bonds between individuals that defines their membership in certain social groups. However, rituals are not timeless traditions, nor do they simply restore social equilibrium. Rather, rituals are active and ongoing social processes that unite and divide across multiple social categories. This paper applies archaeological network methods to analyze the multiscalar structure of ritual traditions across Classic Maya (ca. 300–900 CE) society using hieroglyphic inscriptions from dated and provenienced monuments cataloged in the Maya Hieroglyphic Database (Looper and Macri 1991–2024). For the Classic Maya, public ritual and performance were highly charged political events where meaning and power could be negotiated, creating opportunities for identity formation and community integration. Such contexts helped establish strong moral bonds in Classic Maya society. However, we know relatively little about the specific forms and content of these ritual practices. In this study we construct ritual similarity networks from hieroglyphic inscriptions to analyze the structure and organization of these moral communities as well as the ritual relations that bound them together.
Network research has recently been adopted as one of the tools of the trade in archaeology, used to study a wide range of topics: interactions between island communities, movements through urban spaces, visibility in past landscapes, material culture similarity, exchange, and much more. This Oxford Handbook is the first authoritative reference work for archaeological network research, featuring current topical trends and covering the archaeological application of network methods and theories. This is elaborately demonstrated through substantive topics and case studies drawn from a breadth of periods and cultures in world archaeology. It highlights and further develops the unique contributions made by archaeological research to network science, especially concerning the development of spatial and material culture network methods, and approaches to studying long-term network change. This is the go-to resource for students and scholars wishing to explore how network science can be applied in archaeology through an up-to-date overview of the field.
Throughout the history of archaeology, researchers have evaluated human societies in terms of systems and systems interactions. Complex systems theory (CST), which emerged in the 1980s, is a framework that can explain the emergence of new organizational forms. Its ability to capture nonlinear dynamics and account for human agency make CST a powerful analytical framework for archaeologists. While CST has been present within archaeology for several decades (most notably through the use of concepts like resilience and complex adaptive systems), recent increases in the use of methods like network analysis and agent-based modeling are accelerating the use of CST among archaeologists. This article reviews complex systems approaches and their relationship to past and present archaeological thought. In particular, CST has made important advancements in studies of adaptation and resilience, cycles of social and political development, and the identification of scaling relationships in human systems. Ultimately, CST helps reveal important patterns and relationships that are pivotal for understanding human systems and the relationships that define different societies.
Network analysis has become increasingly common within archaeological practice, yet little consensus exists as to what networks based on material culture actually reveal about ancient social life. One common approach to archaeological network inference relies on constructing similarity networks based on shared material types or stylistic categories between archaeological sites or contexts. Many studies implicitly or explicitly assume that the topology of similarity networks is a useful proxy for underlying patterns in ancient social networks, yet this basic assumption has not been rigorously evaluated. Here, I present a preliminary test of how well network measures inferred from material culture—in this case, bone daggers made on the island of New Guinea between 1845 and 2002—predict network measures derived from ethnographic accounts of social engagement between 1720 New Guinea communities. In this case study network distance partially predicts material similarity, and neighborhood/cluster identification algorithms partially identify similar patterning in underlying patterns of inter-community engagement. However, most commonly applied network measures of centrality are not strongly predicted by material cultural similarity. Similarity based network analysis is a powerful means of visualizing and exploring data, and can help in formulating archaeological hypotheses, but may be problematic as a direct inference procedure.
The primary aim of this study as part of the larger ‘Finding the limits of the limes’ project is to analyse and reconstruct the cultural landscape of the Dutch limes area, more specifically looking at the site and settlement patterns, the transport networks and their interrelationship with the natural environment.
The Cambridge Manual to Archaeological Network Science provides the first comprehensive guide to a field of research that has firmly established itself within archaeological practice in recent years. Network science methods are commonly used to explore big archaeological datasets and are essential for the formal study of past relational phenomena: social networks, transport systems, communication, and exchange. The volume offers a step-by-step description of network science methods and explores its theoretical foundations and applications in archaeological research, which are elaborately illustrated with archaeological examples. It also covers a vast range of network science techniques that can enhance archaeological research, including network data collection and management, exploratory network analysis, sampling issues and sensitivity analysis, spatial networks, and network visualisation. An essential reference handbook for both beginning and experienced archaeological network researchers, the volume includes boxes with definitions, boxed examples, exercises, and online supplementary learning and teaching materials.
The concept of a “social network” has become a popular term thanks to online tools such as Facebook or Twitter, allowing us to connect with everyone. Specific to archaeology, social network analysis (SNA) is well established as a method, but its theoretical application in maritime archaeology is an incipient initiative. This paper presents the use of SNA in maritime archaeology as a potential instrument to reinterpret underwater sites by integrating spatial and nonspatial patterns of cultural contact. The method implies an abstraction of an historical phenomenon in concepts of network analysis to be represented as network data. Using early Australian shipwrecks as examples, this paper shows how the application of SNA in maritime archaeological contexts can help to analyze and visualize flow of material goods, power, influence, and social control. As a result, it can be argued that exploring the structural position of actors in a network can reveal information about developing relationships in maritime contexts during the past.
The brain works as an organised, network-like structure of functionally interconnected regions. Disruptions to interconnectivity in certain networks have been linked to symptoms of depression and impairments in cognition. Electroencephalography (EEG) is a low-burden tool by which differences in functional connectivity (FC) can be assessed. This systematic review aims to provide a synthesis of evidence relating to EEG FC in depression. A comprehensive electronic literature search for terms relating to depression, EEG, and FC was conducted on studies published before the end of November 2021, according to PRISMA guidelines. Studies comparing EEG measures of FC of individuals with depression to that of healthy control groups were included. Data was extracted by two independent reviewers, and the quality of EEG FC methods was assessed. Fifty-two studies assessing EEG FC in depression were identified: 36 assessed resting-state FC, and 16 assessed task-related or other (i.e., sleep) FC. Somewhat consistent findings in resting-state studies suggest for no differences between depression and control groups in EEG FC in the delta and gamma frequencies. However, while most resting-state studies noted a difference in alpha, theta, and beta, no clear conclusions could be drawn about the direction of the difference, due to considerable inconsistencies between study design and methodology. This was also true for task-related and other EEG FC. More robust research is needed to understand the true differences in EEG FC in depression. Given that the FC between brain regions drives behaviour, cognition, and emotion, characterising how FC differs in depression is essential for understanding the aetiology of depression.
In this work we examine developments in ceramic use through the Ubaid and Late Chalcolithic 1 periods in Greater Mesopotamia. Our paper is a heuristic study of ceramic assemblages across the period from 5300 to 4200 BCE. This period roughly corresponds to the Ubaid 3 and 4, and Late Chalcolithic 1. We explore the periods that correspond to the spread and dissolution of what has been referred to as the Ubaid interaction sphere. This is carried out through analysis of the development of ceramic assemblages across an area that covers southern and northern Mesopotamia including northern Syria and Iraq and southeastern Turkey. The goal is to understand the strength and directionality of interactions between sites across the Ubaid/LC1 transition, and how the use of ceramics may have changed over time. To do this we use Principal Component Analysis and Formal Network Analysis to analyze ceramic assemblages belonging to 72 different sites from the selected time period. This approach helps us explore the strengths of connections within potting industries across three time-slices roughly corresponding to the Ubaid 3, Ubaid 4, and Late Chalcolithic 1. Our results show that rather than a complete and sudden breakdown of communication networks from the Ubaid to the LC1 there was a gradual disintegration of the network that started during Ubaid 4 and continued into LC1.
This chapter presents a summary of some of the results of Mazzucato’s doctoral dissertation; it assembles the work and suggestions of many of the members of the Çatalhöyük Research Project, and it is the outcome of the integration of a vast array of data collected by archaeologists and specialists during the 25 years of the Çatalhöyük Research Project. The current study explores the potential of network concepts and methods as a way to disentangle the dense set of relations that formed the social fabric of Neolithic Çatalhöyük at different chronological points during its development. It seeks to shed light on the dynamics of interconnectivity and cooperation between buildings, combining both an exploratory approach of observed networks and a hypothesis-testing methodology. For this study, networks are used as conceptual and methodological tools for integrating a range of archaeological data within a framework that privileges connections between entities instead of the entities in isolation.
The rhythms and organisation of daily life at Çatalhöyük were influenced by seasonal variation in the natural and social world its residents navigated. Seasonal changes in day length, temperature and rainfall shape overall productivity of the landscape (Fairbairn et al. 2005a). These biophysical cycles would have been punctuated by seasonal changes in the composition of local plant and animal communities, the seasonal presence of migratory species, and particular cycles of growth and maturation among resident populations (e.g., Russell, McGowan 2003; Pels 2010; Haddow, Knüsel 2017). The conceptions of seasonal patterns and activities shaped the ways in which Çatalhöyük’s residents interacted with their local environments, and structured the timing and spatial requirements of necessary tasks (Ingold 2000; Fairbairn et al. 2005a).....
Brain connectivity can be estimated through many analyses applied to electroencephalographic (EEG) data. However, substantial heterogeneity in the implementation of connectivity methods exist. Heterogeneity in conceptualization of connectivity measures, data collection, or data pre-processing may be associated with variability in robustness of measurement. While it is difficult to compare the results of studies using different EEG connectivity measures, standardization of processing and reporting may facilitate the task. We discuss how factors such as referencing, epoch length and number, controls for volume conduction, artefact removal, and statistical control of multiple comparisons influence the EEG connectivity estimate for connectivity measures, and what can be done to control for potential confounds associated with these factors. Based on the results reported in previous literature, this article presents recommendations and a novel checklist developed for quality assessment of EEG connectivity studies. This checklist and its recommendations are made in an effort to draw attention to factors that may influence connectivity estimates and factors that need to be improved in future research. Standardization of procedures and reporting in EEG connectivity may lead to EEG connectivity studies to be made more synthesisable and comparable despite variations in the methodology underlying connectivity estimates.
Previous research in the Mixtequilla region of south‐central Veracruz documented commercial market exchange centered on the Middle Postclassic period (1200–1350 CE) center of Sauce. However, residential evidence and the spatial articulation of exchange (commercial or not) with centers has not been evaluated systematically for both the Preclassic (600 BCE – 300 CE) and Late Classic (600–900 CE) periods. These periods are of particular interest in evaluating the association of political centers with commerce because they are marked by the formation of a large capital and state (Cerro de las Mesas) during the Preclassic, and the breakdown of this state into several likely competing polities (Nopiloa, Azuzules, and Zapotal) in the Late Classic. Density collections of ceramics at residential mounds made by Stark's Proyecto Arqueológico La Mixtequilla provide evidence for changes in the scale and network distributions of exchange over time.[Veracruz, quantitative methods, markets, Preclassic, Late Classic]
Research on food has a long history in archaeology and anthropology, with many agreeing that we need to examine the food of complex societies in a more holistic way, through the various stages from production to disposal. Typically, this has occurred through the application of the concept of foodways, although this has a range of definitions and is generally only used in historical archaeological and anthropological research. By building on this important area of research this paper will explore the usefulness of applying a food-systems framework to understanding food in the past. Systems research is already well established in archaeology, sharing elements with approaches such as social-network analysis and complexity science. These theories have been used to address a broad array of questions about the relationships between actors, activities and outcomes for individuals and larger groups at a range of social scales. Thus food systems can help us to explore greater connections between food, human society and the environment via a combination of different archaeological evidence and comparative data.
The Early Iron Age (ca. 1200-800 BCE) in the eastern Mediterranean was an era of regeneration and innovation following a major economic and social collapse. During this period influential advancements in metalworking included the development of iron smelting, for which the period was named, as well as advancements in bronze casting. These practices were adopted by smiths around the Mediterranean. Previous scholarship has suggested that that in the Aegean, technological knowledge necessary for many aspects of complex craft production was forgotten and that techniques in metalworking were subsequently imported from Cyprus, which was a center of metallurgical innovation. In fact, the evidence for this claim is far from conclusive and many questions remain about the practical mechanisms by which these innovations could have been transmitted. This dissertation widens the scope of the questions asked as well as the range of evidence used, looking at more mundane copper and iron objects found in larger numbers in both Cyprus and Crete. It combines an archaeometric analysis of copper-based objects from the Penn Museum’s 20th century excavations at Kourion and Lapithos on Cyprus and Vrokastro on Crete with a social network analysis of bronze and iron objects from Cyprus and Crete using data gathered from published reports. Drawing on châine opératoire, this work reconstructs communities of practice active at the sites and investigates how metallurgical knowledge was shared among and between them. The results of these analyses indicate that the most frequent and significant interactions occurred on a local scale and that long-distance connections between Cyprus and Crete have been overstated.
This study examines the intersection of political, cultural, and linguistic differences in the archaeological study of boundaries. The Late Postclassic and Early Colonial periods (A.D. 1350-1525) in the Maya lowlands are known for political instability and the formulation of new identities, especially in the northern region of the Peten Lakes District (Guatemala) to the greater Rio Hondo drainage (Belize). This article approaches the theoretical formulations of archaeological borders from the perspective of lithic technology, focusing on small projectile points recovered from numerous sites in the subregion. Analysis of data suggests differences in resource acquisition, material preference, and production during a time of historically fluid interaction and occasional conflict in the Peten-Belize area. Such information adds to our understandings of political frontiers of Late Postclassic polities from a social and economic perspective that is often ignored.
Historical societies reshaped their environment in various ways; by clearing forest, cultivating crops, mining, and modifying waterways. Evidence of these activities persists in palaeoenvironmental archives, which represent comprehensive histories of human activity in a landscape. Analysis of settlement networks across landscapes is another common approach to investigating how past societies operated, but these analyses rarely incorporate palaeoenvironmental data. Here, we combine these two data sources to examine past socio‐political relationships in a society that experienced disruption and transformation. Applying network analysis, and using settlement histories built from palaeoenvironmental proxies for occupation and land use, this paper reconstructs population dynamics at several key nodes (cities) within the Khmer kingdom of Southeast Asia, before and after the climate stress and political upheaval of the 14th–15th centuries ce. Our results reveal how the Khmer city network transformed across space and the nature of the relationships that existed within the network prior to its disruption.
The doctoral dissertation „From individuality to regionality in the distribution area of tarand cemeteries in the Roman Iron Age“ explores the affiliation of people who lived in the distribution area of tarand cemeteries and used those cemeteries in the Roman Iron Age (ca first four centuries AD) on the individual, communal and regional levels. Tarand cemeteries are monumental communal stone burial places where burials and artefacts are commingled, fragmented and thus identifying single burials is difficult. The individual level was distinguished based on the presence of bone clusters that could refer to individual episodes in the burial of the deceased, which distinguished them from others buried in the cemetery. The ones buried into tarand cemeteries probably belonged to the higher strata of the society because they were buried into the monumental cemeteries, often with elaborate grave goods during time-consuming and multi-stage rituals. In Viimsi I cemetery a correlation of male individuals and crossbow brooches was present; thus, some social groups could have worn specific ornaments. Also, bones of the deceased and grave goods were often deposited to a specific area in the cemetery. The fixed spatial arrangement refers to established patterns of practices maintained over centuries. Burying to tarand cemeteries was a part of the collective identity of the community. On a regional level, it was distinguished that different ornaments were preferred in specific regions. Wearing those ornaments may have been important to differ from other regional groups. The ornaments also could have held different social meanings when used in a specific context. Local culture was influenced by long-distance contacts with southern areas, especially with the eastern and south-eastern coastal areas of the Baltic Sea. Since the third century, connections with Eastern Europe rose as well. Selected new forms of ornaments were adopted into the regional culture, new versions were created and developed according to the local context.
Local ornaments of the 3rd and 4th century AD in southeast Estonia and north Latvia are inherent to the region and mostly found from there. In this paper, intraregional interaction, the main routes of communication, and whether different sub-regions were present is studied on the basis of the distribution of local ornaments. Methods from network science are adopted to achieve this. Based on the results of chi-squared similarity metric and degree centrality measure, sub-regions where different types of local ornaments were preferred stand out. This preference could suggest the expressions of some regional ideas. Items in local style could have, more or less intentionally, marked the similarities within the region, setting it apart from other regions. Central areas could have been the ones with higher degree centrality values, whereas these areas could be interpreted to form the main axis of communication which maintained similarities between those sites. The main interaction routes were water ways which connected distant areas and maintained unity within sub-regions. Being situated near bigger water routes is what determined the importance of areas. This study shows the patterns of interaction between, and the formation and expression of, culturally uniform subgroups based on local ornaments of the 3rd and 4th centuries found from southeast Estonian and north Latvian stone cemeteries.
Did towns return to early medieval Europe through political leadership or economic expansion? This paper turns the spotlight on a particular group actors, the long-distance traders, and finds that they stimulated proto-towns of a special kind among the Vikings. While social and economic changes, and aristocratic advantage, were widespread, it was the largely self-directed actions of these intrepid merchants which created what the author calls 'the nodal points.' One can think of many other periods and parts of the world in which this type of non-political initiative may well have proved pivotal.
Many researchers have linked the evolution of the prehistoric center Cahokia to its location near the confluence of the Mississippi, Missouri, and Illinois rivers. It is possible to evaluate this idea mathematically through the graph-theoretic concept of centrality. The analysis suggests that Cahokia was located at the point of highest centrality in the Mississippi River drainage.
One of the most prominent but least understood demographic phenomena in the precontact Southwest is the disappearance of the Hohokam from the valleys of southern Arizona. Despite extensive research, no widely accepted explanation has been offered. We argue that the failure to identify a satisfactory cause is due to excessive focus on catastrophic phenomena and terminal occupations, and a lack of attention to gradual demographic processes. Based on a combination of macro-regional population studies and local research in the lower San Pedro River valley we present an explanation for gradual population decline precipitated by social and economic coalescence beginning in the late A.D. 1200s. In the southern Southwest an influx of immigrants from the north led to a shift from a dispersed, extensive settlement/subsistence strategy to increased conflict, aggregation, and economic intensification. This shift resulted in diminished health and transformation from population growth to decline. Over approximately 150 years gradual population decline resulted in small remnant groups unable to maintain viable communities. Small, terminal populations were ultimately unable to continue identifiable Hohokam cultural traditions and consequently disappeared from the archaeological record of southern Arizona, either through migration or a shift in lifestyle that rendered them archaeologically invisible.
Examination of regional-scale processes in prehistory requires explicit consideration of what we mean by regions. Definitions vary with research interests and the times, but the boundaries of regions are usually defined by topography and the distribution of a number of material culture traits. As such, regions are essentially the scale within which archaeologists believe social interactions were concentrated. A closer look at regions, however, at least as they are defined archaeologically, suggests that they are less internally coherent than we might expect. The question then becomes not only whether we can identify regions but whether the regions we identify are meaningful. I suggest that a consideration of demography and some of its associated properties can further archaeologists' understanding of variability in material culture in different areas during later prehistory and that it will permit us to construct regions with greater behavioral meaning. I begin with a brief review of the history of southwestern regions to present a context from which to evaluate current use of the term. This is followed by a descriptive presentation of Pueblo IV (A.D. 1275-1400) settlement patterns in the Western Pueblo area, leading to the conclusion that critical settlement changes occurred at about A.D. 1275 and 1325. Major developments in iconography and macroregional population movements also occurred at these times. This patterning has been the basis of arguments regarding the scale and organization of Pueblo IV society and ideology (e.g., Adams 1991; Crown 1994; Upham 1982). I then investigate the Upper Little Colorado district to consider how archaeological regions can be interpreted and to investigate differences that exist both within and between areas considered to be regions. The scale and approximate boundaries of regions are the combined product of research histories and definitional criteria. If- As is often the case-regions are assumed to be archaeological proxies for social entities, the validity of the geographic-cultural link must be demonstrated. Consideration of comparative population density measures suggests that regional interaction occurred on multiple and contrasting scales, each probably involving different social processes.
Hopi villages played important roles in the precontact and contact periods in the American Southwest, but analysis has largely focused on their occupants' longdistance contacts with non-Hopi populations. Relatively little direct archaeological evidence has been mustered to document intervillage relationships on the Hopi Mesas. The lack of attention to intervillage dynamics risks encouraging an overly homogeneous view of Hopi as a sociopolitical or ethnic entity. This study employs compositional analysis of Jeddito Yellow Ware pottery to track the local movement of pottery among Hopi villages and thus map patterns of interaction among them. The circulation of pottery is found to differ over time and by ceramic type, with bichromes moving within mesas and polychromes more often between mesas. Prior to Spanish contact, the Hopi settlement cluster contained a number of localized social networks rather than a single, all-encompassing network. /// Los pueblos Hopi desempeñaron un papel importante durante los períodos precolombinos y colonial en el suroeste Norteamericano, pero el análisis se ha enfocado principalmente en los contactos extensos entre los Hopi y otras poblaciones. Relativamente poca evidencia directa arqueológica ha sido compilado para documentar relaciones entre aldeas Hopi. La falta de atención a las relaciones entre los pueblos, corre el riesgo de caracterizar de una manera demasiado homogénea a los Hopi como entidad socio-política o étnica. Esta investigación usa un análisis composicional de la cerámica Jeddito Yellow Ware para seguir el intercambio de cerámica entre los pueblos de Hopi, y por lo tanto, modelar la interacción entre ellos. La circulación de cerámica parece variar temporalmente y tipologicamente, con el intercambio de piezas bícromadas dentro de la mesa y las policromadas entre las mesas. Antes del período español, la región Hopi contenía varias redes sociales localizadas, y no una masiva que abarcaba todas.
The authors raise spatial analysis to a new level of sophistication - and insight - in proposing a mathematical model of 'imperfect optimisation' to describe maritime networks. This model encodes, metaphorically, the notion of gravitational attraction between objects in space. The space studied here is the southern Aegean in the Middle Bronze Age, and the objects are the 34 main sites we know about. The 'gravitation' in this case is a balance of social forces, expressed by networks with settlements of particular sizes and links of particular strengths. The model can be tweaked by giving different relative importance to the cultivation of local resources or to trade, and to show what happens when a member of the network suddenly disappears.
This review aims to expose the potential of formal network methods for archaeology by tracing the origins of the academic traditions, network models, and techniques that have been most influential to archaeologists. A brief discussion of graph theoretic applications in archaeology reveals how graph visualization and analysis was used since the 1960s in a very similar way to later network analysis applications, but did not seem to have influenced the more widespread adoption of network techniques over the past decade. These recent archaeological applications have been strongly influenced by two academic traditions, social network analysis and sociophysics. The most influential and promising techniques and models adopted from these traditions are critically discussed. This review reveals some general trends which are considered to be the result of two critical issues that will need to be addressed in future archaeological network analysis: (1) a general unawareness of the historicity and diversity of formal network methods both within and outside the archaeological discipline has resulted in a very limited methodological scope; (2) the adoption or development of network methods has very rarely been driven by specific archaeological research questions and is dominated by a few popular models and techniques, which has in some cases resulted in a routinized explanatory process. This review illustrates, however, the great potential of formal network methods for archaeology and argues that, if this potential is to be applied in a critical way, a broad multidisciplinary scope is necessary and specific archaeological research contexts should dominate applications.
This paper argues that the centralised hierarchy that emerged at the beginning of the Kofun (mounded tomb) period in Japan can be explained by the locations that the polities to be hierarchised occupy and the differences in the topological potentials that these locations generate. Previous attempts of explaining the phenomenon by attributing its cause to factors such as differential access to resources and control over their distribution have been proven not to fit with the available body of evidence. The application of social network analysis-derived concepts and methods reveals that the topological locations that polities occupied generated different centralities, i.e. different degrees of connectedness to other polities and of mediating interactions between polities, which led to the hierarchisation and centralisation of their relationships. The paper concludes that the topological structure of a social network itself can be a significant cause of its own hierarchisation, and it compares the finding with the manner in which the concepts of agency and power are applied to the explanation of social hierarchisation and centralisation.
The late pre-Hispanic period in the US Southwest (A.D. 1200-1450) was characterized by large-scale demographic changes, including long-distance migration and population aggregation. To reconstruct how these processes reshaped social networks, we compiled a comprehensive artifact database from major sites dating to this interval in the western Southwest. We combine social network analysis with geographic information systems approaches to reconstruct network dynamics over 250 y. We show how social networks were transformed across the region at previously undocumented spatial, temporal, and social scales. Using well-dated decorated ceramics, we track changes in network topology at 50-y intervals to show a dramatic shift in network density and settlement centrality from the northern to the southern Southwest after A.D. 1300. Both obsidian sourcing and ceramic data demonstrate that long-distance network relationships also shifted from north to south after migration. Surprisingly, social distance does not always correlate with spatial distance because of the presence of network relationships spanning long geographic distances. Our research shows how a large network in the southern Southwest grew and then collapsed, whereas networks became more fragmented in the northern Southwest but persisted. The study also illustrates how formal social network analysis may be applied to large-scale databases of material culture to illustrate multigenerational changes in network structure.
The work by Elizabeth Bott is still mentioned as a "hypothesis" even though it has inspired many researchers over generations, pointing out that the subject is not closed. She raised a new fundamental question about the link between network structure and the forms of conjugality, which remains relevant in a world that has evolved in the social, cultural, and scientific domains. Networks are considered not only an object of research, rather they shed light on other objects (way of life, culture, behaviors, etc.). Today, Bott’s questioning may undergo some shifts as some social realities have changed and the lenses for observing these realities have also progressed. Advances in network analysis and in cultural and gender studies, as well as the more recent emphasis on relational dynamics, all contribute to further explore her question and give new insights on her hypothesis. The greater accuracy of the categories of both network structures (specifying the position of the partner) and conjugal roles (dividing them between norms and practices, then decisions and tasks) allows a more detailed description of their ways of combination. The dynamic dimension makes it possible to differentiate between contrasting processes of building a couple and integrating the partner into people's relational universes.
The Roman province of Baetica, roughly commensurate with modern Andalusia, Spain, provides an excellent case study of “Romanization” from its early days as a republican overseas possession to its development into a pillar of the imperial economy. The work presented here uses Network Analysis applied to our current knowledge of transport and communication routes in the region in order to better understand the relationship between the location and political/economic significance of sites. This paper focuses on the technological aspects of the study, in particular the methodology used, as well as the results, which indicate strong transport-influenced spatial patterning. The concluding section takes a deeper look at the nature of the source data and its “directionality.”
The work of Fulkerson and Gross on incidence matrices shows that the question, whether a given incidence matrix A can be so re-arranged by rows as to bring together all the ATs in each separate column, can be settled if one merely knows A through the symmetrised product ATA. Suppose it is known that such a row re-arrangement exists; it is proved here that A can then be re-arranged in the required way if one merely knows A through the dual symmetrised product, AAT. Thus ATA and AAT contain respectively (i) information sufficient to decide on the possibility or otherwise of such a re-arrangement, and (ii) information sufficie nt to determine asorting algorithm. Implications for archaeology are briefly discussed.
The intuitive background for measures of structural centrality in social networks is reviewed and existing measures are evaluated in terms of their consistency with intuitions and their interpretability.
This chapter explores the process of outlining appropriate techniques, and the derivation of network models and some of the more general problems to which these may apply. To date, three major areas of concern have served as foci for consideration: (l) the material objects involved in exchange, through source identification, distributional studies; (2) the specific economic function of trade and its diachronic and synchronic relations to the function of other cultural subsystems, particularly the evolution of other institutions such as urban society and the state; and (3) exchange as a symbolic medium and as a focus for patterns of social interaction. A network trade model can be devised to provide the sole methodology for an analysis of prehistoric trade. Exchange is a form of interaction that creates and reflects biological and social systems over a wide range of size and complexity. These linkages make up a network differing in content but not in structure from networks considered in other fields. In archaeology, it is made up of settlements, network points or vertices, and exchange relations, edges, or links; it is also subject to a variety of analytic approaches. The raw materials of archaeology lend themselves well to these analyses because they present a permanent fossilized, though incomplete, record of prehistoric exchange patterns.
Employs graph theory in order to investigate aspects of regional economic organisation indicating that the road network was organised dendritically, thus facilitating trafficking up and down the settlement hierarchy. The author also argues that Aztec political economy exhibits many of the characteristics of a dendritic central-place system, but accepts that this does not preclude the development of more complex economic arrangements. The paper provides a topological analysis of the structure and functioning of the Aztec Empire road network. -after Author
Social Capital, the advantage created by location in social structure, is a critical element in business strategy. Who has it, how it works, and how to develop it have become key questions as markets, organizations, and careers become more and more dependent on informal, discretionary relationships. The formal organization deals with accountability; Everything else flows through the informal: advice, coordination, cooperation friendship, gossip, knowledge, trust. Informal relations have always been with us, they have always mattered. What is new is the range of activities in which they now matter, and the emerging clarity we have about how they create advantage for certain people at the expense of others. This is done by brokerage and closure. Ronald S. Burt builds upon his celebrated work in this area to explore the nature of brokerage and closure. Brokerage is the activity of people who live at the intersection of social worlds, who have a vision advantage of seeing and developing good ideas, an advantage which can be seen in their compensation, recognition, and the responsibility they're entrusted with in comparison to their peers. Closure is the tightening of coordination in a closed network of people, and people who do this do well as a complement to brokers because of the trust and alignment they create. Brokerage and Closure explores how these elements work together to define social capital, showing how in the business world reputation has come to replace authority, pursued opportunity assignment, and reward has come to be associated with achieving competitive advantage in a social order of continuous disequilibrium.
The main feature of this book is a discussion of 'role analysis' and its relevance to social structure. Arguing that the role system of a society is the matrix of its social structure, the author presents a detailed theoretical analysis of the problems inherent in this approach.
The statistical technique of this paper is based upon the empirically established fact that over the course of time pottery types come into and go out of general use by a given group of people. It is further based upon the established fact that in cultures where chronology has been determined the differential use of types takes on a form illustrated in Figure 89. The data of this diagram are hypothetical, the purpose being merely to illustrate the present discussion.
Social interactions within a region may reduce the risk of resource stress by facilitating access to resources in other areas. Archaeological implications of this view of social networks are considered for the part-agricultural inhabitants of central New Mexico during the Pithouse period (ca. A.D. 900-1250). Spatial patterning of climatic variables suggests that social networks at least 50 km in extent and oriented in an east-southeastern direction from the focal site toward the Sierra Blanca region could have provided access to extralocal resources during years of poor local productivity. Similarity of ceramic assemblages (measured by Brainerd-Robinson coefficients) between the focal site and sites in the proposed alternative resource area confirms some degree of social contact during the Pithouse period; dissimilar ceramic assemblages from comparably distant sites to the west (in the Socorro area) indicate that geographic distance alone is not a good predictor of social interactions in this region.
Pearson's coefficient of linear correlation, r, sometimes is used to express the similarity between two archaeological collections when each collection is characterized by the percents of the artifact types it includes. Examples show that r can be extremely misleading when used in this way, and patterns of similarity among a group of collections can be wildly misrepresented. The Brainerd-Robinson statistic is one example of a similarity coefficient that is much better than r for comparing collections.
THE article which precedes this one describes a statistical technique for the chronological placement of archaeological artifact collections. The purposes of this paper are first to describe the rationale of archaeological analysis under which the data and problem as presented to Robinson were formulated, and upon which the validity of his solution therefore depends, and second to describe analytic and interpretive work which I have based upon his results.
In social network analysis, brokerage refers to the processes through which individuals or larger groups mediate interactions between actors that would otherwise not be directly connected. Brokers occupy key intermediate positions that have alternately been interpreted as sources of social capital or potential disadvantages. Recent empirical studies suggest that the relationship between brokerage and rewards or risks varies considerably depending on the nature of interactions in a given setting. In this study, we use a large settlement and ceramic database including sites across the western U.S. Southwest (C.E. 1200-1400) to identify settlements that likely filled brokerage roles in ceramic networks. We develop a new structural measure of brokerage and compare long-term outcomes for settlements characterized by varying degrees of brokerage. We argue that brokerage was not a major source of social capital in our study area, as interactions instead favored the formation of discrete groups over such intermediate positions.
Artifact assemblages from long-inhabited sites may include ceramic types and wares from multiple time periods, making temporal comparisons between sites difficult. This is especially problematic in macro-regional data sets compiled from multiple sources with varying degrees of chronological control. We present a method for chronological apportioning of ceramic assemblages that considers site occupation dates, ceramic production dates, and popularity distribution curves. The chronological apportioning can also be adjusted to take into account different population sizes during the site occupation span. Our method is illustrated with ceramic data from late prehispanic sites in the San Pedro Valley and Tonto Basin, Arizona, U.S.A., compiled as part of the Southwest Social Networks Project. The accuracy of the apportioning method is evaluated by comparing apportioned assemblages with those from nearby contemporaneous single component sites.
Tout archéologue menant une prospection est confronté au grave problème de l'interprétation des résultats. Etant donné le petit nombre d'informations recueillies, aussi bien faite soit la prospection, quelle signification au plan économique, politique, socio-culturel peut-on accorder à l'ensemble des données ? Quel tableau peut-on dresser des forces qui ont commandé le développement d'une région et, à l'inverse, comment des hypothèses établies sur les aspects anthropologiques des dynamiques régionales anciennes peuvent-elles être objectivement testées ? En fait, dans quelle mesure les résultats d'une prospection peuvent-ils été comparés à ceux portant sur d'autres périodes ou d'autres régions ?
Cet article expose la proposition suivante : la théorie mathématique des graphes constitue un outil à ajouter à la panoplie dont disposent les archéologues. En dépit de son nom, la théorie des graphes n'est pas une théorie au sens habituel que donnent à ce mot les spécialistes des sciences sociales. Il s'agit plutôt d'une technique mathématique dépourvue d'hypothèse servant à décrire objectivement et à analyser un système ou un réseau en portant sur un graphique la catégorie, le nombre et la valeur des interconnections existant entre chaque paire de points. Ce réseau peut être aussi bien un circuit électrique que des aires d'activité dans le cas d'un établissement humain. Le grand pouvoir de la théorie des graphes réside dans la conversion de simples observations en matrices mathématiques, chaque position ligne/colonne représentant la relation entre deux aires par rapport à une variable. Par exemple, un graphique pourrait représenter la quantité de céramique transportée d'un lieu de fabrication à ses lieux d'utilisation. Dans un autre cas il serait possible de retenir un indice permettant de corréler le mouvement des objets en fonction de la dimension des sites, ou un autre qui indiquerait un certain contrôle administratif. Une fois mis sous forme matricielle, ces graphes peuvent être manipulés selon un ensemble de techniques mathématiques plus ou moins sophistiquées, ouvertes à toutes possibilités, même non théoriques. Des matrices graphiques individuelles peuvent aussi s'ajouter les unes aux autres de façon à en former de nouvelles. Ainsi, les divers facteurs proposés pour rendre compte d'un type particulier d'établissement peuvent être soit examinés séparément, soit combinés pour former une matrice multi-variée servant à décrire le système d'établissement et permettant des comparaisons avec d'autres systèmes. A l'inverse, si une hypothèse existe telle que le rôle de l'économie dans le processus de centralisation économique, une matrice théorique pourrait être élaborée. En comparant cette matrice à une autre établie à partir de données réelles, l'hypothèse pourrait alors être examinée de façon tout à fait valable.
Afin de démontrer l'utilité de la théorie des graphes pour les archéologues, nous avons choisi de retenir un des cas les plus intéressants du Proche-Orient ancien — les plaines de Susiane à la période d'Uruk, c'est-à-dire au IVe millénaire avant notre ère. Celui-ci a été porté sur graphe. Dans un article publié en 1975, Wright et Johnson, les auteurs de la prospection, avaient émis l'hypothèse que les schemes de répartition des variétés orientales et occidentales de céramiques à décor incisé, croisillonné et à anses larges permettait de montrer que le développement de l'administration avait pu être catalysé par le contrôle de la production artisanale de la céramique : ce contrôle se traduisant archéologiquement par les zones de répartition de la poterie produite massivement. Une analyse effectuée à l'aide de graphes n'a pas permis de vérifier la proposition; en fait Johnson et Wright avaient déjà abandonné celle-ci. Cependant, à partir du travail théorique de Wright et Johnson sur la formation de l'Etat et à partir des idées de Murra sur le rôle joué par la main-d'œuvre agricole, en particulier dans les premières sociétés étatiques, de nouvelles hypothèses ont pu être émises. Ainsi plus spécifiquement on a traduit sur un graphe la répartition des écuelles grossières qui, pour certains, représenteraient des rations officielles dans le cadre de travaux mis en œuvre par l'Etat. Le réseau indiqué par la répartition des écuelles grossières corrélées aux autres types de poterie paraît dépasser les limites administratives telles que Johnson les a établies, c'est-à-dire, à 20 km des centres. Parmi les établissements situés à l'extérieur de cette zone, apparaissent ceux qui sont localisés sur des systèmes d'irrigation postérieurs tant élamites que sassanides, en particulier à des points de jonction importants. Cette observation permet de conclure à un certain rôle de l'Etat dans la maintenance des canaux et même aussi dans la production agricole à l'époque de formation des premiers Etats. Cet exemple permet de conclure que la théorie des graphes peut être adaptée au travail analytique effectué par des archéologues.
This paper presents a way of looking at Roman space from a Roman perspective, and suggests ways in which this point of view might open up new approaches in Roman archaeology. It turns on one concep- tion of Roman space in particular, preserved for us in the Antonine Itineraries. Working from a position that considers the context of the itineraries as movement-through-space, this paper presents an investiga- tion using social network analysis and agent-based simulation to re-animate the itineraries. The itinerar- ies for Iberia, Gaul, Italy, and Britain are considered. The results of the social network analysis suggest structural differences in the way that the itineraries presented space to the reader/traveler. The results of the simulation of information diffusion through these regions following the routes in the itineraries suggest ways that this conception of space affected the cultural and material development of these regions. Sug- gestions for extending the basic model for more complicated archaeological analyses are presented.
Ties often have a strength naturally associated with them that differentiate them from each other. Tie strength has been operationalized as weights. A few network measures have been proposed for weighted networks, including three common measures of node centrality: degree, closeness, and betweenness. However, these generalizations have solely focused on tie weights, and not on the number of ties, which was the central component of the original measures. This paper proposes generalizations that combine both these aspects. We illustrate the benefits of this approach by applying one of them to Freeman’s EIES dataset.
The abstract for this document is available on CSA Illumina.To view the Abstract, click the Abstract button above the document title.
The abstract for this document is available on CSA Illumina.To view the Abstract, click the Abstract button above the document title.
The purpose of this article is to show how three centrality measures—degree centrality, closeness centrality, and betweenness centrality—can advance the analysis of the Inka road network. It proposes that the Inka built storage facilities and/or administrative centers at regions of high centrality and at regions of low centrality, based on the structural properties of two different exchange networks. These networks were themselves based on staple finance and on wealth finance. The article concludes with a discussion of how network models may prove useful for the analysis of the global properties of exchange relations in the Inka empire.