ChapterPDF Available

On the Problem of the Interpretation of Symbols and Symbolism in Archaeology

Authors:
Frederick L Coolidge at University of Colorado Colorado Springs
Frederick L Coolidge
Karenleigh A. Overmann at University of Colorado Colorado Springs
Karenleigh A. Overmann
Thomas Wynn at University of Colorado Colorado Springs
Thomas Wynn
Download full-text PDF
Read full-text
Download citation

Abstract

This paper discusses the use of the terms symbols, symbolism, and symbolling in the archaeological literature. The lack of definition and any grounding in cognitive theory makes identifying prehistoric symbols and symbolling more art than science. A multiplicity of claims from the literature highlights the tendency to claim almost any form from any period of prehistory as symbolic. After the problem is defined, an alternative approach is proposed. The alternative suggests grounding symbols and symbolling in contemporary cognitive theory; this would permit the construct to be operationalized as qualities potentially discernable in prehistoric material forms. A multi-level construct is also proposed, one that is not only capable of differentiating symbolic cognition as exhibited by the human species today from the presumably non-symbolic cognition of contemporary non-human primates, but which is also able to differentiate both from the emergent symbolling capacities of ancestral hominids.
Content uploaded by Karenleigh A. Overmann
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Karenleigh A. Overmann on Oct 17, 2024
Content may be subject to copyright.
Coolidge, F. L., Overmann, K. A., & Wynn, T. (2024). On the problem of the interpretation of
symbols and symbolism in archaeology. In T. Wynn, K. A. Overmann, & F. L. Coolidge (Eds.),
The Oxford handbook of cognitive archaeology (pp. 299–315). Oxford University Press.
Availability: The chapter is available on the publisher’s website:
https://academic.oup.com/edited-volume/41984/chapter/396596306
Also see https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780192895950.013.1
It is available in the SocArXiv repository: https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/gqvjf
It is also available from the author on request.
Abstract: This chapter discusses the use of the terms symbols, symbolism, and symboling in the
archaeological literature. The lack of definition and any grounding in cognitive theory makes
identifying prehistoric symbols and symboling more art than science. A multiplicity of claims from
the literature highlight the tendency to claim almost any form from any period of prehistory as
symbolic. After the problem is defined, an alternative approach is proposed. The alternative
suggests grounding symbols and symboling in contemporary cognitive theory; this would permit
the construct to be operationalized as qualities potentially discernable in prehistoric material forms.
A multi-level construct is also proposed, one that is not only capable of differentiating symbolic
cognition as exhibited by the human species today from the presumably non-symbolic cognition
of contemporary non-human primates but which is also able to differentiate both from the
emergent symboling capacities of ancestral hominins.
Keywords: Hawkes’ ladder; Theory of Mind; Upper Palaeolithic; learning theory; semiotics;
symbol; symbolic cognition; symbolism; symbolling; working memory
... The morphological and technological properties of hominin material culture (i.e., artefacts) provide archaeologists with insight into past behaviour, behavioural variation, and how these changed through time and space (Lycett, 2009;Okumura and Araujo, 2019). Within a Middle Pleistocene context, where hominin behaviour is tightly linked to cognitive capabilities and evolutionary trajectories (Gowlett et al., 2012;Stout et al., 2014;Nowell, 2017;Lombard and Hogberg, 2021;Coolidge et al., 2023), stone tools provide the only abundant source of evidence for understanding how the hominin brain evolved. Part of this discussion Fig. 1. ...
... Art, and the aesthetic values underpinning it, play an important role in our understanding of hominin cognitive evolution. Indeed, the Middle Stone Age of Africa, Middle/Upper Palaeolithic of Asia, and Upper Palaeolithic of Europe witness a strong association between our species and the presence of cave, rock, and figurative art (d' Errico and Nowell, 2000;Barham and Everett, 2021;Coolidge et al., 2023;Martín-Loeches, 2023;Bebber, in press). This does not mean we are the only hominin species to have created art; potentially, far from it (e.g., Joordens et al., 2015;Hoffman et al., 2018;Bello, 2021;Marquet et al., 2023). ...
The West Tofts handaxe: A remarkably average, structurally flawed, utilitarian biface
Article
Full-text available
  • Oct 2023
  • J ARCHAEOL SCI
The West Tofts handaxe is a small British Acheulean biface well known for its cortical preservation of a fossilised bivalve shell. The shell's retention, its prominent central placement, and perceptions of the tool's broader aesthetic-value have resulted in it being described as an example of early hominin aesthetic intent. When combined with its mid-to-late Pleistocene age, the handaxe plausibly has implications for our understanding of hominin cognitive evolution and the origins of Palaeolithic art. Crucial to the assignment of aesthetic intent are a series of assumptions concerning the exceptionality of the tool's design, production and use. Here, we test those assumptions. The West Tofts handaxe is revealed to be technologically and morphologically unremarkable for the British late Acheulean, was produced on a tabular flint nodule that did not require invasive (central) flake removals, and displays remarkably average flaking investment. High-resolution micro-CT scans of its internal structure reveal numerous fractures and air pockets, and at least one – potentially two – additional fossilised shells. These inclusions and flaws feasibly impacted the tool's production, potentially resulting in the shell's retention. Limited microwear traces were identified on its distal flaked edges, potentially hinting at the tool's expedient use. These and other data underline the importance of restraint when attributing aesthetic intent or ‘over-investment’ to the West Tofts handaxe. Today we may consider it a remarkable artefact worthy of elevation, but to the Acheulean individual who produced it, the West Tofts handaxe was likely an average utilitarian tool produced on a flawed but conveniently thin flint nodule.
View
PROPUESTA METODOLÓGICA PARA LA INTERPRETACIÓN COGNITIVA DEL REGISTRO ARQUEOLÓGICO NEANDERTAL
Article
  • Dec 2024
La metodología utilizada en la Arqueología Cognitiva conforma un punto clave para evitar las especulaciones y acercarse al estudio de la mente extinta de una forma científica. Sin embargo, hasta el momento, suele ser su punto débil debido a la falta de consenso, estandarización y las dificultades para trazar límites en los conceptos utilizados. Ante esta situación, algunos investigadores han propuesto métodos orientados a reducir el relativismo, con el fin de limitar las interpretaciones a la información extraída de los datos. Una de estas propuestas es la estructura interdisciplinar de Garofoli y Haidle (2014), la cual será desarrollada en este trabajo con el objetivo de acercarse a la cognición neandertal. Partiendo de las evidencias de los sistemas biológicos de especies vivas y teniendo en cuenta su relación con los sistemas neural, mental y de comportamiento, este método de base comparativa permite inferir características básicas del sistema mental de los neandertales, creando un marco interpretativo de utilidad para la lectura cognitiva de las evidencias arqueológicas.
View
Holme I (Seahenge) and Holme II: ritual responses to climate change in Early Bronze Age Britain
Article
Full-text available
  • Apr 2024
  • GeoJournal
Holme I and II were contemporary, adjacent Early Bronze Age (EBA) oak-timber enclosures exposed intertidally at Holme-next-the-sea, Norfolk, England, in 1998. Holme I enclosed a central upturned tree-stump, its function and intent unknown. Holme II is thought a mortuary structure. Both are proposed here best explained as independent ritual responses to reverse a period of severe climate deterioration recorded before 2049 BC when their timbers were felled. Holme I is thought erected on the summer-solstice, when the cuckoo traditionally stopped singing, departing to the ‘Otherworld’. It replicated the cuckoo’s supposed overwintering quarters: a tree-hole or the ‘bowers of the Otherworld’ represented by the tree-stump, remembered in folklore as ‘penning-the-cuckoo’ where a cuckoo is confined to keep singing and maintain summer. The cuckoo symbolised male-fertility being associated with several Indo-European goddesses of fertility that deified Venus - one previously identified in EBA Britain. Some mortal consorts of these goddesses appear to have been ritually sacrificed at Samhain. Holme II may be an enclosure for the body of one such ‘sacral king’. These hypotheses are considered, using abductive reasoning, as ‘inferences to the best explanations’ from the available evidence. They are supported with environmental data, astronomic and biological evidence, regional folklore, toponymy, and an ethnographic analogy with indigenous Late Iron Age practices that indirect evidence indicates were undertaken in EBA Britain. Cultural and religious continuity is supported by textual sources, the material record and ancient DNA (aDNA) studies.
View
Reconsidering the link between past material culture and cognition in light of contemporary hunter-gatherer material use
Article
Full-text available
  • Mar 2024
  • BEHAV BRAIN SCI
Many have interpreted symbolic material culture in the deep past as evidencing the origins sophisticated, modern cognition. Scholars from across the behavioural and cognitive sciences, including linguists, psychologists, philosophers, neuroscientists, primatologists, archaeologists and paleoanthropologists have used such artefacts to assess the capacities of extinct human species, and to set benchmarks, milestones or otherwise chart the course of human cognitive evolution. To better calibrate our expectations, the present paper instead explores the material culture of three contemporary African forager groups. Results show that, while these groups are unequivocally behaviourally modern, they would leave scant long-lasting evidence of symbolic behaviour. Artefact-sets are typically small, perhaps as consequence of residential mobility. When excluding traded materials, few artefacts have components with moderate-strong taphonomic signatures. Present analyses show that artefact function influences preservation probability, such that utilitarian tools for the processing of materials and the preparation of food are disproportionately likely to contain archaeologically traceable components. There are substantial differences in material-use between populations, which create important population-level variation preservation probability independent of cognitive differences. I discuss the factors — cultural, ecological and practical — that influence material choice. In so doing, I highlight the difficulties of using past material culture as an evolutionary or cognitive yardstick.
View
References
Chapter
  • May 2023
This is a book about numbers – what they are as concepts and how and why they originate – as viewed through the material devices used to represent and manipulate them. Fingers, tallies, tokens, and written notations, invented in both ancestral and contemporary societies, explain what numbers are, why they are the way they are, and how we get them. Overmann is the first to explore how material devices contribute to numerical thinking, initially by helping us to visualize and manipulate the perceptual experience of quantity that we share with other species. She explores how and why numbers are conceptualized and then elaborated, as well as the central role that material objects play in both processes. Overmann's volume thus offers a view of numerical cognition that is based on an alternative set of assumptions about numbers, their material component, and the nature of the human mind and thinking.
View
Evolution of a theory of mind?
Article
Full-text available
  • Jan 2012
Homo sapiens is arguably the only species that possesses a developed 'theory of mind'. By this, this chapter means the ability to attribute the full range of mental states, and to use such attributions to make sense of and predict behaviour. It argues that without a theory of mind, having the ability to speak or perceive speech would have been of little value. A theory of mind must have preceded any ability to use language in the communicative way in which it is used today. The chapter also questions the claim by Steven Mithen that a theory of mind evolved around six million years ago. The chapter's reason for questioning this date is that recent experimental evidence throws doubt on the idea that modern apes have a full theory of mind.
View
How levallois reduction is similar to, and not similar to, playing chess
Article
  • Jan 2010
Modern cognition is more than language and symbolism. One important component of modern thinking is expertise, exemplified best in expert performances in the arts, craft production, sport, medicine, and games such as chess. Expertise is driven by a cognitive system known as long-term working memory, in which retrieval structures held in long-term memory are activated in working memory. Here they enable rapid access to large bodies of procedural and declarative knowledge that have been acquired over years of practice. Although expertise underpins many of our most esteemed accomplishments, it is not reliant on either symbols or language. In the following essay we analyze one example of prehistoric expertise- Marjorie's core from Maastricht-Belvedere. From Nathan Schlanger's (1996) description of the chaîne opératoire we have been able to identify many of the elements of the retrieval structure activated for knapping the core. In its overall organization this retrieval structure was no different from those deployed by modern artisans. With this analysis in hand we are then able to contrast this Levallois retrieval structure with one required for an earlier biface façonnage reduction, thereby tracing one link in the evolutionary sequence leading ultimately to modern expertise.
View
Functional Craniology, Human Evolution, and Anatomical Constraints in the Neanderthal Braincase
Article
  • Jan 2014
Neanderthals and modern humans share a similar cranial capacity but different neurocranial organization. Recently, digital anatomy and computed morphometrics have generated a revolution in functional craniology, allowing quantitative analyses to investigate integration and correlation among the anatomical elements, both in ontogeny and phylogeny. Despite some derived endocranial traits, Neanderthals display a general plesiomorph organization of the braincase. Geometrical and structural constraints between the endocranial soft and hard tissues may have induced morphogenetic limits to the growth and developmental processes. At the same time, heat production associated with a large cranial capacity and a plesiomorph vascular system may have also involved thermal limits. Although in paleontology morphogenetic and metabolic processes can only be investigated through indirect evidence, such hypotheses merit attention when considering the patterns of brain evolution in the genus Homo. It is tempting to wonder whether these limits may be also related to possible factors associated with the extinction of Neanderthals.
View
The Routledge handbook of philosophy of the social mind
  • A Kaufmann