Specialized forager-traders have lived alongside and in exchange relationships with agriculturalists for many thousands of years in South and Southeast Asia. Here is a series of representative case-studies that pertain to a current archaeological debate. The issue concerns the extent to which historical foraging populations are to be understood as specialized adaptations to a complex economically diverse environment, rather than as throw-backs to a Paleolithic way of life.

This special issue publication of the Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory devoted to Pleistocene and Holocene arts examines a number of recent developments in the study of deep-time images. The contributions argue that in a context marked by new technological advances, the study of what was traditionally known as 'prehistoric art' has been transformed into a dynamic area of research marked by four main interrelated processes: (A) the inclusion of new corpuses of images beyond traditional conceptualizations of 'prehistoric' art, (B) the shift from a 'contemplative model' (which treated images and artefacts as 'already made art') to a 'construction model' that focuses on the processes involved in the making of artwork, (C) the transition from a Eurocentric model to a worldwide paradigm, and (D) the increasing incorporation of Holocene and Indigenous arts into general discussions about 'prehistoric' arts. This text appeals to students and researchers in the field. Previously published in Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory Volume 27, issue 3, September 2020 Chapters Art (Pre)History: Ritual, Narrative and Visual Culture in Neolithic and Bronze Age Europe, Chapter An Archaeology of Affect: Art, Ontology and the Carved Stone Balls of Neolithic Britain, and Chapter Hidden Sites, Hidden Images, Hidden Meanings: Does the Location and Visibility of Motifsand Sites Correlate to Restricted or Open Access? are available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

* a coherent, flowing story, written in short, punchy chapters, rich in examples, each dealing with major questions making it suitable for complete beginners in archaeology * shows how such contemporary issues such as biological and cultural diversity, gender, and climate change have deep roots in the human past * creates student interest in the human past as reconstructed by multidisciplinary research, including archaeology, anthropology, biological anthropology, ethnohistory, and many other disciplines

The present volume, based on a related conference in Erfurt, offers interdisciplinary insights on the Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church or the Pan-Orthodox Council, convened on the island of Crete in June 2016. Although some Orthodox Churches finally declined to participate - the most prominent being the Russian one -, the Council was a most significant development. It brought a considerable number of Orthodox Churches together and discussed crucial issues pertaining to today's Orthodox world. However, it also vividly revealed existing serious problems of inter-Orthodox communication and collaboration. The contributions in this volume shed light on main issues related to this Council and their multiple repercussions for Pan-Orthodox unity and the future of the Orthodox world.

This volume addresses the creation, documentation, preservation, and study of the archaeology of lunar, planetary, and interstellar exploration.It defines the attributes of common human technological expressions within national and, increasingly, private exploration efforts, and explore the archaeology of both fixed and mobile artifacts in the solar system and the wider galaxy.
This book presents the research of the foremost scholars in the field of space archaeology and heritage, a recent discipline of the field of Space Archaeology and Heritage. It provides the emerging archaeological perspective on the history of the human exploration of space.Since humans have been creating a vast archaeological preserve in space and on other celestial bodies.This assemblage of heritage objects and sites attest to the human presence off the Earth and the study of these material remains are best investigated by archaeologists and historic preservationists.As space exploration has reached the half century mark, it is the appropriate time to reflect on the major events and technological development of this particular unique 20th century arena of human history.
The authors encapsulate various ways of looking at the archaeology of both fixed and mobile human artifacts in the solar system.As missions continue into space, and as private ventures gear up for public and tourist visits to space and to the Moon and even Mars, it is the appropriate time to address questions about the meaning and significance of this material culture."

From a wider disciplinary perspective, modern conflict archaeology is now a thoroughly established and mature subdiscipline. However, a significant problem conflict archaeologists in the Netherlands face is that modern eras, including both world wars, have so far not received serious attention. Although both world wars appeal strongly to the popular imagination, until recently, Dutch researchers had not approached modern conflict from an academic archaeological perspective to any great extent. This is partly the result of problematic legislation on archaeological activity in the Netherlands. When applied and interpreted appropriately, archaeology can play an important role in the preservation, contemporary experience and historical reconstruction of recent conflicts. However, as Archaeological Approaches to and Heritage Perspectives on Modern Conflict: Beyond the Battlefields argues, research methods other than excavations will be needed to conduct conflict archaeology in the Netherlands effectively. This study aims to develop a Dutch approach to conflict archaeology, integrating archaeology, heritage research and history at a landscape scale.

As much as any other nation, Germany has long been understood in terms of totalizing narratives. For Anglo-American observers in particular, the legacies of two world wars still powerfully define twentieth-century German history, whether through the lens of Nazi-era militarism and racial hatred or the nation's emergence as a "model" postwar industrial democracy. This volume transcends such common categories, bringing together transatlantic studies that are unburdened by the ideological and methodological constraints of previous generations of scholarship. From American perceptions of the Kaiserreich to the challenges posed by a multicultural Europe, it argues for-and exemplifies-an approach to German Studies that is nuanced, self-reflective, and holistic.

This text explores the origins, development and present situation of African domestic animals. The book presents an interdisciplinary overview of the origins of livestock, and provides a synthesis of what archaeozoology and archaeology can tell us about the prehistory of domestic animals in Africa. Information is provided on livestock distributions over time, including significant information on the development of specific cattle size classes or "breeds" in prehistory. Data on DNA and physical characterization of African livestock, as well as ethnographic and linguistic data complete a biological and cultural view of African domestic animals.

This books sets out to explain how and why religion came into being. Today this question is as fascinating as ever, especially since religion has moved to the centre of socio-political relationships. In contrast to the current, but incomplete approaches from disciplines such as cognitive science and psychology, the present authors adopt a new approach, equally manifest and constructive, that explains the origins of religion based strictly on behavioural biology. They employ accepted research results that remove all need for speculation. Decisive factors for the earliest demonstrations of religion are thus territorial behaviour and ranking, coping with existential fears, and conflict solution with the help of rituals. These in turn, in a process of cultural evolution, are shown to be the roots of the historical and contemporary religions.

While ritual and archaic states have both been prominent topics in recent archaeological studies, this is the first volume to combine both subjects by exploring the varying nature, expression, and significance of ritual in archaic states. It compares archaic rituals across many different cultures-Vijayanagara, Swahili Lamu, Venice, Asante, Aztec, Ming China, Oaxaca, Greece, Inca, Wari, and Chaco. The contributors posit that the nature of rituals, the level of investment in rituals, and their sociopolitical significance can vary greatly from state to state, even among societies with similar levels of social complexity, population, and spatial distribution. Highlighting the importance of ritual as an inherent part of a cultural narrative, and demonstrating how the study of ritual enables a better understanding of diverse social groups, this volume shows how the location, frequency, and role of ritual differed significantly across archaic states.

Originally published in 1983, The Norman Heritage looks at the Norman Conquest as a turning point in English history. The book argues that not only was this the last time that England was successfully invaded, but it followed a complete change in the ruling dynasty, the introduction of military feudalism, the reform of the church and the rapid spread of monasticism. The book suggests that such social and political changes were accompanied by dramatic architectural and topographical developments. Frenzied building activity resulted in the construction of cathedrals, churches, monasteries and castles and stone was used on a scale unknown since the end of the Roman Empire. The Norman desire to exercise regional political control and to simulate trade resulted in a rash of newly planned towns across the country. In many more subtle ways, Anglo-Saxon landscape was altered and modified by Norman coercion and influence. Through their energy and administrative ability, the Normans transformed the face of town and country alike, and this book traces the impact of the Norman Conquest upon the British scene, through both a historical narrative, surviving structural remains of buildings and the patterns of settlements, communications and land use that developed during this period.

This book adds to the scant academic literature investigating how comics transmit knowledge of the past and how this refraction of the past shapes our understanding of society and politics in sometimes damaging ways. The volume comes at these questions from a specifically archaeological perspective, foregrounding the representation and narrative use of material cultures. It fulfils its objectives through three reception studies in the first part of the volume and three chapters by comic creators in the second part. All six chapters aim to grapple with a set of central questions about the power inherent in drawn images of various kinds.

Ranging across space and time, this book brings together up-to-date research on the socio-cultural phenomenon of caravans. It shows that caravans for long-distance trade in arid lands are present in both the Old and New Worlds. Alongside historical and archival records, ethnographic analyses of modern caravans provide theoretical frameworks for reconstructing aspects of ancient caravans such as behaviour, ritual and material culture. The volume reflects on the changing foci of caravan research and the future of caravans, when memories of living caravaners are fading, and the fragile and remote nature of caravan-related sites means that they are at risk. It will be relevant to scholars from anthropology, archaeology and history and others with an interest in trade, travel and nomadism.

A general introduction to archeogaming describing the intersection of archaeology and video games and applying archaeological method and theory into understanding game-spaces. "[T]he author's clarity of style makes it accessible to all readers, with or without an archaeological background. Moreover, his personal anecdotes and gameplay experiences with different game titles, from which his ideas often develop, make it very enjoyable reading."-Antiquity Video games exemplify contemporary material objects, resources, and spaces that people use to define their culture. Video games also serve as archaeological sites in the traditional sense as a place, in which evidence of past activity is preserved and has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology, and which represents a part of the archaeological record. From the introduction: Archaeogaming, broadly defined, is the archaeology both in and of digital games... As will be described in the following chapters, digital games are archaeological sites, landscapes, and artifacts, and the game-spaces held within those media can also be understood archaeologically as digital built environments containing their own material culture... Archaeogaming does not limit its study to those video games that are set in the past or that are treated as "historical games," nor does it focus solely on the exploration and analysis of ruins or of other built environments that appear in the world of the game. Any video game-from Pac-Man to Super Meat Boy-can be studied archaeologically.

This book provides a fresh and unique global perspective on the study of caravans by bringing together a wealth of up-to-date research that explores the similarities and divergences of caravan lifeways in Africa, Eurasia, the Near East, Southwest Asia, Mesoamerica, and the Andes. The volume presents theoretical frameworks for caravan assessment and intercultural caravan crossings, pushing the boundaries of caravan route history and archaeology to consider the emergence, evolution, maintenance, and adaptations of caravans. Drawing from anthropological, archaeological, historical, geographical, economic, social, political, and art historical perspectives, the volume will be attractive to scholars of these disciplines and beyond who are interested in social issues embedded on trade, travel, and nomadism. .

In a very influential paper published in 1994, John Baines and Norman Yoffee produced the first analysis to examine the impact of wealth and high culture on the development of states. The contributors to this book apply that model to a range of ancient states around the world, providing evidence on the production and uses of "high culture," literature and monumental architecture. There are chapters on Mesoamerica, the Andes, the Indus Valley, China, and Greece, while others expand on the original Egypt-Mesopotamia comparison.

This is a unique and engaging book on prehistoric stone tools. It advocates an experiential approach in which analysts try to understand stone tool designs from the users' perspectives, and employs a universal logic of designing tools to solve practical problems and evaluate possible solutions. However, to do so it is also necessary to understand how stone can be mechanically modified to serve specific functions. The author enlists a rich array of ethnographic observations and his considerable background as a flintknapper to show the basic ways in which stones can be flaked and modified and what these characteristics can reveal about prehistoric problem-solving strategies and design constraints. This is an invaluable primer for anyone contemplating the study of prehistoric stone tools.

Each case study provides the social, cultural, historical and ecological context of the disaster and then analyzes evidence of human and related remains in order to better understand the identities of victims, the means, processes, and extent of deaths and injuries. The methods used by specialists to interpret evidence and disagreements among experts are also addressed. It will be helpful in understanding the circumstances of a range of disasters and the multidisciplinary ways in which bioarcheologists employ empirical methods and analytic frameworks to interpret their impacts and consequences.

This new edition of Historical Archaeologies of Capitalism shows where the study of capitalism leads archaeologists, scholars and activists. Essays cover a range of geographic, colonial and racist contexts around the Atlantic basin: Latin America and the Caribbean, North America, the North Atlantic, Europe and Africa. Here historical archaeologists use current capitalist theory to show the results of creating social classes, employing racism and beginning and expanding the global processes of resource exploitation. Scholars in this volume also do not avoid the present condition of people, discussing the lasting effects of capitalism's methods, resistance to them, their archaeology and their point to us now. Chapters interpret capitalism in the past, the processes that make capitalist expansion possible, and the worldwide sale and reduction of people. Authors discuss how to record and interpret these. This book continues a global historical archaeology, one that is engaged with other disciplines, peoples and suppressed political and economic histories. Authors in this volume describe how new identities are created, reshaped and made to appear natural. Chapters in this second edition also continue to address why historical archaeologists study capitalism and the relevance of this work, expanding on one of the important contributions of historical archaeologies of capitalism: critical archaeology.