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Revealing invisible brews: A new approach to the chemical identification of ancient beer

Posted on June 27, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 27 June 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): E. Perruchini, C. Glatz, M.M. Hald, J. Casana, J.L. ToneyWhile ancient Near Eastern cuneiform texts and iconography unambiguously demonstrate the social, economic, and ritual significance of beer, direct archaeological evidence for beer production or consumption remains surprisingly rare. This scarcity of material evidence renders it difficult to extrapolate information about the ingredients and production processes of beer, on the one hand, and the paraphernalia and social contexts of its consumption, on the other. In recent decades, organic residue analysis has become an essential tool in the identification of ancient alcoholic beverages, but research on Near Eastern beer has focused largely on production and storage vessels, whose form, archaeological context, and associated macroscopic residues already indicated their use in beer production. In this paper, we present a novel field sampling protocol that prevents contamination along with a refined organic residue analysis methodology that relies on a series of co-occurring compounds to identify confidently beer in ceramic vessels. The same compounds were identified in several modern beer samples and, thus, support our identification of a similar fermented barley-based beverage in archaeological samples from the late second millennium BCE site of Khani Masi in northeastern Iraq. The results presented in this paper allow us, for the first time, to unambiguously link a diverse range of vessel types to the consumption and production of beer, identify a fundamental change in Mesopotamian consumption practices, and shed light on the cultural dimensions of Babylonia’s encounter with the Zagros-Mesopotamian borderlands.

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Identifying social learning between Roman amphorae workshops through morphometric similarity

Posted on June 20, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: August 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 96 Author(s): Maria Coto-Sarmiento, Xavier Rubio-Campillo, José RemesalThe aim of this study is to identify dynamics of social learning between amphorae workshops during the the Roman Empire. The Baetica province developed a massive infrastructure of olive oil production that supplied the Western provinces of Rome for almost 300 years. The olive oil produced in this area was shipped through maritime and riverine transport networks in a standardized amphoric shape made in several workshops spread around the region. These workshops have generated a large amount of evidence but it is still difficult to understand through archaeological proxies how the production of amphorae was organized.We apply here an evolutionary framework to find links between workshops through the morphometric similarities of the amphorae they produced. The suggested approach identifies how individual potters acquired and transmitted technical skills by exploring small yet statistical significant differences in the amphorae made in 5 different workshops. Multivariate methods are used to cluster a variety of amphorae based on morphometric measurements and the outcome shows that the analysis is useful even when a high degree of standardization exists, such as was the case for Roman amphorae (i.e. Dressel 20).Results suggest that morphometric similarity is inversely correlated with spatial distance between workshops. This pattern suggests that pottery-making techniques were transmitted through oblique transmission with little or no movement of potters between distant workshops. The conclusion is that morphometric similarity may be an effective proxy to identify social learning dynamics even amongst workshops producing exactly the same amphoric type.

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Dendroarchaeological dating of Renaissance Mudejar artefacts in western Spain

Posted on June 19, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: August 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 96 Author(s): Daniel Patón Domínguez, Jose M. González Bornay, Fidel A. Roig JuñentThe absence of precise dates in Extremadura’s Renaissance heritage can generate ambiguities that hinder the cultural interpretation of regional history. The analysis of the duration of the art styles, the date of construction of buildings and artefacts or the exact determination of restoration periods are severely affected by the absence of specific chronological information. Dendrochronology can help to resolve these unknowns. We analysed historical woods from timbers, painting panelings, ceilings, furniture and art objects, all from two Renaissance monumental buildings: the San Vicente Ferrer church in the city of Plasencia and the Las Veletas palace in Cáceres, both in Spain. We used a local chronology of living trees as reference. This living chronology was developed with tree-ring data hosted in the International Tree Ring Data Bank (ITRDB) but reinforced with recent wood samplings from the Sierra de Gredos, a mountainous area close to the historic sites. After a step-by-step crossdating process, the historical timbers were dated and a floating chronology was built. The comparison between this floating chronology and that obtained from living trees reached a Pearson-r correlation of 0.65 with a temporal overlap of 106 years. Thus the living tree-ring chronology was extended 253 years into the past (from 1769 CE to 1516 CE), allowing the dating of new historical materials that may arise in the future for this period and confirming that tree-ring dating is a feasible technique to use in the dating of historic buildings and artefacts in western Spain. The results indicate that it is feasible to admit that Mudejar art, a mixture of Arab and Christian styles, remained in active development in Extremadura for much longer than in any other regions of Spain.

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Moving metals III: Possible origins for copper in Bronze Age Denmark based on lead isotopes and geochemistry

Posted on June 15, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: August 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 96 Author(s): L. Melheim, L. Grandin, P.-O. Persson, K. Billström, Z. Stos-Gale, J. Ling, A. Williams, I. Angelini, C. Canovaro, E. Hjärthner-Holdar, K. KristiansenThis article presents the results of a comprehensive provenance study based on a combined geochemical-isotopic and archaeological approach, comprising 98 analyses of 97 copper-alloy objects from the Danish Bronze Age. When it comes to the question of the origin of the metal, our interpretations diverge somewhat from earlier established theories about the origin of copper imported to Denmark, which mainly pointed to Central and Eastern Europe. Clear geochronological patterns in the Danish dataset are interpreted as being due to shifts in ore sources; reflecting varying areas of origin as well as the utilization of varying ore types. This again relates to shifting trade networks/suppliers and shifting technological trends. Plausible sources for Danish copper-alloys identified in the current study are ore regions in the British Isles, Alpine ore districts in Italy and Austria, as well as ore regions in the western part of the Mediterranean and to some degree the Slovak Carpathians. The comparison includes hundreds of recently published lead isotope data for ores in Slovakia, the Iberian Peninsula and the Italian and Austrian Alps.

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Formation processes at the early Late Pleistocene archaic human site of Lingjing, China

Posted on June 15, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: August 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 96 Author(s): Hao Li, Zhan-yang Li, Matt G. Lotter, Kathleen KumanLingjing, located in northern China, is an open-air spring site dated to ∼90–125 ka through Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) dating. Two late archaic human crania, which possess a mosaic of features indicative of both eastern Eurasian and Neanderthal ancestry, were excavated from the site, along with abundant animal fossils and stone artifacts. Despite Lingjing’s obvious significance, detailed analyses of the processes that have influenced site formation and modification have not yet been performed. In this paper we provide an interpretation of the depositional context at Lingjing and we also provide an assessment of the level of site disturbance, both during and post-deposition. Sedimentary and archaeological indicators are employed in this study, and results show that there is differential modification of the stratigraphic horizons, primarily between lower layer 3 and the overlying upper layers 2 and 1. Although this disturbance is apparent, overall its extent is limited. The findings in this study therefore confirm that assemblage integrity at Lingjing is high, and that behavioural information is well preserved.

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Understanding resource choice at the transition from foraging to farming: An application of palaeodistribution modelling to the Neolithic of the Konya Plain, south-central Anatolia, Turkey

Posted on June 15, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: August 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 96 Author(s): Christina Collins, Eleni Asouti, Matt Grove, Ceren Kabukcu, Lee Bradley, Richard ChiverrellThe role of the environment in shaping agricultural origins is still not fully understood, despite a century of debate on this topic. Comparison of the expected prevalence of a resource in the landscape with actual archaeological presence of the same resource can provide a metric for assessing resource choice in prehistory. However, the palaeoenvironmental data that would allow resource choice to be evaluated in this way are rarely available. Species Distribution Modelling (SDM) techniques allow independent palaeoenvironmental datasets to be computed, which when compared to actual species’ presence at sites as attested by archaeological datasets, can provide data on resource choice. Following recent calls for SDM to be applied more widely in archaeological contexts, we outline a simple method for predicting the presence of plant species in prehistory using modern analogues and palaeoclimatic datasets. These modelled distributions provide an independent dataset for comparison with archaeological data, thus providing a window into human resource choice in prehistory. We outline the method with specific reference to the transition from foraging to farming in the Neolithic of Central Anatolia, but the method could be applied to any period or region. We have used exclusively open source data and provided all code in our online supplementary materials, so that our method can be utilized by researchers interested in human resource choice in any region of the world and any period.

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Editorial Board

Posted on June 7, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: July 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 95

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Bacterial tetraether lipids in ancient bones record past climate conditions at the time of disposal

Posted on June 6, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: August 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 96 Author(s): James T. Dillon, Sam Lash, Jiaju Zhao, Kevin P. Smith, Peter van Dommelen, Andrew K. Scherer, Yongsong HuangAssessing impacts of climate change on ancient human societies requires accurate reconstructions of regional climate variations. However, due to the scarcity of in situ climate indicators in archaeological sites, climate interpretation often relies on indirect, geographically distant data from geological archives such as lake or ocean sediments, ice cores and speleothems. Because many cultural changes occurred abruptly over periods of years to decades, and are regional or even local in scale, correlating societal changes with climate reconstructions from geological archives induces significant uncertainties: factors such as chronological dating inconsistencies and geographic heterogeneity of climate can severely undermine interpretation. Here we show, for the first time, that it is possible to determine past climate change by analyzing bacteria-derived ‘branched glycerol dialkyl glycerol tetraethers’ (br-GDGTs) in ancient bones from archaeological sites. To the best of our knowledge this proxy has never been applied before to bones, nor with the intention of developing the method for application in archaeological research. We demonstrate that these compounds are likely derived from bacterial growth within bones following deposition in the ground, and the potential for their distributions to reflect climate and environmental conditions during the years immediately following deposition when bacteria consume internal substrates. Our preliminary results show that bone samples from different climate zones display distinct br-GDGT distributions. Well-dated late Pleistocene and Holocene bones from Alaska yield reconstructed temperatures consistent with existing climate reconstructions. While further work is necessary to determine how quickly the signal stabilizes in the bones, and to continue ongoing refinement of calibrations for temperature, precipitation, and other influences on br-GDGTs, we propose that br-GDGTs from ancient bones in archaeological sites may be taken as a new, in situ archive for reconstructing past climate conditions. This opens new perspectives for assessing connections between climate variations and social transformations in the past.

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Combined influence of meteoric water and protein intake on hydrogen isotope values in archaeological human bone collagen

Posted on June 2, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: August 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 96 Author(s): Christine A.M. France, Haiping Qi, Gwénaëlle M. KavichHydrogen isotopes in archaeological human bone collagen are poorly understood, but present an opportunity to add new depth to our understanding of ancient populations. The competing influences of meteoric water versus protein intake on human bone collagen hydrogen isotope values were examined through comparison with the well-understood proxies of hydroxyapatite oxygen and collagen nitrogen isotopes, respectively. Consideration of the data set as individual points compared to averaged pools of individuals in each of 11 archaeological sites suggested the latter partially eliminates inherent variability due to food choice or regional movement. Collagen hydrogen isotopes were moderately correlated with hydroxyapatite oxygen isotopes (R = 0.695, site averages) and collagen nitrogen isotopes (R = 0.562, site averages). Correlation improved with a multiple linear regression including both oxygen and nitrogen (R = 0.745, site averages). Correlation between meteoric water hydrogen and oxygen isotope values converted from hydroxyapatite and collagen values, respectively, yielded a slope well below the expected value of ∼8 observed directly in meteoric water (i.e. the “meteoric water line”). Correlation between converted meteoric water hydrogen and the measured collagen non-exchangeable hydrogen isotope values showed a slope well below the expected value of 1.0. Theoretical meteoric water hydrogen isotope values and theoretical herbivorous collagen hydrogen isotope values were calculated based on previously established equations in order to construct a hypothetical framework free of trophic level influences. Deviations between actual values and these theoretical values correlated weakly with collagen nitrogen isotope values, suggesting that direct trophic level enrichment/depletion is not controlling the disparity between expected and measured values. The deviations are hypothetically caused by non-local food sources, and a decoupling of expected oxygen and hydrogen relationships as individuals consumed more meat and decreased in vivo non-essential amino acid production. This work presents a new model that facilitates understanding of the complex relationship between meteoric water and protein intake controls on hydrogen isotopes in omnivorous human populations that can potentially inform about past meteoric water values and amounts of animal protein consumption.

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The colossal hats (pukao) of monumental statues on Rapa Nui (Easter Island, Chile): Analyses of pukao variability, transport, and emplacement

Posted on June 1, 2018 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 31 May 2018Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): Sean W. Hixon, Carl P. Lipo, Ben McMorran, Terry L. HuntThe archaeological record of Rapa Nui (Easter Island, Chile) is noteworthy for its massive statues (moai) that were transported over long distances with relatively small numbers of people and minimal use of resources. Equally impressive are the colossal bodies of red scoria (pukao) placed on the heads of many of the moai. In this study, we use three-dimensional models of 50 pukao found across the island and 13 red scoria cylinders from Puna Pau, the island’s pukao quarry, to study the process of pukao manufacture, transport, and placement atop statues. Our analysis identifies surface features that are explained by the process of construction and transport of these multi-ton objects. Based on shared physical features of pukao, evidence in the archaeological record, and the physics necessary for pukao movement, we propose a falsifiable hypothesis in which relatively small numbers of people rolled pukao up stone ramps to place pukao atop moai. We conclude that activities of pukao production and transport did not require oversight by a centralized political authority, nor do they support notions of a large population that collapsed with “ecological suicide” on Rapa Nui.

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