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To understand the development of prehistoric cultural and economic activities, archaeologists try to obtain as much relevant information as possible. For this purpose, large numbers of similar sites must be identified, usually by non-destructive prospection methods such as aerial photography and geophysical prospection. Aerial archaeology is most effective in locating sites and the use of digital photogrammetry provides maps with high accuracy. For geophysical prospection mainly geomagnetic and geoelectrical methods or the ground-penetrating radar method are used. Near-surface measurements of the respective contrasts within physical properties of the archaeological structures and the surrounding material allows detailed mapping of the inner structures of the sites investigated. Applying specially developed wheeled instrumentation, high-resolution magnetic surveys can be carried out in a standard raster of 0.125 x 0.5 m covering up to 5 ha per day. Measurements of ground resistivity or radar surveys in a raster of 0.5 or 0.5 x 0.05 m, respectively, are used to gain information on archaeological structures and on the main stratigraphic sequence of sites covering up to 0.5 ha per day. Data on intensities of the Earth's magnetic field, apparent resistivities of the ground or amplitudinal information of radar reflections are processed using a digital image processing technique to visualize the otherwise invisible archaeological structures or monuments buried in the ground. Archaeological interpretation, in the sense of detecting, mapping and describing the archaeological structures, is done using GIS technology by combining all relevant prospection data. As most of the Middle European archaeological heritage is under a massive threat of destruction, dramatically accelerated by intensive agriculture or industrial transformation of the landscape, the prospection techniques presented here represent an approach towards an efficient documentation of the disappearing remains of our ancestors.
Knowledge of our ancestor's diets is becoming increasingly important in evolutionary medicine, as researchers have argued that we have evolved to specific type of 'Palaeolithic' diet, and many modern nutritional disorders relate to the mismatch between the diet to which we have evolved, and the relatively newer agricultural-based 'Neolithic' diets. However, what is the archaeological evidence for pre-agricultural diets and how have they changed over the four million years of hominid evolution? This paper briefly introduces the three lines of evidence we have for Palaeolithic and Neolithic diets; morphological changes, archaeological material evidence, and direct measurement of diet from bone chemistry. The morphological changes, increasing gracilization of the mandible and increasing brain size have been interpreted (based on analogies with living primates) as the move from plants to higher-quality, more digestible, animal meat, although this is debated. The archaeological evidence is especially weak, as many organic materials, especially plants, do not survive well, and are therefore invisible in the archaeological record. Artefacts, such as stone tools which are likely to be used for hunting and animal bones with evidence of human processing and butchering do indicate that hunting did occur at many times in the past, but it is impossible to judge the frequency. Direct evidence from bone chemistry, such as the measurement of the stable isotopes of carbon and nitrogen, do provide direct evidence of past diet, and limited studies on five Neanderthals from three sites, as well as a number of modern Palaeolithic and Mesolithic humans indicates the importance of animal protein in diets. There is a significant change in the archaeological record associated with the introduction of agriculture worldwide, and an associated general decline in health in some areas. However, there is an rapid increase in population associated with domestication of plants, so although in some regions individual health suffers after the Neolithic revolution, as a species humans have greatly expanded their population worldwide.
Archaeological data are frequently cited in support of the idea that big game hunting drove the evolution of early Homo, mainly through its role in offspring provisioning. This argument has been disputed on two grounds: (1) ethnographic observations on modern foragers show that although hunting may contribute a large fraction of the overall diet, it is an unreliable day-to-day food source, pursued more for status than subsistence; (2) archaeological evidence from the Plio-Pleistocene, coincident with the emergence of Homo can be read to reflect low-yield scavenging, not hunting. Our review of the archaeology yields results consistent with these critiques: (1) early humans acquired large-bodied ungulates primarily by aggressive scavenging, not hunting; (2) meat was consumed at or near the point of acquisition, not at home bases, as the hunting hypothesis requires; (3) carcasses were taken at highly variable rates and in varying degrees of completeness, making meat from big game an even less reliable food source than it is among modern foragers. Collectively, Plio-Pleistocene site location and assemblage composition are consistent with the hypothesis that large carcasses were taken not for purposes of provisioning, but in the context of competitive male displays. Even if meat were acquired more reliably than the archaeology indicates, its consumption cannot account for the significant changes in life history now seen to distinguish early humans from ancestral australopiths. The coincidence between the earliest dates for Homo ergaster and an increase in the archaeological visibility of meat eating that many find so provocative instead reflects: (1) changes in the structure of the environment that concentrated scavenging opportunities in space, making evidence of their pursuit more obvious to archaeologists; (2) H. ergaster's larger body size (itself a consequence of other factors), which improved its ability at interference competition.
With a few exceptions, archaeologists have been far less concerned with the form of their texts or problems of authorship than have ethnographers. Typically, archaeologies are presented in the form of narratives understood as sequential stories. Approaches to narrative analysis drawn from literary theory, philosophy, and sociology and definitions of characters, events, and plots are examined, together with particular problems these may pose for the discipline of archaeology. It is suggested that neither literary analysis nor the tendency to write and evaluate archaeological and historical narratives in terms of explanatory value takes sufficient account of the often hybrid nature and aims of these texts and the contexts in which they were produced. This argument is illustrated with particular reference to stories of the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in Europe. It is argued that reconsidering archaeology's positioning across the 19th-century science-humanities divide suggests a broader approach to the idea of what constitutes a narrative which can offer fresh opportunities for useful reflexivity and experimentation in presentation. Further roles and possibilities of narrative and non-narrative ways of writing archaeologies are also considered.
Cladistics is widely used in biology and paleobiology to construct phylogenetic hypotheses, but rarely has it been applied outside those disciplines. There is, however, no reason to suppose that cladistics is not applicable to anything that evolves by cladogenesis and produces a nested hierarchy of taxa. This includes cultural phenomena such as languages and tools recovered from archaeological contexts. Two methodological issues assume primacy in attempts to extend cladistics to archaeological materials: the construction of analytical taxa and the selection of appropriate outgroups. In biology the species is the primary taxonomic unit used, irrespective of the debates that have arisen in phylogenetic theory over the nature of species. Also in biology the phylogenetic history of a group of taxa usually is well enough known that an appropriate taxon can be selected as an outgroup. No analytical unit parallel to the species exists in archaeology, and thus taxa have to be constructed specifically for phylogenetic analysis. One method of constructing taxa is paradigmatic classification, which defines classes (taxa) on the basis of co-occurring, unweighted character states. Once classes have been created, a form of occurrence seriation-an archaeological method based on the theory of cultural transmission and heritability-offers an objective basis for selecting an outgroup.
Archaeology can provide two bodies of information relevant to the understanding of the evolution of human cognition--the timing of developments, and the evolutionary context of these developments. The challenge is methodological. Archaeology must document attributes that have direct implications for underlying cognitive mechanisms. One example of such a cognitive archaeology is found in spatial cognition. The archaeological record documents an evolutionary sequence that begins with ape-equivalent spatial abilities 2.5 million years ago and ends with the appearance of modern abilities in the still remote past of 400,000 years ago. The timing of these developments reveals two major episodes in the evolution in spatial ability, one, 1.5 million years ago and the other, one million years later. The two episodes of development in spatial cognition had very different evolutionary contexts. The first was associated with the shift to an open country adaptive niche that occurred early in the time range of Homo erectus. The second was associated with no clear adaptive shift, though it does appear to have coincided with the invasion of more hostile environments and the appearance of systematic hunting of large mammals. Neither, however, occurred in a context of modern hunting and gathering.
Freud's "The Aetiology of Hysteria" (1896) begins with the description of an excavation. With this passage as a point of departure, the role of archaeology in Freud's early psychoanalytic formulations is examined. The archaeological imagery in his later writings and the collection of ancient objects that came to fill his consulting room and library are well known, but the passage must be contextualized in its own moment to show the influences that led Freud to articulate an "expanse of ruins" at this particular time. In the late nineteenth century, archaeology provided an innovative representation of "topography"--one that exceeded the limitations of this concept in neuroanatomical visualizations and that offered the layered site as an analogy for psychic processes. Schliemann's highly publicized excavations of Troy are recognized as an important but not exclusive source for Freud's narrative of 1896. The additional, perhaps dominant, impact of Austrian archaeological projects in the 1880s and 1890s is noted. These enjoyed considerable visibility in Vienna, and were used by Freud to symbolize the processes of destruction and rebuilding in the city itself. The excavation imagery in "Aetiology" is thus posited as the continuation of a complexity of meanings that Freud brought early on to his engagement with acts of unearthing.
The last century's environmental pollution has created health problems, acidification of ground and lakes, and serious damage to our cultural heritage. Outdoor monuments suffer from this pollution, but so do buried archaeological remains. However, research on the deterioration of archaeological artifacts underground has so far been limited, and it is important to draw attention to this neglected field. This article presents results obtained at the Swedish National Heritage Board on the degradation of archaeological objects of bronze and iron and of bones from prehistoric graves, materials of which seem to be most affected by pollutants. The investigation methods, which were employed, are described. Other relevant studies are briefly reviewed. It is obvious that the deterioration rate of archaeological artifacts, especially of inorganic materials, has accelerated in recent years, and that this increased deterioration to a large part can be attributed to anthropogenic pollution. Regions that might be endangered are exemplified.
Sex determination presents a difficult problem in archaeology and anthropology in cases of fragmentary or juvenile remains, and where grave goods are absent. Here, a molecular genetic analysis of the sex of human remain from the Early Medieval cemetery at Nefedievo, North Russia, was carried out and the results were compared with archaeological and anthropological data. Teeth without cavities (15 samples) and bones (9 samples) were used as the ancient DNA source. The repetitive sequences in DYZ1, DYZ3, DXZ3 loci, and a unique sequence in the first intron of the X-Y homologous gene amelogenin, were amplified. Sex was determined in 87.5% of the samples by archaeological criteria, in 95.8% of the samples by anthropological methods, and in 79.2% of the samples by DNA analysis. PCR allowed the sex of infant's remains to be identified in individual where the sex could not be determined by anthropological methods and in three remains where sex could not be inferred from archaeological data. Uneven preservation of nuclear DNA loci was evident.
Archaeological excavation sites represent underexplored microbial habitats with the potential to recover taxonomically and biotechnologically valuable actinomycetes. In this study, two Saccharopolyspora strains, 5N708T and 5N102, were isolated from soil samples collected from the Gaziantep-Doliche-Dülük and Bitlis-Ahlat-Selçuklu Cemetery archaeological excavation sites in Türkiye. A polyphasic taxonomic approach, including 16S rRNA gene sequencing, phylogenetic and phylogenomic analyses, average nucleotide identity, digital DNA-DNA hybridization, phenotypic characterization, and chemotaxonomic analyses, showed that strain 5N708T represents a novel species of the genus Saccharopolyspora, for which the name Saccharopolyspora antiqui sp. nov. is proposed, whereas strain 5N102 was assigned to Saccharopolyspora elongata. Both isolates were further evaluated for their antimicrobial, antioxidant, and cytotoxic activities, and their biosynthetic potential was investigated by genome mining. Both strains showed activity against Staphylococcus aureus, with strain 5N708T producing the larger inhibition zone. Strain 5N102 exhibited markedly stronger antioxidant activity than strain 5N708T in radical scavenging, ferric reducing antioxidant power, and reducing power assays. In contrast, strain 5N708T showed more promising cytotoxic activity, with relative selectivity toward MIA PaCa-2 pancreatic cancer cells compared with HEK293 cells after prolonged incubation. Genome mining revealed multiple biosynthetic gene clusters in both isolates, supporting their capacity to produce secondary metabolites. These findings indicate that archaeological soils are promising reservoirs of taxonomically novel and biologically active Saccharopolyspora strains.
Two different analytical approaches, direct exposure electron ionization mass spectrometry (DE-MS) and gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS), were compared in a study of archaeological resinous materials. DE-MS was found to be an efficient fingerprinting tool for the fast screening of organic archaeological samples and for providing information on the major components. GC/MS appeared to be more efficient in unravelling the sample composition at a molecular level, despite the long analysis time and the need for a wet chemical pretreatment. Both procedures were applied to characterize the organic material present as coatings in Roman and Egyptian amphorae. DE-MS successfully identified abietanic compounds, hence a diterpenic resinous material could be identified and its degree of oxidation assessed. GC/MS enabled us to identify dehydroabietic acid, 7-oxodehydroabietic acid, 15-hydroxy-7-oxodehydroabietic acid, 15-hydroxydehydroabietic acid, retene, tetrahydroretene, norabietatriene, norabietatetraene and methyl dehydroabietate. These oxidized and aromatized abietanes provided evidence that the amphorae examined were waterproofed with a pitch produced from resinous wood of plants from the Pinaceae family. The chemometric evaluation of the GC/MS data highlighted significant chemical differences between the pitches found in the two archaeological sites, basically related to differences in the production techniques of the materials and in their degradation pathways.
Biodeterioration of archaeological sites and historic buildings is a major concern for conservators, archaeologists, and scientists involved in preservation of the world's cultural heritage. The Maya archaeological sites in southern Mexico, some of the most important cultural artifacts in the Western Hemisphere, are constructed of limestone. High temperature and humidity have resulted in substantial microbial growth on stone surfaces at many of the sites. Despite the porous nature of limestone and the common occurrence of endolithic microorganisms in many habitats, little is known about the microbial flora living inside the stone. We found a large endolithic bacterial community in limestone from the interior of the Maya archaeological site Ek' Balam. Analysis of 16S rDNA clones demonstrated disparate communities (endolithic: >80% Actinobacteria, Acidobacteria, and Low GC Firmicutes; epilithic: >50% Proteobacteria). The presence of differing epilithic and endolithic bacterial communities may be a significant factor for conservation of stone cultural heritage materials and quantitative prediction of carbonate weathering.
The latest edition of the Oxford Dictionary (1989) defines archaeology as '... the scientific study of the remains and monuments of the prehistoric period'. It is not surprising, therefore, that modern archaeology draws as much as possible on scientific methods of investigation developed in other fields. In the last ten years the powerful method of quantitative isotope analysis has brought a new dimension to the examination of archaeological finds.
Over the past ten years, total mercury (THg) levels have been surveyed in Alaskan wildlife and fish as part of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment (AMAP). Beyond these studies there is little historical data on THg levels in important subsistence species for people in Alaska. A survey of THg in caribou hair from archaeological deposits would provide data to develop temporal trends for this region of the Arctic. Caribou hair from a Western Thule settlement beneath the Alaska native village of Deering (ca. AD 1150) show variability in hair THg values, with a mean level (86 ng/g) which is in the range that is observed in modern Rangifer sp. (caribou and reindeer). Hair from House 1 had a THg mean level of 99.6 ng/g and hair from House 2 had a THg mean of 64.2 ng/g. This is the earliest reported record of mercury in caribou associated with human subsistence activities in the western North American Arctic, and is a first step toward compilation of a needed database through which to measure and evaluate exposure to mercury by people who rely heavily on caribou as a food source. We hypothesize that similarity in mercury values in archaeological samples of caribou and in contemporary samples would give an additional perspective on human exposure to mercury through caribou harvest and consumption today. Since this hypothesis will be more useful if evaluated at a regional rather than global scale, further studies will be needed at different archaeological sites across Alaska to determine the generality of this observation in relation to geographic scale.