Somalia (Country) (Geographic Keyword)
326-350 (509 Records)
This paper looks at how ideas of cosmopolitanism can be applied to the African context using Aksum (50-700 AD) in northern Ethiopia as case study. While there is much interest in issues of cosmopolitanism, or the making of a "world citizen" or a "world community" as drawn from 18th-19th century conceptualizations, such issues become difficult to study on the African continent given the strong emphasis on personhoods configured around local, corporate contexts. Burial practices from ancient Aksum...
New Neighbors/Nearest Neighbors: Slavery, Displacement, and Belonging Along the West African Coast (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Archaeological Approaches to Slavery and Unfree Labour in Africa" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. During the Atlantic Period, Kingdoms along the West African Coast swelled as traders, emissaries, and famers moved to palatial capitals. As these groups freely poured into West African cities, African kings added war captives and enslaved individuals to the urban mix. Elite Africans were reliant on enslaved and attached...
New Perspectives on Precolonial Trade in Eastern Africa (2024)
This is an abstract from the "The Elemental Analysis Facility at the Field Museum: Celebrating 20 Years Serving the Archaeological Community " session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Discrepancies are emerging between historical and archaeological perspectives on the nature, scale, and chronology of precolonial and caravan exchange networks in the eastern African interior. For example, the caravan trade is thought to have emerged as coastal interests...
A New Semi-quantitative Method for Identifying Carnivore-Specific Chewing Damage Patterns (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Celebrating 20 Years of Support: Current Work by Recipients of the Dienje Kenyon Memorial Fellowship for Zooarchaeologists" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Hypotheses of hominin scavenging from different felid species have been proposed, but the ability to distinguish between the taphonomic patterns inflicted by different felid species in the fossil record is currently underdeveloped. Previous efforts to identify...
North American Provincialism and Outdated Archaeological Curricula: The Bane of Global Archaeology (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Essential Contributions from African to Global Archaeology" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. I was trained at Northwestern University by Stuart Struever, a student of L. Binford. I was nurtured on a positivist paradigm and force-fed like a goose on the 1960s New Archaeology. I was gratefully cured of these limitations by elders in East Africa who taught me deep respect for historical perspectives on the past. Because I...
Not All Who Wander Are Lost (or, the Awkward Adolescence of a Retiring Giant . . .) (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Archaeological Science and African Archaeology: Appreciating the Impact of David Killick" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. It is hard to hold a candle to the career of David Killick and catch a reflection that adequately reflects the scope and breadth of his contributions to the discipline of archaeology. Those of us who know him well undoubtedly have seen his commitment to separate fact from fiction in the human past,...
Notes on a traditional Ainu vessel replica (2002)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the EXARC Bibliography, originally compiled by Roeland Paardekooper, and updated. Most of these records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us using the...
(Nut) Cracking the Code of Primate Cognition (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Old Technology, New Methodology" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The use of percussive actions to access encased foods—e.g., nuts—has been proposed as a viable hypothesis to explain the emergence of stone tool technology in the hominin lineage. Observations of extant nonhuman primates such as chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) or black-striped capuchins (Sapajus libidinosus) nut-cracking have been used to support the...
Obsidian Characterization in East Africa (2019)
This is an abstract from the "2019 Fryxell Award Symposium: Papers in Honor of M. Steven Shackley" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Steve Shackley’s wide-reaching research includes X-ray fluorescence analyses of obsidian from East Africa. He and co-authors explored sources of obsidian from sites in Ethiopia, providing data that informed many later studies in a relatively unknown region for obsidian studies. Our work on obsidian from mid-Holocene...
Oceanische Rindenstoffe: Tapa, ein ungewöhnliches Material (1980)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the EXARC Bibliography, originally compiled by Roeland Paardekooper, and updated. Most of these records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us using the...
Of Fire and Stone: Cremation and Secondary Burial Practices at Noomparrua Nkosesia, a Pastoral Neolithic Site in Southwest Kenya (2019)
This is an abstract from the "African Archaeology throughout the Holocene" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The spread of food production in East Africa c. 5000-1000 BP involved peoples with diverse subsistence patterns, material culture repertoires and identities. Pastoral Neolithic burial traditions include monumental pillar sites in northern Kenya, cremations in rockshelters in the southern highlands of Kenya and northern Tanzania, and widespread...
Of Ostrich and Ochre: The application of pXRF to detect experimentally pigmented ostrich eggshell (2017)
Ostrich eggshell (OES) is a somewhat common occurrence in Middle and Later Stone Age archaeological contexts. Ethnographically, OES are known to be used as containers, raw material for bead production, and the egg itself as a valuable food source. Archaeologically, it is difficult to determine which of these potential functions the OES fulfilled. The application of mineral pigment powder to OES may suggest a non-subsistence function for that particular piece. For this study we experimentally...
Of Pigments and Tools: Lithic and Ochre Raw Material Procurement Strategies during MIS 5 at Mwulu’s Cave (Limpopo, South Africa) (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Local and/or Exotic Interactions: Symbols, Materials, and Societies" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Middle Stone Age was a period of important innovations for Homo sapiens, including but not restricted to heat-treatment of silcrete, hafting adhesive, symbolic behaviors such as engravings, or exploitation of ochre. Though southern African Middle Stone Age lithics and ochre are commonly studied, combined studies of...
The Olduvai bifaces: technology and raw materials (1994)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the EXARC Bibliography, originally compiled by Roeland Paardekooper, and updated. Most of these records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us using the...
On claims for "Advanced" Ironworking Technology in Precolonial Africa (1996)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the EXARC Bibliography, originally compiled by Roeland Paardekooper, and updated. Most of these records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us using the...
On the alleged complexity of early and recent iron smelting in Africa: Further comments on the preheating hypothesis (1987)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the EXARC Bibliography, originally compiled by Roeland Paardekooper, and updated. Most of these records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us using the...
One More for the Road: Beer, Sacrifice and Commemoration in Ancient Nubian Burials of the Classic Kerma Period (2017)
The funerary equipment of the Classic Kerma elite community included sets of ceramic vessels accompanying the primary deceased and sacrificed individuals. Stacks of beakers were placed in communal areas of graves, suggesting that the vessels were intended for group use in the afterlife. Graves with extraordinary organic preservation include woven giraffe-hair implements placed near the vessels. In comparison with ethnographic examples, these tools are beer strainers. Two graves also had vessels...
Ongoing Excavations at FxJj20Main-Extension-0, Koobi Fora, Kenya (2017)
Original excavation of FxJj20 sites in Koobi Fora, Kenya revealed nine oxidized patches described as combustion features associated with artifacts. Here we describe new excavations at a nearby new locality described as FxJj20Main-Ext-0. This excavation extends previous work in order to explore potential combustion features with newer techniques. Three squares adjacent to a reddened feature yielded 18 bones and 33 stone artifacts. All bone was fragmented. Most stone artifacts were basalt. Nearest...
Online Education on African Archaeology and Heritage: The ONLAAH Platform (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Archaeology in Mozambique: Current Issues and Topics in Archaeology and Heritage Management" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Onlaah platform is formed by a consortium of institutions and partners, from Africa and around the world, such as the German Archaeological Institute (DAI), the University of Namibia (UNAM), the University Eduardo Mondlane (Angola), the ICArEHB (Algarve University, Portugal), the Autonoma...
The organisation of hornfels blade production during the Early Later Stone Age (ELSA) in the eastern Cederberg, Western Cape, South Africa (2017)
The Early Later Stone Age (ELSA) represents the onset of sustained microlithic technology in southern Africa. The ELSA is, however, poorly defined with respect to its technological characteristics and organisation. In this paper we identify key features of the ELSA at Putslaagte 8 (PL8) rockshelter in the south-west of southern Africa, dating ~25-22 ka. The assemblage features relatively expedient production of hornfels blades using natural ridges of cobbles from the nearby Doring River. A...
The Origin of Iron Smelting in Africa (1975)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the EXARC Bibliography, originally compiled by Roeland Paardekooper, and updated. Most of these records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us using the...
The origins of pastoralism in Eastern Africa: new human dental evidence from mid-Holocene Pillar Sites in the Turkana Basin (2017)
Herding spread into Eastern Africa ~5000 BP, but mechanisms of spread are still debated (migration, diffusion, or a mix). If herders migrated from desiccating areas of the Sahara, Sahel, or Ethiopian Rift, they would have passed through the Turkana Basin, where the earliest livestock coincides chronologically with the construction of megalithic "pillar sites." Recent excavations at 3 pillar sites revealed extensive human burials, plus caprine remains and zoomorphic artifacts suggesting these...
Ostrich Eggshell taphonomy and distribution at Knysna Eastern Heads Cave 1 (2017)
Analysis of ostrich eggshell (OES) fragment distribution at Knysna Eastern Heads Cave 1 (KEH-1) revealed taphonomic patterns. The variation of OES features and its distribution indicates that the OES was being used and processed differently in temporal and spatial context. KEH-1, a cave on the southern coast of South Africa, was inhabited by early modern humans throughout the Middle and Late Stone Age. Hearth features are prevalent throughout the sequence, providing evidence of occupational...
Out of Africa, or How Earlier Forms of African Governance Can Save the World (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Essential Contributions from African to Global Archaeology" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. One of the consequences of European colonialism is the narrowing of the world’s political imagination. When colonists began to carve up Africa in the late nineteenth century, they were met with a dizzying range of governance systems—systems most famously pondered by academics in Fortes and Evans-Pritchard’s (1940) *African...
The Oyo Empire, ca. 1570–1840: The Art of Being a Compositional State (2024)
This is an abstract from the "States, Confederacies, and Nations: Reenvisioning Early Large-Scale Collectives." session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Yoruba sovereign states matured about the eleventh century in ideology, symbols of authority, and organizational structure. Governed by a system of monarchy comprising the divine king/palace officials and non-royal lords, theirs was a political arrangement that placed the king as first among equals with the...