Japan (Country) (Geographic Keyword)
301-325 (952 Records)
Since the role of feast as a calendar marker for farming communities was proposed by Bender in 1970s, ‘practical’ roles of feasts in production systems have been debated. In this paper, I argue that feasts can also considered as a farming 'technique' because they can substantially enable regular and continuous farming production by motivating and obliging people for the production, particularly in settings unfavorable for cultivation. In Japan, the southern Amami and Yaeyama Islands were...
Feasting and Concentrated Pottery Production in East Cape, Papua New Guinea (2017)
East Cape, the southeastern tip of Papua New Guinea mainland, is one of the pottery production areas in southern Massim. Domestic pottery production has continued to the present day, mainly made by female potters to supply their own needs. However, more extensive pottery production beyond the household level occasionally occurs, especially when funerals (toleha) are held. Toleha are organized by the matrilineal descent group (guguni) of a dead person; the potters who belong the descent group get...
Feasting and Gift Giving in Pre-Contact and Spanish Colonial Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands of Micronesia (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Feasting and gift-giving in the ethnography, history, and archaeology of native peoples in Southeast Asia and its islands in the Western Pacific are often given primacy in accounts of academic fieldwork. Some ethnohistoric accounts on the pre-Contact and Spanish Colonial Chamorro people indigenous to Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands of Micronesia also...
Feasting from the Early to Middle Jomon Period Deduced from Seed Impressions on Pottery (2017)
Seed impressions of cultigens have been recovered from pottery of the early to middle Jomon periods in the central highland of Honshu and the western Kanto district of Japan. These include such cultigens as Perilla fructescens introduced from China and Azuki bean (Vigna angularis) and Soy bean (Glycine max) domesticated in Japan. They often occur in large numbers and are also found even in clay figurines (Dogu). I found that the seeds exist not only on pottery surfaces, but also within pottery...
Feeding ecology of the Okhotsk hunter-gather-fishers estimated by stable isotope analysis (2017)
Hamanaka-2 site in the Rebun Island, Hokkaido, Japan provides a good faunal assemblage made by Epi-Jomon and Okhotsk hunter-gatherer-fishers. In this study, we reconstruct feeding ecology of the Okhotsk hunter-gatherer-fishers by applying the stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis to faunal and human remains from the Hamanaka-2 site. As a result of the analysis, Okhotsk humans were at the highest trophic level among the mammals, domesticated dogs indicated the similar but slightly lower...
Field School on the Road: An Archaeological Experience without a Site (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Archaeology and Indigenous Issues in Hokkaido Island, Japan" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Hokkaido University’s Center for Ainu and Indigenous Studies sponsors an annual International Archaeological Field School on Rebun Island. The site, spanning epi-Jomon to historic Ainu periods, sits on a sandbar that has over time cut off a freshwater source to the Sea of Japan, creating an ideal occupation area. The summer...
Field Systems, Urbanism, and State Formation in the Hawaiian Islands (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Finding Fields: Locating and Interpreting Ancient Agricultural Landscapes" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The significance of urbanization and royal centers in the development of productive agricultural systems and state formation has been minimized in the Hawaiian Islands. Today, thanks to several key methodological advances, especially remote sensing using lidar, we are closer than ever to an integrated and...
Fieldwork Prior to the CPAS and the Influence of CPAS on Recent Fieldwork (2023)
This is an abstract from the "The Chengdu Plain Archaeology Survey (2004–2011): Highlights from the Final Report" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This poster examines archaeological fieldwork and discoveries made in the Chengdu Plain prior to the launch of the Chengdu Plain Archaeological Survey (CPAS) project in 2005. We pay particular attention to pre-Qin sites found in key areas of CPAS. Since the 1980s, due to the urban development of the...
Finding Buddha: Hi-tech approach to the study of Buddhist transition at the Angkorian center of Preah Khan of Kompong Svay, Cambodia (10th to 16th c. CE) (2017)
The Two Buddhist Towers Project seeks to identify material culture evidence of the important shift from Mahayana to Theravada Buddhism during the decline of the Angkorian Khmer Empire. At the regional center of Preah Khan of Kompong Svay, also known as Bakan, the most representative iconography, found for example at the Tower of Preah Thkol and the temple of Prasat Stoeng, shows the religious foundations of Mahayana Buddhism, which was probably practiced at the site since its inception. On the...
Finding Greener Pastures: The local development of agro-pastoralism in the Ordos Region, North China (2017)
This paper integrated new archaeobotanical and zooarchaeological research in the Ordos region to provide new information on the timing, mechanisms, and process of development of agro-pastoralism in China. The paper includes a new synthesis of archaeobotanical, and zooarchaeological data to understand the nature and the beginnings of agro-pastoralism as early as the Late Neolithic period (2600-1900 B.C.）. Environmental factors constrained and shaped animal husbandry in the Ordos Region, an area...
Finding the Right Spot: Utilizing Historic Maps, Period Imagery, and Archaeological Data to Identify Aircraft Crash Sites within the Larger Battlefield Landscape (2017)
Identifying aircraft crash sites is a critical component of the mission of the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency. This paper uses several examples of aircraft crash incidents and illustrates the contextual use of multiple lines of data, such as historic imagery, GPS, period maps, and GIS for the effective location of individual crash sites across the greater battlefield landscape. This effort is undertaken to help address the goals associated with DPAA's greater mission: the return of missing...
Fire up the Uhmw: Deciphering Botanical Residues from Earth Ovens in Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia (2017)
In Pohnpei, Micronesia, the uhmw, or earth oven, is one important way of preparing food. These ovens are typically located in cookhouses next to residential sites. Pohnpeians use heated stones on the ground to cook food and cover items with large leaves while cooking. It is clear that umhw are a long-standing Pohnpeian tradition, as multiple examples have been found in the archaeological record. In this paper, we ask what botanical residues from uhmw can tell us about the prehistory and history...
Fishponds and Aquaculture in the Ancient Hawaiian Political Economy (2017)
The political economy of ancient Hawai'i, prior to European contact in 1778-79, has often been characterized as based primarily on a "staple economy" with highly intensified forms of both irrigated and dryland agriculture. Less appreciated is the role of intensive aquaculture of two species (milkfish and mullet) using several kinds of often extensive fishponds. This paper explores the role and significance of such aquaculture in the late pre-contact Hawaiian political economy, drawing especially...
Food, Rituals, and Beliefs: Multiple Interpretations of Plants unearthed from Tombs of Chu State—The example of Zanthoxylum bungeanum (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Zanthoxylum bungeanum, a vital component of ancient Chinese culinary life, has been unearthed from many tombs associated with the Chu state. As a prominent funerary offering, it is presumed to hold distinct roles and functions within the burial context. The presence of Zanthoxylum bungeanum alongside various fruit remains underscores its multifaceted...
Foreseeable Tools: Lithic Use-Wear and Technological Organizations in Evolutionary Perspectives (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The paper explores some problems concerning the relationship between aspects of lithic technology and the cultural evolutionary theory. There are three fundamental realms in stone tool analysis, namely, typology, technology, and functional studies. These research phases are integrated into the study of "technological organizations" in the sense of Binford...
Formation of Early State in Highland Southwest China: Rethinking Yelang Culture (2018)
Recent archaeological discoveries in Guizhou, China have moved some scholars to describe and argue for the material existence of a legendary state, Yelang; roughly contemporary with Chinese powers from the late Eastern Zhou to the early Western Han dynasty. Except for precious objects reserved for high ranking people, traditionally-identified indicators of early urban civilizations are largely absent in Guizhou. If the appearance of luxury objects and their applications in well-regulated...
Fortified Towns in a Nomadic Pastoral Landscape on the Mongolian Steppe: Bai Balik and the Northern Railways Archaeological Project (2017)
Mongolia is well known for its history of nomadic pastoralism and Bronze and Early Iron Age burials and monuments. For a brief period in the 8th and 9th centuries, however, the Uygher and Khitan Khanates built large towns and urban centers. One of these, Bai Balik was established about 758 CE during the northward expansion of the Uyghur Empire, by the Uyghur khagan, Bayanchur Khan as a ceremonial and trading center in the fertile and strategically located Selenge Valley. This well-known site,...
Foundations of Childhood: Bioarchaeology of Subadults at the Late Shang Capital of Yinxu (2017)
Oracle-bone inscriptions and pre-Han texts say little about children, making bioarchaeology the best available method to study childhood during earlier periods. In 2004, extensive excavations were carried out on building foundations in Dasikong Village, a Late Shang (c.1200-1046 BC) lineage neighborhood found on the outskirts of modern-day Anyang, Henan Province, China. This led to a uniquely high recovery of subadult remains as younger subadults are often found in and around foundations. For...
Four Thousand Years of Disaster, Vulnerability, and Resilience in the Lower Yellow River, China (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Equity in the Archaeology of Disaster, Past, Present, and Future" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. For the past 4,000 years, humans have assaulted the environments of the lower Yellow River Valley. For millennia this region has been an entirely cultivated and (mis)managed anthropogenic landscape. Indeed, the lower Yellow River is called the “river of sorrow” and flows through a land of famine. At the same time, though,...
From a strategic passage to a remote town ----the status change of Dunhuang in the history of China and West communication reflected from the beacon ruins in Dunhuang (2017)
Silk Road played an important role in the ancient China and West communication. Dunhuang is located in the most western part of the Hexi Corridor, which is a valley between Qilian Mountain and Beishan Mountain. It connects the countries of the Middle Asia, Europe and Africa in west and the East Asia in East. Beacon ruin is the most important type among the archaeological ruins, and played a key role in protecting the Northwest frontier and the Silk Road accessibility. Among the 182 ruins of...
From Dune Stratigraphy to a Model-Based Cultural Sequence for the Marquesas Islands of East Polynesia (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Constructing Chronologies I: Stratification and Correlation" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Marquesas Islands comprise part of East Polynesia, a culture area that also includes Hawai'i, New Zealand, and Tahiti. Calcareous sand dunes are rare in the Marquesas but play an outsized role in Polynesian archaeology. Dune sites yield remarkably rich evidence of human settlement and the preservation of organic remains is...
From Hunting and Gathering to Farming in Northern Thailand (2017)
Southeast Asia’s prehistoric zooarchaeological record is peculiar: faunal assemblages are seemingly ‘diverse,’ and generally include a large number of mammalian/reptilian/avian and molluscan species, but often these assemblages lack telltale evidence for human consumption. Therefore, one of the primary challenges confronting zooarchaeologists in this region is identifying what taxa were actually exploited by prehistoric foragers and how these patterns changed over time. This paper investigates...
From Serial Specialist to Cereal Specialist: Managing Hunting and Husbandry in the Context of the Terminal Pleistocene-Early Holocene Fitness Landscape of North China (2017)
Recent reconstructions of terminal Pleistocene-early Holocene settlement and subsistence patterns in northern China indicate that the intensive yet highly mobile hunting pattern that developed during the Younger Dryas as a way of mediating the increased temporal and spatial patchiness of the terminal Pleistocene resource base was maintained and even facilitated by early experiments with farming millet in the early Holocene. The long-term viability of this novel adaptation was evaluated in the...
From Tangible Things to Intangible Ideas: The Context of Trans-Regional Movements of Artifacts, Cereal Crops and Animals (2019)
This is an abstract from the "From Tangible Things to Intangible Ideas: The Context of Pan-Eurasian Exchange of Crops and Objects" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Scholarly interest has been growing in an episode of trans-Eurasian exchange of agricultural systems and tangible material goods in late prehistory. The trans-regional movement of a number of artifacts, cereal crops and animals occurred within a series of transformative process that...
From Tasmania to Tucson: new directions in ethnoarchaeology (1978)
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