East/Southeast Asia (Geographic Keyword)
451-475 (499 Records)
This paper deals with changes in religious practices during a period when 'Nature' is least stable in early China. It focuses on the rapid spread of new ritual practices and emergence of new ritual networks during the Longshan period (ca. 2300-1800 BCE) as evidence for religious responses to the extraordinary climatic crisis of the late third millennium BCE. It explores the diverse manifestations of the ecological crisis in geomorphological evidence and their implications for a changing...
A Technical Study of Casting and Inlay on Chinese Ceremonial Weapons at the Harvard Art Museums (2015)
The Harvard Art Museums contain one of the world’s largest collections of inlayed Chinese ritual weapons from the Shang dynasty (c. 1600–1046 BCE). These weapons are ornately decorated with turquoise inlay, exemplifying power and elitism in early Chinese society; yet little is known about their manufacture and use. A technical study of 32 inlayed weapons and pre-Shang plaques has yielded new observations on early technology and production organization in ancient China, and concluded that the...
Test Excavation of the 17th Century Provintia, a Dutch Fort in the Southwest Taiwan (2017)
In the 17th century, Taiwan was considered as an outpost for the Dutch East Indies Company to trade with China and Japan, and to compete with its European counterparts in the region. Located in the contemporary Tainan City, Taiwan, Provintia stood as the Island’s first planned city by the Dutch in AD 1625, the second year when they traded the city land with 15 cangan cloth from the indigenous Siraya. In AD 1653, a fort, called Fort Provintia was constructed as a result of Han Chinese rebels...
A Thin Section Petrographic Study of Early to Late Shangshan Ceramics from Zhejiang, China (2017)
Ceramics from the early Holocene Shangshan Culture, in Zhejiang Province, China, have been subjected to thin section petrographic analysis in order to characterize clay groups, view production patterns, and aid in the development of a complete understanding of the Shangshan technological tradition. Analysis has revealed a pattern in the local production of ceramic vessels likely related to the transformations in cooking methods and dietary patterns that coincided with new evidence for the...
Three Cities in the Heartland of the Khitan Liao Empire (2017)
A wide range of Medieval settlement has been identified in the watershed of the Shar mörön river, a territory of grassland and narrow river valleys in the heartland of the nomadic Khitan and their Liao state (907-1125 CE). These settlements range from village landscapes to imperial capitals. This paper will introduce three urban settings of the Liao state: (1) A mercantile center, (2) a local administrative hub, and (3) an imperial capital city along with their immediate hinterlands. Through a...
Tianshanbeilu and the Isotopic Millet Road: Reviewing the Late Neolithic/Bronze Age Radiation of Human Millet Consumption from North China to Europe (2017)
The westward expansion of human millet consumption from north China has important implications for understanding early interactions between the East and West. However, few studies have focused on the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, the vast geographical area directly linking the ancient cultures of the Eurasian Steppe and the Gansu Corridor of China. Here a Bronze Age isotopic study in China is presented about the key site of Tianshanbeilu, in eastern Xinjiang. The vast range of stable carbon...
Timing of Stress Episodes at Houtaomuga: Neolithic and Bronze Age Comparisons (2017)
The unworn and minimally worn anterior teeth of 48 individuals from Neolithic and Bronze Age levels of the Houtaomuga site in Jinlin Province, China were examined macro- and microscopically for location on the labial surface of lines of Enamel Hypoplasia relative to the cementoenamel junction. From estimated ages of enamel formation across the tooth crown surface, ages of occurrence of stress exposure were calculated. Variation in timing of growth cessation and recovery from birth to 6 years, as...
The Tooth About Pastoralism: Oral Health, Physiological Stress and Diet in a 19th Century Mobile Pastoralist Population from Mongolia (2015)
To better understand diet, oral health, and physiological stress loads of historic 19th century mobile pastoralists from Central Asia, the frequency of caries, ante-mortem tooth loss (AMTL), and linear enamel hypoplasia (LEH) were assessed macroscopically from a skeletal sample (n=40) of a pastoralist population from Urga (Ulaanbaatar), Mongolia. Results show a low percentage of individuals affected by caries (11.4%) consistent with a diet low in sugars and carbohydrates but high in animal...
Toward a Reconstruction of Early Settlements in Metal Age Yunnan (2015)
Although research works on the Bronze Age burials in Yunnan in the past fifty years have expanded our knowledge on various aspects of ancient Yunnan societies, many questions pertaining to the earliest stages of human existence in Yunnan have remained to be answered for short of a well-defined chronological sequence from settlement archaeology. Recent findings of early habitation sites in the environs of the Lake Er are beginning to shed new lights on the exiting issues, including questions...
Toward standardization of lithic use-wear identification in conjunction with technological organization and raw material variability (2017)
The paper examines theoretical problems concerning characteristics of lithic micro-wear traces in the Paleolithic. Use-wear studies already experienced 40 years of research since the discovery of micro-polish varieties which reflect worked materials with wide applications to site structure analysis. However, global standardization of identification criteria still needs comparative efforts, especially on raw material variability and behavioral diversity among regional settlement and subsistence...
Towards a Socio-Ecological Understanding of Agrarian-Based, Low-Density Urbanism in Early Tropical State Formations (2015)
Archaeological examination of the remains of the early tropical states in Central America and Asia have demonstrated that, although they exhibit a unique type of settlement pattern, they do represent large, sophisticated, and undoubtedly "urban" state formations. The unique urban footprint of these tropical states – in which settlement units of varying size and complexity are scattered across the landscape, and agricultural lands and green zones extend up to, and even into epicenters – has come...
Trace Metals in Soils as Indicators of Past Human Activities at Hanwangdu East, Anyang, China (2017)
Through chemical analyses of soils, bones, and organic residues, archaeologists can identify anthropogenic impacts on environment at archaeological sites. In this research, we are interested in understanding if and how bronze production had impact on the environment during Bronze Age China. Soil samples from Hanwangdu East, a Middle Shang period site at Anyang, were analyzed by using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). The purpose of this project is to 1) evaluate if ICP-MS is...
Trade Diaspora in Prehistoric Eastern Taiwan (2016)
The origin and expansion of Austronesian, a language group disperses from Easter Island to Madagascar, is a long-term discussed issue in Taiwan and Southeast Asia. For the movement of people and materials, the migrationist models have dominated the explanatory frameworks in the South China Sea, a broader area of my proposed research region. In this proposed research the concept of trade diaspora is applied to examine the possibility of frequent bidirectional movement of materials and people...
The trajectory of early rice intensification and cultural change in the Lower Yangtze Valley revealed by an ecological analysis of archaeological phytoliths. (2015)
Using data from modern and archaeological phytolith assemblages we follow the trajectory of wild rice cultivated on wetland margins at 5000 BC through early domestication and the first artificial arable systems in dug out fields at c. 4000 BC to fully developed irrigated paddy fields in the Lower Yangtze Valley. Using multivariate analysis with phytolith assemblages from ecological communities of rice weed flora across a range of arable systems we create modern analogues of ancient systems which...
Trans-continental cultural exchange in Hexi Corridor, northwest China during Bronze Age (2017)
The Hexi Corridor of Northwest China was an important area for cultural exchange between west and east parts of the Eurasia during both historical and prehistoric times. Here we present new dataset of archaeobotanic, zooarchaeological and bone isotopic analysis, and radiocarbon dating from late Neolithic and Bronze sites in Hexi Corridor, and discuss the history of trans-continental cultural exchange in Hexi Corridor before Han Dynasty (202BC-220AD). Our results revealed the chronology of...
Trans-cultural interaction in China’s Shang Period: an archaeo-metallurgical perspective (2017)
The production of ritual bronze vessels is an internationally recognised feature of Bronze Age China, contrasting strikingly with other early civilizations across the world. Their manufacture exploded in the Shang period (16th to 11th centuries BC), when bronze metallurgy spread across the whole territory of present-day China. However, while the production of ritual bronze vessels predominated in the Central Plains, resent research is showing how surrounding regions exhibited strong local...
Transformation of the Jomon-era Ritual System: A Case Study of the Jomon / Yayoi transition in the 1st millennia BC in the Tohoku Region of the Japanese Archipelago (2017)
It has long been claimed that the Jomon-era cultural and ritual system was probably replaced by a new early farming cultural system (Yayoi Culture) brought by immigrants from the Korean peninsula. Recently, however, Japanese archaeologists have been working to determine the variability of ritual practices in each region of the Japanese archipelago. This paper analyzes the transformational process of ritual items (e.g., clay figurines and stone implements) of the Tohoku (northeastern part of main...
Turquoise Ornaments and Inlays Technology in Qijia Culture -- A Comparative Study of Qijia Culture and Erlitou Culture (2015)
Most turquoise ornaments from early Neolithic sites are pendants with a single material. However, from the later Neolithic period such as Qijia culture, people started to use ornaments which were inlaid with turquoise and other materials by unique techniques. In early Bronze Age, turquoise production process, especially the inlays technology, reached its peak. From a Qijia culture site, we found a bone hairpin. On its tail part, small white bone rings were sticking on black jelly. From Majiayao...
Understanding the Production of Majiayao Painted Pottery in Gansu: New Data and New Thoughts (2015)
This paper examines the evidence for local production of painted pottery of the Majiayao Culture in Gansu province based on their distinguishing characteristics in mineralogical, compositional and technological aspects, and on correlations of these features with the geographical source. An empirical observation of a contemporary family-scale workshop in Lintao County, where the most splendid pieces of Majiayao painted pottery have been found, suggests that the technological difficulties in the...
Understanding the Settlement Structure of the Middle Yangshao Period (Miaodigou Phase) based on Recent Archaeological Discoveries in the Wei River Valley (2017)
As one of the most influential archaeological cultures in prehistoric China, the Miaodigou Phase of the Yangshao Culture has been found widely in many regions. During the Miaodigou Phase, a common cultural identity appeared across China for the first time, which had great significance for the later formation of Chinese civilization. However, archaeological research has until recently been limited to the study of ceramic styles. In recent years, investigations at the Yangguanzhai site in Shaanxi...
Untangling the Urban Morphology of medieval Angkor, Cambodia (2017)
One of the largest puzzles for archaeologists at Angkor is untangling the extremely complex chronological development of the site. The region was host to hundreds of years of urban occupation arising out of a long tradition of habitation through the Bronze and Iron Age. Decades of archaeological investigations have established relational frameworks through which it is now possible to do more precise dating. Recent LiDAR investigations and the associated mapping and ground truthing have...
Urban Construction as a Social Transformation Process (2016)
Archaeological evidence and ancient Chinese text imply that the construction of early urban settlements in China were planned events initiated by rulers relocating their settlements in order to legitimize their arising power and establish hierarchical social systems. Accordingly, the construction of the urban settlements may have been the transformative social environments in which power was legitimized and enacted and new social structure was created. I hypothesize that whether this...
Urbanization and Ceramic Change: An Exploration of the Relationship (2015)
Previous studies about the production, distribution, and consumption of craft goods in complex societies emphasize social relations at the household, site, and regional scales. An often neglected component is the nature of economic organization within different neighborhoods of large settlements. This paper argues that we should attempt to understand neighborhoods as meaningful communities for inhabitants of urban centers. These smaller communities can have a major impact on the nature of social...
Urbanizing Forests: Paleoethnobotanical Research at the Royal Capital of Angkor, Cambodia (2016)
Upon his ascension to the throne, King Yaśovarman I (r. 889-910 AD) founded a new capital at Angkor in northwestern Cambodia that was to become the major center of the Khmer Empire and a dynamic religio-political landscape marked by extensive urbanization and environmental change. Religious institutions played a particularly important role in localized human-environment engagements while contributing to broader processes of polity-building. Drawing on historical ecology, this paper underscores...
The use of Chenopodium plants in China (2017)
This article reviews the use of Chenopodium plants in Chinese archaeobotanical record. We will draw attention to two regions particularly, Northeast and Southwest China. We will consider the use of Chenopodium food in the context of origins of agriculture in China.