East/Southeast Asia (Geographic Keyword)
426-450 (499 Records)
This paper moves discussion of prehistoric earthworks in Cambodia from normative archaeology into an ecological landscape structure, based on archaeological datasets. Discussions provide a synthesis of archaeological and newly borne out ecological explanations for original site construction, occupation, landscape use, sustainability of occupation for the earthwork culture over a c. 2000 year period, and terminal use of the sites. The paper moves discussion of the earthworks in the direction of...
Social aspects of the diffusion of agricultural products and practices (2015)
The adoption of agricultural products and practices is a social process. Archaeological patterns reveal more than just the timing and direction of the adoption, they help to reveal the very nature of social interaction over a wide area. In particular, the spatial and temporal patterns of diffusion point to norms and priorities in social learning, which in turn generate new avenues for exploring archaeological data. Evidence for the adoption of wheat (a western domesticate) in East Asia is best...
Social difference between Songze culture and Liangzhu culture as reflected on jade artifacts (2017)
The Liangzhu Culture (3300–2000 BC) and the Songze Culture (4000 – 3300 BC) are two Neolithic cultures in the lower Yangtze River Delta in China. The two cultures are quite similar in many aspects especially those reflected on ceramics. This research intends to study the difference of social hierarchy between two cultures through an analysis of jades collected from over 20 archaeological sites in the Lake Tai region. By doing so, it is argued that jades in the Songze Culture are precious...
Societies and environmental transformations in early modern Yunnan: A spatial analysis of written sources and oral histories (2015)
This paper uses geographic visualization to analyse possibilities and limitations of historical sources and fieldwork in studying changes in settlement patters and environmental change in Yunnan province. Local gazetteers are an important source on local conditions. It reflects the perspective of the administration on to some extent that of the Han-Chinese elite, and creates a written and rewritten local tradition. Mapping the zones of attention and the information provided in this type of...
The Socio-Ecological Entanglement in Tropical Societies (SETS) Project (2016)
Although comparative studies have been criticized in recent years, especially within the more post-modern corners of anthropology, cross-cultural studies continue to have value for exploring the sometimes congruent, and at other times unique, manner that different communities choose to confront analogous socio-ecological issues. The Socio-Ecological Entanglement in Tropical Societies (SETS) project is a long-term endeavor aimed at promoting the cross-cultural, transdisciplinary examination of...
The Socio-Ecological Entanglement of Water and Resilience in Past and Present Tropical Societies (2017)
Urban resilience and sustainability have gained increasing prominence in the literature as concerns regarding water resources and climate change continue to grow. Cities, particularly those in the midst of extreme urban development, are facing a wider range of stresses that call for greater enhancement of resilience techniques. This paper highlights the work of the Socio-Ecological Entanglement in Tropical Societies (SETS) project, whose goal is to investigate resilience and vulnerability within...
Soil, Hands, and Heads: An Ethnoarchaeological Study on Local Preconditions of Pottery Production in the Wei River Valley (Northern China) (2017)
This paper approaches ceramic production by combining four aspects of data: geographic background, archaeological find, ethnoarchaeological work, and material analysis. Taking the middle Neolithic site of Yangguanzhai in Shaanxi as a case study, this paper examined the preconditions and processes of pottery making in northern China during the Yangshao Period (5000-3000 BC). Materials from over ten years of excavation and survey at Yangguanzhai and the results of ethnoarchaeological studies in...
A Soil-Stratigraphic Record of Landscape Evolution and Human-Environment Interaction at the Yangguanzhai Archaeological Site, North-Central China (2017)
This paper presents the results of soil-stratigraphic investigations and stable isotope analysis at Yangguanzhai, a Middle Neolithic site (~5500 cal. years B.P.) in the Wei River Valley of north-central China. At Yanguanzhai, there is a well-preserved sequence of alternating sediment and buried soils, indicative of multiple fluctuations in landscape stability. Human occupations are associated with three buried soils: the two lower soil horizons contain Middle Neolithic (~6000-5500 cal. yrs....
Spatial Analysis of the Dharmacakras Distribution Associated with the Dvāravatī Period, Thailand (2016)
Dvāravatī (spanning late 6th– 11th centuries C.E.) is one of the oldest religious cultures and artistic periods of Thailand and Southeast Asia. Dvāravatī history cannot be written due to a lack of epigraphic evidence or chronicle. Its center, geographical extent, and political organization remain unclear. The archaeological and geographical evidence suggests that moated sites were associated with the emergence of Dvāravatī civilization. Among Dvāravatī style artifacts found within these sites,...
Spatial patterns of human land-use from surface collections in NW Mongolia (2017)
The spatial distributions of artifacts from different periods of time reveal change in the nature and intensity of human activities in different kinds of places. This is particularly useful when trying to establish how patterns of human mobility and land-use evolved during periods of dramatic environmental or economic change. The Uvs Nuur Basin of northwest Mongolia played host to both. Here, the distribution of glaciers, vegetation zones, and lake systems changed rapidly from the late...
The spread and development of Iron Techologies in China (2017)
Iron production in this paper is divided into two types; wrought iron and cast iron. Wrought iron was spread through the Eurasian grasslands to China two times; at the middle of second millennium BC and 9th to 8th century BC. At the later time, wrought iron daggers with golden or bronze handles spread to northwestern China. After wrought iron arrived in the Central Plains of China where bronze working was developed, there was the invention of cast iron technology. Development of cast iron...
Spread of Digging Tools and the Social Change in Kofun Period Japan (2015)
This paper discusses an aspect of the social change that took place in Kofun Period western Japan as a result of evolution of digging tools. The iron blades of such digging tools changes from rectangular plates with bent edges to U-shaped edges in the fifth century A.D. This change was not merely morphological but technological as well. Background to this change was the introduction of highly advanced smith technique from the Korean peninsula. This technological innovation diffused to all...
Standardization in pottery production of the Jinsha site, Chengdu Plain, China (2017)
In earlier studies, scholars have focused on the measurement of vessels’ dimensions to assess the degree of standardization. It should be noted however that not all dimensions are culturally salient or equally important. Moreover, when manufacturing processes can be decomposed into multiple stages, cultural idiosyncrasies that have been shaped through either institutionalized or unconscious ways might affect and be sought in any of these stages. This has called for analyses on ceramics by using...
Starch and Stone: Preliminary Evidence from Jomon Period Ground Stone in Southwestern Hokkaido (2015)
Lithic assemblages from Jomon Period sites contain a wide variety of artifacts that were chipped or ground from a number of raw materials. Typological frameworks exist to aid interpretations about function and use, but many details are still unknown when it comes to how Jomon people incorporated this array of stone objects into their lives. The place of ground stone implements within Jomon lithic technology and society is particularly intriguing, as questions about the quantities and variations...
Starch Grain Analysis of Human Dental Calculus from Guanzhuang Site, Henan Province (2017)
This research aims to investigate the human foodstuffs and lifestyle during the Western and Eastern Zhou Dynasties in the core area of the Central Plains using starch grain analysis of human dental calculus. Plant microfossils, starch grains and phytoliths, which were found in most of calculus samples from Guanzhuang site, were from millets, bread wheat, rice, adzuki, tubers and acorns. Diversity of starch grains and phytoliths in morphological characteristics extracted from dental calculus...
State Archaeology and Private Museum: An integrated approach to represent heritage values for local people (2016)
The legislative system of cultural heritage in China outlined cultural heritage management and archaeological activities fulfilled under exclusive right of state. This state archaeology proves its worth to increase the authority and quality of cultural heritage management, as well as to enhance the heritage values at the state level. The local communities, however, hardly embedded into the activities of cultural heritage management and archaeological projects, nor meet cultural heritage concerns...
State Formation Process in Seventh Century A.D. Japan from a Religious Perspective (2015)
Religion played an essential role in the state formation process in seventh century Japan. After Buddhism was introduced from Korea in the sixth century, more than 600 Buddhist temples were erected by the middle eighth century. There are some distinctive layouts of temple complexes, and the central authority greatly contributed to temporal change in the layouts. A considerable change took place in the middle seventh century, which marks the beginning of the national policy to adopt Buddhism as a...
Stone artefacts from Southeast Sulawesi: Technology beyond the Toalean (2015)
We report on the stone artefact assemblages and geoarchaeological contexts from two recently excavated rockshelters in southeast Sulawesi, Indonesia. Human occupation starts at 19,000 BP. We find low density occupation during the Pleistocene, followed by a major increase in discard and change in local environmental conditions in the early Holocene. Striking changes in artefact discard rates occur during the middle Holocene, and distinctive retouched forms appear. We discuss the implications for...
Stone tool typology and chronology from late Pleistocene to middle Holocene northwest Mongolia (2016)
Understanding hunter-gatherer adaptations to northern latitude marginal environments such as the Uvs Lake Basin of northern Mongolia is crucial for understanding social historical processes such as the transition to herding and pastoralism. To date, however, the archeological patterns of hunter-gatherer life in this part of the world are notoriously ill-defined, on the one hand because so little attention has been given to them, and on the other because buried, stratified sites have been so...
The Stone-Construction Tombs of Xiaguanzi in Maoxian county, and the Question of Cultural Contact throughout Western China (2017)
Xiaguanzi site in Maoxian County, located at the junction of the upper reaches of Min and Fu Rivers, is an important node on the channels of culture transmission between North and South China. From 2014 to 2015, Neolithic remains and stone-constructed tombs were excavated. The Neolithic remains include pottery, stone and bone artifacts, leather objects, animal bones, plant seeds, house remains, tombs, and ash pits. Although there no painted pottery occurred at Xiaguanzi, the pottery found here...
A Study on the Mid-to-Late Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age Agricultural Economies and their Development at Huizui Site, Yiluo Valley Region, China (2015)
In order to gain procedural understanding of early agricultural economies, researches have much to gain from in-depth, diachronic study of agricultural development in a single region. This study focuses on the changes in agricultural plant-use over time in the Yiluo Valley, North-Central China by using archaeobotanical data from the Mid-to-Late Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age occupations (c 3500 – 1500 BC) at Huizui. The study’s analysis confirms that changing plant-use patterns at Huizui...
Study on the subsistence of Neolithic and Early Bronze Age China using published mammal records (2017)
This research is based on all published zooarchaeological study on Chinese Neolithic and Early Neolithic sites and mainly focuses on the animal subsistence economy in the same period. With the advent of quantitative analysis, refined models can now be built and analyzed from all the published data. The application of big data studies on animal remains provided information of range and relative importance of taxa and their possible change through time-scale and region which may reflect an ancient...
Subsistence ecology in the making of the Shang state, Eastern China (2016)
This study examines the transition of subsistence practices in early Bronze Age sites in eastern China, when the region was integrated into the Shang state in the second millennium BC. Through a combination of geomorphological and archaeobotanical analyses, I reconstruct the long-term environmental history as well as land-use practices at the Yueshi cultural sites, to explore a variety of responses and adaptations that would have been developed before and after the Shang expansion into the area....
Subsistence in the Late Pleistocene of China: A view from Laonainaimiao site (2017)
The paper presents the taphonomic and zooarchaeological analyses of the fauna from the Laonainaimiao site of Late Pleistocene in the central plain area of China. The taphonomy observation shows that the bones were accumulated by human activity. The taxa of the fossil assemblage is composed mainly of Equidae and Bos primigenius, followed by gazelle, deer, wild boar, rhinoceros etc. Most carcasses of Equidae and Bos were likely to be transported to the site as a whole. The carcasses were...
A tale of two towns: Demographic and economic change in two middle Yangzi communities (2015)
The late Neolithic marked the emergence of a new kind of settlement pattern in the middle Yangzi river valley. During this period, large, tightly nucleated communities, many of which were surrounded by moats or walls, rapidly replaced the dispersed hamlets and small villages of the middle Neolithic. This dramatic transition in settlement organization may have been associated with significant changes in social and economic relations between individuals both within and between settlements. To...