Night (Other Keyword)

DOCUMENT Citation Only April Nowell. Nan Gonlin.

Archaeologists have been in the dark on the topic of the night for far too long. Like any other aspect of human behavior, the nighttime has firmly planted itself in the archaeological record, ready for us to uncover it, if only we seek it out. Relying upon the material trails that humans leave behind, it is not only possible but productive to pursue an archaeology of the night to enlighten and broaden our knowledge of the human past. Artifacts, features, structures, and sites provide clues to...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Cecelia Klein.

Scholars have invariably interpreted the blindfolds worn by certain figures in Aztec painted manuscripts as a sign of—in their words—"transgression," "sin," and "punishment." This talk challenges the simplicity and inherent Eurocentrism of that reading. It is true that the Aztecs perceived a person’s mistakes to plunge him into darkness and chaos, and that blindfolds, at one level, symbolized that disorder. The cause of a moral error, however, was embodied by certain objects and substances that...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jan Olson.

While daytime is often reserved for fairly mundane activities, most archaeological questions have focused on this time period. A wide variety of activities though cross the day into the nighttime, or occur only after dark. It is during the night when Mesoamericans recreated much of their mythology in ritualistic acts. This paper explores the use of household temazcales as nightly ritual spaces. These saunas were not only found in large communal spaces, but also in households. For what were the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Robert Weiner.

This is an abstract from the "After Dark: The Nocturnal Urban Landscape & Lightscape of Ancient Cities" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Chaco Canyon, an ancient monumental center in the Four Corners (ca. AD 800-1200), has long been a locus of charged nighttime activity. Visitors today are awed by the clear, dark, and vast night skies, and archaeoastronomical research at Chaco has revealed an extensive settlement design reflecting celestial...