Material Culture and Technology (Other Keyword)
401-425 (718 Records)
This is an abstract from the "Crafting Culture: Thingselves, Contexts, Meanings" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This presentation details different strands of evidence we have on the organisation and kin-based significances of carved stone monoliths during the late prehispanic period of ancient northern Peru (ca. AD 500-1532). Ethnohistorical documents suggest that it was close kin who carved and erected stone images of esteemed forebears; the...
Manufacture of Late Neolithic Pottery from the Southern Balkans: An Integrative Approach (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Throughout their life, from manufacture to final discard, ceramic vessels participated in different human activities within Neolithic communities throughout the Balkans. As a result, vessels, potters, and users are involved in a relational interaction leading to a continuous negotiation of various aspects of the Neolithic world. The outcome of this relation is...
The Manufacture of Northern Fluted Points: A Production Sequence Hypothesis (2018)
Fluted projectile points have been found in the archaeological record of the North American Arctic for over 50 years. Only recently, however, have fluted points found in buried contexts associated with dateable materials and included in region-wide comparative analyses provided chronological, morphological, and technological evidence to support the cohesion of the Arctic specimens as their own fluted variant: the Northern Fluted Complex (NFC). Few sites have provided the opportunity to observe...
Manufacturing Costs of Long Pestles in Late Period Central California: Results from Replicative Experiments (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Formal Models and Experimental Archaeology of Ground Stone Milling Technology" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The shift to mortars and pestles is associated with the acorn-based resource intensification in central California, which is also linked with decreased mobility and changes in social organization. Many long (>35 cm) and completely shaped pestles are associated with Late period California (cal AD 1265–1770)...
Margaret Lyneis and the Pottery Traditions of Corn Creek and Ash Meadows in Southern Nevada (2018)
Margaret Lyneis examined pottery collected from surface and excavation contexts at two of southern Nevada’s desert oases, Desert National Wildlife Refuge and Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge. These rich islands of springs and lush vegetation were occupied fairly continuously from the Early Archaic period, with farming practiced during the Formative and Post-Formative periods. Dr. Lyneis’ investigations demonstrated, for the first time, that pottery was made locally during the later periods,...
Maritime Archaic Spearpoints: A New Examination of Their Context and Chronology (2018)
This research focuses on the morphology, chronology, and provenience of nipple-based spear points found in Newfounland and Labrador. Nipple-based points are primarily thought to date between 7500-6000 B.P. and are associated with the early Maritime Archaic tradition, Newfoundland and Labrador’s earliest inhabitants. A recent find of a nipple-based point at the Stock Cove site (CKAl-3) in eastern Newfoundland suggests that, based on a series of new AMS dates, the chronology of this point type...
Maritime Lifeways and Technological Choices of the Englefield Culture (7000-5600 cal BP) in Southern Patagonia: Insights from Obsidian and Bone Tool Analysis (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Otway Sea and Strait of Magellan region in Southern Patagonia witnessed the emergence of maritime lifeways approximately 7,000 to 5,600 years ago, leading to the establishment of the 'Englefield Culture.' This culture is characterized by its bone and lithic technology, notably the use of green obsidian. Our research is dedicated to reconstructing the...
Material Culture and Chronology at Colha, Belize: Recent Findings and Future Directions (2018)
Lithics, ceramics, and other artifacts, recovered from the 2017 Colha, Belize field season, are utilized to gain insight into chronological developments and changes at the ancient Maya site. Maya material culture recovered from excavations at Colha are presented and interpreted by context. Each artifact category is briefly defined, described, and placed into a general site context. The estimated time range for the recovered material culture extends from the Late Archaic to the Late Preclassic....
Material Culture in Pambamarca Ecuador: Comparing Finds from Two Inkan Fortresses (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. As the Inka expanded north at the end of the 15th century, they were met with fierce resistance from the País Caranqui societies in Northern Ecuador. A prolonged standoff occurred, visible in the plethora of fortresses along the northern frontier. Excavations completed by the Pambamarca Archaeology Project north of Quito at three Inka fortresses within the...
Material Properties, Sensory Experience, and Production Techniques in Early Chinese Bronze Casting (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Craft and Technology: Knowledge of the Ancient Chinese Artisans" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The extraordinary bronze ritual vessels of Shang- and Zhou-period China were produced by casting in multi-part ceramic molds. Laboratory analysis of casting-mold fragments has found that these molds were made from an unusual ceramic material—a paste that was quartz-rich, clay-poor, highly porous, and therefore quite unlike...
Materialización de las nuevas interacciones en la zona fronteriza entre Mesoamérica y el Área Istmo-colombiana durante el Postclásico Temprano: Un acercamiento desde Los Naranjos, noroeste de Honduras (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Materials in Movement in the Isthmo-Colombian Area" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. En los territorios considerados como los márgenes fronterizos entre Mesoamérica y el Área Istmo-colombiana, la transición entre el Clásico y Postclásico (siglos IX-XII dC) corresponde a un periodo de reorganización de sus sociedades. Particularmente en el noroeste de Honduras se caracterizaron notables evoluciones en los centros...
Materials Characterization at the National Museum of the American Indian: (Mostly) Non-destructive Analysis (2018)
The use of portable X-Ray Fluorescence (pXRF) for in-situ elemental analysis is becoming widespread in archaeology and cultural heritage studies. Archaeologists and conservators routinely use pXRF instruments in the field and many museums use them in-house for identification of pigments, metals, and inorganic pesticide residues, characterization of minerals and determination of alloy composition. The NMAI Conservation Department has been using pXRF for over fifteen years for a variety of...
Maya Butchers in Santiago de Guatemala: A Technological Analysis of the Disassembling of Cattle in Colonial Guatemala (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Frontiers in Animal Management: Unconventional Species, New Methods, and Understudied Regions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In colonial Guatemala, cattle constituted a vital element of Hispanic lifestyles through the supply of meat but also by providing basic materials necessary to a multitude of crafts. By the mid-sixteenth century, this flowering industry was thriving thanks to the rapid growth of herds. While the...
Maya Lithic and Metal Technologies in Belize (2024)
This is an abstract from the "“The Center and the Edge”: How the Archaeology of Belize Is Foundational for Understanding the Ancient Maya" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Over more than a century, archaeological research in Belize has contributed greatly to our understanding of past Maya stone and metal technologies. From the preceramic through the colonial periods (~11,000 BC−AD 1700), the analysis of flaked and ground stone tools recovered from...
Mazapan Style Figurines at El Palacio: What Significance for The Early Postclassic Interregional Interactions in Northern Michoacán? (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Mesoamerican Figurines in Context. New Insights on Tridimensional Representations from Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Recent work conducted in Northern Michoacán by the CEMCA in the Zacapu Basin, 30 km North of the Tarascan core-region, shed light on a specific and poorly defined time period at the region before the Tarascan kingdom: The Early Postclassic. The local phase Palacio ranges from A.D. 900 to...
Mea Culpa (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. As I have done no comparative study on the subject, I assume that it is relatively unusual to amend one’s dissertation research let alone to point out its flaws. Nevertheless, this is precisely what I am doing in this presentation. While the salient points of my dissertation (The Origin, Development, and Distributions of Western Archaic Textiles, 1970)...
The Meaning of a Sample of Teeth Pendants from the Paleolithic Bacho Kiro Cave in Bulgaria (Exc. 1971–1975) (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Variability: A Reassessment of Its Meaning, Afforded Range, and the Relation to Process" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Bone artifacts from the past are indicators of increased diversity in human behavior and culture. Determining the bone tool type can provide information about past technology, cultural provenience, symbolic expressions, and the type of exploited fauna that inhabited different geographical regions....
Measuring Reduction Intensity in Laminar Cores: An Experimental Approach and Archaeological Application (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Reduction intensity analysis plays a key role in understanding the formation of lithic assemblages and the occupation patterns of Paleolithic sites. Furthermore, technological variability and core classifications can be better understood if the diachronic component of the reduction is taken into consideration. The Volumetric Reconstruction Method (VRM),...
The medieval Basque iron industry, cultural traits in technological traditions (2019)
This is an abstract from the "The Movement of Technical Knowledge: Cross-Craft Perspectives on Mobility and Knowledge in Production Technologies" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Basquesmith project investigates ironworking production during Early Medieval times ‒mostly utilitarian iron implements such as ladles or keys‒ excavated in rural settlements in the Basque Country (northern Spain), focusing on the characterisation of the manufacture...
Memes of Hohokam Pottery: the Spread of Ceramic Traditions from the Middle Gila River, Arizona (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Cross-Cultural Petrographic Studies of Ceramic Traditions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The idea of memes, as coined by Dawkins, originally referred to an element of a culture or behavior that is passed from one individual to another by nongenetic means. It was used to examine how cultural phenomenon replicate, mutate, survive, or become extinct. This has clear applications to ceramic traditions where the cultural...
Memory-Dependent Practices at a Chaco Outlier: Insights from the Ceremonial Deposition of Shell Ornaments at Salmon Pueblo, New Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the late Pueblo II period, around A.D. 1090, migrants from Chaco Canyon constructed Salmon Pueblo, which would become an important ceremonial and political outlier in the Middle San Juan region of New Mexico. Salmon Pueblo rivals the size of canyon great houses, boasting three stories and nearly 300 rooms, as well as a tower kiva and great kiva. The...
Metal and vitreous production technologies at the Early Bronze Age Resuloğlu (Central Anatolia, Turkey) (2018)
Modern day Çorum is the homeland of the Hatti people, the culture that later formed the Hittite Empire. Resuloğlu, dated to the Early Bronze Age (ca. 2500–2100 BC), is one of the few Hatti sites being systematically excavated. The site, located on a hilltop near the Delice River, consists of a cemetery area and settlement that spreads over two opposing–once connected–ridges with numerous extraordinary metal and vitreous artifacts. The settlement exemplifies well the self-sustaining pre-Hittite...
Metal Production at Abu Muslim qala: An Analysis of Metallurgical Waste from a Medieval Site in Central Asia (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Abu Muslim qala is a multi-phase site located west of the Sultanuizdag mountain range in Karakalpakstan, Uzbekistan, with an occupation beginning as early as the seventh century AD. Situated along the route connecting two of the region’s most prominent medieval cities, Abu Muslim qala may have played a role in the broader network of medieval metals trade...
Metallic Motivations? Using GIS to Determine the Role of Metal and Mineral Resources in Changing Settlement Location Preferences between the Bronze and Iron Ages in Evora, Portugal (2200 BCE–400 CE) (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Bronze Age settlements in the Evora district of Portugal are typically located in rocky terrain with an apparent preference for locations in the highlands. During the Iron Age we see a shift of this settlement pattern, as highland sites are abandoned and new settlements appear at lower altitudes. Was the initial selection of highland sites influenced by the...
The Metallurgical Cycle and Human Responses to Material Fatigue (2018)
Innovations in metallurgy had and continue to have significant and transformative effects on society. From mineral exploration and mining to primary metal production, manufacturing, and consumption across a range of social contexts, metallurgy influenced a wide range of distinctly human conditions. However, while metals are particularly transmutable, they also rapidly corrode back into increasingly stable mineral compounds in processes that people tried to mitigate and often unsuccessfully...