Archaeometry & Materials Analysis (Other Keyword)
351-375 (484 Records)
This is an abstract from the "An Exchange of Ideas: Recent Research on Maya Commodities" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Excavations at Blue Creek from 1992 to 2000 yielded a large collection of jade artifacts with approximately 900 artifacts being found in a single cache in Structure 4 and a total of nearly 1,500 artifacts recovered from throughout the site. In this paper, we revisit our interpretation of the social context of the Structure 4...
Regional Circulation and Production of Bronze Mirrors in Han Dynasty: Focusing on Guanzhong and Jingzhou Area (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The previous study of Han bronze mirrors was mainly concerned with the diachronic change, such as the overall development in typology and the main component formula. Although there is only one Han bronze mirrors workshop found in North China at present, the regional diversity still deserves further investigation. This paper first presents a comprehensive...
Regional Food Paths of Ancient Tropical Agriculturists: A Multi-isotope Approach (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Understanding dietary patterns in past societies is critical for interpreting economic and social transformations. The analysis of dietarily derived isotopes is a reliable source of categorical information about the types of foods consumed by an individual. Furthermore, multisystem-isotope analyses can clarify inferences about food sources and relative...
Regional Production and Trade of Glazed Ceramics in Medieval Central Asia along the Silk Road (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Analyses by NAA and LA-ICP-MS of 106 ceramics excavated from archaeological sites in southern Kazakhstan has demonstrated local production of lead-glazed ceramics during the Early and Middle Islamic periods in Central Asia. The sherds, including both glazed (n=39) and unglazed ceramics (n=67), were excavated from seven medieval sites dated from the 9th to 15th...
The Religious Nature of Defended Sites: Chip's insights at Cerro Baul (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Thinking Big in the Andes: Papers in Honor of Charles Stanish" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Chip has always been a big thinker about the capacity for violence in the human species and has pioneered ways of thinking about warfare in the Andean past that has revolutionized the field. He has also explored the roles of ritual and symbolism in his more recent work and his insights have influenced the ways the current...
Renovación del templo en Chavín de Huántar en el Periodo Formativo Tardío: Una interpretación desde el estudio de los materiales (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Chavín de Huántar’s Contribution to Understanding the Central Andean Formative: Results and Perspectives" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. En esta presentación expondremos sobre los análisis realizados a los objetos hallados en contextos de ofrendas, asociados a lo que hemos definido como la renovación del templo en Chavín de Huántar, practica ritual realizada durante el Periodo Formativo Tardío (900-450 aC). Los...
Renovar para construir: La renovación del templo en Chavín de Huántar durante el Periodo Formativo (1100–450 aC) (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. En esta exposición se discuten las características y el significado de la práctica ritual de renovación del templo encontrada en Chavín de Huántar (Perú) durante nuestras investigaciones. Proponemos que esta formó parte de un conjunto de estrategias de reproducción social que sirvieron para legitimar el poder y la autoridad de la élite que ocupó este...
Research on Materials and Manufacturing Process Used for the Imperial Inlaid Jade Lacquered Wooden Coffin from the Royal Mausoleum No.2 of the Vassal King of Jiangdu State of the Western Han Dynasty in China (2018)
The paper focuses on the characterization of material from fragmented pieces of the imperial lacquered wooden coffin excavated in Xuyi County, Jiangsu Province,whose owner was the empress of Jiangdu State in Western Han Dynasty. The samples were analyzed by scientific techniques including optical and electron microscopy, XRD, FT-IR and GS-MS. The laquer film outside consists of a seven-layer structure, which includes (from the top): a red pigmented layer, two laquer finish layers, three ground...
Resource Networks of Sanxingdui (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Resources and Society in Ancient China" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Located in southwest China, Sanxingdui is well-known for its outstanding and unique bronzes as well as gold, jade, and other high-value artifacts. However, the origin and circulation of these precious resources have not been disclosed. The author believes that the strategic location contributed greatly to the prosperity of Sanxingdui. It was...
Results of a Pilot Study on Wari and Loro Ceramic Pigments from Southern Peru (2018)
In this poster we summarize the results of a pilot study applying LA-ICP-MS analysis to the pigments of 50 Middle Horizon (AD 750-1000) ceramic sherds, with the goal of investigating shared ceramic technologies between people of the Wari and Loro cultures. The sample was taken from four sites: one local site in the Nasca region (Huaca del Loro), and three Wari sites, two located in the Nasca region (Pataraya and Pacheco) and one in the highlands (Jincamocco). INAA conducted on the same sherds...
Revisiting Jahuay: An Early Horizon Maritime Site at the Topará Quebrada on the South Coast of Peru (2018)
The littoral site of Jahuay is located at the mouth of the Topará Quebrada, between the Cañete and Chincha Valleys on the South Coast of Peru. It is a key site for studying the Topará cultural tradition, which emerged on the South Coast during the late Early Horizon (EH)(250 – 1 BCE), and was the site where the Topará ceramic seriation was first documented by Edward Lanning in the mid-20th century. In 2017, we began our first season of excavations at Jahuay, with the goal of investigating EH...
Rock Art in Northern Sonora between Stones and Pigments: Preliminary Archaeometric Analysis (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Interdisciplinary Approaches to Rock Art Documentation, Research, and Analysis" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Sonora has a great concentration of rock art in North America. In order to advance in the analysis and documentation of the rock art groups, the project “Cave Documentation and Patina Study in Northern Sonora” was proposed, focused on Cucurpe (Sierra Madre Occidental) and Caborca (Sonoran Desert). The...
Rock Magnetic Characterization of Florida Pottery (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The methods used in artifact provenance in archaeological research is constantly being added to and updated. Identifying the geographical origin of the artifacts can provide information about past mobility patterns and interaction networks. There are a number of mineralogical and elemental methods currently used to characterize pottery composition, but they...
The Role of Pastoralists and ‘Operational Complexity’ in Shaping the Materiality of Trans-Eurasian Exchange (2018)
For decades, descriptions of prehistoric Eurasian pastoral societies would present ceramic typologies as material evidence for macro scale economic, social, and ideological cohesion – and trans-Eurasian interaction. However, recent investigations that focus more on human-environment interactions and domestic economies reveal a more dynamic and varied past in micro-regions of Eurasia. Pastoral strategies dating to the 3rd-2nd millennium BCE were regionally diverse, and societies were engaged in...
ron Smelting, Stone Carving, and Pottery Production by the Early Settlers in Northeastern Madagascar: Transfer of Techniques and Local Adaptation (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Archaeological Science and African Archaeology: Appreciating the Impact of David Killick" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The project “Stone and Iron by the Rasikajy” started in 2017, focusing on the material remains of iron smelting, soapstone carving, and pottery production in northeastern Madagascar between 700 and 1700 CE. It is a joint project involving scholars from several universities in Switzerland and...
Salt Exploitation in the Northern Ecuadorian Highlands: A Substance of Transformations (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Recent Innovations in Ecuadorian Archaeology" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Salt extraction was always important to local communities due to its uses in food preparation, food preservation, therapeutic practices, and ritual performances. The importance of this mineral for food conservation, nutrition, and other human physiological needs is widely known. However, few local studies have specified the role of this...
Salutary Failures: Bronze Age Metallurgists in China and Their Faulty Seams (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Crafting Culture: Thingselves, Contexts, Meanings" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Creativity and imagination are subjects which do not often appear in the archaeology of craft. Though archaeologists study innovation in relation to a craft’s technological developments and discoveries, we approach such novelties as progress bound rather than creative pursuits. Craft workers are, after all, toiling for other people in...
Scanning Electron Microscopy and Geoarchaeology of Naihehe Cave, Fiji (2018)
This poster reports on field-work and laboratory investigations conducted on geoarchaeological samples from Naihehe Cave, located in the Sigatoka river valley of Viti Levu, Fiji. This research employs novel and exploratory methods, including Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) to determine the elemental content of sediment samples and for detailed imagery useful in grain size and shape...
Scarlet Macaw Avicultural Dynamics in Southern Arizona (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Isotopic and Animal aDNA Analyses in the Southwest/Northwest" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Our understanding of scarlet macaw aviculture throughout the southwestern United States has greatly benefited from recent methodological advances, leading to new discoveries in regional management dynamics, breeding regimes, and exchange networks between the ninth and the fifteenth centuries. These studies have mainly focused...
Scientific Analysis of Metals from the Yinsuodao Site, Yunnan Province (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Recent Research on Early Chinese Borderland Cultures and Archaeological Materials" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Up to now, the Yinsuodao site is one of the earliest Bronze Age sites known in Yunnan Province. This work will present the results of metallographic and lead isotope analyses of a number of metals discovered at this site. The metallographic studies suggest that the metal technology at Yinsuodao represents...
Sclerochemistry in Northwest Mexico: Evaluating Marine Shell Conveyance through Stable Isotope Analysis (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Isotopic and Animal aDNA Analyses in the Southwest/Northwest" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper presents an updated interpretation of marine shell exchange in the NW/SW. Isotopic analyses of marine shell can yield novel insights into regional trade networks. Our paper reviews C and O assays from archaeological assemblages in the NW/SW. These results demonstrate that the northern stretches of the Sea of Cortez...
Sea Shells in the Mountains and Llamas on the Coast: The Vertical Economic Organization of the Paracas in Palpa, South Peru (370–200 BC) (2018)
This research analyzes excavated materials of the Paracas culture (800–200 BC) in southern Peru, particularly obsidian artifacts, malacological finds, and camelid bones. In doing so, different methods including archaeometric techniques, quantification, artifact classification, and species determination are combined to elaborate natural origin, making, distribution, and utilization of the objects. The Paracas remains were excavated by the Palpa Archaeological Project and mainly derive from three...
Searching for Marketplaces at Blue Creek and Xnoha (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Prehispanic Maya Marketplace Investigations in the Three Rivers Region of Belize: First Results" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Marketplaces are a vital component for the economic interdependence of ancient Maya kingdoms. In our view, marketplaces were also definitional components of Maya central places of power as much as the presence of ostentatious presentations of architecture were. The Blue Creek Archaeological...
Seasonal Mobility Patterns During the Middle Holocene on Santa Cruz Island, California (2018)
Data derived from oxygen isotope profiles of mussel shells suggest that sites in the interior of Santa Cruz Island dating between 4700 and 3400 cal BC, the period of the island’s "red abalone middens," were occupied during the spring through early winter, with little or no occupation during the main winter months. In contrast, a small number of oxygen isotope profiles indicates that a large costal site was occupied predominantly during the winter and possibly also the fall, with no occupation...
Sedimentary, Molecular, and Isotopic Characteristics of Bone-Fueled Hearths (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Charred Organic Matter in the Archaeological Sedimentary Record" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Molecular and isotopic analyses of sediments from archaeological combustion features is a relatively new area of study. Applications have the potential to inform us about ancient pyro-technologies and patterns of animal exploitation in a wide range of human contexts but may be particularly informative with regards to...