The Archaeology of Wetlands

DOCUMENT Citation Only James Conolly. Michael Obie. Ana Aristizabal Henao. Dylan Morningstar. Becca Scott.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. I provide an overview of the relationship between Archaic through Middle Woodland peoples and the ecologically heterogenous wetlands and waterways of the Kawartha Lakes region of south-central Ontario. I focus on our research group's survey of submerged shorelines which has revealed a substantial underwater archaeological record that demonstrates a longer...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Byron Smith. Timothy Beach. Sheryl Luzzadder-Beach.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Growing scholarship since the 1980s has focused on ancient Maya–wetland interactions after raised field agriculture was revealed in northern Belize. From this, mounting evidence indicates extensive reliance on seasonal and perennial wetlands for ancient Maya farming, aquaculture, and water retention across the region. These systems would have served as major...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Iride Tomazic.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Wetlands are valuable ecosystems for many animal species, but they also present critical ecosystems for humans. By protecting against floods, erosion and improving water quality, wetlands present a valuable source for human food procurement and activities. In this paper, I exemplify the role of wetlands from the Southern Carpathian Basin by presenting...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Wilhemina Colón Loder. Sheryl Luzzadder-Beach. Timothy Beach.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Wetlands played a crucial role in the subsistence methods of early complex polities, including the ancient Maya. The scale of canal development in the Birds of Paradise wetland field complex reflect the status, technological power, and agronomic wealth that wetlands provided to the ancient Maya in this region during the Maya Late Preclassic to the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Elspeth Geiger.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Nearly 15% of Michigan is covered by wetlands. These environments are widely regarded as critical components of Michigan's unique ecological makeup. From an archaeological perspective, the biological diversity, productivity, and dependability of these natural communities fulfill a variety of societal needs. Moreover, as a site for seasonal aggregation,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Laura Bossio.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Archaeologists are well poised to investigate the past, discover what cannot be seen today, and bring that knowledge to the present in meaningful and effective ways. One important field of archaeological study is that of human relationships with wetlands; many wetlands have already been destroyed worldwide, yet these ecosystems are both culturally and...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Emily Hammer.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The marshlands of the Tigris-Euphrates delta were for millennia among the largest wetland systems in Eurasia. The Gulf coast, the river delta, and marshes extended further north ca. 8000–2000 BCE than they do today. As a result, the world’s earliest cities in southern Mesopotamia may have emerged 6,000–5,000 years ago within or on the edge of wetland and...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kendy Altizer.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Located between Charleston and Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, the Santee Delta is a unique wetland habitat characterized by tidal marshes and low-lying barrier islands. Situated between the North and South Santee Rivers, the delta is a critical stopping point for a number of migratory birds and is also a popular duck hunting destination. However, historically,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Mark Schurr. Terrance Martin. Madeleine McLeester.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The same glacial processes that produced Lake Michigan in midwestern North America also produced numerous wetlands of many types at the southern end of the lake. A diverse wetland matrix of smaller lakes, rivers, streams, ponds, marshes, swamps, bogs, and fens was once found throughout the region. Many of these wetlands have been destroyed or altered by urban...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Sally Brockwell. Colin Pardoe.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. We compare residential patterning of hunter-gatherer/forager populations along wetlands on the coastal plains of the Top End of the Northern Territory of Australia and the Riverine Plain of the Murray Darling River Basin, New South Wales. Although climates are very different in these regions, people needed to adapt to the variability, as well as the specific...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Danielle Riebe. Attila Gyucha. Balázs Nagy.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. People are intricately connected to the land around them, and throughout time, people have manipulated their surroundings to better fit their immediate social, cultural, economic, or subsistence needs with little to no thought about long-term environmental consequences. The Great Hungarian Plain is no exception, and during different periods in the past,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Madeleine McLeester. Jesse Casana. David Overstreet. David Grignon.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Today, the dense forests of the northern Great Lakes seem an unlikely place for expansive ancestral Native American agricultural fields, especially ones dedicated to sun-loving crops, like maize. The short growing season in these northern climes, dense forest, alternative staples like wild rice, and past settlement history all would suggest a limited...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jennifer Farquhar. Arlene Rosen. Sarantuya Dalantai. Tserendagva Yadmaa.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Paleoclimate studies across northeast Asia document a pronounced drying and cooling trend across desert and desert-steppe environments around 6,000 years ago, intensifying between 4500 and 4000 BP. While conditions led to the deterioration of lake and wetland habitats, past archaeological research based on museum collections and a limited number of excavated...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Martin Menz.

This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Wetlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Most prominent Woodland period ceremonial centers along the Gulf Coast are located near wetlands, which provided access to a wide variety of resources for the hunter-fisher-gatherer populations who built them. Researchers investigating these sites often suggest that these rich environments created the conditions for increasingly settled lifeways, complex...