Borderland Processes and the Question of BMAC in NE Iran

Summary

How frontiers and borders are conceptualized in archaeology is critically influenced by the approaches and perspectives in culture contact research. Absence of written documents from Bronze Age Central Asia severely limits the application of such theories. The nature of the Bronze Age civilization of Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex (BMAC) in Central Asia, and its dispersion to neighboring NE Iran has been a long-lasting question in study of Prehistoric Western Asia. This paper aims to examine the BMAC presence in NE Iran, using Tepe Hissar as a case study, to understand how BMAC interacted with local cultures in this region. The evidence for existence of BMAC in NE Iran and the nature and extent of BMAC’s dispersion out of Central Asia is revisited from the perspective of frontier and borderland studies. The goal of this paper is to identify different types of borderland processes that occurred in NE Iran, where these two cultures came into contact. In order to hypothesize about this interaction sphere, I turn to borderland theories, specifically the "continuum of boundary dynamics" and "borderland matrix" models in order to conceptualize the material culture evidence for BMAC in Iran as markers of various borderland processes. 

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 22726