The Technology of Metallurgy and Evolving Views of Its Development in Prehistoric Thailand

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Paradigms Shift: New Interpretations in Mainland Southeast Asian Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

In the archaeology of prehistoric Thailand, the sub-field of archaeometallurgy has undergone numerous changes in established perceptions, both anthropologically and technologically. This paper introduces the Symposium and overviews recent shifts that characterize how metallurgy in Thailand has come to be understood today. These shifts include evidence that copper-based metallurgy appeared in the late 2nd millennium BCE and that large-scale copper mining and massive production proceeded over subsequent centuries at the community level at a cluster of settlements centered in the ore-rich Khao Wong Prachan Valley, in sites excavated by the Thailand Archaeometallurgy Project(TAP). Smelting may have been carried out by kin-related groups that practiced their craft aggregated closely with other such groups. At these sites there are few markers of an elite-focused control of the local industry that, it is argued, developed within a heterarchical, socio-political context with only sparse evidence of emerging social complexity until later prehistory. Analytical evidence supports the premise that Valley products, copper ingots, and other goods (e.g. shell bangles) were being distributed widely along established exchange networks. Thus, this production center offers an example of how metallurgical developments can be understood elsewhere in MSEA.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Paradigms Shift: New Interpretations in Mainland Southeast Asian Archaeology   •
• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 23518