Experimental Archaeology as a Method to Replicate the Ornaments of the Arma Veirana Burial: Overview of the Ongoing Experiments

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The discovery of an Early Mesolithic (10,000–9000 cal BP) newborn buried in Arma Veirana Cave (Erli, Italy) is very important both for the rarity of prehistoric newborn burials and for the richness and diversity of its grave goods. Those are composed of 84 perforated *Columbella rustica and four perforated *Glycymeris sp. with different levels of use-wear. Our project studies experimentally how they were made and worn, to help situate them within their social construct. To do this, we use experimental archaeology to inform us on the physical constraints and possible techniques involved in the creation of shell ornaments, as well as explore how physical movements may have affected their use wears. This poster will focus on the framework of the experiments in order to showcase the potential of using experimental archaeology in the scientific process. It will present the steps required to produce shell beads similar to the ones found in the Arma Veirana newborn burial as well as those required to replicate their use wear, documented through a microscopic analysis. The poster will also briefly present the results of our experiments and discuss how those may shed light on bead inheritance within prehistoric societies.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• SAA 2021: General Sessions

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 33421