Island archaeology

In a recent ISJ paper, “Island Archaeology: In Search of a New Horizon”, Boomert and Bright (2007) argue that the field of “island archaeology” should be replaced by an “archaeology of maritime identity”. We disagree and counter that although islands share many physical, biological, and cultural similarities with continental coasts, coastal zones also grade uninterruptedly into riverine, lacustrine, and terrestrial landscapes, raising questions about the validity of their concept of the archaeology of maritime identity. In our view, island archaeology (the application of archaeology to island settings), regardless of past biogeographical underpinnings, has made major contributions to understanding the historical ecology, human impacts, and cultural developments of islands around the world. A focus on islands by archaeologists has encouraged scholars to study the history of island and maritime societies within a comparative framework that is useful for breaking out of the often provincial focus on a single island or archipelago.

The fifth community archaeology workshop was held in June of 2013 on Cayo Sal in the Los Roques Archipelago, Venezuela. The workshop, designed for the students of the secondary school of Gran Roque Island, was the first historical archaeology initiative of the ongoing community archaeology program and the first initiative of its kind in Venezuela. The experience involved group-building activities and lectures by the team on archaeological methods and the history of Cayo Sal. This was followed by two days of excavation on the 19th-century archaeological site of Cayo Sal, located by the saltpans. Students were given the task of excavating, recording and documenting the dig and the materials as they recovered them in their units. An identification guide of diagnostic artifacts was given to each group which facilitated the understanding of what was being excavated in situ. Following the excavation, the students identified and analyzed the recovered material remains assisted by the archaeologists. Finally, they were encouraged to creatively juxtapose the material evidence and the historical background with their own experiences, to inquire on the quotidian life and work of the 19th-century Cayo Sal salt workers. The schoolchildren empathized with their direct past, identified its similarities and differences with their current realities, and communicated this through lively presentations that were both insightful and transformative for them and the archaeological team.

Anatomically Modern Humans (AMHs) dispersed rapidly through island southeast Asia (Sunda and Wallacea) and into Sahul (Australia, New Guinea and the Aru Islands), before 50,000 years ago. Multiple routes have been proposed for this dispersal and all involve at least one multi-day maritime voyage approaching 100 km. Here we use new regional-scale bathymetry data, palaeoenvironmental reconstruction, an assessment of vertical land movements and drift modeling to assess the potential for an initial entry into northwest Australia from southern Wallacea (Timor-Roti). From ∼70,000 until ∼10,000 years ago, a chain of habitable, resource-rich islands were emergent off the coast of northwest Australia (now mostly submerged). These were visible from high points close to the coast on Timor-Roti and as close as 87 km. Drift models suggest the probability of accidental arrival on these islands from Timor-Roti was low at any time. However, purposeful voyages in the summer monsoon season were very ...

La présente contribution vise à préciser les aspects géographiques et chronologiques liés à l’apparition, au développement et au déclin d’un type de construction en pierre sèche localement appelée « torre ». Ces édifices monumentaux, qui présentent une forme de tour tronconique, sont élevés selon un cahier des charges architectural précis, et trouvent leur strict équivalent en Sardaigne avec les milliers de nuraghi monotorre du Bronze ancien et moyen. La publication du détail du maigre corpus des torre de Corse, ainsi que la révision des données chronologiques fournies par les fouilles et les prospections opérées ces cinquante dernières années, seront également l’occasion de souligner l’importance prise par ces monuments dans l’évolution de la construction du discours archéologique depuis les années 1960 et les travaux de Roger Grosjean.

English Summary:


This remarkable book is the fruit of 30 years of investigations of two archaeologists, husband and wife, Maria Magdalena and Andrzej Antczak, on the pre-Hispanic archaeology of the majestic Los Roques Archipelago, Venezuela. The uniqueness of the Los Roques Archipelago within the panorama of insular pre-colonial archaeology in the Americas centers on the discovery of more than 400 human clay figurines on one small island, Dos Mosquises, along with elaborate primary ritual contexts and the remains of a gargantuan queen conch (lobatus gigas) exploitation enterprise. This book is the winner of two of the highest scientific publication awards in Venezuela (2006 & 2009).


Resumen en Español:


Desde el título de este volumen de indiscutible valor, la palabra “prometidas” aplica oportunamente a nuestro maravilloso archipiélago venezolano de Los Roques la alegoría bíblica que coloca al final de un exigente camino hermosas tierras, donde corren ríos de leche y miel. Hacia estas islas con abundantes recursos marinos, entre los cuales destaca el gran caracol marino llamado ‘botuto’, se dirigían las canoas indígenas durante al menos cuatro siglos antes de la conquista europea. Las campañas de explotación de los recursos en las islas dependían del éxito de la actividad ceremonial, testimoniada por centenares de figurinas humanas, incensarios, ocarinas y pipas cerámicas, flautas de hueso y silbatos de concha, recuperados por los arqueólogos en complejos contextos primarios.

La presencia de esta diversidad de objetos en los campamentos temporales de las pequeñas islas oceánicas es un fenómeno excepcional en la arqueología del Caribe. En este sentido, la publicación de esta monografía es el cumplimiento de un prolongado esfuerzo y de un caro anhelo por proporcionar al lector una explicación sólida y coherente de este fenómeno arqueológico único. Es también el final de una importante etapa de ese camino verdaderamente exigente de la investigación arqueológica. A través de sus páginas, con un soporte teórico documental de inusual solidez y pertinencia, se difunde el fruto de muchos años de perseverante dedicación para sus autores, María Magdalena Mackowiak de Antczak y Andrzej Antczak, arqueólogos y antropólogos vinculados desde hace tiempo con la Universidad Simón Bolívar.

Se trata, sin duda, de una obra mayor, enriquecida por 1500 ilustraciones y más de 200 tablas, que describe hallazgos arqueológicos excepcionales recuperados de manera sistemática durante más de 60 campañas de trabajo de campo, y desarrolla propuestas verdaderamente seminales para el entendimiento del significado y la valoración del legado prehispánico en Venezuela y, en especial, en sus territorios insulares.

Este volumen ha sido concebido no solamente como lectura referencial para profesionales y estudiantes de arqueología y antropología, sino también esta dirigido al lector no especializado que puede sentirse atraído por el vibrante, colorido y desconocido pasado prehispánico presentado en estas páginas. También, a través de esta monografía los autores aspiran a infundir El Orgullo por el Pasado, el lema que orienta sus trabajos de investigación y docencia.

Este vasto y complejo proyecto editorial ha sido posible gracias a la concertación de un gran equipo profesional y una venturosa alianza de nuestra Universidad con Banesco y Petrozuata, confluencias que celebramos también como promesas felizmente cumplidas.

El libro ha recibido numerosos premios nacionales incluyendo:

IV Premio Nacional del Libro 2006, Mejor Libro Científico otorgado por el Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Cultura.

2009 Premio Alterno por Mejor Investigación en Ciencias Sociales, otorgado por la ASOVAC (Asociación Venezolana para el Avance de la Ciencia).

2007 Premio Andrés Bello para la Mejor Investigación en Ciencias Sociales otorgado por la Universidad Simón Bolívar.

A “frying pan” of some interest, since it depicts a longboat, (Syros Museum 1163)  was found in a rescue excavation conducted under the direction of the author in the Roussos field at Chalandriani in Syros in 2002-2008. The field lies in the West Sector of the Early Cycladic Chalandriani cemetery . The excavation revealed 28 undisturbed graves of the corbelled type with grave goods more or less similar to those from Tsountas’s excavations, and distinguished by their variety and wealth. The new find (from Grave VII), besides enlarging the corpus of known depictions of longboats on ‘frying pans’, provides an opportunity, because of its well-documented contexts, to understand better certain aspects of these intriguing objects and the EBA II Chalandriani society they reflect.

This 40th volume of the ASLU series is concerned with the study of the Cycladic settled landscape in Late Antiquity and the Byzantine Early Middle Ages. It offers a fresh approach to the history and archaeology of the Cyclades under the light of current archaeological investigations. It is an attempt to interpret human-environmental interaction in order to “read” the relationship between islands, settlements, landscapes and seascapes in the context of the diverse and highly interactive Mediterranean world. The methodology proposed is an interdisciplinary approach, which combines archaeological evidence, literary sources, and observations of the sites and micro-landscapes as a whole, with the advantages offered by the application of new technologies in archaeological research (Geographic Information Systems). The islands of Paros and Naxos are used as case-studies. It is a challenging task to trace how these neighbouring insular communities reacted under the same general circumstances pertaining in the Aegean and to what extent the landscape played a role in this process.

Once considered a backwater of New World prehistory, the Caribbean has now emerged from the archaeological shadows as a critical region for answering a host of questions related to human population dispersal, Neotropical island adaptations, maritime subsistence, seafaring, island interaction networks, and the rise of social complexity, among many others. In this paper, I provide a review of: (1) what is currently known about the antiquity of Pre-Columbian colonization of the Caribbean using archaeological, biological, and oceanographic data; (2) how these data inform on the dispersal of what appear to be many different population movements through time; and (3) the subsequent adaptations (e.g., technological, subsistence, and economic) that took place across the islands after initial contact. Results of more than a century of research demonstrate that the Antilles were settled much earlier than once thought (ca. 7000 cal yr BP), in multiple waves that show strong linkages to South America, but possibly originated from more than one source location. Dispersal was patchy, with several intriguing chronological and spatial disparities that scholars are now investigating in more detail. Beginning ca. 2500 cal yr BP, and accelerating around 1500 cal yr BP, the frequent transport and exchange of goods, services, animals,
plants, knowledge, and spiritual ideologies between the islands as well as mainland areas — particularly South America — testify to the interconnected nature of Pre-Columbian societies in the region. The use of more advanced analytical techniques, including ancient DNA, archaeobotany, stable isotopes, and
various approaches to geochemical and mineralogical sourcing of artifacts, which until recently have been largely underused in the Caribbean, is opening new avenues of research that are creating exciting opportunities for examining ancient Amerindian lifeways.

"In the RBA the ‘pan’ continues to be a widespread type of pottery. In central and North Sardinia the internal base of the vases of this age is decorated with impressions of a comb, hence the name ‘comb facies’. Large vases (dolia) start to appear in significant numbers during this phase.
This is the only period in which differences can be observed in the ceramic production between the southern and the northern part of the island. In the south an undecorated facies evolves, with nuragic grey ware, and the comb facies in the north. The reasons for this difference are still not clear, but it may be due to external influences, as the south of the island had more contact with the Mycenaeans. It’s difficult to divide the period in two chronological distinct phases (RBA1 and RBA2).
In the RBA Sardinia had more contacts with the Eastern Mediterranean, and Cypriot style arms and utensils; new technologies influenced the development of metallurgy. The greatest developments were in settlement organization. In the RBA, single towered tholos nuraghe predominated, also with complex nuraghe with two to five towers. Their use may have varied, but on the whole they can be considered to have always been principally dwelling places. Villages may also have grown around the nuraghe even though there are villages not associated with nuraghe.
The discovery of ceramic materials in rectangular structures (‘megaron’ temples) and in springs and wells, which have been identified as cult ritual sites, may indicate that sacred architecture could have already started in this period."

"In the FBA, the ceramic industry shows a great variety of forms. These were carenated bowls, storage jars, braziers and clay cooking stands, amphoras, jugs with large handles and askoid jugs (closed vases with narrow asymmetrical necks). These were often with engraved decorative motifs. Based on the pottery types, it’s possible to differentiate three phases, the last one is unlikely to have been distinguishable from the EIA. Metallurgy also developed greatly during this period, and this provides us with important information on the technology used in the economic activities of the Nuragic people.
In this period, the construction of nuraghe stopped and the population lived in villages. The nuraghe were used as food stores or for cult rituals, although in rare cases they continued to be inhabited. When the walls of the nuraghe deteriorated and the upper parts of the walls fell down, rather than rebuild them the people used the stones for building their huts. These were built around the nuraghe and sometimes even inside the courtyard or bastion of the nuraghe. In this period the ground plan of the huts were not only circular in form but also trapezoid, elliptical and rectangular. There were central courtyards in the groups of huts that formed the villages. This is the phase of the largest development of the sacred architecture, represented by megaron temples, circular structures, and sacred wells and springs."

In Anthropological papers of the American Museum of Natural History, no. 93, pp.113-136.

This work presents new archaeological evidence, from the interior freshwater tree islands within Everglades National Park’s  Shark River Slough, that demonstrates the south Florida environment was sufficiently stable to have supported intensive occupation of interior freshwater tree islands during the Late Archaic period, suggesting much greater populations than were previously thought to exist. In the Ten Thousand Islands, she presents new evidence demonstrating a long tradition of shell ring and shell architecture spanning the Late Archaic through Woodland Transition within both the interior wetlands and southwest Florida coast. This reflects an emergence of social complexity much earlier than was previously thought.

Updated Resource Assessment and Research Agenda 2019 for the Isles of Scilly. Includes results from several recent projects which have made major advances in our understanding of Scilly during prehistory, particularly during the Mesolithic, Neolithic and Early Bronze Age.

http://www.scilly.gov.uk/sites/default/files/planning-apps/SHERF%20Resource%20Assessment%20and%20Research%20Agenda.pdf

Ustica is a small island off the coast of Palermo city (Sicily, Italy). It was occupied by human settlements since Neolithic times. During the Middle Bronze Age (half of 2nd millennium BC) it was interested by the presence of an important fortified village (Spatafora F., Ustica tra il Tirreno e la Sicilia, in BTCGI, XXI, Pisa-Rome-Naples 2012, 427-439). First analyses on the samples (charcoals, seeds and microfossils) coming from the vases and the soils of the cultual area of the village are here presented, discussed and contextualized in the framework of 2nd millennium BC analyses from Thyrrenian area.

Naxos, the largest island of the Cyclades, in the center of the Archipelago, swayed over time between the two ends of the pendulum of insularity, namely between isolation and connectivity, in almost every aspect of human life (society, politics, economy, art, worship etc.). The article examines the position and importance of the island in the Archipelago but also its interaction with the neighboring mainland. It seeks the identity of its inhabitants and whether it differed from that of neighboring islands. It is a diachronic study based on the methods of Historical Archaeology, extending from the Early Iron Age to the end of the Roman period. In this respect, the limitations imposed by the material remains of the past can be overcome by the exploitation of textual evidence in conjunction with evidence found in the landscape and the natural resources.
The starting point is the image of Naxos in myth and literature as a place chosen for the upbringing of gods (i.e., Zeus’ and Dionysus’) or as a deserted landscape of abandonment and pain (in the case of Ariadne). The article specifies which of these traditions are of local origin and which are panhellenic. Subsequently, local history issues related to the aspect of insularity are examined, such as: the trade of Naxian goods, the spread of Naxian coins, the mobility of Naxians as individuals (artists, professionals, pilgrims, etc.), products imports, the participation in alliances (i.e. Delian League, Second Athenian League, Nesiotic League), issues of colonization and mobility of Naxians in general etc.

Gallipoli peninsula is one of the most significant geographical point for the movement of the prehistoric
populations between Balkans and Anatolia. Apart from the narrow isthmus connecting the
peninsula to the European continent, it is encircled with the Aegean Sea in the south and Marmara
Sea in the north which makes it rather island geography. In this paper, a reassessment of the four
prehistoric mounds dating from Early Neolithic to Bronze Ages; Değirmenlik, Karaağaçtepe
(Protesilaos), Akbaş, and Asartepe, all situated on the south end of the peninsula are discussed.
Although these prehistoric sites are situated inside the Gallipoli National Park, they are heavily subject
to destruction by natural processes and agricultural activities. The future surveys and studies
on the Neolithic Period would help us to better understand the details on the initial habitation of
the peninsula.
Key words: Gallipoli Peninsula, Prehistory, Prehistoric Mounds, Prehistoric Settlements, Prehistoric Turkish Thrace.

"The funeral deposits and the death domain in general have often been highly considered by scientific research for the significant informations they furnish, frequently more interesting than domestic contexts. Since the origins of the sepulture, the defunct is accompanied in the hereafter by the cultural indicators of his group. In this way, symbolically, the community comes with him in a space imagined in the collective believes. These rituals with great religious value have engendered a form of respect of the tombs, giving in consequence an important number of non-perturbed remains collections and allowing the establishment of general chronologies.
In the articulation between third and second millennium BC, some ceramic forms inherited from the sardinian bell beaker group bring the originality of the funeral deposits of south Corsica and Sardinia. Put together in the appellations of “Bonnanaro culture” in Sardinia and “taffoni-hypogées” in Corsica, these homogeneous productions permit to interrogate about their diffusion, their chronology and their real cultural content. The results of the recent re-examination of these collections will be of service to the general reflection."

In this poster we will present the evolution of the underwater archaeological research regarding the island of Crete (Greece) during the past decades, aiming into increasing the knowledge about it. To this end there will be provided a brief outline of the history of research, from the explorations of the British School of Archaeology in the late 1950s and the survey of Jacques-Yves Cousteau’s team in the 1970s, to the recent foundation (2010) of the Office of the Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities at Crete, along with a recap of the most remarkable discoveries of the underwater archaeology of the island. Finally we will mention the current status of the research and its future prospects.

This book offers a comparative study of the archaeology of colonisation, abandonment, and resettlement of the Mediterranean islands. Presenting an extensive and updated body of evidence, it provides a pan-Mediterranean review of island data, a task last completed in the mid-1990s. The study is supported by a database of 150 islands, from the Balearics in the west to Cyprus in the east, and includes the North African islands, which are often overlooked in syntheses of the Mediterranean. Chronologically, the book covers a period of over 10,000 years (from the Upper Palaeolithic to the Iron Age). Collectively, the results of this comparative approach exceed the insights that can be gained from studies of individual Mediterranean islands or even island groups. The comparative and thematic study encourages anthropological reflections on the archaeology of the islands, ultimately focusing on people rather than geographical units, and specifically on the relations between islanders, mainlanders, and the creation of islander identities. Islands offer ideal case studies for exploring social connectivity, episodes of colonisation, abandonment, and alternating phases of cultural interaction and isolation. Their societies display different attitudes towards the land and the sea, which in turn cast light on group identities. The book thus advances theoretical discussions in “Island Archaeology” and their relevance to Mediterranean archaeology.

ENDORSEMENTS:

"Helen Dawson has provided a strikingly original, thoroughly up-to-date and comprehensive study of Mediterranean island archaeology, adopting a pan-Mediterranean perspective unparalleled in the literature. Treating issues of island colonisation and abandonment, made easy-to-understand with a generous spread of graphs and tables, this volume will be essential reading for anyone interested in island archaeology, within and beyond the Mediterranean."

- A. Bernard Knapp, Dept of Archaeology, University of Glasgow; Cyprus-American Archaeological Research Institute -

"An engrossing account of the complex story of human colonisation, abandonment and resettlement of the islands of the Mediterranean. Theoretically informed and rooted in a detailed understanding of the archaeological evidence, this book is recommended reading for students of both Mediterranean prehistory and island archaeology."

- Ruth Whitehouse, Emeritus Professor, UCL Institute of Archaeology -

Reviewed by Dr Dimitra Mylona:

https://www.academia.edu/29101268/Orbis_2015_13_Review_Dawsons_Mediterranean_Voyages