Anthro weeks 7-8
Settlement expansion
The eastern region of the Candian Arctic and many islands and island groups of the Pasific ocean have been occupied within the last 5000 years
-Settlement began in the eastern arctic about 4000 years ago and has included several different archaeology little known groups.
-Todays Inuit are desended from the Thule people, who migrated into the area from the west
-approx 1000 years ago and replaced the Dorset cuture
-Despite being close to Austrailia- New Zealand has only been occupied fo the last 1000 years
Some of the polynesian islands (FIGI, TONGA, SAMOA, COOK ISLANDS) settled between 3,500-2,500 years ago
Rapa Nui (Easter Island) and Hawaii were settled approx 1000 years ago
5 things a civilization must have:
Civilizations emgered approx 5000 years ago
1) At least one city (5000 ppl minimum)
2) Monumental architucture (Large structures like palaces, pyrimids, megaliths
3)Subsistence based on agriculture (Complex food production/food storage techniques, Craft production is often specalized and highly developed.
4)A state level of political organization (Stratified society, territory defended externally by an army and internally by police, Seperate governemntal institutions to enforce laws and to collect taxes/tribute run by the elite that monopolizes the use of force
5) A system of writing (Earilest widely accepted form of writing =5100 years ago, Mesopotamia is called Cuneiform
Ancient civilization examples
1) Teotihuacan (Mexico)- Monumental architecture
2)Rome (Italy)- Army, state level organization, specialized craftmenship and writing
What was the earilest civilization?
Sumerian Civilization
Comprised several different city states such as Ur, Nippur and Lagash in Mesopotamia (mostly present day Iraq)
Examples of other major civilization that followed in the region
-Akkadians
-Assyrians
-Babylonians
-Persian, Roman, Islamic empires
second oldest civilization
Ancient Egypt approx 5000 years ago with development of hieroglyphics
Series of stable (old,middle new kingdom) seperated by peroids of instability (Intermediate peroids)
Many archaeological sites associated with ancient Egyptian civilization
Examples- Abu simbel and the Luxor temples, valley of the kings, prymaid of Djoser, prymaids of Menkaure, Khafre and the great prymid of Giza
In the more recent times, region was dominated by the Roman and Isalmic empires
The Minoans
First European civilization escpecially on the island of Crete (Greece) approx 4000 years ago
Known for enormous buildings initially labeled minoan palaces (likely served a variety of religious/economic purposes)
Little is known about the strcture of Minoan society but trading via boat was very important to their economy
The minoans had two writing systems and none of them have fully been deciphered yet.
example- The Hittites, Mycenaeans, Greeks, Etrussans in subsequent times. Macedonian, Roman, Byzantinl empires are in more recent times
Earilest Asian Civilization
Indus valley or Haroppan Civ
Pakistan approx 4400 years ago
First evidence of sewage infrastructure that carried waste out of the residential areas
Writing system not yet deciphered and their political system is unknown
Well known examples=Harappa and Mohenjo-daro
In China, the shang civilization
emerged 3800 years ago
Anyang was the shang dynasty capital
-Exacavation uncovered 11 major royal tombs
-The foundations of palaces and ritual sites, containing weapons of war and remains from both animal/human sacrifices
-Tens of thousands of bronze, jade, stone, bone, ceramic articats
-Stratifed society led by a king
-Chinese writing system starts to develop during the shang
-Subsequent civilizations in the region inside Zhou+Han
The first civ in Mesoamerica =Olmec
approx 3,500 Y.A in mexico
First to produce ritual bloodletting and played the Mesoamerican ballgame, but still unknown
Famous artwork, particularily colossal scultped heads
Developed writing as well as one of the earilest uses of the concept "o"
Important sites include San Lorenzo and La Venta
Examples= Maya, Teotihuacan, Toltec, Zapotec, Aztec
First civ to emerge in South America
Chavin (Peru) approx 2500 years ago
The best known site for the civiization is Chavin de Huantar located in the mountains of Peru.
Was likely the religious centre of the Chavin people and their political capital
Includes a complex of teraces and squares, surrounded by the same strctures of dressed stone and zoomorphic oramentation
Much remains to be learned about the Chavin.
Subsequent civilizations include the Moche, Tiwanaku, Nasca, and Inka
What causes civilizations to collapse?
Most common explanations can be categoruzed as ecological,social/political or ideological
Ecological explanations often some enviromental occuance that makes it impossible to provide food and maintain the civilization
Climate change, epidemic diseases amoung crops, overuse of the soil for farming, catastropes (earthquakes/tsunamis)
Social Political explainations often invoke conflict as an important variable in the collapse of civilizations
Infighting can lead to the use of reasources for war or other forms of conflict @ the expense of other aspects of a civilization like food production
Religion/ ideology can also cause collapse- Redirecting ressources for religion and ritual at the expense of subsistence even in situations of high stress
The last 5000 years in NA
Archaeologists usually divide the history of NA into prehistoric (pre contact)or historic (post contact) archaeology
Generally, prehistoric archaeology focsuses on the archeology of first nations and Inuit (and their ancestors) before the arrival of europeans
Historic archaeology tends to focus on the archaeology of Europeans or people of the European descent in NA
After the Archaic peroid, observing lots of cultural density in the archaelogical record
Northwestern plains (alberta)
Archaeological cultures are defined based on projectile points
5000 years ago: Middle plains archaic,oxbow culture (consensus that the oxbow complex developed out of eariler occupations characterized by side-notched points variously called mummy cave)
Followed by Mckean/Duncan/Hanna Culture
Two explanations: Intrusive culture, originally from Great Basin of Nevada, Utah and adjoining states or a sigle unbroken development from oxbow-mckean
Followed by Pelican lake culture (believed to have been developed out of the Mcklean complex
Followed by Besant, Avonlea, old womens culture
Generally, reliance on bison (start of the practice of mass communal killing of bison)
Also exploring other environments (ex- Boreal forest and mountains/foothills environmental zones)
These various cultures store tool kit is dominated by projectile points, end scrappers, random flake scrapper and bi-facial knives
-Dominat elements in the tool kit would have been organic and have not survived in the archaeological record
Cahokia (near st louis, missourri)
UNESCO world herritage site
occupied between the 9-14th century and with an estimated popuation of about 20,000 people
Largest prehistoric settlement north of mexico
More than 100 mounds:Largest is estimated to have covered 12 acres and to have been close to 100 feet in height.
Head smashed in Bufflao Jump (Fort Macleod, Alberta)
UNESSO WORLD HERRITAGE SITE
10 meters thick cultural desposits, containing projectile points/ bison bones
Site was used for several thousand years and inclides drive lanes to direct buffalo off the clif.
Provides considerable evidence related to the communal hunting of bison
Mesa Verde National Park (colorado)
UNESCO WORLD HERRITAGE SITE
Representative of peoples and cultures of the American Southwest from several hundred years ago to more than 1000 years ago
More than 4000 archaelogical sites, including more than 600 cliff dwellings
Ozette (washington)
"Pompeii of North America"
-Village of the Makah people covered by a mudslide around 1750
-Several large multifamily houses + 55,000 artifacts were recovered (roughly 30,000 were made of wood) spanning from roughly 2000 years ago
Many activites are represented, including whale/seal hunting and salmon/halibuit fishing
Hisorical archaeology tends to focus on archaelogical sites associated with Europeans or people with European decnent
Wide variety of sites include
Trade posts
Mission sites
Settlement/ farming sites
Urban sites
Industural production (bricks, ceramics/glass)
L'anse aux meadows (New foundland)
UNSECO world herritage site ans WHS
Norse settlement
approx 1000 CE
Oldest reliability dated site created by Europeans in NA
Eight buidings? presence of women?
The vikings did not have a good relationship with local Indigineous peoples in Newfoundland and abandomed the settlement
Old Quebec City:
UNESCO world herritage site
French colonial city
Contains many archaeological sites from the prehistoric, contact, French and British colonial and modern peroids
Former colonial capital (New France, province of Canada)
Fort Edmonton
Five differnet forts with the same name 1795-1914
The last one was located near the legistlature building by the river
Forts were central locations for the trade
Eventually replaced by the ranching settlement and argriculture lifestyle
3 Major changes in Subsistence Practices:
1- approx two million years ago people started incoperating significant amounts of meat into their diet
2-Use of fire to cook, which increaced the diversity of the plants and animals that could be eaten
3-People domesticate plants/animals, creating a substantial food surplus between 15-12000 years ago
(Surplus significantly increaced several thousand years ago, when people began practicing intensive agriculture)
The surplus was enough that enabeled a large proportion of the production not to be directly invloved in the collection/prodution of food
More recently, industrialism sifnificantly increaced the food surplus once again
General trend over the last 5000 years twards increasingly complex and larger scale political systems (kingdoms/empires)
-Basis sequence of political systems starts with bands, tribes to chiefdoms to states to empires
No one system is better than the other- all closely related to other elememts of that societys cuture, such as subsistence strategies
Contemporary Archaeology:
Shift to contemporary archaeology after Dr. William Rathije's garbology project (showed a disconnect between what people said they did at the household level and what they actually did as indicated by their trash, popular preceptions of landfills were differnet from relality
Atari games
Gaming consoles in New Mexico
Atari games were apart of a generations cultural herritage and mark a tipping point in the history of technology
Trash in outer space, incliding what was left on the moon
Doing archaeology of the contemporary world also invloves dealing with conpemporary issues
Work alongside reserchers from environental geography, environmental science, discord and sustainability studies
Climate change leads to the destruction of archaegical sites (glaciers/coatal erosion)
Archaeogists bring foward "old" solutions to some of the problems we have, by seeing what people in the past were doing. (management of forests/natural resources)
Pseudoarchaeology:
There are often multiple explanations for a particuar phenmenon (collapse of a civilization)
Some are rather bizzare and include aliens and other strange phenomena= PSEUDOARCHAEOLOGY
-Belief that past humans did not have the skill or knowledge to be the creators of the archaeological record, some external force had to be invloved
Pseudoarchaeology may look silly, but it is often related to racism
Pseudoarchaeology explantions can be attrative but they are not based on facts.