Archaeological site formation processes in northwestern Patagonia, Mendoza Province, Argentina

2017 ◽  
Vol 32 (6) ◽  
pp. 605-621 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alfonsina Tripaldi ◽  
Marcelo A. Zárate ◽  
Gustavo A. Neme ◽  
Adolfo F. Gil ◽  
Miguel Giardina ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Site Formation ◽  
Site Formation Processes ◽  
Formation Processes

The Archaeological Record

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manjil Hazarika
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Northeast India ◽  
Site Formation ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Site Formation Processes ◽  
Formation Processes ◽  
Site Structure ◽  
Reserve Forest ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
Ways Of Life

This chapter elaborates the data and results of the explorations conducted in the Garbhanga Reserve Forest. The area has been intensively surveyed for the location of potential archaeological sites and the collection of ethnographic data in order to draw direct historical analogies. An ‘area-approach’ study has been conducted in order to formulate a general model for archaeological site structure, locations, geomorphic situations, and site formation processes that can be used for archaeological study in the hilly landscape of Northeast India. Present-day agricultural implements have been analysed and compared with Neolithic implements in order to reconstruct ancient farming culture by way of undertaking systematic study of modern peasant ways of life in the study area. The ideological significance of stone artefacts as ‘thunderstone’ in Northeast India and among the Karbis has also been discussed.

Identifying the Brazil nut effect in archaeological site formation processes

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 267-281 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Luria ◽  
Alexander Fantalkin ◽  
Ezra Zilberman ◽  
Eyal Ben-Dor
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Site Formation ◽  
Site Formation Processes ◽  
Formation Processes ◽  
Brazil Nut ◽  
Brazil Nut Effect

Soil Genesis and Site-Formation Processes

2004 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vance T. Holliday
Keyword(s):  
Soil Formation ◽  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Site Formation ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Site Formation Processes ◽  
Formation Processes ◽  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Natural Processes ◽  
Natural Formation ◽  
Pedogenic Processes

Pedogenic processes that produce or alter the soils associated with a landscape (buried or unburied) also modify the archaeological sites and other traces of human activity associated with that landscape and buried landscapes. The wide range of processes that form soils can profoundly affect the archaeological record. Pedogenesis, therefore, is an important component of the processes of archaeological site formation. Archaeological “site-formation processes” are those processes that modify artifacts and archaeological sites from the moment they were formed until they are uncovered by archaeologists (Stein, 2001b, pp. 37–38). Understanding formation processes is crucial in archaeology because archaeologists use the patterns of artifacts in the ground to infer behaviors. Formation processes identify patterns that are created by ancient behaviors and separate those patterns from the ones created by later cultural and natural processes (Stein, 2001b, p. 37). In his influential volume Formation Processes of the Archaeological Record, Schiffer (1987, p. 7) notes that archaeologists try to infer past behavior based on the archaeological record, but the record “must be handled with great care by the investigator seeking to infer past behaviors, for the evidence that survives has been changed in many ways by a variety of processes.” These processes introduce variability and ambiguity into the archaeological record. Schiffer (1987, p. 7) further distinguishes between cultural processes, in which the agency of transformation is human behavior, and noncultural processes, which stem from processes of the natural environment. Natural formation processes are many and varied and include plants, animals, wind, water, ice, and gravity, among others. Soil formation is also identified as an important process of site formation. Schiffer (1987) provides a comprehensive discussion of natural site-formation processes, which are summarized by Stein (2001b). Nash and Petraglia (1987) and Goldberg et al. (1993) also provide a number of case histories of natural formation processes identified at archaeological sites. Because soil formation represents the alteration of rock and sediment (chapter 1), pedogenic processes are important natural processes in the formation of archaeological sites. Other weathering processes that are significant in site formation can be grouped as “diagenetic alterations.”

Soils and Landscape Evolution

2004 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vance T. Holliday
Keyword(s):  
Landscape Evolution ◽  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Environmental Indicators ◽  
Site Formation ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Site Formation Processes ◽  
Formation Processes ◽  
Four Dimensions ◽  
External Component ◽  
A Site

Soils and archaeological sites are intimately related to the landscape. Investigating soils across past and present landscapes provides a means of reconstructing and understanding the regional environmental and geomorphic context of archaeological site settings and specific site locations, regional site formation processes, and aspects of the resources available to people in a region. Archaeological sites tend to occupy small segments of the landscape, but human activity may affect a much larger area, and in any case, people wander far and wide from sites, interacting with the environment—including the landscape. Thus, no matter whether a site is just a lithic scatter or bone bed or if it is a tell, understanding the regional landscape is an important part of understanding a site and human behavior, and soils are an important means of understanding a landscape. Soils are also important in reconstructing the evolution of landscapes and, consequently, the evolution of archaeological sites. That is, landscape evolution is an important external component of site-formation processes. Landscapes form the physical framework or underpinning for people and their activities and their resulting sites. As landscapes evolve, so do human activities and so do sites. Soils are key to recognizing and interpreting the evolutionary processes that shape the landscape and associated archaeological sites. Furthermore, the concept of landscape evolution also 1) is a logical continuation of the discussion of soil stratigraphy (chapters 5, 6) because it places soil stratigraphy in three or even four dimensions; 2) is a complement to the discussion of soils as environmental indicators (chapter 8), because landscape evolution can be linked to environmental change and because the evolution of the landscape itself, regardless of changes in other factors, represents a change in the environment from a human perspective; and 3) provides yet another means for predicting site locations. The discussion in this section, therefore, represents an integration of some of the principals outlined previously. Some of the studies presented in other chapters, such as the work on the Loess Plateau of China (chapters 6 and 8), and at Harappa and along the Ravi River (chapter 4), are good examples of landscape reconstructions for very large regions and are not repeated here.

scholarly journals DECODING AN EARLY HOLOCENE SAHARAN STRATIFIED SITE. CERAMIC DISPERSION AND SITE FORMATION PROCESSES IN THE TAKARKORI ROCK-SHELTER, ACACUS MOUNTAINS, LIBYA

2004 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefano Biagetti ◽  
Francesca Merighi ◽  
Savino di Lernia
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Site Formation ◽  
Site Formation Processes ◽  
Formation Processes ◽  
Ceramic Analysis ◽  
Human Occupation ◽  
Hunter Gatherers ◽  
Archaeological Material ◽  
History Of ◽  
Pastoral Neolithic

The surface pottery from a well-preserved Holocene archaeological site in south-western Libya is analysed. The collection suggests a long and protracted human occupation of the shelter, from Late Acacus (Mesolithic) hunter-gatherers to Late Pastoral (Neolithic) herders. Aim of the work is to decode the dynamic history of the site via the study of its surface elements, both artefacts and ecofacts, and the way they interacted over the millennia. To do this, traditional ceramic analysis is combined with recently developed methods of description imported from sedimentology, stressing the potentialities of surface archaeological material. In this framework, spatial analysis of scattered potsherds, in connection with their quantitative and qualitative features and chronological attribution, appears of main relevance in the analysis of site formation processes and postdepositional events that altered the archaeological deposit, transforming its present surface.

scholarly journals Interpreting archaeological site-formation processes at a mountain ice patch: A case study from Langfonne, Norway

The Holocene ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 095968362097277
Author(s):  
Lars Holger Pilø ◽  
James H Barrett ◽  
Trond Eiken ◽  
Espen Finstad ◽  
Sunniva Grønning ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Site ◽  
High Elevation ◽  
Site Formation ◽  
Site Formation Processes ◽  
Spatial Patterning ◽  
Formation Processes ◽  
Natural Processes ◽  
Yield Information ◽  
Combining Data ◽  
Southern Norway

In the context of global warming, ice patches are increasingly important foci of high-elevation archaeology. Langfonne in Jotunheimen, central southern Norway, is uniquely suited to provide a window onto site formation processes and taphonomy in this novel archaeological setting. Here the site record from systematic survey includes the largest number of arrows, bones and antlers from a single ice patch worldwide. Combining data from these finds with the results of glaciological investigations provides an opportunity to interpret the influence of archaeological site formation processes and taphonomy on chronological and spatial patterning. It is inferred that the spatial patterning of artefacts at Langfonne is partly a result of displacement by ice movement, meltwater and other natural processes. Nevertheless, the finds yield information regarding past hunting practices and the extent of ice at different times. An early cluster of finds from c.6000 cal yr BP may result from ice deformation which has brought early objects to the surface. The number of arrows increases from c. 1700 cal yr BP onwards, peaking around c.1200 cal yr BP. Artefacts from this period show a wide spatial distribution indicating both the preferential survival of more recent finds and that they were lost when the ice patch was large. Based on comparison with the chronology of natural bone and antler samples from the site, the greater number of finds of this date may also reflect a period of increased hunting.

Ethnographic text formation processes

1998 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 321-349 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lee Cronk
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Anthropology ◽  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Site Formation ◽  
Site Formation Processes ◽  
Formation Processes ◽  
Detailed Understanding ◽  
The Past ◽  
Scientific Approach ◽  
Text Formation ◽  
Further Development

Although the textualist critique of ethnography has challenged the possibility of science in cultural anthropology, insights provided by that critique are crucial for the further development of a scientific approach in the discipline. The value of the textualist critique of ethnography for the development of scientific ethnology can best be seen through an analogy with archaeology. Just as archaeologists' ability to reconstruct the past has been enhanced, not undermined, by a detailed understanding of archaeological site formation processes, so can ethnologists' ability to understand patterns within and among human societies be enhanced through a better understanding of ethnographic text formation processes. Key elements of the textualist critique of ethnography, including an emphasis on reflexivity, multivocality, and the process of writing ethnography, are great aids in the elucidation of ethnographic text formation processes.

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