Making Pots and Potters in the Bronze Age Maros Villages of Kiszombor-Új-Élet and Klárafalva-Hajdova

2008 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 355-380 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kostalena Michelaki
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Group I ◽  
The Creation ◽  
The One ◽  
The Bronze Age

This article examines the choices potters made while collecting and preparing their raw materials, forming, finishing and firing their pots in the Bronze Age villages of Kiszombor-Új-Élet (2600–2000 cal. bc) and Klárafalva-Hajdova (2000–1650 cal. bc) in present-day southeastern Hungary. Following the one-thousand-year-long ceramic tradition of these villagers, known archaeologically as members of the Maros group, I highlight choices that were shared by all, suggesting deeply engrained ideas about how Maros pots should be made, versus choices that were more restricted in distribution, suggesting a smaller group of potters, of greater skill and possibly greater status within the villages. I argue that, although pot making was one of many small-scale housekeeping tasks, the creation and use of pottery were integrally tied to expressions of status and identity, and that by the Late Maros Phase the identity of ‘potter’ was acknowledged by the community as distinct from other identities, such as those of ‘metalworker’, or ‘weaver’.

Stone Axe-head Manufacture: New Evidence from the Preseli Hills, West Wales

1995 ◽  
Vol 61 ◽  
pp. 433-460 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. David ◽  
G. Williams ◽  
David Jenkins ◽  
Ian Rigby ◽  
Olwen Williams-Thorpe
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Geochemical Analysis ◽  
Group Viii ◽  
Geological Origin ◽  
Thin Section Analysis ◽  
New Evidence ◽  
The Bronze Age ◽  
Section Analysis

Fieldwork by the Dyfed Archaeological Trust during 1989–92 has identified clear evidence for the manufacture of stone axeheads at two locations on the eastern flanks of the Preseli Mountains, Dyfed: at Glyn-y-Fran, Llanfyrnach (SN 186 307) and near Glandy Cross (SN 143 266). At both sites, small quantities of lithic debris were collected from field surfaces after cultivation; unfortunately, no contemporaneous features were found by subsequent, very limited, trial trenching. In this report we describe the fieldwork at these two sites, and the resulting lithic collection, concluding that the latter represents evidence for small-scale and opportunistic exploitation of locally abundant erratics during the Neolithic. The Glandy Cross area was later a focus for the construction of ritual monuments during the Bronze Age, and there is also some evidence for continuing activity at Glyn-y-Fran at this time.Petrological thin section analysis of some of the artefacts is reported and demonstrates a probable identity with petrological Group VIII; geochemical analysis of some of the same artefacts places the likely geological origin of these at local igneous exposures also in the Preselis. These conclusions are reviewed in the light of current discussion on the usage and origins of raw materials in later prehistory.

The Political Machine

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam T. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Mortuary Ritual ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Organized Violence ◽  
Political Sovereignty ◽  
Political Machine ◽  
Material Goods ◽  
The Bronze Age

This book investigates the essential role that material culture plays in the practices and maintenance of political sovereignty. Through an archaeological exploration of the Bronze Age Caucasus, the book demonstrates that beyond assemblies of people, polities are just as importantly assemblages of things—from ballots and bullets to crowns, regalia, and licenses. The book looks at the ways that these assemblages help to forge cohesive publics, separate sovereigns from a wider social mass, and formalize governance—and it considers how these developments continue to shape politics today. The book shows that the formation of polities is as much about the process of manufacturing assemblages as it is about disciplining subjects, and that these material objects or “machines” sustain communities, orders, and institutions. The sensibilities, senses, and sentiments connecting people to things enabled political authority during the Bronze Age and fortifies political power even in the contemporary world. The book provides a detailed account of the transformation of communities in the Caucasus, from small-scale early Bronze Age villages committed to egalitarianism, to Late Bronze Age polities predicated on radical inequality, organized violence, and a centralized apparatus of rule. From Bronze Age traditions of mortuary ritual and divination to current controversies over flag pins and Predator drones, this book sheds new light on how material goods authorize and defend political order.

scholarly journals Big-Men and Small Chiefs: The Creation of Bronze Age Societies

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rune Iversen
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Agricultural Production ◽  
Social Dynamics ◽  
Late Neolithic ◽  
Southern Scandinavia ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Characteristic Features ◽  
Early Late ◽  
The Bronze Age ◽  
Big Men

AbstractThis paper investigates to what extent the significant material changes observable at the end of the Neolithic reflect transformations of the underlying social dynamics. Answering this question will help us to understand the formation of Bronze Age societies. The analysis concerns southern Scandinavia with a certain focus on Denmark. The assumption is that the creation of Bronze Age societies must be understood as a long formative process that partly originated in the culturally-heterogeneous Middle Neolithic. Four aspects seem to have been essential to this process: the rise of the warrior figure, the reintroduction of metal, increased agricultural production, and the establishment of one of the characteristic features of the Bronze Age, the chieftain hall. These aspects do not appear simultaneously but are introduced stepby- step starting out in the late Middle Neolithic and early Late Neolithic to fully develop around 2000 BC. Consequently, this paper argues that the final Late Neolithic (LN II, c. 1950-1700 BC) was de facto part of the Earliest Bronze Age.

scholarly journals From the Parochial to the Universal: Comparing Cloth Cultures in the Bronze Age

2012 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 61-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanna Harris
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
Textile Fibre ◽  
Eighteenth Dynasty ◽  
Salt Mines ◽  
Southern Scandinavia ◽  
Chronological Period ◽  
The Bronze Age ◽  
Thread Count

The aim of this research is to compare the cloth cultures of Europe and Egypt in the Bronze Age and New Kingdom. The comparison focuses on the fourteenth century cal BC and includes four geographically separate areas, including the oak coffin burials of southern Scandinavia, the Hallstatt salt mines of central Europe, Late Minoan Crete, and the tombs and towns of the later Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt. The comparative approach can bring insights even when applied to unconnected cultures or regions. However, in this study I concentrate on a restricted chronological period and areas that were connected, directly or indirectly, by widespread networks of trade or exchange. The concept of cloth cultures is used to include both textiles and animal skins as these were closely related materials in the prehistoric past. Information was gathered according to the following categories: raw materials, including textile fibre, and species of skins; fabric structure and thread count (only for textiles); decoration and finish; and use and context. From this study, it is possible to recognize the universally shared principles of cloth cultures and the great versatility and creativity in the regional cloth cultures of the Bronze Age.

The Bronze Age Round Barrows of Wessex

1941 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 73-113 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. V. Grinsell
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Great Majority ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Northern Limit ◽  
Distribution Maps ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
Important Extension ◽  
The One ◽  
The Bronze Age

The area covered by this survey, which epitomizes the writer's work on Wessex barrows since 1929, is limited on the west by a line drawn from Weston-super-Mare to Bridport, on the east by a line drawn from Dorking to Arundel, on the north roughly by the northern limit of the chalk downs south of the Thames, and on the south by the sea. It encloses the great majority of bell, disc, and saucer barrows, all of which appear to be expressions of Piggott's Wessex Bronze Age culture. It should be noted however that elements of this culture are found outside the area dealt with, notably at various places to the north-east. Nearly all of these are so close to the Icknield Way as to make it certain that this was the means of communication linking the one with the other. Another, though less important, extension of the Wessex Bronze Age culture is represented by a few sites, some of them doubtful, within a short distance of the course of the Upper Thames, and it is probable that the river was the means of communication used.Here it is well to point out the respects in which the boundaries of Bronze Age Wessex, as determined by my own distribution-maps of barrows, differ from those adopted in the O.S. Map of Neolithic Wessex, and by Mr Stuart Piggott in his recent paper, ‘The Early Bronze Age in Wessex.’

scholarly journals Morphological Analysis and Dating of Pottery from the Posolskaya Site (Based on the Excavations of E. A. Khamzina in 1959)

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 ◽  
pp. 25-37
Author(s):  
O. I. Goriunova ◽  
◽  
A. G. Novikov ◽  
D. А. Markhaeva ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Regional Differences ◽  
Late Neolithic ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
Compositional Structures ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Characteristic Features ◽  
The One ◽  
Almost All ◽  
The Bronze Age

The analysis of pottery materials of Posolskaya site (excavations by E. A. Khamzina in 1959), which is located on the southeast coast of Lake Baikal (Kabansk district, the Republic of Buryatia), is carried out in this article. Based on morphological features, several groups of pottery with a set of characteristic features are identified. A comparison of them with the materials of supporting multilayer objects on the coast of Baikal and Cis-Baikal area, in general, made it possible to determine the relative and absolute chronology of these groups. It was determined that pottery complexes of layers 2 and 3 contain artifacts of different cultural and chronological periods from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age in a mixed state. They contain materials of the Middle and Late Neolithic (Posolskaya and Ust-Belaya ceramic types), the Early Bronze Age (pottery with pearls, with fingernails and Northern Baikal type) and the Late Bronze Age (Tyshkine-Senogdinsk type). Reticulated pottery, recorded in small quantities, was found in all complexes of the Neolithic era of the region. The pottery studies showed, on the one hand, its morpho-typological proximity with similar pottery in the south of Central Siberia as a whole. On the other hand, there were some regional differences (thickening of the corolla in bulk on Posolskaya type pottery in two versions: from the outside and from the inside; a variety of compositional structures on vessels with an external thickening of the corolla was revealed, expressed in simplification of the ornamental design; pottery combining features of Posolskaya and Ust-Belaya types was distinguished. A series of radiocarbon dates from stratified complexes of multilayer objects on the Baikal coast made it possible to determine chronological ranges for almost all pottery groups identified at Posolskaya site. Posolskaya type pottery in two of its variants corresponds to a chronological interval of 6750–6310 cal BP; Ust’-Belaia type (focusing on the dates of Ulan-Khada and the Gorelyi Les) – 5581–4420 cal BP; pottery with pearls and constructions from wide lines of the retreating spatula – 4500–3080 cal BP, pottery with finger pinches corresponds to 3370–3230 cal BP; Northern Baikal type – 3346–3077 cal BP; Tyshkine-Senogdinsk type – 2778–1998 cal BP.

scholarly journals Transformations of Metal Supply during the Bronze Age in the Carpathian Basin

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 315-330
Author(s):  
Viktória Kiss
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Neutron Radiography ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Isotope Analysis ◽  
Carpathian Basin ◽  
Raw Material ◽  
Research Centre ◽  
Metal Artifacts ◽  
Mining Sites ◽  
The Bronze Age

This paper presents recent research questions which have been raised and methods which have been used in the study of Bronze Age metallurgy in connection with available natural resources (ores) in and around the Carpathian Basin. This topic fits in the most current trends in the research on European prehistoric archaeology. Given the lack of written sources, copper and bronze artifacts discovered in settlement and cemetery excavations and prehistoric mining sites provide the primary sources on which the studies in question are based. The aim of compositional and isotope analysis of copper and tin ores, metal tools, ornaments, and weapons is to determine the provenience of the raw materials and further an understanding of the chaine operatiore of prehistoric metal production. The Momentum Mobility Research Group of the Institute of Archaeology, Research Centre for the Humanities studies these metal artifacts using archaeological and scientific methods. It has focused on the first thousand years of the Bronze Age (2500–1500 BC). Multidisciplinary research include non-destructive XRF, PGAA (promptgamma activation), TOF-ND (time-of-flight neutron diffraction) analyses and neutron radiography, as well as destructive methods, e.g. metal sampling for compositional and lead isotope testing, alongside archaeological analysis. Microstructure studies are also efficient methods for determining the raw material and production techniques. The results suggest the use of regional ore sources and interregional connections, as well as several transformations in the exchange network of the prehistoric communities living in the Carpathian Basin.

The Dual Character of the Beaker Invasion

Antiquity ◽  
1931 ◽  
Vol 5 (20) ◽  
pp. 415-426 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. G. D. Clark
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Other ◽  
Short Paper ◽  
Type B ◽  
Classic Work ◽  
Dual Character ◽  
Type C ◽  
The One ◽  
The Bronze Age

In his classic work on the Bronze Age pottery of Britain the late Lord Abercromby adopted the old division of the class of beaker pottery into three types originally proposed by Dr Thurnam as far back as 1871. In order that Abercromby may not be misrepresented I propose to quote the essential portions of his definitions. In type A, the ‘ high-brimmed globose beaker ’, ‘ the body is more or less globular ; the upper part, separated from the body by a constriction, frequently very defined, spreads out like the calyx of a flower and forms a brim or neck that almost equals the body in height. The sides of the neck or rim . . . are straight and not recurved at the lip ’. In type B, the ‘ ovoid beaker with recurved rim ’, ‘ there is no distinct demarca- tion between the body and the rim, but the one glides into the other by a gradual curve ’. Finally type C, the ‘ low-brimmed beaker ’, ‘ may be regarded ’, in Abercromby's own words, ‘ as a debased variety of our first type ’.It should be clear already I think that in labelling his types A, B, and C Abercromby has given the false impression that we have three types of beákers, whereas what we really have are two types, of which one has a ‘debased variety’. We therefore suggest that a less misleading classification would be, for instance, A(x), A(Y), and B. This may seem a trifling point but we believe it has helped to obscure the proper recognition of the true dual character of the Beaker invasion of this country. We propose to substantiate the validity of our suggestion in the course of this short paper.

scholarly journals The impact of ancestral heath management on soils and landscapes: a reconstruction based on paleoecological analyses of soil records in the central and southeastern Netherlands

SOIL ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 311-324 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marieke Doorenbosch ◽  
Jan M. van Mourik
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Forest Fires ◽  
Natural Habitat ◽  
Forest Degradation ◽  
Cattle Grazing ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
13Th Century ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Bronze Age

Abstract. The evolution of heathlands during the Holocene has been registered in various soil records. Paleoecological analyses of these records enable reconstruction of the changing economic and cultural management of heaths and the consequences for landscape and soils. Heaths are characteristic components of cultural landscape mosaics on sandy soils in the Netherlands. The natural habitat of heather species was moorland. At first, natural events like forest fires and storms caused small-scale forest degradation; in addition on that, the forest degradation accelerated due to cultural activities like forest grazing, wood cutting, and shifting cultivation. Heather plants invaded degraded forest soils, and heaths developed. People learned to use the heaths for economic and cultural purposes. The impact of the heath management on landscape and soils was registered in soil records of barrows, drift sand sequences, and plaggic Anthrosols. Based on pollen diagrams of such records we could reconstruct that heaths were developed and used for cattle grazing before the Bronze Age. During the late Neolithic, the Bronze Age, and Iron Age, people created the barrow landscape on the ancestral heaths. After the Iron Age, people probably continued with cattle grazing on the heaths and plaggic agriculture until the early Middle Ages. Severe forest degradation by the production of charcoal for melting iron during the Iron Age till the 6th–7th century and during the 11th–13th century for the trade of wood resulted in extensive sand drifting, a threat to the valuable heaths. The introduction of the deep, stable economy and heath sods digging in the course of the 18th century resulted in acceleration of the rise of plaggic horizons, severe heath degradation, and again extension of sand drifting. At the end of the 19th century heath lost its economic value due to the introduction of chemical fertilizers. The heaths were transformed into "new" arable fields and forests, and due to deep ploughing most soil archives were destroyed. Since AD 1980, the remaining relicts of the ancestral heaths are preserved and restored in the frame of the programs to improve the regional and national geo-biodiversity. Despite the realization of many heath restoration projects during the last decades, the area of the present heaths is just a fraction of the heath areal in AD 1900.

Microstructural Examinations of Copper Antimony Alloys

2021 ◽  
Vol 58 (10) ◽  
pp. 620-629
Author(s):  
R. Haubner ◽  
S. Strobl
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Copper Alloys ◽  
Intermetallic Phase ◽  
Smelting Process ◽  
Copper Ore ◽  
Metallographic Examination ◽  
Parallel Cracks ◽  
The One ◽  
Antimony Alloys ◽  
The Bronze Age

Abstract Among other materials, fahlores were used in the Bronze Age copper ore smelting process. These contain, apart from sulfur, arsenic and antimony. Therefore, these elements can be found in Bronze Age copper casting ingots or artifacts. In order to study the behavior of Sb more closely, two copper alloys containing 10 and 30 wt. % Sb were melted and subjected to a metallographic examination. On the one hand, microstructures with copper dendrites and homogeneous interdendritic areas primarily composed of intermetallic phase could be found. On the other hand, at higher Sb concentrations, first Cu3Sb precipitated which, in turn, transformed to Cu10Sb3 upon cooling. The crystals in these microstructures were characterized by numerous parallel cracks. No further phases were observed by XRD.

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