scholarly journals The Culture of the Sakas of Semirechye: Contemporary State and Current Issues of Study

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 22-35
Author(s):  
Ernar A. Estemesov
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
Funeral Rites ◽  
The Third ◽  
Urgent Task ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Burial Mounds ◽  
Second Category

Purpose. The article describes the history and analysis of the main issues in the study of archaeological sites of the Saka period in Semirechye. They are presented by three main types on this territory: burial and memorial complexes, settlements and hoards. The first type of monuments includes numerous burial mounds, where the elite burials of “royal” type and ordinary burials are located. Both social groups are combined by the unity of funeral rites, and the main differences are the complexity of architecture, memorial practices, and richness of burial equipment in the “royal” type burial mounds. The second category of monuments is presented by the settlements that are mostly small in size. The constructions like half dugouts were discovered on them, which gave a rich ceramic material. The third type of monuments of the Saka period in Semirechye includes numerous hoards of bronze items. Some of them are represented by the cult objects (sacrificial tables, lamps and cauldrons) that mark the places of worship. A significant percentage of the hoards contain items of weapons, horse equipment and household purposes and, apparently, serve as offerings to the spirits. However, despite the considerable progress in the study of the Saka monuments of the Semirechye Region, the main problem is their cultural attribution at this time. Some researchers suggest that the independent Saka archaeological culture was formed and developed on the territory of Semirechye in the Early Iron Age, while others believe that the Saka monuments of this region belong to the broader historical and cultural community that also covers the neighboring regions of Kyrgyzstan and Xinjiang. Results Another important issue in the study of the Saka sites of Semirechye is to clarify the chronology of burial and memorial complexes. Up to now, the significant database of radiocarbon dates has been accumulated, which allows us to consider the chronological positions of a wide range of monuments in a new way. It was of great importance to obtain such dates from several burials of Karatuma necropolis, which showed that it belonged to the Saka period, since burial monuments of this appearance are traditionally dated back to the Wusun period. Conclusion. The necessity of solution of these problems is an urgent task for further research of burial and settlement objects of the Saka period in this region.

New radiocarbon dates for Eastern and Southern Africa

1972 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. E. G. Sutton
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Congo Basin ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Eastern And Southern Africa

This article is a follow-up to that of Mr D. W. Phillipson published in this Journal in 1970, and to the six earlier lists compiled for the whole of sub-Saharan Africa by Dr B. M. Fagan. I have endeavoured to include here all radiocarbon dates for archaeological sites of the Iron Age and most of those of the end of the Stone Age in the eastern and southern part of Africa—that is from Ethiopia, the Upper Nile and the Congo Basin southward—which have been published or made available since the preparation of the former articles. Some of these dates are already included in recent numbers of the Journal Radiocarbon, or have been mentioned in publications elsewhere, as indicated in the footnotes. A large proportion of these new dates, however, have not yet been published, and are included here through the agreement of the various individual archaeologists and research bodies, all of whom I wish to thank for their cooperation. In particular, I am indebted to Mr David Phillipson for his willing assistance in providing a number of contacts and relaying information from southern Africa.

scholarly journals Mixture model of pottery decorations from Lake Chad Basin archaeological sites reveals ancient segregation patterns

2016 ◽  
Vol 283 (1827) ◽  
pp. 20152824
Author(s):  
John D. O'Brien ◽  
Kathryn Lin ◽  
Scott MacEachern
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Cultural Dynamics ◽  
Data Types ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
Lake Chad ◽  
Chad Basin ◽  
Archaeological Data ◽  
Lake Chad Basin ◽  
The Many

We present a new statistical approach to analysing an extremely common archaeological data type—potsherds—that infers the structure of cultural relationships across a set of excavation units (EUs). This method, applied to data from a set of complex, culturally heterogeneous sites around the Mandara mountains in the Lake Chad Basin, helps elucidate cultural succession through the Neolithic and Iron Age. We show how the approach can be integrated with radiocarbon dates to provide detailed portraits of cultural dynamics and deposition patterns within single EUs. In this context, the analysis supports ancient cultural segregation analogous to historical ethnolinguistic patterning in the region. We conclude with a discussion of the many possible model extensions using other archaeological data types.

Radiocarbon Dates for Sub-Saharan Africa: VI

1969 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 149-169 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian M. Fagan
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Eighth Century ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
European Contact ◽  
The Third ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Eastern And Southern Africa

The Sixth List contains many dates from Eastern and Southern Africa. An important sequence of dates from Malawi is published, indicating that the Iron Age there had begun as early as the third century A.D. The beginnings of the Zambian Early Iron Age are well established by the fourth century, while important new dates for ‘Dimple-based’ wares in Rwanda and Kenya place that pottery type within the same time span.The Palabora dates from the Transvaal indicate that the Limpopo valley was settled by Iron Age people by the eighth century, and numerous isolated samples are recorded. The five dates from Ife in Nigeria confirm that the terracotta sculpture there was being made before European contact, while numerous samples for earlier sites are published.

scholarly journals The remains of a prehistoric dugout from Skorbičy (Družba) Village in the Buh River region

2020 ◽  
pp. 72-82
Author(s):  
Vitali U. Asheichyk ◽  
Vadzim G. Beliavets
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Design Features ◽  
The Third ◽  
River Region ◽  
Archaeological Excavations ◽  
Radiocarbon Datings

The article discusses the remains of a prehistoric dugout discovered at the edge of a sand quarry near Skorbičy (Družba) Village, Brest District, Belarus in 2013. It was impossible to extract and conserve the boat due to heavy decomposition of wood, but its shape and design features were documented during the archaeological excavations. The boat measured 3.75 × 0.65 m was made from hollowed pine trunk. There were bulkheads near the boat’s bow and stern, and there was a low rib along the bottom on the inside. The bottom and boards were most likely tarred on the outside. There were some dozens of fieldstones inside the boat, on its bow and stern. Some of them were burnt. Five small potsherds of the Iron Age were found in the eastern part of the dugout. Three radiocarbon datings were obtained for the samples of wood from the dugout. Two datings are almost identical and date the boat back from 480 to 210 cal BC. The third one is discordant and has calibrated range from 200 BC to 80 AD. Considering the archaeological context and the results of previous investigations of the archaeological sites in Skorbičy, the earlier dating could be assumed. The dugout is most probably connected with the population of the Pomeranian culture.

Opportunities and Features of the Palynological Analysis Application on Various Types of Archaeological Sites

2021 ◽  
pp. 361-376
Author(s):  
Anna Aleshinskaya ◽  
◽  
Anna Babenko ◽  
Maria Kochanova ◽  
Alla Troshina ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Buried Soils ◽  
Palynological Analysis ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Analysis Application ◽  
Cultural Layers ◽  
Burial Mounds ◽  
Funerary Rites ◽  
Academy Of Sciences ◽  
Research Recommendations

A wide variety of archaeological sites associated with various human activity has led to the emergence of a wide range of problems solved by archaeological palynology. On the example of the palynological materials accumulated in the Laboratory of Nature Sciences of the Institute of Archaeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the opportunities and features of the palynological analysis application are considered both on classical objects for Russian archaeopalynology (cultural layer, buried soils, defensive ramparts, burial mounds, etc.) and on non-traditional ones (latrines, vessels, funerary objects, ceramics, etc.). It is shown that the reconstruction of the natural environment, generally accepted for palynology, is mainly possible for the materials from long timed sites of shepherds in caves and rock shelters and cultural layers of sites, settlements, hillforts. Materials obtained from other objects (ancient and medieval arable lands, storage pits, latrines, the contents of ritual objects, vessels, and the gastrointestinal tract of the buried) give an idea of very local and short-term environmental conditions or events usually associated with economic and/or daily activities of a person, with his food, funerary rites and traditions. In this regard, the possibilities of the palynological method and the purposes will be different for each specific research. Recommendations for the sampling for palynological analysis are given for each specific case.

scholarly journals Bronze Age farms and Iron Age farm mounds of the Outer Hebrides

2003 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Barber ◽  
Geoffrey Collins ◽  
Lisbeth Crone ◽  
Alan Duffy ◽  
Andrew Dugmore ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Suitable Material ◽  
Outer Hebrides ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Structured Approach

Hebridean sites of the coastal sand cliffs and associated machair, or sandy plain have been known for many years. Artefacts and ecofacts of various types have long been collected from archaeological sites in the eroding sand-cliffs of the machairs of the Outer Hebrides. Early in 1983, personnel of the then Central Excavation Unit of Historic Scotland's predecessor revisited very nearly all of the coastal archaeological sites then known in the Long Isle, with the specific task of identifying those at immediate threat from coastal erosion and of assessing the feasibility of their excavation or preservation. Some 32 sites were seen to be undergoing active erosion; at nine of them preservation was not being pursued and excavation was feasible. These sites were of two morphotypes: sites exposed in roughly vertical sand-cliffs and sites exposed over relatively large horzontal areas of sand deflation. It was decided to examine one sand-cliff site along its exposed face. The site selected was Balelone in North Uist, its excavation designed to explore both the problems associated with the excavation of deep midden sites with complex stratigraphy and the not-inconsiderable problems of excavation in sand. In the light of the Balelone trial excavation, a new approach was called for. A structured approach aimed firstly at establishing the three-dimensional extent of the sites to be examined. Four sites were then sampled (the sand-cliff sites of Baleshare, on the island of the same name off the west coast of North Uist and Hornish Point, South Uist and the deflation sites of South Glendale, South Uist and Newtonferry, North Uist) within a rigorously-defined research framework.The machair sites were formed by sand accretion, facilitated by human activities ranging from construction to refuse disposal and cultivation. Their formation was intermittent and they underwent episodes of major erosion, isolating the sites from the landscape mass of the machair sands. Despite their apparent wealth of suitable material, the dating of Hebridean coastal sites presents special problems. The strategy here was to provide a dating framework for the sequences on each site, from which the dates of archaeological significant structures and events could then be arrived at by extrapolation. Preliminary dates from the earliest and latest strata at Balelone spanned such a small period that a First Millennium BC date-range could be assigned. At Baleshare, the deposits investigated were chiefly later Bronze Age; following abandonment (roughly 200 radiocarbon years) of the Period I cultivated soil Period II represented extensive, manured, cultivated fields in the vicinity of a settlement now lost to the sea. As Period II went on. the settlement seems to have moved closer to the excavated area. After another hiatus of a minimum of 350 radiocarbon years, there were further cultivated plots and associated settlement of Iron Age date (Period III). By contrast, the site at Hornish Point (including successive wheelhouses and associated cultivation areas) is considered to be all of one - dynamic, Iron Age - period, lasting some 300 radiocarbon years (with potentially earlier structures unexcavated). A post-medieval blackhouse of characteristic Lewisian form had been cut into the settlement mound. The three dates from Newtonferry suggest that some Early Medieval activity took place at the site, while the bulk of the deposits date from the thirteenth-fourteenth centuries AD. At South Glendale, the radiocarbon dates indicate occupation sometime between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries AD; stratigraphically lower, fragmented and truncated remains were prehistoric, probably early Bronze Age.

Radiocarbon Dates for Sub-Saharan Africa (from c. 1000 b.c.)—III

1965 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 107-116 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian M. Fagan
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Eighth Century ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
The Third ◽  
Iron Smelting ◽  
Sub Saharan

The third list of radiocarbon dates for Sub-Saharan Africa later than 1000 b.c. is considerably longer than its predecessors. As new laboratories commence operations, so more and more dates become available. During the last eighteen months, many more dates from Rhodesian Iron Age sites have been processed, where the earliest Iron Age peoples are now dated to the fourth century a.d. if not earlier. The Kalomo culture in Zambia is now securely dated. Iron smelting furnaces were being operated on the Witwatersrand in South Africa by a.d. 1000, and it is now known that Iron Age peoples were living by the Kuene river in Angola by the eighth century. Recent dates from Katanga have shown that there was a flourishing copper trade there by the same period. An important series of dates have been processed from Saharan Neolithic sites, indicating that the Sahara was suitable for pastoral peoples in the fourth century b.c. Another date for the Nok culture in Nigeria places the later stages of the culture in the third century a.d.By a resolution of the Cambridge Radiocarbon Conference, all dates are now calculated relative to a.d. 1950.

Assimilation, hybridity and encountering. The cinematic representation of queer migrants from Muslim backgrounds living in Europe

2020 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 74-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerard Coll-Planas
Keyword(s):  
Social Groups ◽  
Cultural Background ◽  
Social Location ◽  
The Third ◽  
Muslim Countries ◽  
Sexuality And Gender ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Second Category ◽  
Ideological Context

AbstractMuslim migrants are the counter-figures through whom the modern Western identity is shaped. In Islamophobic discourses, they are constructed as inherently sexist and homophobic. In this ideological context, queer migrants coming from Muslim countries occupy an intersectional social location between Islamophobia and homophobia. In this paper we analyze the cinematic representation of queer migrants living in Europe coming from Muslim backgrounds. The aim of the paper is to analyze whether the films reproduce or subvert the Western “gay narrative”. The corpus of analysis is made up of 19 films which were studied through a process of categorization of the relevant fragments in a matrix. The films are classified in three categories according to their approach. The first gathers those films that hold an assimilationist discourse, according to which queer migrants should embrace the Western “gay narrative” and abandon the values of the communities of origin. In the second category, the films propose a hybrid perspective in which characters merge elements from both the country of residence and the cultural background of origin in the exploration of their sexuality and gender. The films in the third category revolve around a metaphorical relationship between a queer migrant and a native person, promoting a reflection on the possibilities of transformative encounters that break the boundaries between supposedly opposed social groups.

scholarly journals FINNO-UGRIC-TURKIC ETHNOCULTURAL COMMUNITY IN THE FUNERAL RITES OF THE BASHKIRS

2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 336-345
Author(s):  
Farida Gabdulkhaevna Galieva
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Period ◽  
Practical Reasons ◽  
Funeral Rites ◽  
Archaeological Material ◽  
Second Stage ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Stage ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Burial Mounds ◽  
Ethnocultural Community

The article studies the different stages of formation and development of Bashkir funeral rites in the Ural-Volga region of the Finno-Ugric-Turkic community. The first stage (2000 BC - the first half of the first millennium AD) is characterized by the formation of the Finno-Ugric ethnic base of the population in the region, which maintained ties with neighboring Eastern regions and eventually expanded contacts with southern regions, including the areas of ancient Bashkir tribes. The author discusses examples reflecting the ethnic and cultural ties of Bashkir ancestors to the peoples of Siberia, the similarities of their mythological concepts, such as the ways of passing through cremation, burial ceremonies, ground-based burial and burial mounds, which is supported by the archaeological material. The second stage (early Bulgar, the period of Volga-Bulgaria and the Kazan Khaganate) is considered a Finno-Ugric-Turkic ethnocultural community. In different geographical areas Bashkir, Udmurt and Mari peoples used the same type of burial structures (log, wooden). In the third stage (the second half of the 16 century - beginning of the 20 century) the community of the peoples in question strengthened through the process of Islamization, Turkification, and the shift to a Bashkir ethnic identity of the Finno-Ugric population. In the fourth stage (Soviet and post-Soviet era), the momentum of the previous tendencies continued. The influence of Turkic neighbors reflected in the funeral rites of the "pagans" (orienting the faces of the buried to the East, grave niches). At the same time, Bashkirs maintained pre-Islamic customs, or rejected Sharia norms for practical reasons (grave niches were not built because the soil was too loose). The Soviet period also led to the emergence of a common layer of culture.

scholarly journals Radiocarbon Dates from Iron Age Strata at Tel Beth Shean and Tel Rehov

Radiocarbon ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 1333-1342 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amihai Mazar ◽  
Israel Carmi
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Archaeological Sites ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
Calibration Curves ◽  
Iron Age I ◽  
Historical Periods

We discuss the significance of 32 radiocarbon dates from the archaeological sites of Tel Beth Shean and Tel Rehov in northern Israel. All dates are from Iron Age I and II archaeological contexts (12th–8th centuries BCE). Most of the dates were done on short-lived samples (seeds and olive pits), while some are on charred timber. The samples are organized in several homogeneous clusters according to their context. This series is one of the largest groups of 14C dates from the Iron Age in the Levant. The paper discusses the correlation between the 14C dates and the traditional archaeological dates of the same context. Results from two laboratories and two calibration curves are compared, showing some significant differences in one case. We conclude with an evaluation of the relevance of 14C dating for the current debate about the chronology of the Iron Age in Israel, and in historical periods in general.

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