Mortuary and Bioarchaeological Perspectives on Bronze Age Arabia

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Near East ◽  
Death And Dying ◽  
Scientific Data ◽  
Skeletal Remains ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Mortuary Archaeology ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Continuity And Change ◽  
New Ideas

Across the Near East, major changes in the commemoration of death and the formation of identity amongst the living took place at the beginning of the Neolithic. However, these investigations have largely focused on a narrow geographic expanse, including the Levant and Egypt, where processes of death and dying have been extensively documented. Much less is known about death and burial in the Near East, outside of the Levant. In recent years, however, interest in the mortuary landscapes of Arabia has steadily grown, and the potential for using death to reconstruct the lifestyles of once-living communities are becoming more fully realized. Mortuary and Bioarchaeological Perspectives on Bronze Age Arabia brings together an international consortium of archaeologists and bioarchaeologists, who are at the forefront of mortuary archaeology work across Arabia, to examine continuity and change in death and remembrance. While mortuary archaeology and bioarchaeology contribute important perspectives to the interpretation of life and death in ancient Arabia, these subdisciplines are rarely brought together in this region. Indeed, only recently have skeletal remains been recognized as a rich source of scientific data complementing burial context. Such joint collaboration highlights the novel, interdisciplinary perspective proposed in this volume, resulting in a synthesis of new ideas and interpretations that will undoubtedly guide future archaeological endeavors in Arabia and beyond.

scholarly journals ‘Hier wil ik nog niet dood gevonden worden’. Bespiegelingen over de absentie van graven

Paleo-aktueel ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Iris Rom ◽  
Karla de Roest
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Mortuary Archaeology ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
The Bronze Age

Dead and gone: On the absence of graves. Every now and then, archaeologists come across periods or regions that seem to lack graves. Instead of addressing these absences, researchers often resort one of several standard explanations, such as “We haven’t found the burial location yet” or “Apparently, these people employed ways of disposal that cannot be traced in the archaeological record”. While such observations are entirely justifiable, they also leave many unaddressed questions. Did this society opt for archaeologically invisible ways of disposal of their loved ones? Why are these graves missing? Case studies from our PhD projects on mortuary archaeology, relating, respectively, to the Bronze Age in Greece and the Iron Age in northwestern Europe, aim to investigate such questions. Whereas archaeologists are generally reluctant to interpret “non-data”, we pose that the absence of graves also provides invaluable clues as to how people perceived life and death in prehistoric societies.

Dairy Queen. Churns and milk products in the Aegean Bronze Age

2014 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 205-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah P. Morris
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Dairy Products ◽  
Near East ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Specific Function ◽  
Milk Products ◽  
The Third ◽  
Household Processing

This article assembles examples of an unusual vessel found in domestic contexts of the Early Bronze Age around the Aegean and in the Eastern Mediterranean. Identified as a “barrel vessel” by the excavators of Troy, Lesbos (Thermi), Lemnos (Poliochni), and various sites in the Chalkidike, the shape finds its best parallels in containers identified as churns in the Chalcolithic Levant, and related vessels from the Eneolithic Balkans. Levantine parallels also exist in miniature form, as in the Aegean at Troy, Thermi, and Poliochni, and appear as part of votive figures in the Near East. My interpretation of their use and development will consider how they compare to similar shapes in the archaeological record, especially in Aegean prehistory, and what possible transregional relationships they may express along with their specific function as household processing vessels for dairy products during the third millennium BC.

Earthquake-Resistant Construction and the Wrath of the "Earth-Shaker"

1987 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-178 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. M. Driessen
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Near East ◽  
Town Planning ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Construction Techniques ◽  
Earthquake Resistant ◽  
Partition Walls

The writer investigates possible anti-seismic construction techniques used in Minoan architecture on Bronze Age Crete. The frequency of earthquakes in the Aegean seems to imply the presence of such techniques. Starting by noting the methods still in use in Turkey and other dangerous areas, the writer looks at the practice of projections and setbacks, the near absence of windows, room dimensions, roof and floor construction, the presence of partition walls, the size and number of stories, town planning, the presence of cornices and ring beams, and other construction details which helped to improve the anti-seismic capability of Minoan houses. Attention is given to the location of houses and to the question of whether or not the Minoans used these methods consciously. The writer believes they did, not only because of the frequency of these earthquakes but also because of the religious connotations and the existence of an architectural koiné in earthquake-stricken areas in the ancient Mediterranean and Near East, in contrast with Egypt.

scholarly journals Dogs accompanied humans during the Neolithic expansion into Europe

2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (10) ◽  
pp. 20180286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morgane Ollivier ◽  
Anne Tresset ◽  
Laurent A. F. Frantz ◽  
Stéphanie Bréhard ◽  
Adrian Bălăşescu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Dna Sequences ◽  
Near East ◽  
Northern Europe ◽  
Southeastern Europe ◽  
Mitochondrial Lineage ◽  
Domestic Species ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Neolithic Expansion ◽  
The Bronze Age

Near Eastern Neolithic farmers introduced several species of domestic plants and animals as they dispersed into Europe. Dogs were the only domestic species present in both Europe and the Near East prior to the Neolithic. Here, we assessed whether early Near Eastern dogs possessed a unique mitochondrial lineage that differentiated them from Mesolithic European populations. We then analysed mitochondrial DNA sequences from 99 ancient European and Near Eastern dogs spanning the Upper Palaeolithic to the Bronze Age to assess if incoming farmers brought Near Eastern dogs with them, or instead primarily adopted indigenous European dogs after they arrived. Our results show that European pre-Neolithic dogs all possessed the mitochondrial haplogroup C, and that the Neolithic and Post-Neolithic dogs associated with farmers from Southeastern Europe mainly possessed haplogroup D. Thus, the appearance of haplogroup D most probably resulted from the dissemination of dogs from the Near East into Europe. In Western and Northern Europe, the turnover is incomplete and haplogroup C persists well into the Chalcolithic at least. These results suggest that dogs were an integral component of the Neolithic farming package and a mitochondrial lineage associated with the Near East was introduced into Europe alongside pigs, cows, sheep and goats. It got diluted into the native dog population when reaching the Western and Northern margins of Europe.

The cretulae and the Linear A accounting system

1960 ◽  
Vol 55 ◽  
pp. 200-210
Author(s):  
Maurice Pope
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Near East ◽  
Great Majority ◽  
Coherent System ◽  
Accounting System ◽  
Seal Impressions ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
Proper Analysis

Cretulae is the name given in this article to the small clay nodules, stamped with one or more seal impressions, that have been found in quantity at most Bronze Age sites in the Near East. The Minoan examples are generally smaller than those found at other sites, and the great majority of them have a hole through which string once passed. That is to say, they are lumps of clay squeezed round string and then sealed. At most of the sites in Crete where they are known, they have been found in conjunction with inscribed clay tablets and clay disks. At Hagia Triada they are unique in being for the most part countermarked with a sign of the Linear A script. The interrelationships of the countermarks and sealings have not previously been recorded, and it is the primary purpose of this article to publish them. The catalogue will be found in Appendix A. Proper analysis of it should shed light on Minoan methods of administration, and perhaps too on the purpose of the Linear A tablets. That the tablets, or some of them, belong to a coherent system of administration, and are not all mere inventory lists of what happened to be coming into or going out of store at a particular moment, seems guaranteed by the fact, to which I shall revert later, that totals in the same numerical proportion are found at widely distant sites.

scholarly journals East in the Creative Mind of B. Volkov

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 264-280
Author(s):  
E. N. Proskurina ◽  
Keyword(s):  
San Francisco ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Lao Tzu ◽  
Creative Mind ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
The World ◽  
Object Of Study

The article is devoted to the images and motives of the East in the poetry of the author of the Eastern emigration Boris Volkov (1894, Ekaterinburg – 1954, San Francisco). The work of this poet, writer, publicist is still unknown to the domestic reader, although during his lifetime he had a fairly wide publication geography: from Harbin to San Francisco. However, his works were never reprinted, and the manuscript of the novel “The Kingdom of the Golden Buddhas” is considered lost. The analysis involved Volkov’s book of poems “In the dust of foreign roads”, published in Berlin in 1934. Of its four parts, the oriental flavor is especially distinct in the first. Individual works of this part constituted the object of study of this article. The autobiographical substrate of Volkov’s poetry is revealed, the intersection of motives and imagery with the poetic world of Gumilyov is shown. The influence of the Eastern world, its philosophical teachings on the creative worldview of Volkov is investigated. In his poetic thinking, traces of Sufism, Islam, and the philosophy of Lao Tzu are palpable. Exotic images of China and Mongolia weave an intricate pattern in the first cycles of the book, integrating into the depicted biographical circumstances and expanding their semantic palette. “Alien” is trying hard to become “ours” at the level of a philosophical attitude to the world and the fate of the poet himself. He is close to the poetic attitude of the inhabitants of the East to life and death, based on ancient traditions and customs. The poems reflect the confusion of the experiences of the lyrical hero, warrior and wanderer, who has found a place in life as a result of an action-packed duel with fate.

scholarly journals Quando o silêncio narra o que aconteceu: a morte em "To the Lighthouse"

Scriptorium ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 33180
Author(s):  
Adriana Madeira Coutinho
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Virginia Woolf ◽  
Traumatic Event ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
The Novel ◽  
To The Lighthouse ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Empirical Perspective ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Concrete Reality

Este artigo reflete sobre a condição humana e seu fim último, a morte, através do romance “To the Lighthouse”, de Virginia Woolf, em que a narrativa se desenvolve na relação entre a vida e a morte. Nas três partes do romance os acontecimentos giram em torno da morte, não só da morte física mas também de uma morte simbólica. Para tanto são apontadas algumas observações sobre subjetivismo e realidade objetiva, sobre temporalidade e sobre a própria prosa moderna nas formulações de Erich Auerbach. Em uma perspectiva empírica a autora aproxima o romance de sua realidade concreta, desnuda a dificuldade da escrita após um evento traumático além de apresentar aos leitores a fragilidade humana diante do inesperado. O presente trabalho foi realizado com apoio da Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior – Brasil (CAPES) - Código de Financiamento 001.  *** When silence tells what happened: death in "To the Lighthouse" ***This article reflects on the human condition and its ultimate end, death, through Virginia Woolf's novel "To the Lighthouse," where the narrative unfolds in the relationship between life and death. In the three parts of the novel, events revolve around death, not only physical death but also a symbolic death. To this end, some observations on subjectivism and objective reality, on temporality, and on modern prose itself in the formulations of Erich Auerbach are pointed out. In an empirical perspective, the author brings the novel closer to its concrete reality, exposes the difficulty of writing after a traumatic event, as well as presenting the human frailty before the unexpected. This study was financed in part by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior – Brasil (CAPES) – Finance Code 001.Keywords: Virginia Woolf; Death; Human condition; Literary criticism.

scholarly journals Dracula – Hybridity and Metafiction

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 53-74
Author(s):  
Anca Andriescu Garcia
Keyword(s):  
Historical Novel ◽  
Fin De Siecle ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Clear Definition ◽  
Narrative Technique ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Fin De Siècle ◽  
Place Of Origin ◽  
History And Myth ◽  
Good And Evil

AbstractDue to his supernatural nature, but also to his place of origin, Bram Stoker’s well-known character, Dracula, is the embodiment of Otherness. He is an image of an alterity that refuses a clear definition and a strict geographical or ontological placement and thus becomes terrifying. This refusal has determined critics from across the spectrum to place the novel in various categories from a psychoanalytical novel to a Gothic one, from a class novel to a postcolonial one, yet the discussion is far from being over. My article aims to examine this multitude of interpretations and investigate their possible convergence. It will also explore the ambivalence or even plurivalence of the character who is situated between the limit of life and death, myth and reality, historical character and demon, stereotype and fear of Otherness and attraction to the intriguing stranger, colonized and colonizer, sensationalism and palpable fin-de-siècle desperation, victim and victimizer, host and parasite, etc. In addition, it will investigate the mythical perspective that results from the confrontation between good and evil, which can be interpreted not only in the postcolonial terms mentioned above, but also in terms of the metatextual narrative technique, which converts into a meditation on how history and myth interact. Finally, it will demonstrate that, instead of being a representation of history, Bram Stoker’s novel represents a masterpiece of intergeneric hybridity that combines, among others, elements of history, myth, folktale and historical novel.1

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