archaeologists-from-the-united-states

"Between 1130 and 1180 a period of severe drought struck the Colorado Plateaus; this is the same time during which the appears to have disintegrated. Using the year 1150 as the beginning of the recognizes the potentially widespread importance of a real event in history; the end of building and probably, for 100 years, of occupation in . This is no small event given Chaco's role as a major center of activity, population, and exchange."

"The early history of s in has recently been addressed by Gifford and Morris (1985), who emphasize the period between 1920 and 1940 when these institutions provided nearly the only pre-professional, practical experience for archaeology students. The kinds of field classes offered by , founder of the field school, have been described by Chauvenet (1983). Field schools have a recognized long and venerable history and have provided American archaeology with many of its most acclaimed practitioners."

"is the study of . The primary foci of demography are rates and levels of , , and and how these all interact to produce population growth (or decline), density, and age- and sex-structures; how these rates or levels vary across time and space and what produces such variation; and what consequences these have on other aspects of human (or nonhuman) existence. These demographic phenomena lie at the very heart of . occurs as a result of differential fertility and mortality within a population; gene flow occurs because of migration between populations; and the effects of genetic drift are dependent upon population size, which is an outcome of the interactions among mortality, fertility, and migration (Gage, DeWitte, & Wood, 2012). These demographic forces also affect, are affected by, and reflect many of the things that anthropologists find most interesting. For example, the age–sex structure of a population influences the population’s ratio of consumers to producers and numbers of potential marriage partners, and thus places limits on such things as subsistence strategies and household structure."

"As a rule s were perforated lengthwise, so that a wire or piece of string could be passed through the hole and then fastened to the necklace or wristband on which the seal was usually worn. Fairly often the seal-stones were set between caps of gold, silver, or copper."

"Major sculptures which first attracted the attention of the world's art lovers to the ancient Near East derive from the time of of , known to have been an elder contemporary of ..."

", the capital of the dynasty since founded it, remains to be discovered."

"emphasizes the concern for facts, the tangible aspects of the archaeological record; the development of chronological techniques; s; and writing of informed by theory; and a reluctance to make inferences about social organization. Archaeology could provide the historical continuity that challenged the cataclysms of the romantic school and allowed for the development of an anthropological science. Archaeological remains were important in their own right in the early evolutionist program. The remains provided a tangible record of the degree of mental development of various societies. The archaeological remains also provided continuity from the past to the present. The continuity is essential to the development of anthropological science which depends on an orderly universe. Observations of archaeological traits are made and comparisons are drawn among sites and regions, suggesting a scenario of culture history which might then be compared with the scenarios developed by s, linguists, and s."

"Porada, born in Vienna, fled Europe in 1938, after . One of the few things she brought with her to New York was the plate copy of her dissertation, complete with her drawings of seal impressions from European collections, which she presented to , ’s first director. In ancient , s — often carved with exquisitely detailed scenes — were used to roll the owner’s unique stamp onto a document produced by scribes, attesting to its authenticity."

"The medieval (c. 1347-1351) was one of the most devastating s in human history. It killed tens of millions of Europeans, and recent analyses have shown that the disease targeted elderly adults and individuals who had been previously exposed to physiological stressors. Following the epidemic, there were improvements in standards of living, particularly in dietary quality for all socioeconomic strata."

"The downfall of the was brought about by the , a barbarous people who swept down from the northeastern mountains and subjugated the country in the twenty-second century As a result of the invasion, suffered a general disintegration. There were, however, a few centers of culture in which the standards set by the ns continued in force. One of these centers was . Here, under the later part of the Guti domination, reigned a priest-prince named whose statues show a technically proficient adherence to Akkad tradition."

"In the introductory essay, illustrated almost entirely with cylinders from the , Porada demonstrates how evidence derived from excavations post-dating the publication of her definitive catalogue of these seals (Corpus of Ancient Near Eastern Seals, 1948) can refine our understaning of the , , and styles of ancient Near Eastern s generally and of the Morgan seals specifically. The text is studied with insights and lavishly annotated with references to works both recently published and forthcoming."

"Much of the published bioarchaeological research on the has been done using samples from the in London. The location, purpose, and dimensions of East Smithfield are recorded in historical documents. Reports of the Black Death preceded its arrival in London, and East Smithfield was established in anticipation of the high mortality that would result in the city (Grainger et al. 2008, Hawkins 1990). The Black Death arrived in 1349 and lasted in London until 1350; East Smithfield was used only during the Black Death, so most, if not all, of the people buried there were victims of the disease. East Smithfield was partially excavated in the 1980s as part of the larger Royal Mint site, and more than 600 individuals interred in single burials or mass burial trenches were excavated from the cemetery."

"I saw several dogskins hung up to dry. On account of the scarcity of and s, the have to use dogskins for their winter furs. The dogs have fine thick fur, but nothing to compare with that of bears and caribou."

"While in we made four camping trips with and outboard motor, visiting Alaganik on the and sites in the Sound from to . The gave us several lifts, and in August the took us for a ten-day cruise around the Sound, stopping at , , , and other villages where we had an opportunity to talk to the natives, and also touching at a few of the ancient village sites on our route."

"There are a number of ways in which archeology may relate to , but in any given area it may not be possible to trace such connections fully. Ideally, of course, the archeology of a people should enable the to trace the record of the culture back into the stages temporally prior to those which can be explored through ethnological techniques or historical records. Admittedly the archeological data, even under conditions of maximum preservation and most skillful excavation, will never give the complete outline of a culture. At best the picture would be equivalent to that which the ethnologist might see if he visited a village from which the inhabitants had precipitately fled, abandoning all their possessions. But such a complete inventory of material items, in associations reflecting technological processes, economic activities, social organization and other nonmaterial aspects of life, is something to which the archeologist may aspire in vain."

"The ground was thawed to a depth of thirty centimeters. For the rough work of clearing the ground the men used spades and a pickaxe, but as soon as the real excavation began produced the geological spades with little blades, which were better for the more delicate work."

"is a in a plain of partly indurated sands and clays of age, known as the ."

"[T]he past was supreme; the priest who cherished it lived in a realm of shadows, and for the contemporary world he had no vital meaning. Likewise in Babylon the same retrospective spirit was now the dominant characteristic of the reviving empire of Nebuchadrezzar. The world was already growing old, and everywhere men were fondly dwelling on her faraway youth."

"The roots of modern civilization are planted deeply in the highly elaborate life of those nations which rose into power over six thousand years ago, in the basin of the eastern Mediterranean, and the adjacent regions on the east of it."

"[T]he eastern Mediterranean region...lies in the midst of the vast desert plateau, which, beginning at the Atlantic, extends eastward across the entire northern end of Africa, and continuing beyond the depression of the Red Sea, passes northeastward, with some interruptions, far into the heart of Asia. Approaching it, the one from the south and the other from the north, two great river valleys traverse this desert; in Asia, the Tigro-Euphrates valley; in Africa that of the Nile. It is in these two valleys that the career of man may be traced from the rise of European civilization back to a remoter age than anywhere else on earth; and it is from these two cradles of the human race that the influences which emanated from their highly developed but differing cultures, can now be more and more clearly traced as we discern them converging upon the early civilization of Asia Minor and southern Europe."

"The limits of the dominion of the Egyptian gods had been fixed as the outer fringes of the Nile valley long before the outside world was familiar to the Nile-dwellers; and merely commercial intercourse with a larger world had not been able to shake the tradition. Many a merchant had seen a stone fall in distant Babylon and in Thebes alike, but it had not occurred to him, or to any man in that far-off age, that the same natural force reigned in these widely separated countries."

"It was universalism expressed in terms of imperial power which first caught the imagination of the thinking men of the Empire, and disclosed to them the universal sweep of the Sun-god’s dominion as a physical fact. Monotheism is but imperialism in religion."

"Here we see the word "brain" occurring for the first time in human speech, as far as it is known to us; and in discussing injuries affecting the brain, we note the surgeon's effort to delimit his terms as he selects for specialization a series of common and current words to designate three degrees of injury to the skull indicated in modern surgery by the terms "fracture", "compound fracture," and "compound comminuted fracture," all of which the ancient commentator carefully explains."

"It lies like an army facing south, with one wing stretching along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean and the other reaching out to the Persian Gulf, while the center has its back against the northern mountains. The end of the western wing is Palestine; Assyria makes up a large part of the center; while the end of the eastern wing is Babylonia. [...] This great semicircle, for lack of a name, may be called the Fertile Crescent."

"It has now become a sinister commonplace in the life of the post-war generation that man has never had any hesitation in applying his increasing mechanical power to the destruction of his own kind. The World War has now demonstrated the appalling possibilities of man's mechanical power of destruction. The only force that can successfully oppose it is the human conscience – something which the younger generation is accustomed to regard as a fixed group of outworn scruples. Everyone knows that man's amazing mechanical power is the product of a long evolution, but it is not commonly realized that this is also true of the social force which we call conscience – although with this important difference: as the oldest known implement-making creature man has been fashioning destructive weapons for possibly a million years, whereas conscience emerged as a social force less than five thousand years ago. One development has far outrun the other; because one is old, while the other has hardly begun and still has infinite possibilities before it. May we not consciously set our hands to the task of further developing this new-born conscience until it becomes a manifestation of good will, strong enough to throttle the surviving savage in us? That task should surely be far less difficult than the one our savage ancestors actually achieved: the creation of a conscience in a world where, in the beginning, none existed."

"The August sun beat down, baking, broiling, burning."

"All over Russia princes are as plenty as pickpockets in London."

"Marco Madella and Dorian Fuller : ‘Archaeological research in Cholistan has led to the discovery of a large number of sites along the dry channels of the Ghaggar-Hakra river (often identified with the lost Sarasvati and Drishadvati rivers of Sanskrit traditions) ... The final desiccation of some of these channels may have had major repercussions for the Harappan Civilisation and is considered a major factor in the de-centralisation and de-urbanisation of the Late Harappan period.’"

"R. Dyson (1993) remarks, in his discussion of changes taking place in the field, that the invasion thesis "becomes a paradigm of limited usefulness" (576). He proposes that "by freeing themselves from this hypothesis drawn from earlier linguistic studies, archaeologists may now focus their attention on the archaeological evidence in its own terms" (576). Commenting on the "continuing lack of agreement over the criteria by which the presence of the Indo-Aryans can be demonstrated," he outlines the alternative paradigm taking shape in the archaeology of the whole region I have been discussing: "The suggestion of an indigenous Indo-Aryan population going far back into pre-history in Northeastern Iran and nearby Turkmenia is now taken quite seriously." With this trend in mind, he finds it interesting that the discussion between contributors of Possehl's Harappan Civilization "indicated a parallel trend" (577)."

"The succeeding phase of Mundigak I, says Fairservis, adds to the KGM ware " the jars and cups and design repertoire, including black and red polychrome painting familiar in Quetta [central Baluchistan] as the Kechi Beg wares, and which in turn have their equivalents in the early Hissar Culture of north-eastern Iran. ""

"Walter Fairservis, Jr .,' describing the Harappan site of Mohenjo-daro, has dwelt on a structure "known to the excavators as the Assembly Hall". He 2 writes: "Badly preserved, it is nonetheless one of the most striking monuments at Mohenjodaro. It consisted of a broad pillared hall opening principally to . the north, i.e., towards the highest part of the site. Twenty rectangular pillars approximately five feet by three feet in size supported the roof. The pillars were arranged in rows of four with five pillars to each row." After detailing the rest of the important features of the building complex containing the pillared hall , Fairservis ' comments on this complex: " One cannot help but speculate.. . that it was constructed in response to a formality urged by religion or government. Was it indeed a place of assembly or perhaps a place of audience? Wheeler rightfully refers to the Achaemenid pillared hall of audience, the apadana, in this context, and such a comparison is certainly called to mind."

"We should join to them Mundigak in South Afghanistan, about whose pottery Fairservis, Jr., has the general statement: " ...the Mundigak sequence is closely paralleled in northern Baluchistan - so much so, in fact, that one can say that they are essentially of one and the same tradition.""

"It appears to be hieroglyphic or ideographic in form. Human, animal and floral figurines are readily recognizable, multiple dashes probably represent numbers , while such objects as wheels, bows and arrows , and trees very likely represent themselves - it would seem that they are not phonetic symbols."

"Who and whatever James was, so was Jesus."

"Russian and Central Asian scholars working on the contemporary but very different Andronovo and Bactrian Margiana archaeological complexes of the 2d millennium b.c. have identified both as Indo-Iranian, and particular sites so identified are being used for nationalist purposes. There is, however, no compelling archaeological evidence that they had a common ancestor or that either is Indo-Iranian. Ethnicity and language are not easily linked with an archaeological signature, and the identity of the Indo-Iranians remains elusive."

"Reliance upon migrations as the principal agent of social change has been typical of Russian archaeological interpretations, along with a blurring of the distinction between ethnic, linguistic, racial, and cultural entities, the isolation of racial/ethnic groups by the craniometric methods of physical anthropology, and the use of linguistic paleontology to reconstruct the development of cultural groups."

"Perhaps it is my lack of belief in relating the Sintashta-Petrovka with the Rig-veda, separated as they are by 1,000 years and almost as many miles, or in the alleged homogeneity of the Andronovo that Anthony finds “inaccuracies” in my article."

"Increasingly, however, the concept of a single homogeneous culture covering 3 million square kilometers and enduring for over a millennium has become untenable."

"Philip Kohl’s comment is pertinent here: “Archaeological cultures should not be viewed as homogeneous or growing like plants from single seeds; they are always heterogeneous and constantly in the making.”"

"The identity of the Indo-Iranians remains elusive. When they are identified in the archaeological record it is by allegation rather than demonstration."

"In an interesting “Afterword” to Sarianidi’s Margiana and Protozoroastrianism, J. P. Mallory asks, “How do we reconcile deriving the Indo-Iranians from two regions [the steppes and the Central Asian oases] so different with respect to environment, subsistence and cultural behavior?” (1998a:181). He offers three models, each of interest, none supported by archaeological evidence,... His conclusion is that the nucleus of Indo-Iranian linguistic developments formed in the steppes and, through some form of symbiosis in Bactria-Margiana, pushed south- ward to form the ancient languages of Iran and India. It is, however, that “form of symbiosis” that is so utterly elusive!"

"Indus materials are found in Mesopotamia, but the reverse is extremely rare."

"Central Asia has either too many languages and too few archaeological cultures or too few languages and too many archaeological cultures to permit an easy fit between archaeology and language."

"Not a single artifact of Andronovo type has been identified in Iran or in northern India, but there is ample evidence for the presence of Bactrian Margiana materials on the Iranian Plateau and in Baluchistan."

"The fact that these language families are of far less interest to the archaeologist may have a great deal to do with the fact that it is primarily speakers of Indo-European in search of their own roots who have addressed this problem."

"In the context of a renewed fashion of relating archaeology, culture, and language it is well to remember that neither sherds nor genes are destined to speak specific languages, nor does a given language require a specific ceramic type or genetic structure."

"Contemporary methodologies, linguistic or archaeological, for determining the spoken language of a remote archaeological culture are virtually nonexistent. Simplified notions of the congruence between an archaeological culture, an ethnic group, and a linguistic affiliation millennia before the existence of texts is mere speculation, often with a political agenda. Archaeology has a long way to go before its methodology allows one to establish which cultural markers, pottery, architecture, burials, etc., are the most reliable for designating ethnic identity."

"Russian scholars working in the Eurasiatic steppes are nearly unanimous in their belief that the Andronovo culture and its variant expressions are Indo-Iranian. Similarly, Russian and Central Asian scholars working on the Bactrian Margiana complex share the conviction that it is Indo-Iranian. The two cultures are contemporary but very different. Passages from the Avesta and the Rigveda are quoted by various researchers to support the Indo-Iranian identity of both, but these passages are sufficiently general as to permit the Plains Indians an Indo-Iranian identity. Ethnicity is permeable and multi-dimensional, and the “ethnic indicators” employed by Kuzmina can be used to identify the Arab, the Turk, and the Iranian, three completely distinctive ethnic and linguistic groups. Ethnicity and language are not so easily linked with an archaeological signature."

"The almost complete absence of evidence of contact between the Bactrian Margiana complex and the cultures of the steppe is made the more enigmatic by the evidence of settlement surveys. Gubaev, Koshelenko, and Tosi (1998) have found numerous sites of the steppe cultures near Bactrian Margiana settlements. The evidence therefore suggests intentional avoidance. Clearly this situation, should it be correctly interpreted, requires theoretical insights that await elucidation."

"I argue for a different interpretation entirely—that the bearers of any of the variants of the Andronovo culture and the Bactrian Margiana complex may have spoken Indo-Iranian but may just as readily have spoken a Dravidian and/or an Altaic language."