The history of lithic use wear analysis II – Qu’était l’objet?

The fragmentary nature of many archaeological finds can make our work challenging. The anaerobic conditions of the Neolithic and Bronze Age lake side sites of peri-alpine Europe, however, can provide some very welcome insights into the organic part of prehistoric tool kits. It is no surprise that the almost completely preserved sickle from Solferino inspired French archaeologist André Vayson de Pradenne (1919) to address the still unresolved issues of the use of certain lithic artefacts and the polish that can be seen on them.

This sickle was found some time before Vayson saw it in peat bogs just south of the Lake of Garda. It consisted of a number flint blades that fitted seamlessly next to each other in a groove in a wooden haft. They were glued in with a smooth mastic and protruded ca. 12mm from the haft. The form would suggest use as a knife or saw would be impossible. Vayson commenced on a large comparative study of all known sickle and sickle like artefacts from Europe and the Near East. And although he does not describe them elaborately, he does some experiments, trying to work wood and grasses with sickle like flint tools. He come to the conclusion that the artefacts must have been used as sickles, but also argued that wood as well as grasses can produce polish.

Modern serrated flake with broad band of lustre experimentally produced by cutting straw (x2). From Curwen 1930.

British surgeon and archaeologist E. C. Curwen shows much respect for Vayson’s work, whose 1919 paper he summarises elaborately in English in his article in Antiquity (Curwen, 1930). He is, however, not satisfied with Vayson’s results and does more experiments from which he concludes that working grasses and woods each produces distinctive kinds of polish.

When Dorothy Garrod finds sickle blades set in bone handles with polish from Natufian layers in Palestine, this raises new questions about the timing and process of the start of cereal domestication in the Near East. René Neuville discusses the issue in a 1934 paper, building on Vayson’s work and criticizing part of Curwen’s 1930 conclusions (Neuville, 1934). As a result Curwen decides to do more experiments in order to finally get to the bottom of what causes polishes and to address the domestication questions (Curwen, 1935).

Aiming to reproduce more realistic durations of tool use, Curwen devises a mechanical experiment. He sets a number of experimental artefacts made from two kinds of flint into an electric lathe and as such they were used to `work´ bone, oak wood and compressed straw with (30 minutes each; straw 3500 rotations/minute, bone and wood 2500). The results supported the view that lustre and its development is not just the result of the intensity of use, but also conditioned by the worked material. In the case of these sickles Curwen concluded that the worked material was probably a siliceous plant material of “a yielding nature”. It was thus established that the type of tool, the worked material, the length of use as well as the kind of use all influence the build-up of polish. With this Spurrell, Vayson, Neuville and Curwen had set the parameters for most use wear studies to this date.

It is fascinating to see the photographs Curwen used in both, otherwise relatively sparsely illustrated, 1930 and 1935 publications to illustrate his findings. Although his photos are not microscopic (scale 2:1 and 2½:1), their aesthetics foreshadow those of the microscopic photography of use wear traces on lithic artefacts that have become the norm during the past sixty years or so. The photography used by most presenters at the Usewear2012 conference last September still stuck to these aesthetics, which can be described as a visual vocabulary. Only recently, really with the appearance of digital photography and SEM-technology, do we see a widening of this visual vocabulary within the discipline of use wear analysis.

Lastly, Curwen’s use of mechanic experiments seem to have been rather forwards looking. It has not become the norm in experimental archaeology, neither in use wear analyses, but it might have a future after all. The mechanical experiments allowed Curwen to reproduce intense artefact use with each of the experimental artefacts and enabled him control the parameters of his study and to make direct comparisons between the polish developed on each tool. In a study by Iovita et al (Iovita et al. In Press) mechanised experiments are used to control the experiments parameters and enable reproducibility. Mechanised experiments might also allow for larger reference samples for use wear studies.

Microscopy has not entered the discipline of lithic use wear studies in the 1930’s yet. Researchers had been able to define the factors causing polish and the discipline’s visual repertoire had been established by a small group of researchers working across Europa and the Near East engaged in an international debate, doing experiments and willing to try new methods and to learn from each other.

Literature

CURWEN, E. C. 1930. Prehistoric Flint Sickles Antiquity, 4, 179-188.

CURWEN, E. C. 1935. Agriculture and the Flint Sickle in Palestine. Antiquity, 9, 62-66.

IOVITA, R., SCHÖNEKEß, H., GAUDZINSKI-WINDHEUSER, S. & JÄGER, F. In Press, Projectile impact fractures and launching mechanisms: results of a controlled ballistic experiment using replica Levallois points. Journal of Archaeological Science.

NEUVILLE, R. 1934. Les débuts de l’agriculture et la faucille préhistorique en Palestine, Jerusalem.

VAYSON DE PRADENNE, A. 1919. Faucille préhistorique de Solférino. L’Anthropologie, XXIX, 393-422.

The history of lithic use wear analysis – the unusual suspects

Spurrell, Vayson, Flinders Petrie and Curwen. Those are perhaps not the first names that come to mind, when thinking of the beginnings of lithic use wear analysis. That would probably be Semenov and Keeley.

As the continuing winter weather is not ideal for working on the experimental work for my PhD, I decided to intensify my research on the history of use wear analysis and its methodology as well as to work on a databank. So while it is snowing outside and the garden where I am to do the experiments is still the domain of a few hardy birds and some brave crocuses, I have time to write about the earliest attempts archaeologists made at determining the use of chipped stone artefacts.

In 1889-90 M. Flinders Petrie finds “a sickle having a compound armature” in Kahun, Egypt (Flinders Petrie 1891, Spurrell 1891, 1892). These denticulated flint blades had been known for a few decades from various sites and were assumed to be saws. However, Flinders Petrie’s finds included an almost complete wooden sickle in which such a blade was still hafted, using a cement consisting of “black Nile mud and gum” (Spurrell 1892). Further blades were found in the immediate vicinity of the sickle and would have formed the remainder of the tool. These artefacts were to leave a 40 year long trace of debate amongst archaeologists. To a certain extend it even continues to this day. It started when Flinders Petrie passed the artefacts on to Flaxman Charles John Spurrell.

What struck me most is that Spurrell uses many of the major analytical methods and evidence applied by use-wear and lithic specialists today. He studies the artefact’s morphology and compares the Kahun sickle as well as the individual blades to those from other prehistoric sites across the Near East and Europe. Amongst these are sickles found by Jakob Heierli at Vinelz, a lakeside village on the Lake Biel/Bienne, here in Switzerland. Interesting is also his discussion of the Egyptian pictorial evidence of the use of these sickles.

Besides the morphology it is, of course, the polish visible along the edge of the blades, that gets Spurrell’s attention. Similar polish was already known from artefacts from other Near Eastern and European sites. However, the origin of this polish is unknown at the time. One archaeologist, for example, suggests it is a patina which builds after excavation in the museums where they are stored. Like many of his European contemporaries, Spurrell decides to do imitative experiments. He notices the adequate angle of the sickle handle, the effectiveness of the tools and his experiments confirm the prehistoric depictions of sickle use. But his experiments are mostly concerned with the polish. To be able to recreate the polish he tries sawing bone, wet and dry wood and horn, but without results. Cutting ripe straw, however, does produce the polish. Furthermore, the polish distribution suggests the working of a relatively soft and pliable material. He concludes that it is the organic silica in grasses or cereal stems causing the polish, thus confirming the direct archaeological evidence. However, the archaeological community of the time was not yet ready to accept Spurrell’s results.

Spurrell does not write about using a microscope as part of his analyses and it seems that not even during the nineteen thirties, when E. C. Curwen enters in a debate with Francoise Vayson, microscopic use wear studies are applied. The study of the use of lithic artefacts does get raised to another level, though. If the weather stays like this I will be writing about that here soon.

Literature

Spurrell, F. C. J., 1892, Notes on early sickles, in The archaeological journal 49, p.53-69

Spurrell, F. C. J., 1891, The stone implements of Kahun, in Flinders Petrie, Illahun, Kahun and Gurob. 1889-1890, London, David Nutt, pp. 51-56

Flinders Petrie, W. M. 1891, Illahun, Kahun and Gurob. 1889-1890, London, David Nutt

Lab I: getting to know my tools

A big day today. While the outside world is covered in deep fresh snow, I started working in a warm lab in at the University of Fribourg, Geosciences today, getting to know my equipement. I will be mostly using this digital microscope for the lithic use wear analyses for my PhD research. It makes fantastic images with a good depth of field. It would even make 3D images, but I am not sure yet if the quality of these is sufficient for my purposes. In any case, it is very exciting to get started.

Photograhpy – First adventures with an Agfa Synchro Box

My first camera was red with a big separate flash, 35mm of course. As an archaeologist I have used a large array of cameras over the years. They range from normal analogue 35mm SLRs and very early digital cameras (I hardly dare to think about the quality of those photographs!) to high-end DSLR’s. On the site I’m working now we even use a  120mm film Hasselblad!

Most archaeologists seem to have some affinity with photography. And I guess that is true of me as well. It was thus fun to find this AGFA Synchro Box (produced from 1951-1957) in a box in my parent’s house. It must be the very camera with which those little childhood photographs of my Father and his family were made.

So, we cleaned it and we tried a film. It is truly amazing how simple these boxes are! The camera takes a bit of getting used to, though. It is quite tricky to use the viewfinder and determine what will actually be on the photo. Photos 1 & 2 are the results of that first film. The rest come from the second attempt.

Not very happy with the processing of Photos 1 & 2: Ilford Delta 400 Pro, b & w processing, the format of the prints is wrong (lost some at the short sides) and colour printing. Photos 3, 4 & 5 are better (Ilford FP4 plus, b & w processing and printing) even though they are just contact prints. (I then scanned all of them to be able to post them here.)

Church, Unterseen, Switzerland, Mai 2012. Afga Synchro Box, Ilford Delta 400 Pro

Excavation Unterseen/Untere Gasse. Mai 2012. Agfa Synchro Box, Ilford Delta 400 Pro

Laatsch, Switzerland, Mai 2012. Agfa Synchro Box, Ilford FP4 plus

Carolingian Church in Mistail, Switzerland, Mai 2012. Agfa Synchro Box, Ilford FP4 plus

Carolingian Church in Mistail, Switzerland, Mai 2012. Agfa Synchro Box, Ilford FP4 plus

There is a colour film in the Synchro Box now and I am curious to see the results of that.

Unterseen II: the archaeology of a 19th Century road surface – Strassenarchäologie des 19. Jh.s

English text below.

Manchmal bleibt es bis lange nach der Ausgrabung noch ungewiss was Du ausgegraben hast, manchmal ist es sofort klar. Dies war letzte Woche der Fall. Auf der Ausgrabung in Unterseen legten wir zwei alte Strassenpflästerungen frei.

Neben der Stadthauslaube, direkt unter dem heutigen Strassenpflaster dokumentierten wir einen letzten Rest einer Pflästerung, die aus in Mörtel gesetzten Flusskiesel bestand. Das zweite Stück eines Kopfsteinpflasters dürfte älter sein, wurde aber direkt unter dem modernen Teerbelag gefunden. Auf seiner Unterseite waren selbst die Abdrücke der Steine sichtbar.

Vielen Passanten fiel die gut verständliche und wunderschön erhaltene Pflästerung auf und weckte ihr Interesse, sogar mehr als die daneben liegenden mittelalterlichen Mauern. Vielleicht auch weil ihre Urgrosseltern noch darauf spaziert sind?

Zwei Reihen aus grossen Quadersteinen, die tief in die darunterliegende ältere Oberfläche einer Naturstrasse gesetzt worden waren, begrenzen einen ca. 1 m breiten Streifen Flusskiesel. Die etwas grösser als faustgrossen Steine waren nur in lockere Sand gesetzt worden, bilden aber trotzdem eine bemerkenswert feste Oberfläche. Regula Glatz wertet im Moment ältere Grabungen des ADB in Unterseen aus. Sie wies mich auf ein Büchlein hin, in dem ich dieses Bild von 1819 fand. Es zeigt nicht nur das Stadthaus kurz nach der Umbau von 1818, sondern auch eine Bollensteinpflästerung in der Unteren Gasse: vier schmale und ein breiteren Streifen Pflästerung, die durch Quadersteinreihen voneinander getrennt waren.

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Sometimes you do not know what you are excavating until long after you are finished on site. Sometimes, however, you know it all too well. This was the case a few weeks back on our Unterseen excavation when we uncovered an old street surface. It was the second bit we found.

We discovered a first section directly below the present road surface against the old Stadthaus (town hall). A small area covered with river pebbles set on their sides in mortar. The second, probably older, section was also found directly underneath the modern surface. Its stones’ impression in the bottom of the tar covering them.

Many passers-by commented on it. The beautifully preserved street on which some of their great grandparents might have walked still was instantly recognisable as such and grabbed people’s attention. Even more so than the walls in other parts of the excavation.

Two rows of stones set deep into the compacted, older road surface below frame a ca. 1 m wide stretch of pebbles. Although these slightly larger than fist sized pebbles were only set in loose sand, they formed an incredibly stable road surface. Regula Glatz is doing post-excavation work on earlier excavations in Unterseen. She showed me a booklet with paintings and etchings of Unterseen, mostly dating to the 18^th and 19^th C. And yes, the one depicted here shows the Stadthaus, just after its 1819 renovation with a pebbled road surface in front of it. Four narrow and one wider stretches of pebbles, separated by rows of large rectangular stones.

Unterseen I – temps de repos

Lunch break at the excavation. Archaeological rescue excavation of medieval building remains in the small city of Unterseen by the Archäologische Dienst des Kt. Bern (Archaeological Service of the Canton Berne, Switzerland)

Dingos, lynxes, stone tools and the wilderness downtown

After almost two years, I’ll be visiting my hometown again soon. I live and work as an archaeologists in a country in Central Europe where I did not grow up. I was reading John Bradley’s “When a stone tool is a dingo: Country and relatedness in Australian Aboriginal notions of landscape” the other day. Bradley manages to illustrate and summarize some important points about how past (and present) societies might understand their surroundings much less compartmentalized as we in western societies of the 21^st C might do. It made me wonder if the concept of a lithic tool being a dingo can be translated to the (peri-)alpine Central European Mesolithic. Could a stone tool be a lynx instead?

However, intuitively the first thing that came to mind reading about such a complete/holistic worldview did not concern the Mesolithic, but my own life. More than a third of my life I have now spend away from where I grew up. Those ca. 13 years were spend in 6 cities on two continents. All of these cities have grown dear to me, but none of them I know as well as the city I spend my younger years in.

A. Deusser - Arcen von Westen (Lottum, von Arcen aus gesehen, mit Bodennebel, Abendlandschaft an der Maas, Lottum, 1918 - 1924.)
Deusser moved to the region I grew up in, during the 1910s-1920s, living and painting in Arcen.

One of the band members of Arcade Fire went back to the neighbourhood he grew up in and wrote the song “We used to wait” about this. Chris Milk and a team from Google made the interactive video The wilderness downtown around it, taking you back to YOUR youth. It is an amazing experience and shows what is possible with HTML5. It’s worth a try (best with google chrome).

My understanding and knowledge of the part of Europe where I spend the first 19 years (and a few more later on) of my life goes back at least four generations, roughly 120 years. It is probably the most in depth and intense knowledge and understanding I will ever have of any part of the world. I guess this will be true for most if not all people who pack up their things and go and live in a new part of the world. Perhaps I will look back at this post in 20 years and think how wrong I was. But maybe archaeologists, dealing with the material and immaterial remains of the past (and present?) in our surroundings find it easier than many others to find stone-tool-dingos – or lynxes – in their newly adapted homes.

 Bradley, J., 2008, When a stone tool is a dingo: Country and relatedness in Australian Aboriginal notions of landscape, in David, B. & Thomas, J. (eds), Handbook of Landscape Archaeology. Left Coast Press

Experimental archaeology in a museum – an exhibition review

«Savoir-faire – Mit Kopf und Hand, die experimentelle Archäologie erzählt»
Museum Schwab – 28.05.2011 -26.02.2012

A man with a long grey ponytail, dressed in yellowish leather clothes assembles a stone axe. A little later we see him stalk through the forest with a hafted stone axe in hand, looking for a victim. After a while he finds an average sized, living tree. Within a few minutes he has the tree down.
You wonder why he has to chop down a living, healthy tree. But that is not the main point here. This stereotypical scene of experimental archaeology is shown on a big screen in the entrance hall of the Museum Schwab in Biel/Bienne, Switzerland. This small archaeological museum shows a small selection of excellent finds from the rich archaeology of the region of the Lake of Biel.

Museum Schwab. Biel, Switzerland

The ground floor, however, is reserved for temporary exhibitions. Until Feb. 26th 2012 one can still visit the exhibition «Savoir-Faire», on experimental archaeology. So what does the exhibition show us? I believe the film scenes I described above are a little unfortunate. Throughout the exhibition one does not get to see many experimental archaeologists working, neither in photos not in film. To then start with such a stereotype, which also probably is not true for many exp. archaeologists, is a shame. Especially, as it seems that the rest of the exhibition and also the accompanying booklet tries to give us a very different impression. L. Marquis, the museum’s director, writes in the introduction of the exhibition booklet: “Experimental archaeology asks, using a practical method, about the function and production methods of archaeological finds, asks about the `how´.” (my trans.)

The first half of the exhibition is very hands-on. On a number of low tables examples of materials used to produce various archaeological artefact categories are presented: wooden throwing sticks and spears, pottery, bows and arrows, chipped stone artefacts and polished stone artefacts etc. Considering the location of the Museum within the Three-lake –region, it is not surprising many examples come from the archaeology of the lake side villages. The material samples can all be handled. Each category is accompanied by a leaflet in which the production of the artefact category is described and an example is given of how experimental archaeology has contributed to our understanding of them. Furthermore, examples of each of the artefact categories are presented in nearby a glass case. There is no definite order in which to view the small exhibition and that is fine, really. Especially, if there are many visitors it might be nice to be able to manoeuvre freely around the room. The design is very clean and easily `read´. The visitor is not bombarded with images and text and the designers worked with few colours.

A second room is largely taken up by two `tableaux vivant´.

St.Ursanne: middle ages and hazelnuts

There has to be some diversion in the life of a phd student. So on a quiet rainy Sunday a few friends suggested a visit to St. Ursanne, Switzerland. (Thanks for a great day L., Chr. & R.!). I have been living very close to the Jura Mountains for a number of years now, but never actually made it there. It was starting to gain mythical proportions in my mind. So, time for some exploration. The whole day I had a nagging feeling that I should know St. Ursanne, that it was known for something else, besides from being a well preserved town and the medieval monastery.

St. Ursanne, from Kunstführer durch die Schweiz 3 (1982)

St. Ursanne lies in the remote but beautiful valley of the Doubs. You enter the town through one of its 3 towers. The town has bags of charm and it is not surprising that it is rather touristy. At its centre lies the church and monastery of Saint Ursanne. Its predecessor was founded ca. 635 AD over the grave of St. Ursinicus, an irish monk and student and companion of St. Columban. The present church and monastic buildings dates mostly to early 13^th C AD and is stylistically truly on the transition of the romanesque to the gothic. The cloister dates to the 14^th C AD. The southern entrance is one of the best pieces of romanesque sculpture in Switzerland. Beautiful, but a little mad is the baroque choir. In the lapidarium one walks over a glass floor under which lie scores of those fascinating early medieval trapezoid sarcophagi made of the local chalkstone.

Cloister, St. Ursanne

Sometime this week it finally dawned on me: the Abri Les Gripons lies just northwest of St. Ursanne! I cannot blame the others for not knowing of this site. Although all four of us were trained archaeologists, none of the other have much to do with the Mesolithic. But I should have remembered. The site was excavated in 1986 – 1989 (Pousaz 1991; see also Nielsen 2009) and is mostly known for its Early Mesolithic horizon. Burned earth and charcoal indicate hearths. Finds include mostly calcinated bones and flint artefacts.

My interest is in the Late Mesolithic horizon, though.

The «6. Interregionales Silex Symposium» – an interregional/-national early summer’s evening in Basel

Last Friday, I had the pleasure of taking part in the highly informal „6. Interregionale Silex Symposium” in Basel. The fabulous weather allowed for an early May bbq and beer gathering, followed by a stimulating evening of flinty-talk.

Acheulean Implements, Kent UK

D. Schuhmann (Germany) started us off with some musings on the Yabrudien in Hummal other sites in Syria. H. Flück (Fricktal), really a Romanist, took a brave step standing up in front of a room full of hard-core prehistorians and introduced us to the fabulously beautiful knapping work of the Mayas. M. Bolliger (Fricktal) subsequently read out a highly informative alphabetic list of 1000 interesting rawmaterial sites in Europe. We will never again be lost for ideas on what to do when on holidays!

The break was spent with more interregional international beer (Efes, Kronenbourg and Bittburger; thanks to the little Turkish shop next door’s tendency to promote cosmopolitism) outside again and used for much valueless networking, the most useful kind.

Flint nodule; ©Arco Ardon, Flickr

I (Limburg) had the honour to start the second block and gave the audience my take on Kohn & Mithens (Antiquity 1999) so called Sexy Handaxe Theory. D. Brönnimann (Baselländer) then proceeded to succinctly explain us the many things we can not learn from flint thin sections. Dr. R. Jagher (Basel) finished off the evening by giving us a slightly worrying insight into the biology and toxicology of the Tuber silexorum (Common Flint nodule) from a Baseller point of view. After which we just managed to get the last train home (although there are rumours that a few locked themselves in the building and stayed a bit longer.)

Thanks everyone for a good evening!

Blogging Archaeology 1 to 5 and VIARCH – when an archaeologist temporarily ceases to be an archaeologist

Many archaeologists identify themselves rather strongly with their profession and I guess I stand accused. However, even archaeologists can’t always be archaeologist. I was being distracted from archaeology for a while working on our house. It’s about finished now and we’ve moved in. As I returned to the world I noticed I have missed two big events in archaeological blogging and visualisation: Okay, I knew I sadly sadly would not be able to make it to the VIARCH-Conference. The Archaeological Eye has more infos on this.

Secondly, as a prequel to the SAA conference session on blogging archaeology, Colleen Morgan of Middle Savagery, held a blog-carnival. For four weeks, she each week posted a question which was answered by various archaeological bloggers on their blogs. These she collected and synergised. A shame I missed it. However, I think it was a fantastic effort and it’s great to see such a self confident and reflective bunch of blogging archaeologists.

Much of my thoughts were voiced by the many contributors, so I’ll only highlight a few issues here and give a Swiss/continental European perspective on some. (Better late then never!) That actually brings me to the first point. It seems there are not many non-English language archaeology blogs around, or they are not well integrated with the English language bloggers. In fact, I know that there are only very few German language archaeology blogs. And I guess, I once again stand accused as I decided to blog in English and not in German (or any of the other Swiss languages or my native language). It would be great if the interaction could become more international.

The questions C. Morgan asked were: 1.) What is the place of this conversation within academic, professional, and public discourse? Simply put, what can the short form do for archaeology? 2.) on the risk of blogging archaeology. What does one share, what not? 3.) are we really changing opinions or moving the field forward? Who is your audience and how to you interact with this audience? What do you want out of interactivity by means of blogging about archaeology? 4.) and lasty she asked how people feel about publishing the blog-carnival.

EXPO¦ARCH¦DISS digitally

A good year ago, B. Dubosson, H. Flück and I started EXPO¦ARCH¦DISS, an exhibition of posters of PhD projects concerning Swiss archaeology or by Swiss archaeologists. The posters have been exhibited at the yearly meetings of the societies of prehistoric, roman, medieval and classical archaeology in Switzerland in 2010. Now the posters are also available digitally on the new EXPO¦ARCH¦DISS-website!

We are interested to hear from you what you think of EXPO¦ARCH¦DISS and invite all phd candidates who work on a Swiss archaeological topic to send in a poster.

You can find all information on the website (the French version is in the making).

The Aesthetics of Lithics – Marden Henge and Late Mesolithic Switzerland

I have great respect for the prehistoric flintworkers that produced the extraordinary pieces of craftsmanship that stand out from the usual crowd of artefacts and debitage we archaeologists mostly deal with. However, I do not count myself amongst the lithics fans who can dote on these special artefacts for hours. When I saw the picture of these ripple-flaked oblique arrowheads, though, it struck me how much they differ from the late Mesolithic artefacts from Central Europe that I am working with.

Ripple Flaked Arrowheads, Marden Henge. from Leary etal 2010, PAST 66

Let me introduce the mentioned arrowheads briefly. First, they are stunning and amazing pieces of craftsmanship! They were found during excavations by English Heritage at Marden Henge, southern England. Marden Henge dates to the Late Neolithic, ca. 2500 BC and lies between Avebury and Stonehenge. Leary, Field and Russell (2010) briefly report on the fieldwork in Past 66. The arrowheads came from a trench in which a remarkably well preserved building was discovered. More on Marden Henge and the fieldwork can also be found on these sites: The BBC site shows a short video and The Guardian website has an article and a small interactive feature. Digital Digging made this nice little overlay video.

Back to the lithics. Leary, Field and Russell (2010, p. 16) write:

“Two exquisitely crafted ripple-flaked oblique flint arrowheads were also recovered from this trench, but with broken tips and one missing barb each. However, if an intriguing broken fragment of flint from another part of the site is correctly interpreted, these arrowheads may have once sported grossly elongated barbs on one side. This long and narrow surface-flaked ‘barb’ fragment closely matches the character and width of the stubs on the arrowheads – so much so that it almost refits with one of them. Such an overstated feature places the artefact well beyond the realms of practicality, and must have been the ultimate show-off item. As far as we know, nothing similar exists in Britain – and even the barbs on elaborate continental barbed and tanged arrowheads are small by comparison. We lay a challenge here at the feet of all flint knappers out there to try to recreate a similar arrowhead and barb.”

What struck me was how different they are from the finest, most sophisticated artefacts from the Central European Late Mesolithic. And yes, I do realise artefacts from different periods and different parts of the world are being compared. It is also not my aim to do a typological comparison, but to take a moment to look at some of the wonderful things we – as archaeologists – have the privilige to work with, to contemplate how a skill can be used in such varied ways, producing artefacts withi such different functions and meanings.

To me the small trapezes are the most aesthetically beautiful chipped stone tools from Late Mesolithic Switzerland. These, however, can be assumed to have been practical tools, used and hafted as arrowheads, unlike the “ultimate show-of items from Marden Henge”. And unlike the Marden arrowheads, their beauty lies in their simplicity, their elegance, their practicality. With this technique many highly efficient arrowheads (or other tools) can be produced from relatively small pieces of raw-material (if need be raw-material of lesser quality). They can be routinely made and replaced. There is no reason to suppose they were show-off items, in fact when hafted you would hardly have seen much of them.

late mesolithic trapeze, Central Switzerland (Foto ProSpect)

That almost seems to be a shame with e.g. trapezes like this one, made of rock crystal (from a site in the Central Swiss Alps). Its beauty, it seems, is in the design, and not in an ostentatious display of skill and luxury as in the Marden Henge arrowheads.

Update here!

Leary, J.,  Field, D.  and Russell, M., 2010, Marvels at Marden Henge, in PAST 66, p. 14-16

Four Stone Hearth Tea-Party and a weekly anthro round-up

Krystal at Anthropology in Practice invites to the 102nd Four Stone Hearth Tea-Party.

It’s a good and very wide selection this time. So, head over there.

And also at Neuroanthropology the Wednesday round-up has some fascinating links as well!

Keep up the good work, all of you!

Alpine Archaeology-Blog, e-learning and archaeological methods and techniques

From today the Alpine Archaeology-Blog is up and running. The Department of Pre- and Protohistory of the University of Zürich, Switzerland has got a long history in teaching and researching the archaeology of mountainous areas. There are e.g. the Leventina Project (Della Casa, in press, Hess et al., 2010) and the projects in the Andes by my collaegues M. Kolb-Godoy Allende and P. Fux (Fux, 2007) and colleagues. A current example is the “Rückwege” project in the Silvretta (Reitmaier, 2009, Reitmaier, 2010, Reitmaier and Walser, 2008).

During the 2010 autumn semester almost all taught courses will be solely devoted to Alpine Archaeology. As part of this alpine semester I will be teaching an e-learning course on the methods and techniques of archaeological research in alpine environments. To be able to enhance not only this course, but the learning and teaching experience throughout the department (for lecturers and students alike) we decided to start a blog. All students and teaching personal are encouraged to use this blog to exchange knowledge, document their work and have fun posting and reading the blog.

Both the blog and the e-learning course will be an experiment in how to integrate digital media into teaching. Of course, we are not the first to do this.

Open Day / Journées Portes Ouvertes et Découverte d’une fouille préhistorique – Site d’Arconciel/La Souche

From the excavators of Arconciel/La Souche (SAEF):

Dimanche 5 septembre 2010 – Entre 10 et 16 heures.Non loin de l’abbaye d’Hauterive, les falaises de la Sarine abritent un habitat du Mésolithique.

Sis sur le domaine de l’abbaye cistercienne d’Hauterive, l’abri naturel d’Arconciel/La Souche se trouve au cœur des magnifiques gorges de la Sarine, à six kilomètres en amont de la ville de Fribourg. Largement ouvert au sud-ouest, il offre protection, ensoleillement, surface habitable conséquente et accessibilité. A ce titre, il est considéré comme l’un des plus beaux exemples d’habitat de pied de falaise de notre région, un type de sites qui fut particulièrement apprécié par les derniers groupes de chasseurs-cueilleurs du Mésolithique (9700-5000 av. J.-C.).

Estimé dès sa découverte comme l’un des plus hauts lieux de la Préhistoire fribourgeoise du fait de son très bon état de conservation, de sa stratigraphie de plus de trois mètres et de la richesse du matériel mis au jour (près de 15 000 artefacts en roches siliceuses, éléments de parures et plus de 150 000 restes fauniques), mais menacé par l’érosion, l’abri d’Arconciel/La Souche fait l’objet depuis 2003 d’une fouille de sauvetage qui sert également de chantier-école à plusieurs Universités.

interpreting woodhenge-stonehenge rivalry

So archaeologists from the UK & Austria believe to have found ‘the find‘: a woodhenge (/barrow?) near Stonehenge. Illustrator Mike Frodsham does a nice tongue-in-cheek interpretation job : henge jealousy and an almost cave painting.

Palaeolithic and Mesolithic archaeology in Switzerland – where we stand now

As usual, the 2010 Jahrbuch Archäologie Schweiz vol. 93 includes a list of newly discovered and excavated sites. It is no surprise that the number of Palaeolithic and Mesolithic sites discovered or investigated in 2009 is relatively low in comparison to the number of sites from most later prehistoric, roman and medieval periods. The figure below comes from Siegmund’s 2008 publication in the Jahrbuch der Archäologie Schweiz 2008, vol. 91.

Siegmund 2008 Abb. 9, p. 95. Do not be confused by the typos in the Roman and Medieval numbers: the correct ones are 1630 & 1288.

It clearly shows the chronological distribution of the newly recorded or excavated sites in Switzerland during the period 1987 – 2006. It is also noted by Siegmund, that especially concerning the Mesolithic, Germany and France show even worse records (although for the alpine areas this might not been true; see below). Also, about a third of the Mesolithic sites mentioned in the above table are recorded in only one Canton: Fribourg.

Below the numbers of Palaeolithic and Mesolithic sites, and as a comparison the Bronze Age sites, recorded in 2008 & 2009. It shows ten sites mentioned in 2008 of which five were new discoveries and nine sites mentioned in 2009 of which four were new discoveries, against seventeen and forty-three sites dating to the Bronze Age.

Grabung Parkhaus Opéra, Zürich

In Zürich, Switzerland the excavation of the Phalbausiedlung, or lake side village, in front of the Opernhaus has started. It is right next to the excavation Mozart-Strasse, that some might know. Various waterlogged occupation layers dating to the Horgen period (late fourth millenium BC), the Early and Late Bronze Age can be expected.

The paper Tages Anzeiger publishes a weekly diary by fieldmanager Niels Bleicher. It also appears on the website of the city of Zürich.

Radiolarite and spring in the Fribourger Prealps

A number of raw materials were used for the production of chipped stone artefacts at the site of Arconciel/La Souche, Kt. Fribourg, Switzerland. Some of you might already know that I am doing a use wear analysis of the finds from the Late and Final Mesolithic abri for my PhD.

Of course, I am curious to see these places and the sources of the raw material of the archaeological artefacts. And it is spring! Here on the Swiss plateau the snow is gone, and in the Alps much has already melted as well. So, Regula and I set out on an expedition to go and find the radiolarite outcrops in the Fribourger Prealps on the Brendelspitz. As guides we had the article by Braillard etal 2003 and the great little book Geologischer Pfad Gastlosen by Braillard and Rebetez (2010) (thank you Luc!).  What these, sadly, did not tell us, was that we underestimated Lady Winter’s resilience and had to fight through leg-deep snow at times. And no, we did not bring snowshoes… By then, we were too foolhardy and just had to get up there!

various types of radiolarite, from Braillard etal 2003

The main raw materials used at the site during the Mesolithic are “Ölquartzite”, radiolarite and silex (Braillard, Menoud et al. 2003; Mauvilly 2005; Mauvilly, McCullough et al. 2008). Most of these raw materials are to be found at a not too great distance from the site of Arconciel/La Souche. The closest source would have been the Sarine riverbed. Radiolarite, “Ölquartzite” and some types of silex can be found there. In the Jura Mountains various sources of silex are known. Sources of “Olquatzite” and radiolarite are known in the Fribourger Prealps, the range of middle high Alpine mountains in the southern parts of the canton, and in the neighbouring areas of the Bernese Oberland[1]. But I will focuss only on the radiolarite in this post.

Malapa Cave – Australopithecus sediba

So now, of course, I can’t not draw your attention to the ~2mya Malapa Cave (South Africa) finds just published in Science, esp. as one of the authors has his home as the same university as I do (Zürich, Switzerland). The two partial skeletons, MH1 and MH2 are dubbed Australopithecus sediba. Who would want to miss out on the rare opportunity to name a new species, eh?

I haven’t read the articles yet, but I am sure to do so soon.  John Hawks has already some usefull comments on his blog.

Below the abstract of the main article in Science and the ref to the second article. It’s also worth to have a look at the website of the University of Zürich and the videos there, even if you don’t understand much German. The main video doesn’t show much of the bones, but is subtitled in English. What’s rather nice, is that Schmid and colleagues say that they want to keep the material available for and share it with other researchers, incl. the original material.

Denisova II

I came across another article on the Denisova find here, on Spiegel-online, which includes a nice little slideshow (or in english), and John Hawks wrote a few more lines on it too.

Below the abstract of the letter in Nature:

Nature advance online publication 24 March 2010 | doi:10.1038/nature08976; Received 21 January 2010; Accepted 3 March 2010; Published online 24 March 2010

The complete mitochondrial DNA genome of an unknown hominin from southern Siberia

Johannes Krause¹, Qiaomei Fu¹, Jeffrey M. Good², Bence Viola^1,3, Michael V. Shunkov⁴, Anatoli P. Derevianko⁴ & Svante Pääbo¹

Abstract

With the exception of Neanderthals, from which DNA sequences of numerous individuals have now been determined, the number and genetic relationships of other hominin lineages are largely unknown. Here we report a complete mitochondrial (mt) DNA sequence retrieved from a bone excavated in 2008 in Denisova Cave in the Altai Mountains in southern Siberia. It represents a hitherto unknown type of hominin mtDNA that shares a common ancestor with anatomically modern human and Neanderthal mtDNAs about 1.0 million years ago. This indicates that it derives from a hominin migration out of Africa distinct from that of the ancestors of Neanderthals and of modern humans. The stratigraphy of the cave where the bone was found suggests that the Denisova hominin lived close in time and space with Neanderthals as well as with modern humans.

1. 1. Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Deutscher Platz 6, D-04103 Leipzig, Germany
2. 2. Division of Biological Sciences, University of Montana, Missoula, Montana 59812, USA
3. 3. Department of Anthropology, University of Vienna, Althanstr. 14, A-1090 Wien, Austria
4. 4. Paleolithic Department, Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, Russian Academy of Sciences, Siberian Branch, Lavrentieva Avenue, 17 Novosibirsk, RU-630090, Russia

Correspondence to: Johannes Krause¹ Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to J.K. (Email: krause[at]eva.mpg.de).

Rückwege – Archaeology of the Silvretta at “Visualisation in Archaeology”

Archaeology has always had its own visual vocabulary. We show our research results to our colleagues and to the wider public. This can, at the danger of simplification, often be divided into two categories: 1.) the dokumentation of the research results (plans, finds, tables etc.); and 2.) those visualisations that convey our interpretations (e.g. reconstruction drawings).

If we take the accurate visual representation of lithics (chipped stone tools) research, Martingell and Saville (Martingell and Saville 1988; Saville 2009) for example, argue we should that we should attempt to include as much factual information, mainly on technology, in drawings. Saville (2009, p.750) also includes, rightly I believe, use wear results in this.

However, like with most visualisations, it is, e.g. difficult to use this style of illustration to represent the dynamic, non-linear character of technology. Riede (Riede 2006, fig. 6, p62) tries to represent an evolutionary chaîne opératoire – artefactontogenies and phylogenies – and as such also the dynamic nature of technology in a figure. Although it is not a bad attempt, it is still rather linear. I fear that most people, including archaeologists, who are not in detail familiar with these ideas, see little more then another representation of the classic reduction sequences he tries so hard to avoid. This is especially the case as I expect that for many researchers the idea of an evolutionary chaîne opératoire is rather counter intuitive.

I have not seen any really satisfying examples of illustrations showing the dynamic nature of technology or an evolutionary chaîne opératoire.

EXPO¦ARCH¦DISS I

EXPO¦ARCH¦DISS is a ‘travelling poster show’ of on-going PhD-research from archaeological PhD-students at Swiss universities or concerning ‘swiss’ topics. The exhibition will be shown at the yearly meetings of the associations of roman (ARS), classical (SAKA), prehistoric (AGUS) and medieval (SAM) archaeologists in Switzerland in 2010.

Our aim is to provide a platform of on-going PhD-projects in Switzerland or concerning Swiss topics and to bring PhD-students in touch with each other and with archaeologists in other institutes and companies.

The posters will contain a short summery of the research – questions and methods rather then results – and contact details. Besides, we hope to publish the posters on the www in the future.  Want to join? Drop us a line at expoarchdiss[at]gmx.ch.

We are looking forward to include as many projects as possible and are curious about your research.

Recumbent Stone Circles, Castles and a Shell Midden – archaeological photography

I came across these photos. They are contributions to Picturing The Past – Capturing Aberdeenshire’s Archaeology, a photography competition focussing on archaeological sites and monuments in Aberdeenshire.
They brought back good memories of fieldwork in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, digging and surveying Recumbent Stone Circles such as those on some of the photos. I also love the photo of the Mesolithic Shell Midden Sands of Forvie, Newburgh by Erin Taylor Sharp (Children’s category)!

B. Finlayson @ Universität Zürich & R. Ebersbach @ Berner Zirkel für Ur- und Frühgeschichte

I’d like to point out and invite you to two more talks in December that might interest readers in Switzerland. First, Bill Finlayson (CBRL, Jordan and University of Reading, UK) will give a lecture at the University of Zürich. He’ll speak on recent work in Jordan. Renate Ebersbach (Archäologische Dienst, Kt. Bern, CH) will talk on survey work in the Berner Oberland (Alpine regions of Canton Berne, CH) at the Berner Zirkel für Ur- und Frühgeschichte.

Bill Finlayson worked in Scotland, a. o. on a number of Mesolithic sites, and for the past decade or so has been director of the CBRL in Amman, Jordan. He is active in various Neolithic projects in the Levant. For example, as co-director of the excavations at the PPNA site Wadi Faynan 16. He also excavated the PPNA site of Dhra’ with Ian Kuijt and is involved in the Water-Life-Civilisation Project.

Date and location: Wednesday dec. 9^th 2009, 18:00, Universität Zürich Room K02-F-153.

The Archaeological Unit of Canton Bern, CH, has been quite active with survey work in the Alpine regions of the Canton. The finds of the Schnidejoch, for example, have received quite some media attention. There has been a new surge of research in the Alpine regions of the country. The University of Zürich, the Unit of Canton Fribourg, Canton Schwyz, the Unit of Canton Bern, for example, are all active in different regions, mainly staging survey projects. Renate Ebersbach has executed a survey project in the region of Meiringen. She will also show a short film.

Date and location: Thursday dec. 17^th 2009, 18:30, main building Universität Bern.

So come along, if you’re around! It would be good to see you there.

AG Mesolithikum, Luzern, CH, 2009

From April 3rd to 5th, the ‘AG Mesolithikum’ 2009 took place in Lucerne, Switzerland. The AG Mesolithikum is really a  group of mostly German Meso-researchers who meet once a year to informally exchange ideas and present their recent work. This year it travelled beyond its German homeland and the meeting was organised by Ebbe Nielsen, of the Kantonsarchäologie Luzern, Switzerland (Cantonal Archaeological Unit of Lucerne).

The Saturday was started with a short but enlightening introduction into the organisation and work of the Swiss Cantonal Archaeological Units, with special emphasis on Lucerne, by Head of Unit Jürg Manser. Willy Tinner followed by discussing the arguments for and against off-site palynological evidence for early cereal cultivation in the Alpine region. Although what he presented was not hugely different from the publication of Tinner etal 2007, it was interesting to hear Willy put forward the arguments in person and to be able to discuss them with him. He made clear that the evidence he put forward was not conclusive, but there is a large chance that Pre-Neolithic populations opened up the forest, especially around lakes and moors, and that around 6500 cal BC an increase in the presence of cerealia type pollen and adventives and apophytes can be observed in many cores. It also once again showed how fantastic the preservation of palynological evidence is in the (circum) alpine lakes.

Jehanne Affolter told us about her methodology for interpreting data on flint raw-material distribution in the circum alpine region. It was brought to the point how limiting the small number of known sites (esp. those well dated and with raw-material data) still is.

Claus-Joachim Kind and Dorothée Drucker presented fragments of 2 reindeer metatarsus from the Holocene site of Siebenlinden II, sth. Germany. Comparative isotope research indicates it would have lived in the same wooded and temperate environment as the roe deer and red deer from the site. D. Drucker next presented how isotope 13C & 15N research could possibly be used to reconstruct the Mesolithic human diet and environment. It seems to me, though, that the few known Mesolithic skeletons from Europe don’t allow for a sufficiently fine resolution yet.

Birgit Gehlen (Blätterhöhle, Hagen, GER), Michael Baales & Ingrid Koch (Kreuztal-Buschhütten & Netphen, GER) and Harald Lübke (waterlogged sites on Rügen, GER) presented new fieldwork in Germany. And Thomas Doppler presented the methodologies used on site by the University of Basel at Lutter, Abri St. Joseph (FR) and Arconciel/La Souche (CH) for recovering organic remains.

Erik Brinch Petersen, the only Danish participant, talked with great enthusiasm about – and showed us many photos of – beautiful decorated amber hangers known from the Danish Mesolithic. On Sunday Michel Mauvilly summarised the surveying work he and his colleagues in Ct. Fribourg (CH) have done. They already located a large number of find-spots in many of the (pre-) Alpine parts of the Canton (e.g. in the Petit Mont, Grand Mont and Oeschels valleys) and their distribution maps show clearly that blank spots on the map are largely the result of research biases. Their search for flint and other stone sources show interesting results as well, esp. when integrated with their survey and on-site work. This also suggests that the lack of knowledge we have of the prehistory of other Alpine regions is largely due to research biases; an observation that is supported by a number of other recent survey projects in Switzerland. But I’ll have to write some more about that in the future.

Thomas Richter (presenting fieldwork at Germering-Nebel (Bayern, GER) and Ebbe Nielsen finished off this part of the conference. Ebbe briefly introduced a site at the shores of the Soppensee (CH), where Late Palaeolithic and Early Mesolithic finds have been made. The Sunday then continued with a tour of the Soppensee and the Wauwilermoos near Lucerne, with its many famous Late Palaeolithic, Mesolithic (e.g. Schötz 7) and Neolithic (e.g. Egolzwil) sites.

Thanks to the organisers at the Kantonsarchäologie Luzern and the participants and especially to Ebbe Nielsen for a few pleasant days in Lucerne.

NEANDERTHAL TUNES

Often the way archaeology is portrayed and published is rather restrictive and can lack imagination. It also clearly has its own visual tradition and semantics. It is thus fantastic to see/hear a project like the composition NEANDERTHAL by welsh composer Simon Thorne which gives our scientific knowledge such a fresh and exciting voice. He composed a piece of music, a ‘soundscape to provide a musical illustration for the palaeolithic section of … [the National Museum of Wales'] … exhibit Origins of Early Wales.’

 

Simon Thorne in an interview: ‘The soundscape uses a degree of electronic manipulation, but the live piece will be just the four singers plus stones and whatever primitive sound-making system we feel is appropriate. It’s completely based on what we did in that initial three-hour session. We had to let go of our preconceptions about how we thought it should all go, and that opened up a really remarkable space.’

 

At the pieces’ first performance it was accompanied by a discussion of the composer with Prof. Steven Mithen, who has a strong interest in the evolution of language and music. Filmmakers were also invited to produce visualisations to accompany the soundscape.

 

Simon Thorne - Neanderthal

 

Although archaeology is strongly based on the hard data obtained from excavation and the subsequent analysis of the findings thereof, there is, of course, also strong more or less subjective interpretation involved. As is the case with many of the ‘sciences’. Openly subjective or artistic representations and interpretations of the archaeological process and its results can be very interesting and informative and make us more (self-)conscious archaeologists. Either by using visual (or other sensory) representations or critiques. It opens up our archaeological eyes as well as the eyes of the wider public about the questions we ask, the methods we use to answer them, our dilemmas and our opportunities. Admitting to this subjectivity has been advocated by, a.o. many post- processualist archaeologists. I once came upon an article by a journalist who wrote that archaeology is a most complicated art, drawing on many sciences to paint its picture. Nonetheless I believe one of the main aims of archaeology is to understand past realities through the study of material remains.

 

However, it is not just archaeologists who are slowly (re-)discovering the values of artistic interpretation and representation of their work and findings. Researchers in other fields, like the physicists and the neuro-scientists mentioned in this piece on the website of Seedmagazine, are also finding it a valuable tool and medium. 

 

In their manifesto Cochrane and Russell have asked for a ‘re-engagement of archaeology with the history and contemporary practice of the visual arts’ (2007, p.8). and for archaeology ‘to express theoretical concepts in a format which is not constrained by linguistic context (2007, p.3). I believe this can be extended to the not explicitly theoretical part of archaeological practice and its findings. The NEANDERTHAL project for the National Museum Wales does exactly that, using not so much the visual as audio. It is an artistic and alternative (and seemingly educated) interpretation of Neanderthal sounds, based on current scientific thought, which transcends that of the scientific report.

 

As Thorne states on his website:

…why did we ever come to make music in the first place? The idea that Neanderthals sang their way through the landscape, and that early humans were also accomplished musicians creates a space that is ripe for conjecture…

The lure of experimentalism II

hafting a replica of a Late Mesolithic scraper

I have been meaning to post a few photos of the tanning I wrote about in The lure of experimentalism. Here they finally are; with many thanks to Fiona McCullough. The top photo shows the hafting of a replica of a late mesolithic scraper, as found at the site of Arconciel/La Souche, with vegetable tar and synthetic sinew on a hazelwood stick. This turned out to be remarkably easy and robust.

On the photo below Fiona and I are scraping one of the sheepskins. This skin had been dried for a while. Fiona is using a hafted scraper, I am trying an un-hafted scraper, which was far less effective than the hafted tools.

scraping sheepskin with replicas of Late Mesolithic scrapers

Below, I also added a photo of Matthias Bollinger’s and my attempt at making birch-tar . We used two cans, one as a container, the other one as a lid. The lid was perforated a few times to allow steam to escape. The can (400ml) was packed, although not too tightly, with birch-rind and produced ca. 3 cubic cm of tar.

making birch-tar

hazelnut_relations auf Deutsch

Man kann jetzt auch auf Deutsch über mich & meine Arbeit lesen auf der Website der Abteilung Ur- & Frühgeschichte der Universität Zürich. (Siehe Profil, Biographie & Forschung)

I am now also present – in German – on the website of the Abteilung Ur- & Frühgeschichte of the University of Zürich. (See Profil, Biographie & Forschung)

Bronze Age, Spiez-Einigen, Ct. Berne, Switzerland

There we go, already diverging. My wife, Regula Gubler, and Marianne Rammstein, both Archaeological Unit Ct. Berne, Switzerland have made some fantastic discoveries in Berne’s Alpine Region.

Already in 1970, 2 Early Bronze Age graves dating to ca. 3800 BP were discovered at the Holleeweg in Spiez-Einigen, Ct. Berne, Switzerland. A concentration of graves dating to this period is known from the region around the Lake of Thun, Switzerland. It was therefore not much of a surprise to find more graves during building work carried out right next to the graves that were dug almost 40 years ago.

The newly discovered graves are well preserved. Two graves contain the skeleton of a woman. The other grave is actually a double grave of two young children. Of the grave-structures only the underground parts are preserved. These consist of grave pits, lined with stones. They were probably also covered with stones.

The skeletons and the grave goods are very well preserved. The grave goods of the women include wrist-bracelets, bronze pins (incl. a two-egged pin), finger-rings, a bronze necklace and hair adornments made of parallel placed bronze tubes at the back of the skull. At least one of the children also wore a finger-ring. The grave goods can typologically be dated in the period about 1800-1600 BC. The pottery found on site confirms this date.

Even though no building remains were found, it can still be expected – because of the quantity of recovered ceramic – that a settlement existed in the immediate vicinity.

It is likely that the region formed part of transit-routes across the Alpes, as earlier finds and also the finds from these graves are known in various regions north and south of the Alpes.

Post-ex and anthropological work should shed more light on this. A re-analysis of the graves dug in1970 will probably be part of this.

More infos at the site of the Archäologischer Dienst Canton Berne.

Many thanks to Regula Gubler for the information & the photos!

UPDATE. The excavations have now been published:

Gubler, R. 2010. Spiez-Einigen, Holleeweg 3. Gräber am Übergang zwischen Früh- und Mittelbronzezeit, In Archäologie Bern/Archéologie bernoise. Jahrbuch des Archäologischen Dienstes des Kantons Bern/Annuaire du Service archéologique du canton de Berne, 147-173.

Cooper, C., Harbeck, M., Kühn, M., Rast-Eicher, A., Schweissig, M., Ulrich-Bochsler, S. & Vandorpe, P. 2010. Spiez-Einigen, Holleeweg 3: Naturwissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zu den bronzezeilichen Bestattungen, In Archäologie Bern/Archéologie bernoise. Jahrbuch des Archäologischen Dienstes des Kantons Bern/Annuaire du Service archéologique du canton de Berne, 2010, 175-198.

a little pilgrimage

Last week I went to visit the site Arconciel La Souche, the material of which will take a central role in my PhD. Of course, I knew the field-season starts later in summer, but it is good to know what the place looks like. I hadn’t been there yet. So here a picture of what it looks like now. It looks like something of a cross between a building site and a military installation. It’s covered by a roof of scaffolding and lots of plastic and sandbags to prevent further erosion.

It lies on the beautiful grounds of the Cistercian abbey of Hauterive, in the Sarine valley.

As a display my déformation professionnelle another pic, an archaeologist’s lunch under an abri…

the very very beginnings

Thanks for coming to have a look! As I am only just trying to make a start with my phd, I don’t have much to write yet. Sure, lots of information is already being stuffed into my brain, but still more is neatly stacked on my desk here. However, things are slowly taking shape and if you just bear with me for a bit, I’ll try to post something useful soon.