Mateusz Baca, Barbara Bujalska, Danijela Popović
et al.
Abstract Background The field vole, an abundant and widespread microtine rodent, is a complex comprised of three cryptic species: the short-tailed field vole (Microtus agrestis) which is present over much of Eurasia, the Mediterranean field vole (Microtus lavernedii) in southern Europe, and the Portuguese field vole (Microtus rozianus) in western Spain and Portugal. Previous research has shown high genomic differentiation of these three lineages. However, the details of the process underlying their divergence remain unknown. Results We analyse 70 mitogenomes and 16 nuclear genomes of modern specimens, and 83 mitogenomes and 12 nuclear genomes of ancient specimens spanning the last 75 thousand years (ka). We estimate the divergence of Portuguese from short-tailed and Mediterranean field voles to be ca. 220 ka ago and of the latter two species to be ca. 110 ka ago, earlier than previous estimates involving only modern sequences. The divergence times we obtain match those between major mitochondrial lineages of cold-adapted and steppe rodents in Europe. We find signatures of gene flow within and between field vole lineages, with some analyses suggesting a hybrid origin of the Mediterranean lineage. Ancient specimens from the Italian Peninsula reveal a previously unrecognised lineage that show evidence of genetic exchange with other populations. Conclusions The pattern of genetic variation in the field vole species complex demonstrates the impact of stadial-interstadial cycles in generating recurrent episodes of allopatry and connectivity of populations, a situation which could only be revealed by our dense genomic sampling over time.
This article examines how the archaeometric and archaeological analysis of funerary assemblages in Roman tombs reveals gender inequality in Ancient Rome. Through modern scientific methodologies based on techniques coupled with mass spectrometry, differentiated patterns in funerary offerings according to the sex of the deceased are identified. The role of wine is analyzed as a symbolic marker of male power, linking its production, consumption, and representation to gender and the patriarchal structures of Roman society. Through the study of literary sources, archaeological evidence, and chemical analyses, it is demonstrated that wine was not merely an economic or ritual good, but a socially codified and widespread expression of power. Emphasis is placed on the discovery of liquid wine in a Roman mausoleum unearthed in Carmona (Spain), dated to the first half of the 1st century CE, and its exclusive association with male remains, which reinforces the symbolic dimension of wine as a masculine attribute, even in death. The article combines arqueometry, funerary archaeology, written sources, and gender studies, demonstrating how gender inequalities were reproduced even in mortuary practices.
This work addresses the study of everyday practices in relation to the lithic production systems of the ar-chaeological site Piedra Negra 2 (PIN2) in the Laguna Blanca region, Catamarca province, Argentina. The material analyzed comes from two rooms of the site, one of them interpreted as a kitchen (RA) and the other as a small semi-roofed yard (R6). Based on the techno-morphological and morphological-functional analyses of the lithic artifacts at a macroscopic level, it was possible to determine the stages of production and possi-ble uses (primary functions) of the instruments, as well as the various raw materials that have been used for lithic manufacturing at the site
Walter Neves, Maria Helena Senger, Gabriel Rocha
et al.
The latest periods of human evolution are a heated topic of debate and have been at the center of paleoanthropological discussions since the beginning of the field. In the last twenty years, new excavations increased the geographic range of paleoanthropological data, new fossil hominins of the last third of the Pleistocene were found, and old key fossils were redated by modern and more accurate methods. The new picture emerging from this research changed the discussion about the neandertal-sapiens interaction, the finding of their common ancestor, and the understanding of how our lineage evolved. To integrate these new discoveries and to better contextualize how they fit in the hominin framework of the Chibanian, we compared the cranial morphology of 86 well-preserved fossils from Europe, Africa, and Asia of the last 500 thousand years. 25 linear measurements were used to describe the cranial morphology of the fossils, and their biological affinities were explored though multivariate discriminant function analyses. These analyses allow us to assess affinities and possible phylogenetic relationships of Archaic Homo species, including the expressive morphological variability of the specimens included under the umbrella-term “Homo heidelbergensis” from Africa, Asia, and Europe. Our results support that cannot be accommodated in one same species. Additionally, we contribute to the disputable discussion about the origin of H. sapiens, adding support to an African origin for our species.
Our understanding of the planning processes involved before any Neolithic structure was physically built, from the moment when it was conceived in a person’s mind up to the point of its construction requires further investigation for which experimental archaeology can provide some direction. During the British Neolithic period, circa 4000-2500 BC, we witness the building of numerous ceremonial, domestic and funerary structures which dominated the landscape. The exact number of structures created is unknown, although it is possible that we could be looking at a figure in the thousands (Hill, 2024). If we accept that the architectural form of these structures was so designed that their appearance alone indicated the specific types of rituals or domestic usages that could be legitimately held there (see Fleming, 1973, p.189; Bradley, 2007, pp. 46-50), then accordingly, their respective designs would have been well thought out: their architecture had to meet the visual and experiential expectations of the people. Overall, one is led to consider the possibility that any form of construction was the result of deliberate thinking and that the Neolithic builders were working to specific plans or blueprints in advance of any building work. Furthermore, moving from design to physical form required setting out, a technique which implied measuring of some description. This is where we hit the major drawback to this assertion, which experimental archaeology can offer insight. The British Neolithic communities were preliterate, and they have left behind no written records or any sculptured, pictorial reliefs at their building works which could be interpreted as evidence of “architectural” schematics. Nor do we find surveyor marks or hints of measuring-notches scratched on the surfaces of those orthostats used to build their monuments. We have yet to recover any material evidence of a British Neolithic numeracy system that could have supported those prehistoric surveying and setting out techniques that must have been needed to build complex monuments such as Stonehenge. Such a difficult subject should not be ignored and experimental archaeology may offer a solution for consideration.
This paper challenges the traditional focus on indoor spaces in Neolithic archaeology by examining the role of open-air areas in daily life. It approaches open-air spaces as active zones of Neolithic daily life in northern Greece and contributes to an updated narrative of community formation in the region. The study examines 37 excavated sites and explores how localized, socio-cultural assemblages exhibit significant diversity, pointing to varied forms of collective structures rather than unified community groups. The results of this study do not suggest marked contrasts in spatial expressions between the earlier and the later phases of the Neolithic, indicating that social coherence was achieved through various communal quotidian and special, individual and collective performances, in both the domestic–private and communal–public spheres. The study looks at the location of combustion features, such as hearths, ovens, fire pits and kilns in the settlements as a proxy to understand the dynamics of openair spaces and their contribution to the formation of social life. The evidence discussed in this paper suggests that open-air spaces were actively manipulated by people and constituted significant social arenas for everyday routines, workshops, communal gatherings, and social interactions, all of which played a key role in the formation of community traditions, collective identities, and social cohesion.
The Rönneholm-Ageröd peatland complex, situated in central Scania, contains numerous archaeological sites discovered since the 19th century. Two sediment sequences were obtained at the Ageröd peatland to compare the sediment stratigraphy with a previous sequence obtained in 1960 to detect any modern-day changes and to establish the Holocene environmental development in the area. To clarify the timing of ceased peat-cutting activities, dendrochronological analysis was performed on trees growing on the peatland. The results indicate that the lake transitioned into first a fen stage and later a raised bog stage, at about 7300 cal BP and 6500 cal BP, respectively. Furthermore, the dendrochronological analysis indicates that peat cutting ceased at least before 1960 in the sampled areas. Depending on e.g. hydrological conditions and human impact, the potential for preservation of organic remains varies greatly within the Rönneholm-Ageröd peatland complex. After peat-cutting activities ceased at the Ageröd peatland, the area was abandoned, without being restored to its original state and the drainage systems were left open but without maintenance. Our results show that these drainage ditches are still effective at the Ageröd peatland, which contributes to an active loss of peat at the top of the stratigraphic sequence. This causes the youngest formed peat layers to degrade, in turn, exposing older layers and reducing the buffer zone above the preserved organic cultural heritage from the lake-phase of the wetland with their destruction. To increase the understanding of modern-day processes affecting the preservation of organic remains in peatlands, continued monitoring and measuring of the peatland preservation status is needed in areas with archaeological deposits. We predict that if we fail to take action and establish a routine for finding and mitigating ongoing wetland degradation, the organic cultural and environmental heritage in them will, in the not-too-distant future, collapse and irrevocably deteriorate.
Alejandro García, Alejandra Gasco, Juan Pablo Aguilar
Existe actualmente una marcada escasez de información sobre la materialidad incaica de la precordillera mendocina, por lo que resulta difícil evaluar el papel de este espacio durante el control estatal regional. A fin de contribuir a llenar ese vacío se presentan aquí algunos datos surgidos del análisis del registro estratigráfico, lítico, cerámico y arqueofaunístico de uno de los sectores del sitio precordillerano más importante, el alero Agua de la Cueva. A partir de los mismos se discuten algunos aspectos relativos a la funcionalidad del sitio, a la cronología de la ocupación incaica, a la movilidad transversal en el noroeste de Mendoza y a propuestas previas sobre el abastecimiento del valle de Uspallata desde las tierras bajas orientales.
The article attempts to present current results of landscape archaeology concerning a military conflict between Prussia and Austria in the summer of 1866 near Hradec Králové (Sadowa/Königgrätz). The aim is to introduce the possibilities of analysing individual available sources using the methods of battlefield archaeology, which is a sub-discipline of post-medieval archaeology. The historical period in question is not only a regional issue. This topic is mainly important with regard to protection of constantly endangered war relics, whose number in East Bohemia has been increasing in the past decade. The knowledge acquired from systematic and rescue excavations conducted in various parts of battlefields in the territory of Hradec Králové region demands new analysis to be appropriately evaluated and interpreted. The primary processing and treatment of finds are equally important as their spatial information and a successful setting into the chronological frame of well-known historical events. Archaeological knowledge thus sheds a new light on these events. The paper presents basic research topics and methods, to which increased attention is currently being paid within the context of archaeological sites. All of them use a wider view of the 1866 historical landscape, which was not distinctly modified for the purpose of military operations, but on the contrary significantly influenced their course and sequence. In order to properly interpret the acquired spatial data, it is necessary to reconstruct this historical landscape and to define the form of various activities which took place there during the war.
La radiología y tomografía aplicada a la investigación de momias de animales nos aporta una valiosa información sobre diferentes aspectos: conocer los diversos tejidos y capas de vendajes; determinar la existencia de amuletos en el interior de los animales; precisar la datación de las momias; analizar las técnicas de conservación y de la anatomía animal; conocer la existencia de elementos internos si los hubiere. Los animales examinados han sido una cría de cocodrilo del Nilo y un reptil americano con un proceso de embalsamamiento particular relleno de papiro. El estudio se ha completado con un bronce de gato envuelto en lino momificado. Con este nuevo trabajo son 21 animales estudiados en la Universidad de Navarra desde 2009.
José Ignacio Royo Guillén, Francisco José Navarro Cabeza, Serafín Benedí Monge
Los estudios sobre grabados rupestres al aire libre de cronología postpaleolítica, adolecen de importantes carencias que, en el valle medio del Ebro, se han visto superadas con la llegada del tercer milenio. Con la presentación de este trabajo se pretende dar a conocer un nuevo núcleo de grabados rupestres, localizado en el extremo suroeste de la provincia de Zaragoza, en las gargantas calcáreas del río Mesa. Entre los nuevos enclaves rupestres, destacan los abrigos con grabados protohistóricos, pero muy especialmente los de cronología medieval andalusí y los de iconografía cristiana entre los siglos XIV y XVIII, con perduraciones hasta mediados del siglo XIX y algunas escenas relacionadas con la primera Guerra Carlista en Aragón. La distribución de los hallazgos, su tipología e iconografía y los restos arqueológicos asociados, permiten documentar una importante ocupación del territorio desde la Iª Edad del Hierro y la sacralización del paisaje a través del arte rupestre, con pervivencias que se perpetúan a lo largo de la Edad Media y Moderna, destacando como novedad la presencia de un importante conjunto de inscripciones epigráficas islámicas que deben situarse entre los siglos XI y XII.
Abstract
The studies on open-air rock engravings in post-Paleolithic chronology suffer from important deficiencies, which in the middle valley of the Ebro, have been overcome with the arrival of the third millennium.With the presentation of this work, the aim is to make known a new nucleus of rock engravings, located in the extreme southwest of the province of Zaragoza, in the limestone gorges of the River Mesa. Among the new rock engravings, the shelters with protohistoric engravings stand out, but especially those with a medieval Andalusian chronology and those with Christian iconography between the 14th and 18th centuries, which lasted until the middle of the 19th century and some scenes related to the first Carlist War in Aragon. The distribution of the findings, their typology and iconography and the associated archaeological remains, allow us to document an important occupation of the territory since the First Iron Age and the sacralization of the landscape through rock art, with survivals that are perpetuated throughout the Middle and Modern Ages, highlighting as a novelty the presence of an important set of Islamic epigraphic inscriptions that must be located between the 11th and 12th centuries.
Prehistoric archaeology, Auxiliary sciences of history
Augusto Fernández de Avilés fue nombrado Director del Museo Arqueológico de Murcia en 1931 y Profesor Ayudante de la universidad entre 1931-36. En Murcia comenzó a colaborar con Mergelina como codirector de la excavación de la necrópolis ibérica del Cabecico del Tesoro entre 1935-36. Sobre este tema intentó elaborar una tesis doctoral, pero Mergelina prefirió que la tesis fuese para su ayudante, Nieto Gallo, al que cedió la dirección de campo de las excavaciones. En 1941 consiguió el traslado al Museo Arqueológico Nacional, colaborando en las excavaciones de Taracena en Vizcaya y la Rioja (1942-1946). Al mismo tiempo, estrechó su relación con García y Bellido, su nuevo director de tesis doctoral, que lo incorporó como Profesor Ayudante de Arqueología (1942-45, 1948-49), Secretario de la revista Archivo Español de Arqueología (1946-58), Jefe de Sección del Instituto Rodrigo Caro (1952-58), además de participar en las excavaciones de Iuliobriga (Santander) (1953-58) y Herrera del Pisuerga (Palencia) (1960-61). Su tesis doctoral sobre la escultura ibérica del Cerro de los Santos (Albacete) (1949) no le sirvió para conseguir la cátedra de Arqueología en Salamanca en 1949, donde no tuvo el apoyo de Taracena, pero le impulsó a excavar el Cerro de los Santos entre 1962-63. Al dimitir Navascués como director del Museo Arqueológico Nacional en 1966, fue nombrado director interino en abril de 1967, y se presentó al concurso convocado en julio. Contó con el apoyo de Nieto Gallo y Navascués, compitiendo con Almagro Basch, pero el cese de Nieto Gallo, y el nombramiento de Pérez Embid como nuevo Director General de Bellas Artes, en mayo de 1968, facilitó el nombramiento de Almagro Basch, aunque poco antes Fernández de Avilés había fallecido de una leucemia, con 60 años.
The aim of this paper is to examine the relation between monumentality and connectivity of the cities on the Iberian Peninsula during the High Empire, using spatial and social network analyses. Firstly, the presence of the monuments under scrutiny (amphitheatre, circus and theatre) will be treated by a critical analysis of the different sources. Secondly, a social network analysis will be used to illuminate the role of Centrality in relation to the monumentality of cities. Naturally, the history of specific cities can explain their individual situation. However, large patterns cannot be understood by individual study of cities.
Since the pioneering days of Paleolithic archaeology in western Europe, the making of stone tools has received special attention. Numerous studies were aimed at creating systematic typologies of artifacts based on descriptions of their technical features and morphological attributes. Recently, the concept of chaîne opératoire, or “operational sequence” (sometimes called “core reduction sequence”), borrowed from French social anthropologists, has been introduced into the study of Old World prehistory. Its conceptual framework is focused on the recognition of the overall technology and the practical skills of the prehistoric knapper in employing a particular technique responsible for the transformation of raw material to tools. Although the stone objects of all periods received attention, those of the Middle Paleolithic—due to issues such as the significance of lithic variability in retouched tools, the demise of the Neanderthals, or the emergence of “modern behavior”—have been at the forefront. This paper discusses the definition of chaîne opératoire and its practice and demonstrates that as a system of classification, it is overformalized and provides but an illusion of reading the minds of prehistoric knappers. The need to pay more attention to the recognition of patterning in the technological information is essential if we wish to go beyond a formal type list of knapping products. We argue that an elaborate, complex typology of core reduction products and discrete chaînes opératoires is an approach that impedes informed behavioral interpretations by forcing a rigid framework of “technical” definitions on the prehistoric lithic technologies.
El presente trabajo analiza los paisajes antiguos del territorio de la
Sonsierra riojano‐alavesa y su evolución, estrechamente ligada al desarrollo de los procesos históricos.
A noção de identidade tem sido objeto de investigação de várias disciplinas das ciências humanas e sociais, porém na Arqueologia são mais escassas as pesquisas sobre essa questão. Neste trabalho, buscamos identificar traços ou marcadores de identidades coletivas nas estruturas funerárias dos sítios pré-históricos, localizados na região Nordeste: Furna do Estrago (PE), Pedra do Alexandre (RN), Toca da Baixa dos Caboclos (PI), Toca do Serrote do Tenente Luiz (PI), Justino (SE) e São José II (AL). As estruturas funerárias pré-históricas condensam, no seu interior, elementos biológicos e da cultura material que consideramos como marcadores de identidades coletivas. Estes, portanto, estariam representados, ainda que parcialmente, no conjunto dos elementos que compõem a estrutura funerária. Como resultados, foram evidenciados marcadores de identidades relacionados à cultura material, a posição do corpo e a idade dos indivíduos.
ABSTRACT
The notion of identity has been the subject of investigation of several areas within humanities and social sciences; however, research on this matter is scarce in archaeology. In this research, I aim at identifying traits or markers of represented collective identities in funerary structures of prehistoric sites localised in the Northeast region of Brazil: Furna do Estrago (state of Pernambuco), Pedra do Alexandre (state of Rio Grande do Norte), Toca da Baixa dos Caboclos (state of Piauí), Toca do Serrote do Tenente Luiz (state of Piauí), Justino (state of Sergipe) and São José II (state of Alagoas). Prehistoric funerary structures concentrate in their interior biological matter and elements of the material culture that are regarded as markers of collective identities. These, as a result, would be represented, albeit partially, in the entire set of elements that comprises the funerary structure. As a result, identity markers related to the material culture, body position and age of individuals were recognised.
KEYWORDS: Identities; Prehistoric Funerary Structures; Northeast Brazil