Bone Tools and Technological Choice

Bone Tools and Technological Choice PDF Author: Janet Lynn Griffitts
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Bone implements
Languages : en
Pages : 629

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Book Description
This study examines decision making concerning tool use and raw material choice through the analysis of bone technology from five sites from the Middle Missouri subarea of the Northern Plains of North America.

Bone Tools and Technological Choice

Bone Tools and Technological Choice PDF Author: Janet Lynn Griffitts
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Bone implements
Languages : en
Pages : 629

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Book Description
This study examines decision making concerning tool use and raw material choice through the analysis of bone technology from five sites from the Middle Missouri subarea of the Northern Plains of North America.

Bone Tools and Technological Choice: Change and Stability on the Northern Plains

Bone Tools and Technological Choice: Change and Stability on the Northern Plains PDF Author: Janet Griffitts
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 1258

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Book Description
This study examines decision making concerning tool use and rawmaterial choice through the analysis of bone technology from five sites from the MiddleMissouri subarea of the Northern Plains of North America. The research methods employed include high power optical microwear analysis, experimental replication, and the study of modern bone tool use. At the time of contact with Europeans andEuroamericans, the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara lived in semi sedentary villages along the Missouri River where they practiced a mixed economy centered on both agriculture and bison hunting. The villagers were central in indigenous trade networks and later in the international fur trade, as European and Euroamericans traders and explorers sought to insert themselves into the existing networks. Occasional trade goods are found as early as the seventeenth century, increasing through time as more Europeans and Euroamericans entered the area, indicating that the villagers supplied the newcomers with food, horses, and furs in exchange for those goods. They also were impacted by European diseases, increasing violence, and by accompanying changes in many aspects of their society. Post contact technological change is often modeled as a relatively simple unilinear process in which metal tools quickly replaced older technologies. Analysis of modified bone and antler from historic sites indicates the processes were more complicated. Some tool types were quickly replaced, while others persisted, and there was also variation within tool types. Rather than immediately rendering bone technology obsolete, as has been suggested, there was an initial period of experimentation as people used the new metal cutting and chopping tools to modify the older bone technology. Some tools were made by simply shaping the bone with metal rather than stone, but in other cases the new metal tools were used to create bone tools in completely new forms. Both social and functional factors influence tool choices in raw material, form, and use. This study provides a deeper understanding of many processes involved in technological change in the contact period.

Technological Choices

Technological Choices PDF Author: Pierre Lemonnier
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134523068
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description
Technological Choices applies the critical tools of archaeology to the subject of technology and its impact on humankind throughout the ages. An examination of the challenges technological innovations present to various cultures, Technological Choices asserts that in any society, such choices are made on the basis of cultural values and social relations, rather than on the inherent benefits in technology itself. Of course, this revolutionary viewpoint has critical implications for contemporary Western societies. Based on case studies covering a wide range of chronologies and geographies, Technological Choices moves rapidly from Neolithic Europe to the modern industrial age, stopping on the way to examine the tribes of Papua, New Guinea, rural Indian and North African societies as well as several European peasant communities. The techniques studied range from the manufacture of stone implements to the development of high-tech transportation devices. With its breadth of subject matter and multidisciplinary approach, Technological Choices offers new insight into the interrelationship between technology and society. Also unprecedented is the book's emphasis on the functional aspects of material culture.

Bones as Tools

Bones as Tools PDF Author: Christian Gates St. Pierre
Publisher: British Archaeological Reports Oxford Limited
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 194

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Book Description
The papers in this volume were originally collected for a symposium entitled Recent Developments in Bone Tool Studies, organized for the 69th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology held in Montreal (Canada) on April 2nd, 2004. The objective of the symposium was to illustrate how recent developments in approaches, methods and techniques in worked bone studies can contribute to our understanding of basic problems encountered in archaeological research, with case studies from Europe and North America essentially, but also from Latin America and Oceania.

From These Bare Bones

From These Bare Bones PDF Author: Alice Choyke
Publisher: Oxbow Books
ISBN: 1782972129
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 702

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Book Description
A fundamental component of the study of worked osseous objects is the identification of the raw materials chosen to make them. In archaeological contexts many objects become degraded to the point where identification is very difficult and the way in which these materials decay during burial and upon excavation can vary greatly. Correct identification is crucial to the investigation of objects, their conservation and future curation. Above all, understanding raw material selection aids our understanding of human-animal interaction in the past both on pragmatic and symbolic levels since the choices made by artisans vary by cultural tradition as well as availability. The 20 papers presented here explore a wealth of information pertaining to the use of osseous materials over the long period of human craftsmanship and tool manufacture by exploring several key themes: · Raw material selection and curation within tool types · Social aspects of raw material selection · New methods of materials identification It is demonstrated that the issue of raw material identification has numerous implications for conservation work, reproduction of objects, the physical characteristics of the tool or ornament, availability of raw materials, the materials chosen for procurement and the cultural reasons that lie behind the choice of raw materials from particular species and skeletal elements to produce planned tool and ornament types. Together, these papers emphasize the need for confident and correct materials identification and demonstrate that functionality is by no means the only, nor necessarily the most important, factor in the selection of osseous raw materials for the fabrication of tools and other cultural objects.

Stone Tools in the Paleolithic and Neolithic Near East

Stone Tools in the Paleolithic and Neolithic Near East PDF Author: John J. Shea
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107006988
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 427

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Book Description
This book surveys the archaeological record for stone tools from the earliest times to 6,500 years ago in the Near East.

Bone, Antler, Ivory and Horn

Bone, Antler, Ivory and Horn PDF Author: Arthur MacGregor
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317602021
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
Artefacts made from skeletal materials since the Roman period were, before this book, neglected as a serious area of study. This is a comprehensive account which reviews over fifty categories of artefact. The book starts with a consideration of the formation, morphology and mechanical properties of the materials and illuminates characteristics concerning working with them. Following chapters discuss the organisation of the industry and trade in such items, including the changing status of the industry over time. Archaeological evidence is combined with that from historical and ethnological sources, with many illustrations providing key visual reference. Originally published in 1985.

Designing Experimental Research in Archaeology

Designing Experimental Research in Archaeology PDF Author: Jeffrey R. Ferguson
Publisher: University Press of Colorado
ISBN: 1607320223
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 281

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Book Description
Each chapter addresses a particular classification of material culture---ceramics, stone tools, perishable materials, composite hunting technology, butchering practices and bone tools, and experimental zooarchaeology---detailing issues that must be considered in the development of experimental archaeology projects and discussing potential pitfalls. The experiments follow coherent and consistent research designs and procedures that are given theoretical context. Contributors outline methods that will serve as a guide in future experiments. This degree of standardization is uncommon in traditional archaeological research but is essential to experimental archaeology. --

Designing Experimental Research in Archaeology

Designing Experimental Research in Archaeology PDF Author: Jeffrey R. Ferguson
Publisher: University Press of Colorado
ISBN: 1607320231
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 281

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Book Description
Designing Experimental Research in Archaeology is a guide for the design of archaeological experiments for both students and scholars. Experimental archaeology provides a unique opportunity to corroborate conclusions with multiple trials of repeatable experiments and can provide data otherwise unavailable to archaeologists without damaging sites, remains, or artifacts. Each chapter addresses a particular classification of material culture-ceramics, stone tools, perishable materials, composite hunting technology, butchering practices and bone tools, and experimental zooarchaeology-detailing issues that must be considered in the development of experimental archaeology projects and discussing potential pitfalls. The experiments follow coherent and consistent research designs and procedures and are placed in a theoretical context, and contributors outline methods that will serve as a guide in future experiments. This degree of standardization is uncommon in traditional archaeological research but is essential to experimental archaeology. The field has long been in need of a guide that focuses on methodology and design. This book fills that need not only for undergraduate and graduate students but for any archaeologist looking to begin an experimental research project.

Kingly Crafts

Kingly Crafts PDF Author: Yung-ti Li
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231549636
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 310

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Book Description
The site of Anyang, the last capital of the Shang dynasty, dated to around 1200 to 1000 BCE, is one of the most important sources of knowledge about craft production in Bronze Age China. Excavations and research of the settlement over the past ninety years demonstrate both the advanced level of Shang craft workers and the scale and capacity of the craft industries of the time. However, materials unearthed in Anyang by different expeditions have since been stored separately in China and Taiwan, making a thorough study of this important aspect of life in Shang China challenging. Despite efforts to integrate the data based on published material, the physical evidence rarely has been considered as a single group. Through a systematic analysis of the archaeological materials available in both China and Taiwan, Yung-ti Li provides a detailed picture of craft production in Anyang and paves the way for a new understanding of how the Shang capital functioned as a metropolis. Focusing on craft-producing activities, including bronze casting, bone working, shell and marble inlay working, lithic working, and pottery production, Kingly Crafts examines the material remains, the technology, and the production organization of the craft industries. Although the level of Shang craftsmanship can be seen in the finished products, Li demonstrates that it is necessary to study workshop remains and their archaeological context to reconstruct the social and political contexts of craft production. Offering a comprehensive investigation of these remains, Kingly Crafts sheds new light on the relationships between craft industries and political authority in the late Shang period.