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Tom Austen Brown Professor of Australian Archaeology

Peter Hiscock

School of Philosophical and Historical Inquiry

Presented to Heat and human evolution SFU Human Evolutionary Studies Program

3rd Annual Symposium Vancouver February 2014

ARCA1000 Week 2

I am a destroyer of the past: practicing archaeology

For a quarter of a century I have been an archaeologist, a destroyer of the past, and for nine or ten active years a gunner, helping a little, I suppose, to build the future on good constructive high-explosive.

Sir Mortimer Wheeler 1958 Still Digging. Adventures in Archaeology.

Mortimer Wheeler

Sir Robert Eric Mortimer Wheeler (1890-1975)

He took up the positions of Keeper of Archaeology in the National Museum of Wales and Lecturer in the University of South Wales in 1920.

As brigadier-general of an artillery unit in Africa Wheeler possessed regimentation and organization.

For a quarter of a century I have been an archaeologist, a destroyer of the past

3. A portion of the deposit is often left intact, for future investigations when archaeological methods may be better than those available to us now.

2. Where excavation cannot be avoided there is a moral obligation to dig carefully and record thoroughly, because it is the only chance we have to obtain that information.

1.Where possible employ non-invasive data collection.

Reconstructions can be sound when they involve:

Accurate observation of preserved materials.

Basing all interpretations on recovered material, grounded in empirical evidence.

Cross-checking multiple strands of evidence to evaluate the likelihood of the interpretations.

Detailed investigations of formation processes.

Evaluating the limits of reasonable inference.

Facilitating the scrutiny of other scientists by publishing the evidence on which all interpretations are based.

follows well developed protocols known to be effective.

Modern archaeological research:

is continually reassessed by archaeologists examining the conclusions from previous fieldwork, looking for other, better interpretations

It is only after consideration of the evidence that we should accept reconstructions of the past that are developed from excavations.

What is important in evaluating reconstructions is the link between the evidence obtained in excavation and inference made by the excavator or subsequent researchers.

Differential preservation involves some components of a body being well preserved in one microenvironment but not in another.

Desiccation of Egyptian mummies often conserved skin and bone in lifelike states

but the high water content of internal organs meant these could not be preserved and were often removed and/or discarded.

Differential preservation involves some components of a body being well preserved in one microenvironment but not in another.

Cold, anaerobic and acidic waterlogged deposits preserved the skin and internal organs of bog bodies

but the bones were softened and distorted.

John Hartnell, buried 1844.

Extreme cold, below 4oC, limits bacterial activity, prevents putrefaction, and can create sublimation.

Hot and dry conditions can desiccate flesh.

But preservation also requires protection against scavengers.

Information about soft body parts can be preserved in very early archaeological contexts, even when tissue has decayed.

Mary Leakeys famous Laetoli footprints. Dated to 3.6 million years ago they were made by three individuals of the species Australopithecus afarensis.

Studying bone weathering

Anna K. Behrensmeyer

Research Paleobiologist at the Smithsonian Institution.

Behrensmeyer recorded the bones of dead animals at regular intervals, recording how the bone changed.

Behrensmeyer constructed a classification of bone weathering, with six categories.

0 = unweathered (surfaces intact with no surface cracking)

to

5 = most weathered (large areas of fibrous bone exposed)

Actualistic study

Actualism is the methodology of inferring the nature of past events by analogy with processes observable in action at the present.

Archaeological interpretations are based not only on the archaeological objects but also on an understanding how processes work today.

Archaeologists acquire knowledge by a three-step process:

1. Experiment and observation of contemporary processes,

2. Observation of and reflection on the patterns of archaeological material, and

3. Comparison of contemporary and archaeological patterns.

Anne Vincent:

Studied the consumption of wild tubers by the Hadza, in northern Tanzania.

The Hadza hunt game and gather edible plants from the dry savannah where they live near Lake Eyasi.

Vincent then carried out a vegetation survey in Lake Manyara National Park to characterise phytoliths found in tubers.

Phytoliths are plant microfossils composed of silica preserved in the soil and on the edge of stone tools.

Archaeologists often have to do actualistic studies to develop the relevant principles.

Archaeologists often have to do actualistic studies to develop the relevant principles.

One kind of actualistic study called experimental archaeology attempts to replicate and use objects.

Another kind is ethnoarchaeology where the archaeologist undertakes fieldwork with other cultures to observe how an archaeological record is created.

Brian Hayden spent more than a year with Pitjantjatjarpa.

He concluded:

Stone adzes must be resharpened every 4-5 minutes and are exhausted within half an hour.

It takes 1-2 such adzes to make a hardwood spear or a wooden bowl.

Uniformitarianism

Uniformitarianism is the adherence to a view advocating uniformity.

There are two kinds of uniformitarianism:

Substantive Uniformitarianism, which says the world remains unchanged from earlier times and that the rate and intensity of processes creating change have remained the same.

Methodological Principle of Uniformitarianism, which says the laws of physics, chemistry, geology, biology have remained the same through time.

Methodological uniformitarianism can be viewed as telling archaeologists how they must behave

as scientists.

Cave Trampling

Shaws Creek Shelter is a small cavity underneath a sandstone block in western Sydney.

In the early 1970's Eugene Stockton, a local catholic priest, excavated the site.

He designed an experiment to understand how the deposit had formed.

Stockton and his crew smashed up red glass and laid 254 glass fragments on the surface of the deposit.

Stockton's team then walked across the surface of the deposit for one day.

Archaeologists call this 'trampling' of the cave floor

They excavated the deposit in 2-3 cm deep units.

What did they find?

26% of specimens were still on the surface where they had been placed.

52% of specimens had moved upward into the sand that had buried the surface.

22% of specimens had moved down into the deposit below the surface on which the glass fragments were laid out.

Treadage is the action of a foot pushing down on the deposit, causing objects within the deposit to migrate downwards.

Scuffage is the horizontal and upward motion of the foot in sand causing objects in front of the foot to migrate upwards.

These are mechanisms causing vertical movement of archaeological objects.

Archaeologists can measure how much vertical movement there has been in a deposit.

We piece together fragments of an object that was broken in antiquity. Archaeologists call this conjoining.

These fragments were probably discarded at the same time, so we would expect to find them at the same level in an undisturbed deposit.

PRESERVATION OF CLARITY For archaeologists clarity is the ability to separate different events that happen in the past.

When material from different time periods is mixed together we call that a palimpsest.

Minimal Temporal Unit (MTU)

Other factors:

Rapid sediment accumulation buries the occupation from different periods and keeps it separate. Slow sedimentation produces a mixed assemblage.

Vertical movement of objects within a deposit causes mixed assemblages.

Nomadic people stay only a short time, and leave debris which represents a narrow time span.

The methods of archaeology enable archaeologists to develop interpretations of the complex events that have shaped the

archaeological record.

HOW CAN ARCHAEOLOGISTS PROCEEED?

The Sinking of great Stones through the Action of Worms. - When a stone of large size and of irregular shape is left on the surface of the ground, it rests, of course, on the more protuberant parts; but worms soon fill up with their castings all the hollow spaces on the lower side; for as Hensen remarks, they like the shelter of stones. As soon as the hollows are filled up, the worms eject the earth which they have swallowed beyond the circumference of the stones; and thus the surface of the ground is raised all round the stone. As the burrows excavated directly beneath the stone after a time collapse, the stone sinks a little.

Charles Darwin The Formation of vegetable mould through the action of worms, with observations of their habits.

In the 1850s and 1860s Charles Darwin was trying to explain how, and at what rate, large rocks would sink below the ground surface:

As soon as the hollows are filled up, the worms eject the earth which they have swallowed beyond the circumference of the stones; and thus the surface of the ground is raised all round the stone. As the burrows excavated directly beneath the stone after a time collapse, the stone sinks a little. Charles Darwin The Formation of vegetable mould through the action of worms, with observations of their habits.

Darwin excavated buried rocks at Stonehenge and estimated how much time had elapsed since the rocks had first fallen.

Archaeological objects cannot be treated as though they were just abandoned and still

intact.

Darwin excavated buried rocks at Stonehenge and estimated how much time had elapsed since the rocks had first fallen.

The position of seemingly immovable objects had changed.

'Pompeii premise', a term invented by Robert Ascher, describes the view that many archaeological sites had been created:

by a single group of people carrying out activities in a single day

'Pompeii premise', a term invented by Robert Ascher, describes the view that many archaeological sites had been created:

by a single group of people carrying out activities in a single day

and these objects had been buried rapidly and preserved until recovered by archaeologists

Archaeological record is a distorted version of past events:

pots that were used are broken

Archaeological record is a distorted version of past events:

pots that were used are broken

buildings burnt and collapsed

Archaeological record is a distorted version of past events:

* pots that were used are broken

* buildings burnt and collapsed

* food eaten and only scraps remain

Site formation processes = study all the distorting changes that have altered the archaeological material

Taphonomy = the processes operating on organic remains after death and which results in fossil deposits

Australopithecus is a genus of extinct hominid.

Australopithecus was recognised in 1924 by Raymond Dart who was given the fossil skull of a hominid child found at Taung.

Australopithecus africanus, the "southern ape of Africa"

Dart posed the question: what is the connection between the bones of Australopithecus africanus and the bones of other animals found in the same caves. In 1929 he said:

Examination of the bone deposit at Taungs shows that it contains the remains of thousands of bone fragments. It is a cavern lair or kitchen-midden heap of a carnivorous beast. The bones are chiefly those of small animals like baboons, bok, tortoises, rodents, bats and birds. Egg shells and crab shells have also been found The deposit was, therefore, formed by primitive man or by Australopithecus, an advanced ape with human carnivorous habits.

In 1929 Dart thought that after Australopithecus had finished their meals they had used their bones, teeth and horns as weapons to kill further animals.

man's predecessors differed from living apes in being confirmed killers: carnivorous creatures, that seized living quarries by violence, battered them to death, tore apart their broken bodies, dismembered them limb from limb, slaking their ravenous thirst with the hot blood of victims and greedily devouring livid writhing flesh.

Dart also concluded Australopithecines were head hunters because the bodies of baboons were only represented by crania.

Did this mean humans evolved from ancestors who achieved dominance and evolutionary success through their violent behaviour?

BUT what about site formation processes?

Leopards often target medium to large game, such as baboons.

When eating baboons cheetahs and leopards will destroy much of the backbone, hands and feet.

Leopards often drag prey into inaccessible places such as tall trees to prevent them being stolen by hyenas.

Leopards and leopard-like animals were present at South African sites such as Sterkfontein and Swartkrans

Were leopards the agent accumulating bones?

Leopards appear to have been the animals hunting the antelope and baboons.

Swartkran was a deep cavity that filled up as material dropped down shafts.

What is the role of Australopithecus?

Perhaps Australopithecines were not brave hunters but just another prey of Leopards

Australopithecus individuals are represented by the same body parts as baboons.

Leopard teeth marks are found on the skulls of Australopithecus individuals.

Australopithecines were not the hunters,

but the hunted.

Reconstructing the site formation of an archaeological site requires

tracing the evidential trail back as in a forensic investigation.

Sherlock Holmes said this was

"reasoning backward, or analytically".

Here how:

* work back through the distortions

* quantify each distorting factor

* calculate the original composition of the assemblage

A major framework for reconstructing the past is what Michael Schiffer has called the Synthetic Model.

Objects can exist in two states:

Systemic context when items are participating in an ongoing behavioural system.

Archaeological context when they leave the functioning human system and are deposited.

Three properties of material in the archaeological record:

Correlates = Principles used to relate human activities to the archaeological objects.

C-Transforms = Principles used to describe the nature of object loss from the cultural system and the post-depositional changes that result from cultural activities.

N-Transforms = Principles used by archaeologists to describe the post-depositional changes in the record that result from non-cultural processes.

Inferences move upward from the base of the pyramid.

Stipulations adapt the principles to specific situations.

The width of the graph represents the amounts of information that is available.

To reconstruct the original form of archaeological material it is necessary to do three things:

* describe the range of site formation processes,

* arrange those processes in the order in which they occurred, and

* calculate the extent to which those processes have altered the record.

In 1940 the Russian Ivan Efremov invented the study of: Taphonomy

Taphonomy = "the laws of burial"

the study of the transition (in all its details) of the animal remains from the biosphere into the lithosphere.

Olduvai Gorge

Archaeological sites contain patches of artefacts and bones distributed over a small area.

These were seen as the locations of hominid activity as living floors.

He suggested that these archaeological sites were home bases, around which early hominids organised their foraging and social life.

Glynn Isaac (1937-1985) founded the Koobi Fora research project in Kenya.

He taught at University of California, Berkeley and Harvard.

Isaac thought of these sites as fossilised camps.

Early hominids who had killed animals somewhere else returned with the meat to share it with their family.

Isaac led some archaeologists to think of Australopithecus as very like a modern hunter, reliably killing game and bringing the meat home for the family, who relaxed on shady river and lake-sides.

Olduvai Bed I has a number of sites, including FLKNN-3 and FLK Zinj. These are concentrations Hominid bones, bones of other animals and stone artefacts.

Bones were arranged in a criss-cross pattern with a preferred orientation typical of a pattern produced by water.

Many bone fragments are rounded with broken edges, a pattern consistent with water transport.

Olduvai assemblages at least 15-25% of bones show damage diagnostic of non-human carnivores.

Perhaps carnivores brought bones to the site?

Alternatively, hominids may have brought the animal carcases to the sites where they were scavenged by other animals.

We can compare a modern hyena den and these Olduvai sites in terms of the frequency of Bovid bones.

Site % Small % Medium % Large

Amboseli den 34 53 13

FLK Zinj 35 50 15

Hill studied a modern hyena den in Amboseli National Park.

Bovid bones

Tooth marks are usually visible as grooves and punctures, either single or in pairs, with rounded or flattened cross-sections.

At FLK Zinj carnivore tooth scratches are more numerous than identifiable cut marks!

At FLKNN-3 most carnivore tooth marks are on fresh bone, whereas hominid cut marks are found on slightly weathered bone.

The carnivores seem to be at the site before the hominids!

Never assume that only human behaviour is represented in the record, that there are no taphonomic transformations.

The End