Archaeological Anthropology
Terms
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- What is archaeology?
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The reconstruction of **cultural systems** from various kinds of remains;
The study of **dead** populations. - Prehistoric Archaelogy
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Reconstruction of societies that have NO written records
(ex. Ancient Egypt, Africa, etc.) - Historical Archaeology
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Reconstruction of cultures that have written records
(ex. present-day, ancient Rome, etc.) - Artifacts
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Material culture that is modified by human activities and can be removed from the site without destroying them.
(ex. stone tools, bows, pottery, etc.) - Features
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non-portable material culture made by human activity; can't be moved from archaeological site without causing damage to the site or the feature.
(ex. hearths, huts/houses) - What is the definition of an archaelogical site?
- a spatial distribution of artifacts and features
- Ethnographic Analogy
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Inferring the use of ancient tools by look at similar tools in recent living primative societies
(ex. Kalahari Bushmen) - Experimental Archaeology
- inferring use of ancient tools by making and using similar tools
- Stages of Archaeological Research
- Discovery; Recovery; Analysis and Curation
- Discovery Stage of Archaeological Research
- Pedestrian Survey or Aerial (Satellite) Survey; 1.5 foot test pits based on statistical sampling.
- Recovery Stage of Archaeology
- Use grid system to dig site and remove materials from site using ***vertical*** and ***horizontal*** dimension.
- Vertical Dimension
- how deep the artifact was found in the site; accumulation of sediments through time reveals age of artifact.
- Horizontal Dimension
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Controlled by using grid system; placement of artifacts is recorded and photographed/drawn
Stratigraphy can reveal order of events (ex. Sir Mortimer Wheeler's famous Roman battle reenactment) - Relative Dating Techniques
- superposition; seriation; association
- Superposition
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Relative dating technique based on superposition (stuff at the top is younger than stuff on the bottom);
determining age of one item in comparison to another.
(ex. stratigraphic sequence) - Seriation/Seriation-Graphs
- placing archaeological material in chronological order according to popularity of the stylistic shifts in the artifcats.