Remiantis komparatyvistiniu, aprašomuoju analitiniu, sintezės, apibendrinimo metodais darbe analizuojamos archeologinio paveldo pažinimo sklaidos ir gaivinimo galimybės ir perspektyvos Lietuvoje. Sąlygiškai darbą galima skirtyti į dvi dalis: pirmojoje nagrinėjami teoriniai aspektai, o antrojoje pateikiama praktinių archeologinio paveldo animavimo įžvalgų. Siekiant akcentuoti visuomenės įsitraukimą ir aktyvų dalyvavimą archeologinio paveldo apsaugoje, darbe kaip paveldo pažinimo sklaidos ir gaivinimo sinonimas vartojamas animavimo terminas. Tyrimo objektu pasirinkus archeologinį paveldą, jo santykį su visuomene, siekiama aptarti archeologinio paveldo specifiką, išryškinti vertes ir reikšmę šiuolaikinės visuomenės tvariai raidai bei išskirti metodus, padedančius optimaliai įgyvendinti interaktyvumo programą ir skatinančius užmegzti dialogą su visuomene. Šiuos reikalavimus atitinka eksperimentinė archeologija. Todėl darbe apžvelgiamos jos praktikavimo ištakos, kategorijos ir sklaida Lietuvoje bei išskiriamos eksperimento metodo taikymo perspektyvos archeologijoje. Viena jų – gyvosios archeologijos festivaliai, įvairios edukacinės programos, kurių atsiradimą ir gausėjimą paskatino bandymas padaryti visuomenę aktyvia dalyve. Kaip esminė dialogo su bendruomene forma darbe įvardinama archeologinio parko idėja, įvertinami šio animavimo metodo privalumai ir trūkumai, charakterizuojamos potencialios archeologinių parkų vietovės Lietuvos teritorijoje; atsižvelgiant į objekto išlikimo... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Using a set of general methods which include comparative analysis and synthesis of scientific literature this paper discusses issues of recognition, promotion and rehabilitation of archaeological heritage, the perspectives and opportunities of its use in Lithuania. Basically this work can be divided into two main parts: the one with theoretical analysis of various approaches and the other orientated towards practical recommendations and suggestions of possible animation work in regional parks. Seeking to define the vital importance of involvement and participation of society in the process of conservation, the overall term animation is adopted and used as synonym for recognition, promotion and rehabilitation concept. Considering the relationship between archaeological heritage and society as the main subject of this research, the specifics of archaeological heritage and importance of sustainable development to modern society is reviewed in the work. One of the tasks is to separate out the methods which provide optimal conditions of interactive communication and stimulate the engagement in dialogue with communities. Experimental archaeology meets such requirements. Therefore the genesis, development, categories of experimental archeology and promotion of this tendency in Lithuania are defined, alongside the perspectives of practical use of experiment in archaeology are reflected. Good examples of interaction are various educational programs and archaeological festivals, which... [to full text]

Microblades were a common feature of many lithic toolkits around the North Pacific during the late Pleistocene and early Holocene epochs. On Haida Gwaii, on British Columbia's North Coast, the earliest known microblades have been recovered from the Richardson Island site and date to approximately 8750 BP. Deep, well-defined stratigraphy at the site has provided a unique opportunity to observe a major technological shift as, between 8750 BP and 8500 BP, microblades gradually replaced the earlier bifacial toolkit and came to be a definitive aspect of the subsequent Moresby tradition technological suite. Several hypotheses have been presented, including microblades as a response to increasing raw material scarcity as a result of sea-level change, microblades as a technology imported by incoming Athapaskan speaking peoples, and microblades as an in situ design response to new subsistence practices brought about by ecological changes following the end of the last glaciation: a more durable, more deadly weapon well adapted to high-risk hunting activities. In this thesis I examine the possible reasons behind that shift in lithic technology. My analysis employs multiple lines of evidence to consider the theories. I examine the microblade assemblage and consider aspects of tool manufacture, use, and discard to determine how the microblades may have been used, and how they may relate to other microblade traditions in the region; I consider the paleoecology of southern Haida Gwaii during the early Holocene; and I use a set of controlled experiments to compare bifaces and slotted points in terms of durability and wound channel creation. / Graduate

This essay discusses different opinions about experimental archaeology. To start with literature was examined and a questionnaire was sent out to students and working archaeologists. The possibility for experiments to mediate archaeology to people without an education in archaeology is lifted and is also mentioned in the questionnaire. In the discussion part of the essay the results from the questionnaire and the literature are used to see what opinions are the strongest. The mediating is also discussed and the result is compiled in the conclusion. There are different opinions about experimental archaeology, but no prominent difference between what students and archaeologists answered. It is possible to see different opinions in the literature, but concerning the mediating most of the writers agree that the experimental archaeology is a good method to communicate with the laymen.

Handaxes are some of the longest lasting and most iconic stone tools throughout human evolution. Appearing in the early Pleistocene, these bifacially flaked tools persisted around one and a half million years and span across all of the Old World, from Africa to eastern Asia. Despite their ubiquitous nature, relatively little is known about their function. Handaxes are often speculated to be multi-functional tools which were selected for due to their large cutting edge; however, only a handful of use-wear studies have attempted to elucidate their use in the archaeological record. The lack of experimental use-wear studies surrounding handaxe function is due to preservation issues and the fact that manufacturing and curating handaxes compounds the ambiguity of microwear signatures. The methodology undertaken in this research provides a pathway to overcoming these obstacles through experimental archaeology in conjunction with low powered microscopy, image-based GIS, and statistical hypothesis testing. In particular, this thesis investigates handaxe function at an assemblage scale (n = 56) in a late Lower Paleolithic to Middle Paleolithic archaeological site called Shishan Marsh – 1 (SM-1) in al-Azraq, Jordan. Experimental handaxes (n = 22) were replicated and used in various activities such as butchery, plant processing, woodworking, shellfish processing, and digging. The results of this research corroborates the idea of handaxes being used as multifunctional tools. These results have implications for handaxe function, hominin tool use in a desert refugia, and provides a new pathway to investigate inter-site variability in handaxe use. / Graduate / 2018-08-01

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After carbon, phosphorus is the most commonly detected element in archaeological iron. The typical phosphoric iron range is 0.1wt% to 1wt%P. The predominant source of phosphorus in iron is the ore smelted. Around 60% of economic UK rock iron ore formations contain over 0.2%P. Under fully reducing conditions, both in liquid-state (cast iron) and solid-state bloomery smelting (direct reduction) processes, such rock ores would be predicted to produce phosphoric iron, and bog iron ores even more so. Ore-metal-slag phosphorus ratios for bloomery iron are derived here, by means of: laboratory experiments; full-scale experimental bloomery smelting; and analysis of remains from three Medieval and two Late Roman-Iron Age iron production sites in England and the Netherlands. Archaeological ore, slag, metal residues (gromps), and iron artefacts were analysed by metallography, SEM-EDS, EPMA, and XRD. The effects of forging and carburising on phosphoric iron were studied by experiment and artefact analysis. The ore to slag %P ratio for solid-state reduction was determined to range from 1:1.2 to 1: 1.8. The ore to metal %P ratio varied from 1:0.2 to 1:0.7 ¿ 1.4, depending on furnace operating conditions. Archaeological phosphoric iron and steel microstructures resulting from non-equilibrium reduction, heat treatment, and mechanical processing are presented to define the technology of early phosphoric iron. Microstructures were identified by a combination of metallography and chemical analysis. The phosphoric iron artefacts examined appear to be fully functional objects, some cold-worked and carburised. Modern concepts of 'quality' and workability are shown to be inapplicable to the archaeological material.

Cette thèse de doctorat en archéologie est consacrée à l'étude des "militaria" découvertes dans la péninsule balkanique et issues de contextes datés de l'époque romaine tardive et protobyzantine. La définition des champs de l'enquête permet, dans un premier temps, d'établir un corpus répertoriant 156 sites archéologiques à armes et de proposer l'inventaire des "militaria" dans leurs contextes historiographiques, géographiques et chronologiques. L'analyse typologique replace ensuite ces armes dans leurs contextes de production, de diffusion et d'approvisionnement, d'utilisation, d'entretien et d'abandon. Une telle analyse démontre enfin qu'aucune forme n'est anodine et que l'évolution de celle-ci résulte d'héritage, d'adaptation et d'innovation. / This Phd work in archaeology deals with the study of "militaria", found on the Balkan Peninsula, from late roman and early-byzantine archaeological contexts. At first, the definition of field investigation allows to establish a database indexing 156 archaeological sites with weapons and to take stock of the "militaria" within their historiographical, geographical and chronological contexts. Cluster analysis then puts these weapons in their contexts of manufacture, circulation and supplying, use, maintenance and abandonment. This analysis demonstrates finally that no style is trivial and that the evolution of the latter results of inheritance, borrowing and innovation.

No presente trabalho realizamos uma análise das lâminas líticas polidas produzidas pelos habitantes pré-históricos no território brasileiro, provenientes de diferentes regiões, grupos e modos de vida. A partir do estudo de coleções arqueológicas e de experimentações pretendemos compreender melhor as diferenças e semelhanças apresentadas por estas lâminas polidas em cada região e sua resistência a testes de impacto em laboratório. Foram analisados 926 artefatos, entre lâminas, fragmentos e alguns percutores. São peças que integram coleções de museus centrais em diferentes regiões do Brasil (Norte, Nordeste, Sudeste e Sul). São principalmente coleções antigas, que apresentam objetos provenientes de diversas partes de cada um dos estados, possibilitando uma cobertura territorial ampla. A despeito dos parcos dados de procedência das peças foi possível caracterizálas regionalmente de forma bastante clara, demonstrando que morfológica e tecnologicamente há variações significativas de uma região para a outra. Em alguns casos foi possível ir ainda mais longe, permitindo propor atribuições culturais a determinados tipos, relacionando-os a algumas Tradições Arqueológicas. No entanto, se tornou evidente também que a partilha dos modos de fazer regionais tem importância capital, que quase sempre vai além das escolhas culturais de um grupo específico. Os trabalhos experimentais (de compressão e impacto) evidenciaram a força necessária para a fragmentação de uma lâmina de basalto de tamanho intermediário, durante seu uso no corte, bem como permitiu estimar a força utilizada por um lenhador mediano, possibilitando compreender melhor algumas relações entre força de impacto, quebras e formas de encabamentos. Finalmente, conseguimos lançar luz sobre a importância das lâminas, tanto para as sociedades do passado, quanto para os arqueólogos do presente, mostrando-as como ferramentas importantes para a compreensão dos modos de vida e dos processos de ocupação do território. / In the present work, we performed an analysis of lithic polished blades produced by the prehistoric inhabitants of the Brazilian territory, from different regions, groups and ways of life. From the study of archaeological assemblages and of experimental archaeology we aim to better understand the differences and similarities presented by these polished blades in each region and their resistance to impact tests. We analyzed 926 artifacts, including blades, fragments and some hammerstones. These items integrate collections of central museums in different regions of Brazil (North, Northeast, Southeast and South). The collections were formed mostly from the middle of the XX century on and present objects from different parts of each of the states, making possible a wide territorial coverage. Despite the scarce data provenance for the pieces it was possible to characterize them regionally quite clearly, showing that morphologically and technologically there are significant variations from one region to another. In some cases it was possible to go even further, allowing the proposition of some cultural attributions to certain types of artifacts, relating them to some Archaeological Traditions. However, it also became clear that sharing the ways of doing things has a major role importance, which often goes beyond the cultural choices of a specific group. The experimental work (of compression and impact) revealed the force required to break a basalt blade of average size during its use in chopping, and allowing us to estimate the force used by an average lumberjack, then enabling a better understanding of some relationships between impact force, breakages and forms of hafting. Finally, we shed light on the importance of the blades, both for past societies, as to the present day archaeologists, showing them as important tools for understanding the ways of life and the processes involved in the human occupation of the territory.

The post-firing variability of fire-affected rock (FAR) recovered from a stone-cooking platform within a prehistoric stone grill was examined. This examination tested the physical properties of FAR recovered from site CA-SBR-3773, located the Crowder Canyon Archaeological District in San Bernardino County, California. There is a lack of archaeological research in this area of Southern California; however, this project established a fundamental perspective of thermal feature reuse and episodes of firing activity for prehistoric cooking features by examining the physical changes FAR experienced due to various heat exposures. Regional archaeologists often encounter these features as they speckle the landscape of upland desert regions in California. This research is an experimental project that compares the cultural stones’ properties to those of non-cultural origin, which have been fired various times during controlled replicative experimentation. The end comparison identifies the FARs’ change in physical conditions. Repeated exposure to high temperatures has a direct relationship to the stability and matrices of rock, in this particular case, schist (Yavuz et al. 2010). As the stone is repeatedly exposed to high temperatures, its durability and structural components begin to deteriorate. This deterioration can be measured and compared to pre-fired physical properties. One of these physical properties is the stones’ porosity, which is calculated using the measured absorption rate of stone before and after exposure to firing episodes. These firing episodes are meant to approximate the cultural use of these stones during prehistoric cooking episodes. The results of the experiment show that FAR may have some diagnostic capabilities to infer multiple firing episodes, confirm facility reuse, and support suggested mobility with respect to available resources and temporal episodes through accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) dating and other analyses such as micro-botanical analysis.