Ant 293: Lecture One A: Introduction to Archaeology

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Ant 293 Lecture One A Introduction to
Archaeology
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• Archaeology
• modern archaeology is the systematic study of
  humanity in the past, including
• ancient technology
• human behaviour
• social organization
• religious beliefs
• every aspect of human culture

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• Archaeology is also a facet of anthropology
• Physical anthropology
• studies human evolution and the variations
  between different living populations

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• Cultural anthropology
• deals with the analysis of human social life,
  both past and present

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• Ethnography
• describes the culture, technology, and
  economics of living and extinct societies

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• ethnology
• engages in comparative studies of societies, a
  process that involves attempts to reconstruct
  general principles of human behaviour

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• linguistic anthropology
• studies human languages

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• archaeology
• special type shares many common objectives with
  cultural anthropology
• the major difference is that archaeologists study
  ancient societies, but they do so using many
  theoretical frameworks to link their excavated
  data to actual human behavior

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• archaeologists both build theories and apply
  scientific techniques and theoretical concepts in
  studying the material remains of culture
• they cover all of human history from the time of
  the earliest human beings up to the present

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• it is a very applied science that requires a
  knowledge about
• soils
• geology
• plants
• animals
• human skeletal anatomy
• physics
• trade and economics
• pottery

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• flint knapping
• stones
• architecture
• art
• religion
• camping
• surveying
• equipment repair
• use of computers
• statistics

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• Seven types of archaeological pursuit

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• Prehistoric Archaeology
• History
• 5000 ya in Egypt and Near East
• 700 BCE in Mediterranean
• 55 BCE in Britain
• 16th C CE in New World
• 19thC in Africa

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• prehistory
• that portion of human history that extends back
  from before the time of written documents and
  archives
• prehistoric archaeologists deal with an enormous
  time scale of human cultural evolution, dating
  back 2.5 million years
• prehistoric archaeology is the primary source of
  information on 99 percent of human history

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• prehistoric archaeologists investigate how
• early human societies all over the world came
  into being
• they differed from one another
• they changed through time

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• biblical archaeology
• requires the archaeologist be an expert on a
  variety of ethnic groups living in what is now
  Israel, Lebanon, and Syria
• it attempts to link accounts in biblical and
  Canaanite literature with archaeological data.

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• historical archaeology
• the study sites of recent history
• scholars at these sites frequently specialize in
  such objects as pottery imported from England,
  Italy, and China, Spanish-style architecture and
  uniform buttons
• for these, the archaeologist supplies details
  lacking in historical records

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• underwater archaeology
• the study of ancient wrecks in the Mediterranean,
  around Florida and elsewhere
• techniques
• special recording techniques have been devised
  to recover the smallest details of shipwrecks and
  the cargoes in their holds

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• this field has the same intellectual goals as
  their dry land colleagues to recover,
  reconstruct and interpret the past
• complex and expensive
• the excavation may involve shifting vast
  quantities of sediment, and recording and
  removing bulky objects as storage jars, metal
  ingots, and cannons

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• more than 100 sunken vessels have been excavated,
  revealing not only how they were constructed, but
  also many insights into shipboard life, cargoes,
  trade routes, early metallurgy, and glassmaking
• the invention in recent times of miniature
  submarines, other submersible craft, and scuba
  diving gear has enabled divers to stay underwater
  longer, and to reach sites at previously
  impossible depths

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• industrial Archaeology
• the study of buildings and other structures of
  the Industrial Revolution such as Victorian
  factories

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• Classical
• relies heavily on written sources
• until recently, Classicists have had relatively
  little interest in the minute economic,
  environmental, and social problems that absorb
  prehistoric archaeologists
• art, architecture, literature, and history all
  come together in archaeology