Good Old Stuff
The spectacle of production: A Roman imperial winery at the Villa of the Quintilii, Rome
Emlyn Dodd, Giuliana Galli & Riccardo Frontoni
Antiquity, April 2023, Pages 436-453
Abstract:
The elites of many past cultures have sought to romanticise agricultural labour -- often the source of their wealth and hence their status. A recently discovered winery at the Villa of the Quintilii on the Via Appia Antica, near Rome, provides only the second known example from the Graeco-Roman world of an opulent wine production complex built to facilitate vinicultural ‘spectacle’. The authors present the architectural and decorative form of the winery and illustrate how the annual vintage was reimagined as ‘theatrical’ performance. Dating to the mid third century AD, the complex illuminates how ancient elites could fuse utilitarian function with ostentatious luxury to fashion their social and political status.
Archaeological evidence for two culture diverse Neanderthal populations in the North Caucasus and contacts between them
Ekaterina Doronicheva et al.
PLoS ONE, April 2023
Abstract:
Neanderthals were widespread during the Middle Palaeolithic (MP) across Europe and Asia, including the Caucasus Mountains. Occupying the border between eastern Europe and West Asia, the Caucasus is important region regarding the Neanderthal occupation of Eurasia. On current radiometric estimates, the MP is represented in the Caucasus between about 260–210 ka and about 40 ka. Archaeological record indicates that several culture diverse MP hominin populations inhabited the Caucasus, but the region complex population history during this period remains poorly understood. In this paper, we identify for the first time the archaeological evidence indicating contacts between two culture diverse MP Neanderthal populations in the North Caucasus and discuss the nature of these contacts. Basing on the lithic assemblages that we excavated at Mezmaiskaya cave in the north-western Caucasus (Kuban River basin) and Saradj-Chuko grotto in the north-central Caucasus (Terek River basin), dating from MIS 5 to MIS 3, and comparative data from other MP sites in the Caucasus, we identify two large cultural regions that existed during the late MP in the North Caucasus. The distinctive toolkits and stone knapping technologies indicate that the MP assemblages from Mezmaiskaya cave and other sites in the west of North Caucasus represent a Caucasian variant of the Eastern Micoquian industry that was wide spread in central and eastern Europe, while the assemblages from Saradj-Chuko Grotto and other sites in the east of North Caucasus closely resemble the Zagros Mousterian industry that was wide spread in the Armenian Highlands, Lesser Caucasus and Zagros Mountains. The archaeological evidence implies that two culture diverse populations of Neanderthals settled the North Caucasus during the Late Pleistocene from two various source regions: from the Armenian Highlands and Lesser Caucasus along the Caspian Sea coast, and from Russian plain along the Sea of Azov coast.
Timber imports to Norse Greenland: Lifeline or luxury?
Lísabet Guðmundsdóttir
Antiquity, April 2023, Pages 454-471
Abstract:
The native trees of Greenland are unsuitable for larger construction projects or shipbuilding. Instead, the Norse colonists (AD 985–1450) relied on driftwood and imported timber. The provenance and extent of these imports, however, remain understudied. Here, the author uses microscopic anatomical analyses to determine the taxa and provenance of wood from five Norse Greenlandic sites. The results show that while the needs of most households were met by local woodlands and driftwood, elite farms had access to timber imports from Northern Europe and North America. By demonstrating the range of timber sources used by the Greenland Norse, the results illustrate connectivity across the medieval North Atlantic world.
Revisiting the concept of the ‘Neolithic Founder Crops’ in southwest Asia
Amaia Arranz-Otaegui & Joe Roe
Vegetation History and Archaeobotany, forthcoming
Abstract:
Zohary and Hopf coined the term ‘founder crops’ to refer to a specific group of eight plants, namely three cereals (einkorn, emmer and barley), four legumes (lentil, pea, bitter vetch and chickpea), and a fibre/oil crop (flax), that founded early Neolithic agriculture in southwest Asia. Zohary considered these taxa as the first cultivated and domesticated species, as well as those that agricultural communities exploited and eventually spread to Europe and other regions. As a result, these eight species soon become the hallmark of the Neolithic plant-based subsistence. However, the ‘founder crops’ concept was defined at the end of the 1980s, when the development of agriculture was considered a rapid event, and therefore, terms like domestication, agriculture and plant cultivation were used interchangeably in the literature. The aim of this paper is thus to revisit concept of the ‘Neolithic founder crops’. Through a critical review of the archaeobotanical evidence gathered in the last 40 years, we evaluate the relative contribution of the ‘eight founder crop’ species to the plant-based subsistence across different periods of the southwest Asian Neolithic. We conclude that multiple groups of ‘founder’ species could be defined depending on whether one seeks to represent the most exploited plants of the Neolithic period, the first cultivated and domesticated crops, or the species that agricultural communities cultivated and eventually spread to Europe. Improved understanding of Neolithic plant-based subsistence in general, and agriculture in particular, will be attained by moving beyond conventional narratives and exploring the evolutionary history of plants other than the original ‘founder’ species.
Early to Middle Bronze Age agricultural terraces in north-east England: Morphology, dating and cultural implications
Antony Brown et al.
Antiquity, April 2023, Pages 348-366
Abstract:
Terracing is found widely in the Mediterranean and in other hilly and mountainous regions of the world. Yet while archaeological attention to these ‘mundane’ landscape features has grown, they remain understudied, particularly in Northern Europe. Here, the authors present a multidisciplinary study of terraces in the Breamish Valley, Northumberland. The results date their construction to the Early to Middle Bronze Age, when they were built by cutting back the hillside, stone clearance and wall construction. Environmental evidence points to their use for cereal cultivation. The authors suggest that the construction and use of these terraces formed part of an Early to Middle Bronze Age agricultural intensification, which may have been both demographically and culturally driven.