Archeology Of Early Cities

Front 1

Historical Materialism

Back 1

-the study of history as a pattered sequence of one mode of production to another
-history is the progression of one change in the mode of production (which leads to revolution) after the other
-Marx

Front 2

Mode of Production

Back 2

-society is a systematic whole of interdependent parts; change in one social domain systematically effects all others
-consists of base (means and relations of production) and superstructure (ideology)
-Marx

Front 3

Alienation

Back 3

-when a workers labor is owned by the elite leads to a revolution
-Marx

Front 4

False Consciousness

Back 4

-the ideological processes that conceal the true relations
-Marx

Front 5

Revolution

Back 5

-a change in the mode of production (change in the base)
-conflicts/revolutions/times of upheaval drive history forward (historical materialism)
-Marx

Front 6

Urban Revolution

Back 6

-change in the mode of production
-cities appear when there is a change in the mode of production
-ex. hunter gatherers to agriculture
-Childe

Front 7

Childe's 10 Traits

Back 7

1) large, densely populated settlements
2) economic specialization
3) taxation (support people who are involved in jobs that don’t directly correlate to feeding themselves)
4) monumental architecture
5) class divisions
6) writing and recording (some later civilizations (Inca) don’t have a writing system which is an argument against Childe)
7) math, science and astronomy
8) art
9) long distance trade
10) new political and economic order (the state)

Front 8

Which person placed an emphasis on how civilizations developed economically and politically?

Back 8

-Childe

Front 9

Society "Sui Generis"

Back 9

-we have a shared society of what civilization consists of, and this idea replicates itself
-phenomenon that appears to generate or given rise to itself
- society and its structures/institutions are treated as pre-existant ensambles of positions, roles, rule and sanctions to which individual actors are born
-Durkheim

Front 10

What are the two kinds of Solidarity proposed by Durkheim? Define them.

Back 10

1) Mechanical Solidarity
-associated with societies where everyone is very similar. no mechanism for reconciliation (hunter gatherers)
-strong solidarity
-no institutions for dealing with difference (problems lead to splitting apart)
-ex. same size gears

2) Organic Solidarity
-associated with complex societies where there a many differences between people. have instututions that reconcile differences. differences between people.
-have institutions to reconcile difference (police and court systems)
-ex. different organs in the body
-class system

Front 11

Anomie

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-the opposite of solidarity
-when society becomes an “aggregate of disconnected parts that fail to cooperate with one another”
-sees this as a cause of things like suicide
-civilization no longer functions
-Durkheim

Front 12

Collective Consciousness

Back 12

-the values, attitudes, and mores shared by members of society
-both in organic and mechanical solidarity
-Durkheim

Front 13

Discuss Childe's "Urban Revolution" in regards to Durkheim.

Back 13

-childe sees the urban revolution as making a change from mechanical to organic solidarity (although he is more influenced by marx than Durkheim)

Front 14

Which person emphasized the religious aspect of civilizations rather than their political or economic aspects?

Back 14

-Wheately

Front 15

Cosmograms

Back 15

-cities recreate the order of the universe
-Wheately

Front 16

Cities as "Imago Mundi"

Back 16

-cosmograms
-"centres of the world"
-uses monuments to create mythical locations, which essentially makes them those mythical locations themselves (in this way the elites control the supernatural/spiritual within their own city)
-temples with the cities act as axis mundi (linking the human world with the supernatural world
-Wheately

Front 17

Cultural Resource Management (CRM)

Back 17

-consulting branch of archeology, not academic research
-called in prior to construction projects
-most common form of archeological research in North America today
-private sector archeology
-rescue or salvage operations

Front 18

Reconnaissance

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-walking/driving around without any form of systematic sampling
-what sites you can see from the road
-precursor to larger survey project just to see what is out there

Front 19

Survey

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-use different sampling methods (predictive, arbitrary or stratified random sampling methods)
-walking over the landscape using carefully lain out transects (linear paths) and noting the presence of ancient artifacts (pottery and architectural remains) on the surface

Front 20

Remote Sensing

Back 20

-aerial photography
-satellite imaging

Front 21

What are some of the different ways we can go about identifying sites?

Back 21

-reconnaissance
-survey
-remote sensing

Front 22

What are the 3 kinds of sampling methods?

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-predictive
-arbitrary
-stratified random

Front 23

Predictive Sampling Method

Back 23

-use present knowledge of current sites to find new sites
-unlikely to find new sites
-ex. if your doing a survey of a river valley you may decide to only put your transects on areas where sites have been discovered previously

Front 24

Arbitrary Sampling Method

Back 24

-grid out your map and use a random number generator to put transects across the map while making no reference to where you know sites are located
-larger sample
-doesn’t take into account environmental factors or historical research
-miss out on natural locations (might randomly only get mountains and coasts and not get any river valleys)

Front 25

Stratified Random Sampling Method

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-set # of transects in each of the naturally occurring environments
-units within placed in a random number generator
-preferred method used

Front 26

Settlement Patterns

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-if all the sites are on the coast there is probably an emphasis on fishing
-tells you about defense (shift from flood lands to the mountains might indicate a period of extended warfare)
-tells you about political centralization (taxation makes you group people together)
-can indicate where other settlements might be near by

Front 27

What are the 3 subsurface remote sensing methods?

Back 27

-electrical resistivity
-magnetometry
-ground penetration radar

Front 28

Electric Resistivity

Back 28

-stick metal probes into the ground which sends out electrical current into the ground. measure differences in the sediments resistance to electrical current
-used to find stone deposits and things like foundations

Front 29

Magnetometry

Back 29

-different materials have their own magnetic properties
-varies variations in magnetic fields to locate features and architecture
-when there is metal debris in the soil it can make the readings very scattered

Front 30

Ground Penetrating Radar

Back 30

-uses radar pulsed to determine sub surface features
-different materials reflect radar pulses at different degrees

Front 31

Surface Collection

Back 31

-most excavations start off with this
-put out grids (or dog leash) and collect all the pottery and artifacts that are in the sampling unit
-compare to other areas in the grid
-tells you what areas might have been used for what

Front 32

Cultural vs. Natural Site Formation

Back 32

-cultural includes things made by people that might disturb/effect the archeology (plowing, faming, looting)
-natural things might be roots, freeze thaw, erosion, tunneling animals, worms, wind, rain etc

Front 33

Datum

Back 33

-fixed reference point used to measure things in 3 dimensions
-a fixed reference point used to measure the site and the location of artifacts in 3 dimensions
-ex. a large nail or piece of rebar

-used during excavations

Front 34

Feature

Back 34

-group of the remains of an activity
-could be used to refer to a lot of little things
-a group of associated artifacts representing a single activity over a defined period of time
-ex. walls, hearths, garbage pits

-used during excavations

Front 35

Stratigraphy

Back 35

-actual layers of deposition in the site
-law of superimposition of deposits (lower layer is earlier)
-natural levels = excavation according to natural changes in the stratigraphy.
-archaeologists number the levels the strata and then record which layer any artifact was found in so that they might better understand the time frame it came from

Front 36

Screening and Floatation

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-take a sieve (box with wire mesh) and put sediment through it to show pottery or shards of remains
-flotation puts sediment in water and waits for the light stuff to float to the top, and then strains them through a fishnet stocking (ex. seeds and pollen)

Front 37

Paleoethnobotony

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-study of plant remains
-fossils, seeds, spores, pollen etc
-what agriculture was used

Front 38

Geoarchaeology

Back 38

-study of natural site formations
-study of natural processes that effect sites
-things like landscapes or geomorphology
-study the natural physical processes that affect archaeological sites such as geomorphology, the formation of sites through geological processes and the effects on buried sites and artifacts post-deposition

Front 39

Zooarchaeology

Back 39

-study of animal remains

Front 40

Bioarcheology (Forensic Anthropology)

Back 40

-study of human remains
-Dr. Temperance Brennan #Bones #greatshow

Front 41

Relative Dating Techniques

Back 41

-stratigraphy to see how the layers relate to each other
-typographic sequences (evolution of a kind of object)
-ceramic variations

Front 42

Absolute Dating Techniques

Back 42

-radio carbon dating (rate of decay of carbon in organic material; only used on organic remains)
-tree-ring dating

Front 43

What are the two regions of Mesopotamia?

Back 43

-Akkad (north)
-Sumer (south)
-spoke different languages

Front 44

Gertrude Bell

Back 44

-lucky rich lady who travelled around with Lawrence of arabia and was a spy for Britain
-Mesopotamia

Front 45

Leonard Wolley

Back 45

-first professional archeologist (paid to do it)
-Mesopotamia
-1922-1934 conducts excavations at Ur for the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania

Front 46

Robert McCormick Adams

Back 46

-did a lot of survey in Mesopotamia
-Did walking surveys of Mesopotamia where he discovered the irrigation channels
-worked

Front 47

Robert and Linda Brainwood

Back 47

-associated with the oriental institute in Chicago
-trained other scholars
-Mesopotamia

Front 48

Urk and the Urk Revolution

Back 48

-Childe's 10 characteristics of a civilization start to emerge (temples, taxation, class structure etc)
-Mesopotamia
• farming settlements have quickly raised population levels
-irrigation allows for more land to be cultivated
-possible kinship and or religious ties between farmers lead to protostates
-one settlement in these protostates becomes prominent in size and importance and become a small urban center

Front 49

Agricultural Practices of Mesopotamia

Back 49

-irrigation
-build up banks so the flood plain is higher
-upper – hot and dry in the summer, cooler and wetter in the winter
-lower – much more aerid, dependant on irrigation agriculture due to lack of precipitation
-deserts and marshes
-very hot climate
-thin, relatively poor soils
-diversity of naturally occurring plants
-grew barley, wheat, onions, grapes, turnips and apples
-irrigation required cooperation and organization (some degree of central control) and therefore can indicate the start of civilizations
-allowed expansion in population and social and cultural complexity

Front 50

Nippur

Back 50

-home of the principle god of the Mesopotamians (enlil)
-both have claimed the city of Nippur (Sumer and Akkad)
-whichever region controlled Nippur was considered the greatest Mesopotamian region (usually the south)
-rulers of other cities need his approval to legitimize their rule by making offerings to enlil
-spiritual capital
-both rich and poor livbing in the same neighbourhoods
-many of the inhabitants engaged in agriculture outside of the city (egalitarian)

Front 51

Uruk

Back 51

-city in Mesopotamia
-the Ziggurat at Uruk (large temple mound)
-instead of Urk conquering places (in a colonial way), they were sending merchants there which explains their influence on foreign cities
-other theory suggests the small cities just adopted Urk ways as a form of prestige

Front 52

What were the two parts Egypt was divided into?

Back 52

-Lower Egypt – the river delta near the mediteranean (northern)
-Upper Egypt – aerid river valley to the south
(location in between was modern Cairo)

Front 53

Agricultural practice of the Egyptians

Back 53

-built retaining walls to trap residual moisture when Nile flooded
-Nile would run extremely shallow in it's valley for large portions of the year
-river flooding has a thick level of fertile silt on the flood banks and delta, making habitation only really possible in those areas
-very much influenced the location of Egyptian sites
-relied on water from the floods of the Nile. They used levee’s to capture water after the flood started to receed, and then that residual moisture was used to maintain irrigation

Front 54

Dominique Vivant Denon

Back 54

-one of the sevants who went with napoleon
-illustrated monuments and people he saw
-Egypt

Front 55

William Flinders Petrie

Back 55

-donated his head to science
-invented syriation
-is credited with making the Egypt switch from treasure hunting to academic exploration
-made the first official Egyptologist professor at the university college London
-did a lot of the early survey in ancient Egypt

Front 56

Old vs. New Kingdoms of Ancient Egypt

Back 56

-old kingdom = pyramid construction
-Pharaohs had absolute power and were considered gods on earth.
-new kingdom = mortuary temples with separate tombs
-The new kingdom was Egypt's expansion period. Egypt expanded her borders through military conquest and became a world power.
-During the time period of the new kingdom, pharaohs were all powerful, and pharaohs were all buried in the same geographic area called the Valley of the Kings.

Front 57

Akhenaten

Back 57

-Egyptian Ruler
-the “heretic” king
-made the new capital at the site of Tell el-Amarna
-short period of monotheism in Egypt
-made the sun god the primary god of the state and outlawed all other rules, including the worship of the moon, who was associated with the king
-new style of art which depicted humans gracefully and showed them in natural settings

Front 58

Hatshepsut

Back 58

-Egyptian Ruler
-female king
-refused to step down when her stepson came of age, and instead assumed a male persona in order to continue to rule herself
-ruled for 20 years

Front 59

Tutankhamun

Back 59

-Egyptian Ruler
-the “Boy King”
-died when he was only 18 years old
-didn’t accomplish much during his reign
-famous because his un-looted tomb was discovered by Howard Carter in 1922

Front 60

Ramesses ll

Back 60

-Egyptian Ruler
-“Ramses the Great”

Front 61

Memphis

Back 61

-political capital
-where the king and his court lived
-located at the junction of the nile valley (north)
-founded during the dynastic period
-not much there today except a museum
-place of truth, justice and order (maat)

Front 62

Thebes

Back 62

-sacred capital in Egypt
-opet festival
-western thebes vs. eastern thebes
-was the ritual and ceremonial capital
-karnak, luxor, valley of the kings, deir el medina
-celebrated the kings both in life and death

Front 63

Deir el Medina

Back 63

-workers village for the valley of the kings

Front 64

Amaran

Back 64

-Akhenaten's capital
-when the capital was moved from memphis to here temporarily

Front 65

John Marshall

Back 65

-first to excavate the Indus Valley
-26 years old
-Harappan

Front 66

Mortimer Wheeler

Back 66

-excavated mohenjo derro
-Indus Valley
-“Still Digging”
-asked by Britain to head up the Indian campaign
-classically trained in Roman and European archeology
-ran his projects like military campaigns
-wheeler box-square method

Front 67

Mohenjo-Daro

Back 67

-organized into the citadel (great bath, granary, assembly hall, and stupa) and the lower city (residential architecture)
-Indus Valley

Front 68

Harappa

Back 68

-consists of 4 walled mounds
-made out of mud brick instead of fired clay brick
-no shared institutions/architecture between the cities
-Indus Valley
-southeast asia
-composed of a number of urban centers
-broadly shared principles of economic, cultural, authoritative systems
-conspicuous lack of authority figures

Front 69

Who did the Indus Valley trade with and how?

Back 69

-Mesopotamia
-cotton sails allowed for long distance trade on the rivers

Front 70

Indus Valley

Back 70

-no evidence for social stratification and lack of monumental architecture
-no big capital, just lots of individual centers that had their own authority and smaller surrounding villages
-a lot of similarities between the cities but there were also many differences

Front 71

How was Mesoamerica (Maya) divided?

Back 71

-southern highlands
-southern lowlands
-northern lowlands

Front 72

Bartholomew Columbus

Back 72

-first contact with the Maya
-spanish conquistador

Front 73

Bishop Diego de Landa

Back 73

-burning existing maya properties
-record what we know about maya belief system at the start
-not a great guy
-Mesoamerica

Front 74

Frederick Catherwood and John Lloyd Stevens

Back 74

-spent several month traveling around visitng and illustrating archeological sites in Mesoamerica (Maya)
-popularized the subject

Front 75

Olmecs

Back 75

-important sites were San Lorenzo and La Venta
-olmec heads depict individual rulers
-would later evolve into the Maya culture

Front 76

Were-Jaguars

Back 76

-combing of jaguars with features of the Olmec elites
-Mesoamerica

Front 77

Maya agricultural techniques

Back 77

-irrigation but mostly reliant on collecting rainwater

Front 78

Popol Vuh

Back 78

-book that records oral history of maya methodology
-contains the Maya creation myth
-Mesoamerica

Front 79

Sacrifice and the Ballgame in Maya

Back 79

-sacrifice of humans and animals
-blood letting practices by the maya elite
-losing team being beheaded afterwards

Front 80

Palenque

Back 80

-Maya city state in southern Mexico that flourished in the 7th century
-temple of inscriptions (tomb of pacal), palace, temples of the cross group
-Mesoamerica (Maya)

Front 81

Copan

Back 81

-green quetzal-macaw and the teotihuacan connection
-temple 16, temple 22, altar q
-conflicts with other cities (capture and sacrifice of 18 rabbit)
-Maya

Front 82

Julia Hendon

Back 82

-argued about the role of architecture in the materialization of social stratification
-people with nicer homes were richer..?

Front 83

Neo-Evolutionism

Back 83

-Neoevolutionism is a social theory that tries to explain the evolution of societies by drawing on Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and discarding some dogmas of the previous social evolutionism.
-Neoevolutionism is concerned with long-term, directional, evolutionary social change and with the regular patterns of development that may be seen in unrelated, widely separated cultures.
-it's the argument that things progress from bands to tribes to chiefdoms to states
-a band is defined as an autonomous, self-sufficient group with egalitarian leadership that comes from experience/qualities rather than political power
-a tribe has the presence of mechanisms to accommodate a sedentary lifestyle such as redistribution, and leadership skills are rarely formalized - this is associated with groups following the neolithic revolution
-a chiefdom is still kin-based but more hierarchical, power is more formalized - elites are leaders - might accumulate a bit more wealth but still more likely to redistribute in society
-and a state has centralized social and political organization, class stratification, intensive agriculture allowing them to support a large number of people and dedicate people to tasks not related to food production (e.g. craft specialization)

Front 84

Mesopotamian Urbanism

Back 84

-look for “site hierarchy” with 1 primary site (the largest), a few secondary sites, and many small tertiary sites
-presence of a site hierarchy implies the presence of a state-level society
-the largest site, Uruk, is assumed to be the political and economic capital

Front 85

General Principles of Mesopotamian Environment (E.Stone)

Back 85

-- One of the world’s largest deltas – broad flat expanse of alluvium generated by accumulated silts of Tigris and Euphrates rivers
-Settlements were built along multiple channels of interweaving which limited the ability of political centers to dominate those down river by threatening to divert water
-High river beds made canal irrigation easy
-Irrigation also caused progressive salinization of the land making it increasingly less arable

Front 86

Behinstun Inscription

Back 86

-written by Darius the Great
-what we use to decode mesopotamian writing because it was written in 3 languages
-king darius the great who was king of the persian empire in 522 BC - it's his autobiography with a list of his military victories and has old persion elamite and babylonian (so it's 3 cuneiform scripts) and the man who translated it correctly guessed the old persian was phonetic

Front 87

Rosetta Stone

Back 87

-discovered in the Napoleonic expedition
-led to the deciphering of hieroglyphics in 1922
-discovered by French soldiers while building fortifications
-written in Ancient Greek, Egyptian demotic script (cursive) and Egyptian Herioglyphics
-content of the text is the same in all 3, which was a decree by Ptolemy V dating to 196 BC regarding texts and the erection of statues in temples
-deciphered by Thomas Young in 1814 and Jean-Francois Champollion in 1822

Front 88

Meskelle's Argument for the Gendering of Space at Deir-el-Medina

Back 88

-so she argues that you need to combine material culture with social theory and is pushing for the employment of the concept of gender rather than fixed sex, she argues that you should look at male and female differences because of processes of identification and differentiation as fluid identifications are subject to change over time, she says that the basic family unit consists of parents, their children, married ones with their children, any attached relatives (unmarried daughters and grandparents), and slaves and servants (though it was unclear if they had their own housing and/or if they were like modern day maids and traveled around to different families for work), she says that the female sphere = married and sexually potent

Front 89

Harappan Political System According to Possehl

Back 89

--he argues that the political system is just like mesopotamia and egypt, there's evidence for sociocultural complexity at each site in the indus valley, they had long distance trade and cultural contact with mesopotamia which qould require some sort of structure/regulation, there was a range of housing indicating there were city dwellers, farm herders, and craft specialization which indicates class and social stratification

Front 90

Early to Mature Harappan Transition

Back 90

-that mture harrapan society was the time of large urban centers
-there are many debates about the transformations of society especially in relation to the formation of cities some say it happened gradually others say it happende in as little as 100 years
-but there's not much research because of the instability in the area

Front 91

Collapse of Indus Civilization

Back 91

-Around 1800 BCE, signs of a gradual decline began to emerge, and by around 1700 BCE, most of the cities were abandoned. In 1953, Sir Mortimer Wheeler proposed that the decline of the Indus Civilization was caused by the invasion of an Indo-European tribe from Central Asia called the "Aryans". As evidence, he cited a group of 37 skeletons found in various parts of Mohenjo-Daro, and passages in the Vedas referring to battles and forts.
-Today, many scholars believe that the collapse of the Indus Civilization was caused by drought and a decline in trade with Egypt and Mesopotamia.[79] It has also been suggested that immigration by new peoples, deforestation, floods, or changes in the course of the river may have contributed to the collapse

Front 92

Difference Between the New World and Old World

Back 92

-old world is europe.,asia ,and africa
-new wolrd is the americas
-the new world developed in isolation and away from and other type of civlization and had limited contact with other areas in the americas because of limited trade. unlike the old world which developed with many different civilizations
-the Old World developed the ability to work with bronze and then iron, while the New World never did.

Front 93

Excavation

Back 93

-the controlled destruction of a site
-intended to answer academic research questions or to rescue data from a site that will be destroyed due to modern activities
-dig through multiple occupation layers as you go deeper and deeper
-archaeologists rarely excavate the entirety of the site