Malacological Remains from the 2011-2016 Excavations at Khashuri Natsargora and Aradetis Orgora (Shida Kartli Region, Georgia, Southern Caucasus)

L’articolo discute i resti malacologici rinvenuti a Khashuri Natsargora e Aradetis Orgora, due siti dell’Età del Bronzo/Ferro nel bacino del Kura nella provincia georgiana di Shida Kartli (Caucaso Meridionale). Il corpus consiste in più di 500 esemplari ed include specie sia di terra che d’acqua dolce (queste ultime soprattutto per Aradetis Orgora), mentre le specie marine rappresentano una porzione estremamente marginale del totale. Il record, ottenuto attraverso la raccolta diretta in corso di scavo, include solo le specie con la conchiglia più resistente e di maggiori dimensioni, più riconoscibili ad occhio nudo e quindi rappresenta solo una parte degli inventari malacologici pertinenti alle sequenze stratigrafiche investigate. Nonostante questi limiti obiettivi, si è ritenuto opportuno presentare i dati raccolti e i risultati della loro analisi, che hanno permesso di ottenere informazioni di tipo paleoecologico e paleoeconomico non prive di interesse. L’analisi dei resti disponibili mostra una chiara predominanza di specie connesse con ambienti aperti e xerici, in sostanziale accordo sia con l’ambiente locale attuale che con i pochi dati paleoambientali disponibili. La debole variazione diacronica della composizione degli inventari suggerisce una sostanziale stabilità ecologica per entrambi i biotopi. L’abbondanza di molluschi d’acqua dolce ad Aradetis Orgora può essere spiegata con la prossimità del sito ai fiumi Prone e Kura, biotopi dai quali essi potrebbero essere stati raccolti intenzionalmente a scopi alimentari, come potrebbero suggerire alcuni paralleli da altre società dell’Età del Bronzo.The paper discusses the malacological remains recovered at Khashuri Natsargora and Aradetis Orgora, two Bronze Age/Iron Age sites located in the Kura River basin of the Shida Kartli province of Georgia (Southern Caucasus). The corpus consists of over 500 items, which include both land and (especially for Aradetis Orgora) freshwater species, while marine species represent an extremely marginal portion of the total. In both cases a clear dominance of species connected with open and xeric environments can be observed, in substantial agreement both with the present local environment and with the little available palaeoenvironmental data. The record is characterised by a scarce variety of species and shows very weak diachronic variability, which suggests a substantial ecological stability for both biotopes. The abundance of freshwater molluscs at Aradetis Orgora can be explained by the proximinity of the site to the Prone and Kura rivers

Burial Customs between the Late Chalcolithic and the Early Bronze Age in the Shida Kartli Region of Georgia

The paper analyses the development of burial customs in the Shida Kartli region of Georgia from the Late Chalcolithic until the end of the Early Bronze Age, especially focusing on the Kura-Araxes culture and on the culture (Martqopi, Bedeni) of the following Early Kurgan period. It summarises available evidence in the light of a recent revision carried out in the framework of the “Georgian-Italian Shida Kartli Archaeological Project” and compares it with contemporary evidence from the neighbouring regions of the Southern Caucasus and of the Upper Turkish Euphrates region. Analogies and differences are highlighted and analysed, with a special attention to the diffusion of barrow graves (kurgans), in the general framework of diachronic developments in interregional relations in the 4th and 3rd millennium BC

Usi funerari nel Caucaso Meridionale nell'Età del Bronzo Antico: il caso di Shida Kartli (Georgia)

Based on the results of recent investigations, the paper discusses the transformation of funerary customs from the 4th to the end of the 3rd millennium BC in the Shida Kartli region of Georgia. In contrast with both the previous and the following phase, the Kura-Araxes culture is characterised by a weak differentiation in burial goods. The transition to the following Early Kurgan period, when wealthy individual graves in the shape of large barrows become common, appears to have been less sharp in Shida Kartli than elsewhere, and possibly mediated by the appearance of large collective pit graves. Hybridisation phenomena between Kura-Araxes and Early Kurgan funerary customs can also be observed

The kurgans of the Alazani Valley in Eastern Georgia: A new assessment via remote sensing and targeted field survey

This paper presents the results of a landscape archaeological investigation conducted on the kurgans in the Alazani Valley, Eastern Georgia. Recognized for its remarkable kurgans, some exceeding 100 m in diameter, this region emerges as a pivotal area for the examination of burial mounds. The study highlights the effectiveness of integrated survey methods in mapping burial mounds within extensively exploited environments, facilitating the reconstruction of the archaeological landscape and the identification of areas with more preserved information. Utilizing remote sensing techniques, encompassing historical satellite imagery from the 1960s and recent data, coupled with a comprehensive four-year field survey, the research successfully mapped previously unrecorded kurgans. The analysis of historical and recent satellite imagery offers valuable insights into land use changes over the past six decades, enabling an assessment of the impact of human activity on the archaeological landscape

The Kura-Araxes Culture In The Shida Kartli Region of Georgia: An Overview

Located in the centre of present-day Georgia, in what is traditionally considered the heart of the Kura-Araxes culture, the Shida Kartli region hosts a relatively high number of excavated Kura-Araxes sites, as well as several sites of the preceding Late Chalcolithic and of the following Early Kurgan cultures (Early Bronze?). It therefore offers a good opportunity to analyze one of the regional variants of the Kura-Araxes culture in its diachronic development. The paper describes the stratigraphy of the main Kura-Araxes sites of the region, discusses available evidence concerning architecture, settlement patterns, burial customs, pottery and other categories of finds, and attempts at drawing up a relative chronology of the region on the basis of stratigraphy, chrono-typology and recent 14C evidence. The origins and the end of the Kura-Araxes culture in Shida Kartli, and the changing patterns in the subsistence and social organization of the local population are discussed in the wider framework of contemporary developments in the neighbouring regions

Palynological and Archaeological Evidence for Ritual Use of Wine in the Kura-Araxes Period at Aradetis Orgora (Georgia, Caucasus)

Pollen and non-pollen palynomorphs found in two zoomorphic Kura-Araxes vessels (ca. 3000 BCE) from Aradetis Orgora suggest they were utilized for the ritual consumption of wine and likely represent the beginning of the enduring tradition of animal-shaped wine-drinking containers in Georgia. This hypothesis is supported by archaeological and geoarchaeological data: the vessels resemble later wine-containing vessels from Georgia and elsewhere and were found in a building whose context is suggestive of a small shrine. Their palynological spectra match those of present-day wine and wine containers of other periods. One of the vessels was intact, with only a small access hole, that hindered the contamination of its contents; consequently, its palynological spectrum can be utilized as a standard for determining the presence of wine in other archaeological vessels. The analysis of pollen and non-pollen palynomorphs from different contexts at the Aradetis Orgora settlement and from its cemetery (Doghlauri) yielded other significant results regarding the practice of viticulture and the cultural relevance of wine during the Kura-Araxes period

Armenia, Caucaso e Asia Centrale. Ricerche 2019

Il volume della serie «Eurasiatica. Quaderni di Studi su Balcani, Anatolia, Iran, Caucaso e Asia Centrale» delle Edizioni Ca’ Foscari di Venezia raccoglie diversi articoli dedicati all’Armenia, al Caucaso e all’Asia Centrale. Il volume rispecchia alcune delle principali linee di ricerca portate avanti in questi ultimi anni dagli studiosi italiani e internazionali. Ne fanno pertanto parte articoli di carattere filologico, storico, economico e politico che affrontano numerosi temi di rilievo per la conoscenza di queste regioni, caratterizzate tanto da una tradizione culturale di grande ricchezza quanto da una crescente rilevanza nello scenario politico contemporaneo

Giornata dell’archeologia: scavi e ricerche del Dipartimento di Studi Umanistici

The paper summarises the main research activities of the Near Eastern Archaeology team of Ca’ Foscari University of Venice in the course of the last few years. Research on Early Bronze Age Upper Mesopotamia concentrated on the study of the results of the 1992-1010 Syro-Europaean excavations in Tell Beydar: the stratigraphy of Field I (Northern Building and North-Eastern Inner City Gate), 3rd millennium pottery, metallurgy and metal objects, and glyptics (seals and seal impressions). The Southern Caucasus was the object of field investigations in the Shida Kartli region of Georgia, where the sites of Natsargora and Aradetis Orgora and the Okherakhevi kurgan field were excavated, and unpublished material from old Georgian excavations at Natsargora was analysed and published. Important results were achieved, in particular, regarding the Kura-Araxes and Bedeni cultures (late 4th-3rd millennium BC) and the Late Bronze/Early Iron Age period (second half of the 2nd, early 1st millennium BC)

Revising the Contours of History at Tell Leilan

Northern Mesopotamia’s low grain yield costs and high land transport costs were fundamental forces behind early state growth in the fifth-fourth millennia BC (Weiss1983, 1986, 1997). That development, as well as the southern Mesopotamian Uruk colonization in northern Mesopotamia, was terminated by the 5.2 ka BP abrupt climate change that persisted for two centuries (Weiss 2001). In its wake, northern Mesopotamia underwent the Ninevite 5 experience: four hundred years of reduced settlement size,limited political consolidation, and abridged contact with southern Mesopotamia (Weiss and Rova eds. 2002). In the Leilan IIId period, ca. 2600-2400 BC, at the end of the Ninevite 5 period, Leilan suddenly grew from village to city size, 90 hectares, and its politico-economic organization was transformed into a state apparatus (Weiss 1990). The reasons for this secondary state development are still unclear, but seems to have occurred synchronously across northern Mesopotamia and induced, briefly, the emulation of southern Mesopotamian administrative iconography (Weiss 1990)

Exploratory analyses of structured images: a test on different coding procedures and analysis methods

In order to test the ability of textual coding to depict the features of structured images, a corpus of images of Near-Eastern seals of the late IVth millennium B.C. was studied through different exploratory analysis techniques. Two different coding systems were considered: the classical presence/absence coding of iconographical elements present in the images and a new textual coding, based on a formalised text describing the image. These were submitted to Multiple and Textual Correspondence Analyses. The textual analyses were performed according to two different coding systems, and several choices of the items involved. The results of the different analyses are discussed and compared here. In particular, textual analysis proved effective in substituting the classical coding in the description of the iconographic elements appearing in the images. In addition, it allowed us to broaden the investigation to include aspects of the images (occurrence of fixed sub-patterns and composition) which are beyond the capacities of classical coding. The ability of textual coding to select particular elements, and/or element sequences, to be taken into account in the analyses, was also considered an interesting feature for fine-tuning the analyses to the particular characters of specific corpora. Thus, the use of a formalised text as an intermediate between images and analysis tools proved to be a method worth using, in spite of the special care needed, and some still unsolved difficulties