14 research outputs found
Holocene resource exploitation along the Nile:diet and subsistence strategies of Mesolithic and Neolithic societies at Khor Shambat 1, Sudan
The subsistence practices of Holocene communities living in the Nile Valley of Central Sudan are comparatively little known. Recent excavations at Khor Shambat, Sudan, have yielded well-defined Mesolithic and Neolithic stratigraphy. Here, for the first time, archaeozoological, palaeobotanical, phytolith and dental calculus studies are combined with lipid residue analysis of around 100 pottery fragments and comparative analysis of faunal remains and organic residues. This holistic approach provides valuable information on changes in adaptation strategies, from Mesolithic hunter-gatherers to Neolithic herders exploiting domesticates. A unique picture is revealed of the natural environment and human subsistence, demonstrating the potential wider value of combining multiple methods
Mashes to Mashes, Crust to Crust. Presenting a novel microstructural marker for malting in the archaeological record
The detection of direct archaeological remains of alcoholic beverages and their production
is still a challenge to archaeological science, as most of the markers known up to now are
either not durable or diagnostic enough to be used as secure proof. The current study
addresses this question by experimental work reproducing the malting processes and subsequent
charring of the resulting products under laboratory conditions in order to simulate
their preservation (by charring) in archaeological contexts and to explore the preservation of
microstructural alterations of the cereal grains. The experimentally germinated and charred
grains showed clearly degraded (thinned) aleurone cell walls. The histological alterations of
the cereal grains were observed and quantified using reflected light and scanning electron
microscopy and supported using morphometric and statistical analyses. In order to verify
the experimental observations of histological alterations, amorphous charred objects (ACO)
containing cereal remains originating from five archaeological sites dating to the 4th millennium
BCE were considered: two sites were archaeologically recognisable brewing installations from Predynastic Egypt, while the three broadly contemporary central European
lakeshore settlements lack specific contexts for their cereal-based food remains. The
aleurone cell wall thinning known from food technological research and observed in our own
experimental material was indeed also recorded in the archaeological finds. The Egyptian
materials derive from beer production with certainty, supported by ample contextual and
artefactual data. The Neolithic lakeshore settlement finds currently represent the oldest
traces of malting in central Europe, while a bowl-shaped bread-like object from Hornstaad–
Ho¨ rnle possibly even points towards early beer production in central Europe. One major further implication of our study is that the cell wall breakdown in the grain’s aleurone layer can
be used as a general marker for malting processes with relevance to a wide range of charred
archaeological finds of cereal products
Scaling the state: Egypt in the third millennium BC
Discussions of the early Egyptian state suffer from a weak consideration of scale. Egyptian archaeologists derive their arguments primarily from evidence of court cemeteries, elite tombs, and monuments of royal display. The material informs the analysis of kingship, early writing, and administration but it remains obscure how the core of the early Pharaonic state was embedded in the territory it claimed to administer. This paper suggests that the relationship between centre and hinterland is key for scaling the Egyptian state of the Old Kingdom (ca. 2,700-2,200 BC). Initially, central administration imagines Egypt using models at variance with provincial practice. The end of the Old Kingdom demarcates not the collapse, but the beginning of a large-scale state characterized by the coalescence of central and local models
Timing and pace of dairying inception and animal husbandry practices across Holocene North Africa
The timing and extent of the adoption and exploitation of domesticates and their secondary products, across Holocene North Africa, has long been the subject of debate. The three distinct areas within the region, Mediterranean north Africa, the Nile Valley and the Sahara, each with extremely diverse environments and ecologies, demonstrate differing trajectories to pastoralism. Here, we address this question using a combination of faunal evidence and organic residue analyses of c. 300 archaeological vessels from sites in Algeria, Libya and Sudan. This synthesis of new and published data provides a broad regional and chronological perspective on the scale and intensity of domestic animal exploitation and the inception of dairying practices in Holocene North Africa. Following the introduction of domesticated animals into the region our results confirm a hiatus of around one thousand years before the adoption of a full pastoral economy, which appears first in the Libyan Sahara, at c. 5200 BCE, subsequently appearing at c. 4600 BCE in the Nile Valley and at 4400–3900 BCE in Mediterranean north Africa
Tell el-Farkha (Ghazala) 1998-2002
Chłodnicki Marek, Ciałowicz Krzysztof M. Tell el-Farkha (Ghazala) 1998-2002. In: Archéo-Nil. Revue de la société pour l'étude des cultures prépharaoniques de la vallée du Nil, n°13, 2003. Actualité de la recherche prédynastique : les terrains de fouilles. 2-La Basse-Égypte. pp. 47-54
Post-Meroitic cemetery at the Khor Shambat site in Sudan
Archaeological research at the Khor Shambat site located in Omdurman in central Sudan has been conducted since 2012, when a team of scientists from the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology Polish Academy of Sciences (Poznań) launched a salvage exploration of a Neolithic site and cemetery damaged by road construction. Research is now conducted within the scope of a grant from the National Science Centre, Poland (No. 2015/17/D/HS3/01492). Three seasons of fieldwork since 2016 have focused on the extensive prehistoric settlement spanning nearly 4000 years, from the early Mesolithic to the late Neolithic. The site turned out to be attractive not only for Mesolithic hunters-gatherers and Neolithic shepherds, but also as a burial place for the Meroitic and post-Meroitic inhabitants of the region. A survey of about 1% of the surface of the Khor Shambat site (KSH 1) resulted in the discovery of 66 graves; 12 of these are probably post-Meroitic, and of these three presented a rich and interesting array of burial goods, including imports from the Far East. At the same time, KSH 1 is one of the southernmost post-Meroitic cemeteries
What forced the prehistoric cattle-keepers to emigrate from the Red Sea Mountains?
To day’s desert area of Red Sea Hills is now in hab ited by a Beja-Bisharin tribe, the camel breed ers. In pre his toric times, this area was in hab ited or pen e trated by pas to ral com mu ni ties en gaged in cat tle breed ing. Their oc cu pa tion is pri mar ily marked by thou sands of en grav ings with rep re sen ta tions of long-horned cat tle, which were dis cov ered in a rock art gal lery in Bir Nurayet, one of the larg est rock art gal ler ies in Af rica and the whole world. We still do not know when the shep herds and their herds aban doned the area. This is sue can be ad dressed by geoarchaeology and in ves ti ga - tion of sed i ments dis cov ered in Wadi Diib, i.e. silts. As we be lieve, they re cord cli mate and en vi ron men tal changes tak ing place in re cent mil len nia, which prob a bly to a large ex tent de ter mined the socio-cul tural pro cesses in the area