Archaeology of productions

The evidence for textile industy in Neopalatial Crete is compared with the parallel evidence from the Mycenaean period in the island, to see if some characteristics could have been inehrited by the Mycenaean organization from the previous periods.

e s t r a t t o Gli artigiani e la città. Officine e aree produttive tra VIII e III sec. a.C. nell'Italia centrale tirrenica a cura di M. Cristina Biella, Roberta Cascino Antonio F. Ferrandes, Martina Revello Lami ATTI DELLA GIORNATA DI STUDIO BRITISH SCHOOL AT ROME 11 GENNAIO 2016 e s t r a t t o Premessa.

RESUMEN
La sal común es una sustancia fundamental para la supervivencia de las sociedades humanas. Necesidad fisiológica y cultural han dictado el desarrollo de estrategias de obtención de este recurso por sociedades humanas desde la Prehistoria. A continuación revisamos diacrónicamente las evidencias prehistóricas de producción de sal en Europa, las técnicas empleadas y su influencia en las sociedades prehistóricas de manera que esta perspectiva global puede ser útil para la resolución de las incógnitas que existen en la península ibérica. Palabras clave: sal común, Prehistoria, técnicas de extracción de sal, Europa, Península ibérica.

ABSTRACT Common salt is an essential substance for the survival of human societies. Physiological and cultural needs have prompted societies to develop salt extraction strategies since Prehistory. Next we will conduct a diachronic review of prehistoric salt production in Europe, its techniques and impact in prehistoric societies. This global outlook may be helpful in solving current unknowns regarding Iberian salt production and its social implications.

A faunal sample from the medieval site (second half of the 13th century) of Canne della Battaglia (Barletta) includes a large
sample of young and sub-adult domestic cat bones. Skinning and butchering marks have been found on some anatomical
elements. In medieval Italy they represent an unicum in the zooarchaeological literature and they have more convincing comparisons with Northern European sites as evidence for fur exploitation. In the documentary sources the alimentary use of the cat meat is attested only during periods of famine or in coincidence of particular situations of poverty.

With a short overview of the evidence for purple productionin the ancient Mediterraen (up to2006), this paper underlines the importance of recycling phenomena in ancient times, with many consequences regarding the wide range of indicators attested.

"Many of the arguments for how and why people began to use iron in Southwest Asia rely on assumptions about the technology and relative organization of copper and iron smelting. However, research on the technological transformations of the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age suffers from a lack of investigation of primary metal production contexts, especially in regions outside the Levant. The current research examines metal production debris from a large number of smelting sites in western Georgia,
and addresses questions of technology and resource utilization through detailed examination of few select sites. Through the chemical and mineralogical analysis of slag samples, we demonstrate the existence of an extensive copper-production industry and reconstruct several key aspects of the smelting technology during the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age. Combining a statistical analysis of slag mineralogy with other lines of evidence, we argue that copper was extracted from sulfide ores through a process of roasting and smelting in deep pit furnaces. The data also suggest that metalworkers at different sites exploited different ore sources within the same ore body. These results form a fundamental basis for further examination of spatial and chronological patterns of technological variation, with implications for models of Near Eastern copper production in this crucial period. Intriguing evidence of bloomery iron smelting, though currently undated, reinforces the region’s potential to provide data on a key technological transformation."

A norma della legge sul diritto d'autore e del codice civile è vietata la riproduzione di questo libro o di parte di esso con qualsiasi mezzo, elettronico, meccanico, per mezzo di fotocopie, microfilm, registratori o altro. Le fotocopie per uso personale del lettore possono tuttavia essere effettuate, ma solo nei limiti del 15% del volume e dietro pagamento alla SIAE del compenso previsto dall'art. 68, commi 4 e 5 della legge 22 aprile 1941 n. 633. Ogni riproduzione per finalità diverse da quelle per uso personale deve essere autorizzata specificatamente dagli autori o dall'editore.

Bone, antler, ivory, horn and tooth artefacts from the early Roman (50 BC - AD 50) town "old Virunum" on the Magdalensberg in southern Noricum / Austria. Material culture studies, including typology, chronology, numerous parallels, bone and antler manufacturing, raw materials.

Six scarab-gems found in the Etruscan archaeological site of Gravisca (VT, Italy) have been classified through stylistic and iconographic studies in order to be framed chronologically. The gems have been subsequently analysed using not invasive methods (XRD, XRF, mid-FTIR, Raman spectroscopy) to discover their chemical features and to understand the kind of material used by the artisan. With the help of the optical microscopy it has been possible to analyse the carvings that characterize the artefacts and to go through all the manufacturing phases, allowing the identification of the employed tools. Collection of data coming from the different techniques permitted to disclose the presence in Gravisca, during the 4th century BC, of a centre of glyptic production.

Within the framework of the “Late Antique and Medieval Landscapes Global Archaeology Project” in the Central-Lower Adriatic slope of Italy, recent zooarchaeological research
shows the articulated and complex relationship between men and domestic animal resources during the late Middle Ages. Specialized patterns of animal breeding were practiced
with the aim of differentiated production and on the basis of the specific role of human settlements in the territory. Meat, wool and hides were the preferred goods.

"La fornace oggetto di questo contributo è stata individuata e documentata nel corso di un survey di superficie, nell’ambito di un più ampio progetto di studio archeologico dei paesaggi della Bassa Val di Cecina.
Dopo un’introduzione che rende conto di questi aspetti e consente di contestualizzare questo manufatto nel quadro insediativo e produttivo di età postmedievale, se ne affronta l’analisi: si tratta di una struttura attestata dalle fonti archivistiche almeno dal 1822 e attiva fino alla metà del Novecento, quando era di proprietà di una famiglia Lessi.
Il complesso, costituito da 5 Corpi di Fabbrica, è il solo, dei quattro individuati nell’ambito del survey, ad essere stato indagato poiché estremamente leggibile nelle sue parti funzionali e corredato da vari tipi di fonte che ne hanno permesso una più vasta conoscenza. L’utilizzo della fonte orale è stato determinante per ricostruire le vicende della struttura e ha permesso di documentare i materiali ivi prodotti: mattoni, embrici e coppi per la maggior parte. Peculiarità di questa fornace, a conduzione familiare e a carattere stagionale, resta senza dubbio quella di non aver subito gli ammodernamenti che molti altri complessi subiscono con la metà del XIX secolo, con la conversione a forno Hoffmann. L’impossibilità di effet¬tuare uno scavo archeologico e il progetto di riqualificazione dell’area, i cui lavori non è stato possibile seguire, hanno posto un limite evidente alla ricerca, non consentendo di poter risalire a fasi anteriori agli inizi dell’Ottocento, periodo che sarebbe stato utile indagare per poter fare confronti con strutture simili o con gli altri edifici studiati per quel periodo nel comprensorio.
"

During archaeological excavations carried out in Late Antique and Medieval sites in Apulia many animal bones belonging to
domestic animals were collected. Among the scarce wild animals, red deer is the most represented. From Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Age red deer remains are more numerous, especially when the settlements became rural villages. In the Late Middle Ages deer remains are rare, both in rural settlements and in castles as well as in administrative centres. In these latter sites worked deer antlers seem to be more numerous. For all the historical periods considered no particular differences in the manufacturing process have been observed: this can be explained with an unspecialized, but widespread, handicraft activity.

The article presents a mould cast from the Early Middle Ages preserved in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale of Altino (VE). The artifact was used for the production of three-hoops earrings ('Pinguente type'), rings and, perhaps, front closures of basket-earrings. Although it does not have a context of discovery, it probably originates from the Altino area. The valve can be dated witihin the 7th c., although a slightly wider chronology cannot be excluded. It belongs to a group of rather rare archaeological finds that were used in early medieval metallurgical processes.

This paper analyses the metallurgical production detectable in the Archaic district of the Vigna Parrocchiale,
in the heart of the urban area of Caere.
In the present work new observations are devoted also to the interpretation of the scanty evidence related to
metalworking explored in the ’80, which includes clay and ceramic remains of smelting or casting furnaces,
slagged and vitrified materials.

I contributi sono valutati, con procedure di peer review, da un componente del Comitato scientifico e da un revisore esterno. EPIGRAFIA E TERRITORIO X-Isbn 978-88-7228-806-1-© 2016 Edipuglia srl-www. edipuglia.it raffaella Cassano-GianluCa masTroCinque RICERCHE ARCHEOLOGICHE NELLA CITTÀ DI EGNAZIA.

Il lavoro sviluppa il tema della produzione di ceramica figurata a Taranto ed in area messapica tra l'età del ferro e l'età arcaica attraverso l'analisi dei contesti produttivi ed anche degli altri contesti che hanno restituito testimonianza relativa a produzioni figurate (santuari e luoghi di culto, necropoli).

Among the many themes related to the transformation of the city in the late antique period, one of the most interesting is the dispersion of productive activities within the urban space, where public and private spaces were often reoccupied by new workshops: this phenomenon, previously considered as the result of scavenging activities, has now begun to be seen as something more organised and probably directed by a superior authority.
Among these productive activities, metallurgy, in particular, seems to have played a dominant role: many issues still need to be clarified about the activity of metalworking structures within the city, and the implications for its history and economy in a period of such important transformations.
My presentation thus offers an overview of all the spaces where metalworking took place across the centre of Rome between the 5th century and the 7th centuries, trying to investigate the possible reasons behind this phenomenon.
The contents are part of my research for a PhD project at the University of Leicester, entitled “Metals, craft products and the urban economy in late antique Rome”.

Il caso studio presentato in questa sede esporrà le problematicità riscontrate nella ricostruzione della produzione ceramica a Pisa tra XV e XVI secolo laddove l’evoluzione degli studi e l’apertura di nuovi scavi stratigrafici nel centro urbano negli ultimi quindici anni hanno permesso l’acquisizione di nuove conoscenze e di individuare una discrasia nelle considerazioni tratte in passato. Solo attraverso l’integrazione di tutte le fonti passate e presenti (archeologiche, storiche, documentarie) è stato possibile ottenere una lettura corretta ed omogenea di vecchie e nuove informazioni, dimostrando come la smaltatura sia in uso a Pisa sino alla fine del XVI secolo e come la diversificazione delle classi ceramiche ingobbiate si sviluppi solo con gli inizi del Cinquecento.

This paper deals with the bioarchaeological researches on ovine transhumance in Apulia from the Late Antiquity to the Medieval Age, with particular regard to the contribution of the zooarchaeological researches. By integrating historical, epigraphic, archaeological and bioarchaeological data it is now possible to re-enact the development and the characters of the sheep/goat movements and the transhumance products, such as wool and milk, from the 4th to the 15th c. A.D. Archaeobotanical and archaeoantropological data indicate that Apulian landscape was characterized by uncultivated areas (woods, marshlands or pasture) from Roman to the Late Antique Ages; zooarchaeological analysis propose the continuity of sheep/goat breeding until the Middle Ages, in spite of some changes, with a prevalent and continuous wool production activity. In this way the study of faunal remains can integrate the knowledge by new evaluation elements such as the mortality and the periodical slaughtering, with ...

Il convegno propone una riflessione sullo sfruttamento e la produzione dell’allume, una materia prima diffusa in numerose aree del bacino del Mediterraneo, ed una riflessione sugli aspetti economici e sociali che essa ha determinato.
La sua produzione ebbe un impatto ambientale di notevole rilievo in aree significative del territorio della penisola italiana, in particolar modo a cavallo fra il tardo Medioevo e la prima età moderna. Mentre le ricerche in corso stanno apportando nuovi elementi di riflessione rispetto al ciclo produttivo, il convegno vuole offrire un’occasione per riflettere su alcuni aspetti relativi alla produzione, in particolare:
-esporre lo “ stato dell’arte” della ricerca in relazione alle aree di più antica tradizione estrattiva;offrire  un approfondimento mirato per alcuni territori sui quali sono in corso analisi multidisciplinari e si sperimentano con successo nuove metodologie di indagine e restituzione dei dati; evidenziare le potenzialità di ricerca in ambiti cronologici e geografici ancora poco studiati.

Archaeology as a scholarly discipline has the scientific reconstruction of communities in the past, based on their material remains, as it main objective. From splinters of bone, researchers strive to reconstruct the composition of livestock or patterns of consumption and isolated postholes are assigned to house plans and sherds of pottery are used to construct tableware. Notwithstanding the fact that determining the age and original functions of objects will always form a central issue in archaeology, there is a risk of a one-sided approach towards material culture. Original form and function are but part of the story, as attention towards the ways in which objects were crafted (what materials were chosen, which techniques were applied, what skills were required?) is also very rewarding, as it holds ample information about how communities in the past engaged material culture themselves. Archaeological analysis of the production processes, patterns of use, reuse and repair are all informative on a level beyond that of functionalism and typochronology alone. Moreover, the study of the way people discarded objects in the past has also proven to yield rich insights into past human action. Not all archaeological remains represent meaninglessly discarded objects or buried waste. There is sound evidence that certain types of objects, and not only bronzes, were deliberately deposited in certain types of contexts (e.g. left behind as offerings). Clearly, the study of the entire life-history of objects, from their production to their deposition, has proven a fertile field of study commonly designated as the biographical approach.
Since the nineties of the former century the biographical approach (as inspired by Kopytoff (1986) and Gosden (1999; Gosden & Marshall 1999)) has gained momentum. This essentially anthropological framework tries to construct narratives (for objects, architecture et cetera) in which the different possible life-stages are discussed, and in which asking the proper questions yields information on the bandwidth of options available and chosen. As Igor Kopytoff (1986, 66-67) has put it: ‘In doing the biography of a thing, one would ask questions similar to those one asks about people: What, sociologically, are the biographical possibilities inherent in its “status” and in the period and culture, and how are these possibilities realized? Where does the thing come from and who made it? What has been its career so far, and what do people consider to be an ideal career for such things? What 14 bijdragen in de studie van de metaaltijden ii are the recognized “ages” or periods in the thing’s “life,” and what are the cultural markers for them? How does the thing’s use change with its age, and what happens to it when it reaches the end of its usefulness?’ In Dutch archaeology, the biographic approach has mainly been applied with the field of (cultural) landscape studies (Hidding, Kolen & Spek 2001; Kolen 2005; Kolen & Witte 2006; Vervloet et al. 2010). This is striking, as there are fundamental issues when trying to apply Kopytoff ’s approach to landscapes (e.g. what determines the ‘start’ or ‘end’ point of a cultural landscape?, cf. Vervloet et al. 2010, 134) and there is a significant risk of the concept of cultural biography being reduced to a buzzword, synonym for what are essentially histories of landscape use and habitation. That would be a long way of, from the valid and fertile approach that Kopytoff intended.
More suitable applications of the biographical approach can be found in studies of the house(hold) (e.g. Gerritsen 2003) or studies of particular categories of material culture (e.g. Fontijn 2003; Van Gijn 2010; Raemaekers et al. 2011), that present better analogies, in terms of their life-histories, (i.e. birth/ production, life/use-life, death/discard) to human life-cycles and thus suit the biographical approach better than landscape studies. As archaeological fieldwork generally targets the locations were material culture was used (i.e. settlements), the two other anchor-points for a biographical narrative ‘the start’ (production) and ‘ the end’ (discard and depositional patterns) are underrepresented. After an excavation of a settlement site, only rarely do the excavation reports raise questions as to where in the cultural landscape the production of the wooden, metal and ceramic artefacts did actually take place. Not only are such production sites rarely found and thus poorly known, the production processes of the artefacts recovered also merit more study. What choices were made in selecting base materials and in tools and techniques applied? What degree of variability in materials, style or forms of objects was desired or tolerated? How did locally manufactured objects compare to imported goods? If one wants to learn more about the ‘deposition’ phase of objects, the study of funerary contexts is very informative – yet this type of study has thus far been undertaken mainly with Neolithic contexts (Wentink et al. 2011, yet compare Fontijn & Van der Vaart 2013). Additionally, the study of intentional depositions in (wet) parts of the landscape or settlement space has proven insightful (e.g. Fontijn 2003; Arnoldussen 2008, 442-444), but such locations are rarely excavated and seldomly studied from a biographical perspective. Research questions specifically targeting such matters are, moreover, generally absent in present-day commercial archaeological investigations. This means we lack answers to questions like ‘in what ways and in what form were objects left behind at the end of their lifecycle?’. To draw more attention to the critical and informative phases at the beginning and end of object’s lifecycle, it was decided to select ‘Of beginning and end: production and deposition in later prehistory’ as the main theme for the 2014 Metaaltijdendag colloquium. In the call, explicit attention was directed towards the biographical approach applied to material culture and speakers were called upon to address the issues discussed above. Accordingly, the thematic presentations arnoldussen & ball 15 comprised presentations on the production of bronze axes (Kuijpers, this volume), on iron production (N.Ø. Brusgaard; Brusgaard in press; Arnoldussen & Brusgaard 2014), on an enigmatic antler object (M. Rijkelijkhuizen, A. Verbaas & H. Siemons; this volume) and the production of glass bracelets (J. van der Laan; Roymans et al. 2014). Moreover, presentations addressed the full sequence from production to deposition for specific items such as prehistoric querns (M. Melkert; this volume) or discussed a biographical approach towards Iron Age houses (C. Koot). Finally, two presentations specifically targeted the final stages of object biographies. The recognizability of abandonment deposits in settlements was discussed by P.W. van den Broeke (this volume) and A. Nieuwhof (Nieuwhof 2015) addressed the depositional traditions in the coastal terp (raised dwelling mound) area. Fortunately, a number of speakers agreed to publish their viewpoints as a paper in the present issue of Metaaltijden. Consequently, the present issue starts off with a number of contributions on objects and their specific lifecycles. Kuijpers ponders on the possibilities and problems of recognizing the skill involved in the production of Early Bronze Age axes. Van Alphen and Theunissen present a remarkable bronze bracelet that most likely was intentionally deposited into the river Meuse. Janssens brings forward an example of an object of the normally elusive Bronze Age bronze foundry. In addition to the biographical study of metal items, other categories such as stone, bone and pottery have shown to yield important insights. Melkert provides a narrative of prehistoric querns that spans from their production to their discard or deposition. Rijkelijkhuizen, Verbaas and Siemons discuss an ornately decorated antler object the function of which – despite detailed study – remains beyond our grasp. Bloo, Kooi and Kleijne discuss the implications of a rare pottery find at Tilburg, and Van den Broeke – after critical consideration – shows that pottery is an important item in abandonment deposits on settlements. Similar to the setup of the Metaaltijdendag colloquium, the proceedings also offer a stage for publications not referring directly to that year’s main theme. This year, the coastal part of the Western Netherlands is well represented amongst those publications. Kleijne discusses the Neolithic and Bronze Age funerary traditions of the Velsen area. A recent excavation from the same area inspired Van Heeringen to review the state of affairs regarding Bronze Age communities from the Western Netherlands. The Late Bronze Age in the coastal zone is represented as well: De Mulder offers a reinterpretation of a coastal cemetery discussed in the first Metaaltijden volume (Bulten & Opbroek 2014), and a Late Bronze Age ceramic assemblage from De Zilk is presented by Bloo and Briels. Lastly, Arnoldussen and Albers discuss the transformation of the Noordbarge urnfield (Drenthe) into settlement space and Wolthuis and Arnoldussen evaluate models of landscape preference and Iron Age settlement dynamics for the sandy regions of the Netherlands. All in all, this second volume of Metaaltijden covers the full range, from production and deposition of material culture, funerary traditions, settlements and remarkable patterns such abandonment deposits from Dutch later prehistory.