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Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology, 2019
Mediterranean Africa forms a crucial junction between the wider Saharan zone and the rest of the Medi-terranean. In contrast to its well-investigated history from the first millennium BC onward, its antecedent dynamics are very poorly understood, and deeper archaeological histories of the Mediterranean therefore remain unbalanced and incomplete. This paper draws on a new surge in data to present the first up-to-date interpretative synthesis of this region's archaeology from the start of the Holocene until the threshold of the Iron Age (9600-1000 bc). It presents the evidence for climatic, environmental and sea-level change, followed by analysis of the chronological and spatial patterning of all radiocarbon dates from Mediter-ranean Africa, brought together for the first time. The principal exploration then divides into three phases. During Phase 1 (9600-6200 bc) diverse forms of hunting, gathering and foraging were ubiquitous. Phase 2 (6200-4000 bc) witnessed more continuity than elsewhere in the Mediterranean, but also the widespread uptake of domesticated livestock and gradual evolution of herding societies, as well as limited enclaves of farming. Phase 3 (4000-1000 bc) has been least explored, outside developments in Egypt; in the east this phase witnessed the emergence of fully nomadic and transhumant pastoralism, with political superstructures, while trajectories in the west remain obscure, but in parts of the Maghreb suggest complex possibilities. Contacts with the Mediterranean maritime world grew during the third and second millennia bc, while interaction to the south was transformed by desertification. Understanding how the southern Mediterranean shore was drawn into Iron Age networks will require much better knowledge of its indigenous societies. The present constitutes a pivotal moment, in terms of accumulated knowledge, pathways for future investigation and engagement with a challenging current geopolitical situation.
Journal of Open Archaeology Data, 2020
The MedAfriCarbon radiocarbon database and its accompanying web application are outcomes of the MedAfrica project — Archaeological deep history and dynamics of Mediterranean Africa, ca. 9600–700 BC. The dataset presented here in Version 1.0 of the database includes 1587 archaeological 14C dates from 368 sites in Mediterranean Africa. The database is unusual because the majority of the dates within it have been annotated with further cultural and environmental variables, notably the presence/absence of different domestic/wild species and particular material culture traits. MedAfriCarbon also includes an publicly-accessible web application that facilitates data exploration and informal analysis.
New Light on the Silent Millennia: Mediterranean Africa, ca. 4000–900 BC
African Archaeological Review
The so-called neolithization process (ca. 6000/5500–4000 BC) in Mediterranean Africa and the Sahara has been increasingly researched in recent years. In contrast, relatively little is known, especially in Mediterranean Africa, of the period between the beginnings of irreversible climatic deterioration in the Sahara, around 4000–3500 BC, and the onset of Iron Age to broadly Classical times. Why, with the exception of the Nile Delta, is our knowledge of the period between the fourth millennium BC and the threshold of the first Iron Age Phoenician and Greek colonies so limited? To what extent can this information gap be attributed to aridification in the Mediterranean zone, or is it rather a product of the failure to look for the right kinds of materials and sites, and of their relative visibility? In order to answer these questions, this paper focuses specifically on Mediterranean Africa (with the exception of Egypt) from about 4000 BC to ca. 900 BC. It is mainly based on the data mad...
SOMA 2003: Symposium on Mediterranean Archaeology
2005
With the intention of integrating the archaeology of the Mediterranean's different regions, the annual SOMA conference was held in 2003 at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London. These thirty-two papers, which form the proceedings, are multi-disciplinary and consider evidence and sites from the Pleistocene through to Late Antiquity. Subjects range from the dispersal of hominids around the Mediterranean and ancient Near Eastern skull cults to Libyan funerary architecture and monkeys in Egyptian and Minoan art and culture. Other subjects include: the antiquities market; the south Italic fighting technique; north Syria in the 6th century AD; Roman fulling; religion in the southern Levant Chalcolithic; Hellenistic numismatics; burial customs in Argos; the Mycenaean Argolid; gender identities in Egypt; Punic altars; Samnium and the Roman world; archaeological museum space; monument conservation; ethnic identity in archaic Pompeii. All of the papers are in English. 170p, b/w illus (Archaeopress BAR S1391, 2005) 32 papers from the Symposium on Mediterranean Archaeology held at the Institute of Archaeology, London in 2003. Contents: North Syria in the sixth century AD: coast and hinterland (N. Beaudry); Intra-regional variation in long distance trading relationships on the northern Levantine coast – the key to site survival? (C. Bell); The south Italic fighting technique (M. Burns); The Necropolis of Capestrano: New Excavations and Finds (M. Capodicassa); Corn-mummies come to light (M. Centrone); The Tomb S1 of Cyrene: from the Hellenistic phase to Christian re-use (L. Cherstich); Lilith across the ages (V. Danrey); Cycles of island colonisation in the prehistoric Mediterranean (H. Dawson); Adventures in Fields of Flowers: Research on contemporary saffron cultivation and its application to the Bronze Age Aegean (J. Day); Votive niches in funerary architecture in Cyrenaica (Lybia)(E. Di Valerio et al.); Ars Fullonia. Interpreting and contextualising Roman fulling (M. Flohr); GIS Study of the Rural Sanctuaries in Abruzzo: Preliminary Report (D. Fossataro et al.); How monkeys evolved in Egyptian and Minoan art and culture (C. Greenlaw); The central place of religion in Chalcolithic society of the southern Levant (E. Kaptijn); Archaeology's well kept secret: The managed antiquities market (M. Kersel); New images of the Erechtheion by European travellers (A. Lesk); Mani: A unique historic landscape in the periphery of Europe (K. Liwieratos); Numismatics, Hellenism, and the Enemies of Alexander Jannaeus (K. McAleese); The Hominid Dispersal into Mediterranean Europe during the Early to Middle Pleistocene: the Sabre-toothed cat connection (L. Marlow); Gendering figurines, engendering people in early Aegean prehistory (M. Mina); Naue II swords and the collapse of the Aegean Bronze Age (B. Malloy); Urban development and local identities: The case of Gerasa from the late Republican period to the mid-3rd century AD (R. Raja); Burial customs and social change in Argos from the Protogeometric to the Late Roman Period (1100 BC - 500 AD)(F. Ramondetti); Open endings at Osteria dell’Osa (Lazio). Exploring domestic aspects of funerary contexts in the Early Iron Age of Central Italy (E. van Rossenberg; A scale of identity in the Mycenaean Argolid (D. Sahlén); Expressions of ethnic and gender identities in Egypt during the Early 1st Millennium B.C.E. (H. Saleh); Altars and cult installations of Punic tradition in Western Sicily (F. Spagnoli); Sacred landscape and the construction of identity: Samnium and the Roman world (T. Stek); Investigating colonialism and post-colonialism in the archaeological museum space: The case of the Lebanon and France (L. Tahan); Ethnic identity in archaic Pompeii (E. Thiermann); Monument conservation in the Mediterranean: Issues and aspects of anastylosis (K. Vacharopoulou); The skull cult of the Ancient Near East. Problems and new approaches (A. Wossink).