Engineering Feats and Consequences: Workers in the Night and the Indus Civilization (original) (raw)
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Introduction to the Archaeology of the Night
Archaeology of the Night, 2018
As twilight settled in the ancient world, a host of activities ensued, some of which were significantly different from what people did during the daytime. Some artifacts, features, and buildings associated with these activities were particular to the dark, while other material culture was transformed in meaning as the sun set. Night offers refuge from the heat and demands of the day but can also bring with it nightmares, night raids, and other dark doings. Sleep, sex, socializing, stargazing, storytelling, ceremony, work and play—so much of our economic, social and ritual lives, take place at night and yet relatively little archaeological research has been undertaken specifically on nightly quotidian practices. Does darkness obscure these activities for the archaeologist or is it that we need to learn to see them? This volume examines the archaeology, mythology, iconography, and epigraphy of “strange” nocturnal doings and in the process will challenge our “familiar” reconstructions of ancient life. Topics include the liminal periods of dusk and dawn, archaeological evidence for the diversity of sleep (where one sleeps, in what one sleeps, and with whom one sleeps), the practical and psychological effects of artificial light, and the origins of the ‘night shift.’ Contributors to this volume explore the concept of the nighttime within a comparative anthropological framework to provide the broadest possible interpretation of individual case studies drawn from a wide range of ancient and prehistoric cultures from diverse areas of the globe.
Life After Dark in the Cities of the Ancient World
ICNS Conference Proceedings, 2020
As darkness cascaded across the city sky, some workers trudged home for the day for rest and relaxation while others were just commencing their shifts. Dusk signalled the start of urban activities unlike those conducted during the day. Ancient urban dwellers repeated this rhythm many times over, and transformed their nocturnal environment through the artifacts, features, and buildings they utilized, some of which were particularly associated with the dark. Nocturnal quotidian practices shaped the archaeological record as much as diurnal ones, yet archaeologists have not routinely considered the night in their reconstructions of the past. Once we shine our light on the dark, patterns emerge which inform us more holistically about urban lives. Much of our economic, social, and ritual lives have been enacted at night, providing us with an opportunity to consider what the night offers. Many tasks are uniquely suited to the affordances of nighttime and are supported by the built environment of cities. Often times, night is quieter, and refuge from the hustle and bustle of city life is welcome. Darkness offers freedom from surveillance, stresses, the heat of the day. In this article, we examine the material record in conjunction with ancient writing to search for laborers in the night, those who worked the "nightshift" in antiquity.
American Anthropologist, 2008
The seemingly preferred outlet for scholarship on children and childhood in archaeology is in the form of edited volumes. The Social Experience of Childhood in Ancient Mesoamerica is the fifth edited volume in a decade that gathers together works on childhood and archaeology, and it is the second to do so with a particular regional emphasis. It is the first volume to focus on children in Mesoamerica. As the most recent published scholarship on childhood in archaeology, the volume offers a breadth of methodological approaches and thoughtful theoretical discussions that significantly move the archaeology of childhood forward in its development as an area of inquiry.