Village, fortress, and town in Bronze and Iron Age Southern Caucasia: A preliminary report on the 2003–2006 investigations of Project ArAGATS on the Tsaghkahovit Plain, Republic of Armenia (original) (raw)
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Abstract: Palaeoethnobotanical investigations suggest that at least part of the Early Bronze Age population of Tsaghkasar was settled and practiced agriculture in the high mountainous zone. People there appear to have cultivated hexa‐ and tetraploid wheats (probably bread wheat and emmer) and barley (possibly hulled). Bronze Age agriculture in the Southern Caucasus differs from earlier and later period when cultivation of pulses, oil‐producing plants, and other plants was common. This emphasis on the cultivation and use of certain cereal grains at Early Bronze sites such as Tsaghkasar can tentatively be added to a constellation of practices associated with the Kura-Araxes culture in the South Caucasus. Key Words: palaeoethnobotany, mountainous, Bronze Age, South Caucasus
Türkiye Bilimler akademisi Arkeoloji Dergisi, 2010
Since 1998, Project ArAGATS has conducted systematic investigations of the archaeological landscape of the Tsaghkahovit Plain in central Armenia. This contribution surveys the primary findings for three eras of extensive occupation of the region: the Early Bronze Age, the Late Bronze Age, and the Iron 3 (Achaemenid) period. Of particular importance to the wider archaeology of the South Caucasus are the new insights that this work has provided into the interrelation of sites within a broad regional landscape and critical new perspectives on key problems that had long plagued efforts at building material chronologies. Additionally, our investigations have been dedicated to shedding new light on the contours of social and political life in Early Bronze villages, Late Bronze Age fortified centers, and Iron 3 towns.
The Project ArAGATS Kasakh Valley Archaeological Survey, Armenia: Report of the 2014–2017 Seasons
American Journal of Archaeology, 2022
During four field seasons spanning 2014 through 2017, Project ArAGATS (Archaeology and Geography of Ancient Transcaucasian Societies) expanded our long-term research on the origins and development of complex political systems in the South Caucasus with a comprehensive study of the upper Kasakh River valley in north-central Armenia. The Kasakh Valley Archaeological Survey employed both systematic transect survey of 43 km 2 and extensive satellite-and drone-based reconnaissance to accommodate the complex topography of the Lesser Caucasus and the impacts of Soviet-era land amelioration. Though our survey was animated by questions related to the chronology and distribution of Bronze and Iron Age fortifications and cemeteries, we also recorded Paleolithic sites stretching back to the earliest human settlement of the Caucasus, Early Bronze Age surface finds, and historic landscape modifications. Concurrent to the survey, members of the ArAGATS team carried out test excavations at select settlement sites and associated burials, and a series of wetland core extractions, with the goals of affirming site occupation sequences and setting them within their environmental context. This report provides an overview of the results of these multidisciplinary activities. 1