Eichfeld, I., 2010: Diluted causalities: The variability of human response to environmental change. Universitätsforschungen zur Prähistorischen Archäologie 191, 273-284. Bonn. (original) (raw)
Related papers
Landscape History 32, no. 2, 5-17
During the later Bronze Age several parts of northwest Europe saw accelerated deforestation and expansion of agricultural land. In densely populated areas the first (man-made) open landscapes came into being. Simultaneously in the Netherlands and elsewhere more stable settlement patterns appeared as well as extensive and planned allotment. Within a relatively short period of time the landscape became much more ‘cultural’ and planned. The dominance of straight lines and rectangles in this open, parcelled-out and compartmentalised landscape markedly contrasts with the ‘natural’ curved lines and ‘organic’ shapes of the preceding half-open and spatially dynamic ‘wood-pasture’ type landscapes. The new landscape had a distinctly different morphology and this may have influenced the way humans perceived their environment. This altered landscape perception then may explain the shift van curvilinearity to rectilinearity in the shaping of ritual enclosures and burial monuments. The sole ambition of this short paper is to argue the case within available evidence, rather than claiming to be the last word on the topic.
A. Zimmermann/ K.P. Wendt/ Th. Frank/ J. Hilpert, Landscape Archaeology.
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 75, London u.a. 2009, 1-53
Estimations of population density, which consider regional variability, are an important key variable in archaeology as they have consequences not only for the environmental but also for the economical and social domains. In this paper, a ten-step procedure of a consistent group of methods is described which deals with the data required for estimations of population density at different scale levels (from excavation to large-scale distribution maps). For distribution maps, a method is presented by which densities of sites are displayed using optimal isolines. These demarcate so called 'settlement areas' at scales of between 1:25,000 and 1:2.5 million. Our knowledge of the density of households from key areas with the most complete archaeological records is upscaled for the regions within these isolines. The results of this procedure are estimations of population density for the early Neolithic (Bandkeramik, 51st century BC) and the Roman period (2nd century AD) for regions with some 10,000 km². A simple statistical/graphical method is developed to analyse the relationship between settlement areas, soils, and precipitation. Taking into account the aspects of preservation of sites and the intensity of archaeological observations, an analysis of patterns of land use shows that in prehistory not all areas suitable for use were in fact incorporated into settlement areas. For prehistory, the idea of a most optimised use of land up to its carrying capacity (as it has been proposed for at least 50 years) can be falsified for specific areas. A large number of empty regions with good ecological conditions but lacking in settlement activity can be discussed as resulting from culture historical processes. As an example, the separation of areas inhabited by groups of different identities is discussed. The amount of used space (in terms of 'settlement area') however, increases from the early Neolithic to the 4th century BC from 5% to more than 40% . The increase between the Neolithic and the Iron Age is understood in terms of technological developments in farming systems. The percentage of areas with suitable conditions actually utilised between the Bandkeramik and Iron Age increases from 31.1% to 67.5% in the area covered by the Geschichtlicher Atlas der Rheinlande, and is much higher still in the Roman period (84.3%). State societies seem to use the land more efficiently compared to non-state systems. This is becoming even clearer on consideration of the intensity of human impact.
Project description, 2021
Source publications for the archaeology and history of Rasquert from the 3rd century BC to roughly 2000 AD Project description The translation in English is slightly more elaborate than the Dutch version of Project Rasquert that can be found as an open source document on my academia.edu page https://rug.academia.edu/AlbertNijboer or on the website of the Historical Society Baflo http://www.bavvelt.nl/index\_htm\_files/Rasquert%20Projectbeschrijving%202021.pdf
The Archaeology of Human-Environment Interactions: Strategies for Investigating Anthropogenic Landscapes, Dynamic Environments, and Climate Change in the Human Past, 2017
Walte~ L0:-vdermilk. (19~3) rem~ined relatively isolated from archaeology (see hlstoncal overview In Goudie 2013). It was historical geographers like Carl Sa~er (e.g., 1941), rather than archaeologists, who developed the ideas ab~ut Widespread anthropogenic influence that culminated in the 1956 publication of.Man's Role in Changing the Face of the Earth (Thomas et al. 1956). These Ideas had little apparent impact on archaeology until the final third of the twentieth century, when the discipline really began to embrace study of anthropogenic environmental change as fundamental to understanding the human past (d. Redman 1999:Ch.2). At approximately the same time, Calaway, Michael J. 2005 Ice-cores, sediments and civilisation collapse: A cautionary tale from Lake Titicaca. Alltiquity 79(306):778-790. Caseldine, C. J. and C. Turney 2010 The bigger picture: Towards integrating palaeoclimate and environmental data with a history of societal change. Journal of Quatemary Sciellce 25(1):88-93. Clare, Lee and Bernhard Weninger 2010 Social and biophysical vulnerability of prehistoric societies to rapid climate change.
Introduction Settlements, dwellings, pits, and middens – still very far from a theory of everything!
Foraging Assemblages Volume 1 Edited by Dušan Borić, Dragana Antonović, and Bojana Mihailović, 2021
Settlements constitute the category of archaeological sites that most directly reflects the daily life of prehistoric people, as is possible to see from the 15 chapters in this section covering most of Europe – from the Portuguese Atlantic Coast to the Volga Basin in the Russian Plains to central and northern Europe. Remains of hunter‐gatherer settlements can include substantial dwelling structures, such as those documented by Marchand and Dupont for the Beg-er-Vil in French Brittany, Milner et al. for Star Carr, the case of the Motala area in Sweden by Westermark, or Sømmevågen by Meling et al., all in the present volume. These were obviously intended for longer habitation in the same place. In other instances, with good organic preservation, as in the cases presented by Grøn and Peeters in the present volume, settlements can even consist of ephemeral sleeping mats with a hearth, a few nutshells and pieces of flint, and nothing else, probably resulting from a single night’s stay. Internally, settlements can be organized in accordance with strict spatial patterns, indicating a range of contemporaneous elements, or, in a worst-case scenario, they can consist of a palimpsest of numerous overlapping settlement events with a complicated chronology, which can be impossible to disentangle archaeologically.