For millenia, urban networks have shaped the development of human societies. Today, new archaeological approaches are unveiling the evolution of these networks in unprecedented detail. Urban Networks Evolutions reviews the new approaches to urban evolution as archaeology endeavours to characterise both the scale and pace of historical events and processes. Issuing from the work of the Danish National Research Foundation's Centre of Excellence, the Centre for Urban Network Evolutions (UrbNet), the book compares the archaeology of urbanism from medieval Northern Europe to the Ancient Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean World. The 40 contributors demonstrate how new techniques for refining archaeological dates, contexts, and the provenance ascribed to material culture, afford a new high-definition approach to the study of global and interregional dynamics. This opens up for far-reaching questions as to how and to what extent urban networks catalysed societal and environmental expansions and crises in the past.

Vast coastal plains that vanished below the waves thousands of years ago were highways to new territories and a cornucopia of natural riches for early humankind. Oceans of Archaeology presents these virtually unexplored areas of the archaeologicially world map. It scrutinises the submerged early prehistory of Europe and reveals a richness and diversity unmatched around the globe. Specialists from ten countries join forces to tell of flooded settlements, enigmatic sacred places, amazing art and skillful navigation. Multifarious traces of food preparation, flintworking, hunting and fishing vividly illustrate Stone Age daily life. While children's footprints lead the way to new investigations of early prehistoric life in these now inundated landscapes.

Every day millions of people enter public buildings of many forms and functions: Notre-Dame in Paris, Central Station in New York; the British Museum in London, that are decorated with recessed doorways. None of them is likely to be aware that this style of decoration has been continuously employed for 6500 years in temples, royal palaces, tombs, churches, synagogues and modern public buildings, becoming a symbol of the divine and of a place of worship. During this very long period, from the ancient Near East until today, the world has undergone immense changes, but the concept of the recessed opening was never forgotten or abandoned. What is the secret of its longevity? This unique cultural edifice is not only about architecture, but is a language that defines social order and relations with the ruling power and authorities. These, sometimes highly decorated and elaborate, sometimes simple and understated, thresholds in fact functioned on two communicative levels: first, as a liminal marker demarcating a sacred area and second, to emphasize the social order, as few were permitted to pass through. In this book the history of this eternal symbol is presented for the first time through text, figures and photographs. The authors consider historical, anthropological, sociological, religious and economic factors that reflect the significance of crossing these iconic thresholds according to the concept of the longue durée.

As a result of recent methodological and theoretical developments in approaches to the human body in archaeological contexts, the theme has recently become a particularly dynamic research area. This volume, building on the Neolithic Studies Group conference 2014, captures the variety of debates developing across research into the Neolithic bodies of the Near East and Europe. Papers are divided into three themes; living bodies, the body in death and the representation of the body. In the first section, papers present new research assessing skeletal evidence, alongside new interpretations of the body in the Southern British Neolithic to examine the lived experience of the body in the Neolithic. The second theme illustrates the variety of approaches arising from the study of death and burial, focusing on the many different ways the dead were treated during the Neolithic. The third theme examines the body as it is represented in Neolithic art, through artefacts and the stone stele found in Western and Mediterranean Europe. The volume begins with an introduction to the recent developments in the field and concludes with a discussion chapter from Julian Thomas, which sets an agenda for future studies on this theme. The approaches taken in the papers presented here bridge many different methodologies, ranging from theoretical treatises to methodological debates. Overall, the volume presents the study of the body in the Neolithic as a contested site, at which overlapping research themes meet, and addresses the insights provided by thinking about past bodies.

Has the Thames always looked like it does today, confined to the same course, muddy, brackish and tidal? Through analysis of the archaeology investigated along the Crossrail south-east line, which diverts from the main west–east route across the Thames floodplain from Stepney Green to Abbey Wood, this book tells the story of the lower Thames throughout the Holocene (from c. 10,000 years ago to the present). At six sites along the route, geoarchaeologists were called in to assist with understanding the deep floodplain sediments, the environments they reflect and how, if at all, the Thames has affected (and been affected by) the people who lived along its banks through the ages. Introducing the techniques and theories used in geoarchaeology, this book uses the platform of the Crossrail sites to understand the wider, lower Thames area from Erith to Greenwich, Canning Town to Hornchurch. The Thames has suffered the fate of many other river systems across southern Britain, but the story of its transformation is remarkable and relevant today.

Religious spaces are often some of the most debated, contested, or otherwise scrutinized in the early medieval world. That space and place were important to people in the past is evident in their architecture, artwork, literature, and in their cemeteries and burial grounds. While these observations are not new, this volume brings together interdisciplinary and multi-national archaeologists, historians, and geographers to discuss and debate ‘space’ and ‘place’ with a focus on new methodologies and current approaches to Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. The papers in this volume address such themes as phenomenological and experiential issues in the archaeology of space and place; access to and visibility of spaces (locations) in the past; the transformation and appropriation of spaces beyond the ‘Christian/Pagan’ dichotomy; and aspects of community and memory building in the medieval world. The contributors to this volume recognize that terms such as ‘Christianisation’, ‘Islamisation’, and indeed ‘space’ and ‘place’ themselves are loaded words and each paper takes a different route to the discussion of sacred space in the past. Together, they offer a current discussion about the role of ‘space’ and ‘place’ in religious history.

This book presents archaeological research from places of war, violence, protest and oppression of the 20th and the 21st century; sites where the material relics give a deep insight to fateful events – a shadow of war. Alongside renewed interest in National Socialism and the Holocaust, archaeological interest started in former concentration camps of the Nazi dictatorship. The focus was on the central places of the camps, such as the gas chambers, the crematoria, or execution sites, as well as prisoners’ barracks and the parade ground. In many cases, these sites revealed forgotten and vanished structures, where archaeological excavations can offer the possibility for commemorating the victims. The research has since widened and includes other sites of Nazi dictatorship and the Second World War, as well as the First World War, the Cold War and locations of civil wars and civilian protest against state authorities and against companies and corporations in many parts of the world. In order to come to a comprehensive understanding contemporary archaeology must take a global perspective. Archaeological finds often shed light on daily life, revealing survival conditions in the internment camps; the lives of people and their fighting and dying on battlefields and in trenches. Likewise, the relics of politically active people in protest camps give an impression of their commitment in civilian protest. Sometimes material remains can help to tell an alternative or balancing narrative to the state’s official recorded history. The enormous volume and diverse range of material culture presents challenges and opportunities. Through careful archaeological investigation, we can present different and new perspectives that are not recorded clearly in existing written, pictorial or oral archives. The merging and examination of all sources together is what enables us to understand the complexity of the history. This book will also present future directions in contemporary archaeology that will help bring the study focus beyond sites and assemblages of war and protest.

In the context of commodification, material culture has particular properties hitherto considered irrelevant or neglected. First, the market is a spatial structure, assigning special properties to the things offered: the goods and commodities. Secondly, the market defines a principle of dealing with things, including them in some contexts, excluding them from others. The contributions to Market as Place and Space address a variety of aspects of markets within the framework of archaeological and anthropological case studies and with a special focus on the indicators of practices attached to the commodities and their valuation.

Human remains resulting from sophisticated mortuary treatments represent a preferred information source about the organization of societies and about the belief systems of ancient people. Thereby, on the archaeological field, secondary deposits, sacred artefacts made of human bones or dismembered burials emerge as precious raw material in order to reconstruct gestures, practices and finally the symbolic discourse built around those dead who are selected to become particular protective entities, perhaps Ancestors. This work includes the study of double-funerals ceremonies and manipulations of human bones in funerary or ritual contexts but also complicated pre-funerals treatments (exposure, dismemberment, mummification) in a transcultural and transchronological perspective. Human remains and spacial data from archaeological contexts have been analysed using bioanthropological and traceological approach in order to reconstruct complex mortuary operating sequences. An ethnoarcheological study on multiple-steps funerals has been led in order to interpret archaeological remains.

This second volume in the new TRAC Themes in Roman Archaeology series seeks to push the research agendas of materiality and lived experience further into the study of Roman magic, a field that has, until recently, lacked object-focused analysis. Building on the pioneering studies in Boschung and Bremmer's (2015) Materiality of Magic, the editors of the present volume have collected contributions that showcase the value of richly-detailed, context-specific explorations of the magical practices of the Roman world. By concentrating primarily on the Imperial period and the western provinces, the various contributions demonstrate very clearly the exceptional range of influences and possibilities open to individuals who sought to use magical rituals to affect their lives in these specific contexts – something that would have been largely impossible in earlier periods of antiquity. Contributions are presented from a range of museum professionals, commercial archaeologists, university academics and postgraduate students, making a compelling case for strengthening lines of communication between these related areas of expertise.

Animals have always been integral to culture. Their interaction with humans has intensified since the onset of domestication resulting in higher incidences of animal disease due to human intervention. At the same time, human care has counter-balanced pressures of natural selection, reducing morbidity among wild animals. Prior to the emergence of a veterinary record, animal disease can only be traced by analysing pathological symptoms on excavated animal remains. This volume presents a collection of studies in the discipline of animal palaeopathology. An international team of experts offer reviews of animal welfare at ancient settlements from both prehistoric and historic periods across Eurasia. Several chapters are devoted to the diseases of dog and horse, two animals of prominent emotional importance in many civilisations. Curious phenomena observed on the bones of poultry, sheep, pig and even fish are discussed within their respective cultural contexts. Many poorly healed bones are suggestive of neglect in the case of ordinary livestock. On the other hand, a great degree of compassion may be presumed behind the long survival of seriously ill companion animals. In addition to furthering our better technical understanding of animal disease in the past, this volume also mirrors the diversity of human attitudes towards animals during our millennia-long relationship. Some animal bones show signs of extreme cruelty but others also reveal the great attention paid to the recovery of sick animals. Such attitudes tend to be a largely hidden yet are characteristic aspects of how people relate to the surrounding world and, ultimately, to each other.

The Bioarchaeology of Ritual and Religion is the first volume dedicated to exploring ritual and religious practice in past societies from a variety of ‘environmental’ remains. Building on recent debates surrounding, for instance, performance, materiality and the false dichotomy between ritualistic and secular behaviour, this book investigates notions of ritual and religion through the lens of perishable material culture. Research centring on bioarchaeological evidence and drawing on methods from archaeological science has traditionally focused on functional questions surrounding environment and economy. However, recent years have seen an increased recognition of the under-exploited potential for scientific data to provide detailed information relating to ritual and religious practice. This volume explores the diverse roles of plant, animal and other organic remains in ritual and religion, as foods, offerings, sensory or healing mediums, grave goods, and worked artefacts. It also provides insights into how archaeological science can shed light on the reconstruction of ritual processes and the framing of rituals. The 14 papers showcase current and new approaches in the investigation of bioarchaeological evidence for elucidating complex social issues and worldviews. The case studies are intentionally broad, encompassing a range of sub-disciplines of bioarchaeology, including archaeobotany, anthracology, palynology, micromorphology, geoarchaeology, zooarchaeology (including avian and worked bone studies), archaeomalacology and organic residue analysis. The temporal and geographical coverage is equally wide, extending across Europe from the Mediterranean and Aegean to the Baltic and North Atlantic regions and from the Mesolithic to the medieval period. The volume also includes a discursive paper by Prof. Brian Hayden, who suggests a different interpretative framework of archaeological contexts and rituals.

In many regions of Europe and beyond fortifications belong to the most impressive of archaeological remains. Their study has a long tradition and today a multitude of aspects about architecture, function or symbolism has been explored. However, fortifications are generally examined in a temporally, regionally or culturally limited context. Going a step further, this volume aims to bring into focus concepts of fortifications, which can be socially, symbolically or functionally, but also chronologically and supra-regionally aligned. An important question is to determine which fortification elements are culture-specific, and which can be regarded as convergence or even universal phenomena. Adopting a comparative view, the central aim of the volume is to highlight the diversity and the structural similarities of ancient fortifications. The chronological framework goes from the Neolithic to the Late Iron Age, and the geographical scope from the Ural steppes to the Iberian Peninsula.

Did ancient Europeans truly believe in an active after-life, as modern Europeans would like to think they did? What purpose did grave-goods actually serve? Are archaeology and the historical sciences in general able to shed, once and for all, a curse placed upon them at their inception as research disciplines in the early nineteenth century? Searching for answers to these questions is the aim of this book which has been written on the basis of widely spread, typical components of grave-goods. For the last two centuries, they have been interpreted incorrectly, because of being aligned with archaeologists’ ideas about the spiritual world of the society in question. The book introduces a recently discovered phenomenon that accompanied mankind from his discovery of the uses of metal all the way through to the Middle Ages – that is the importance of touchstones, tools used to determine the nature and test the nature and value of non-ferrous metals. Of the hundreds of thousands of such finds, which have most often been regarded as ‘whetstones’, the author has made a selection of specimens that cast light on the role of touchstones in the culture of ancient societies, especially in the burial ritual. Forming a key part of the book are the results of chemical microanalyses of metal streaks on the touchstones, a hitherto unused source of information for the skills of ancient metallurgists. Streaks of precious metal are not as important today as the common streaks of lead, tin, brass, etc.; streaks of metals composed of zinc, nickel, mercury, etc., raise new questions. Viking Age Birka serves as a fine example. It has yielded the largest known assemblage of touchstones and also boasts the largest number of such finds to have been analysed in the scanning electron microscope. However, this site has counterparts in Mesopotamia and the Near East, in the ancient Mediterranean region, in the Cimmerian and Scythian environments, in Europe of the Bronze Age, Iron Age, Roman and Migration periods, and, in particular, in the northern part of Europe during the Early Middle Ages – anywhere trade was not dominated by coins minted by local authorities. The four-millennium continuity of the essentially unified spiritual life shared by a large part of the Old World came to an end with the onset of Christianity in Europe. This book is intended for archaeologists, anthropologists, historians, ethnologists, archaeometallurgists, and for everybody who wishes to marvel at the consistent symbolic behaviour of ancient societies of the Old World from between, at the least, Mesopotamia, the Altai Mountains and Iceland, despite their cultural, ethnic and religious differences.

How people produced or acquired their food in the past is one of the main questions in archaeology. Everyone needs food to survive, so the ways in which people managed to acquire it forms the very basis of human existence. Farming was key to the rise of human sedentarism. Once farming moved beyond subsistence, and regularly produced a surplus, it supported the development of specialisation, speeded up the development of socio-economic as well as social complexity, the rise of towns and the development of city states. In short, studying food production is of critical importance in understanding how societies developed. Environmental archaeology often studies the direct remains of food or food processing, and is therefore well-suited to address this topic. What is more, a wealth of new data has become available in this field of research in recent years. This allows synthesising research with a regional and diachronic approach. Indeed, most of the papers in this volume offer studies on subsistence and surplus production with a wide geographical perspective. The research areas vary considerably, ranging from the American Mid-South to Turkey. The range in time periods is just as wide, from c. 7000 BC to the 16th century AD. Topics covered include foraging strategies, the combination of domestic and wild food resources in the Neolithic, water supply, crop specialisation, the effect of the Roman occupation on animal husbandry, town-country relationships and the monastic economy. With this collection of papers and the theoretical framework presented in the introductory chapter, we wish to demonstrate that the topic of subsistence and surplus production remains of interest, and promises to generate more exciting research in the future.

With Experiments Past the important role that experimental archaeology has played in the development of archaeology is finally uncovered and understood. Experimental archaeology is a method to attempt to replicate archaeological artefacts and/or processes to test certain hypotheses or discover information about those artefacts and/or processes. It has been a key part of archaeology for well over a century, but such experiments are often embedded in wider research, conducted in isolation or never published or reported. Experiments Past provides readers with a glimpse of experimental work and experience that was previously inaccessible due to language, geographic and documentation barriers, while establishing a historical context for the issues confronting experimental archaeology today. This volume contains formal papers on the history of experimental methodologies in archaeology, as well as personal experiences of the development of experimental archaeology from early leaders in the field, such as Hans-Ole Hansen. Also represented in these chapters are the histories of experimental approaches to taphonomy, the archaeology of boats, building structures and agricultural practices, as well as narratives on how experimental archaeology has developed on a national level in several European countries and its role in encouraging a wide-scale interest and engagement with the past.