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Ancient Societies (ancient + society)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Humanities and Social Sciences	50%
Earth and Environmental Science	50%

Selected Abstracts

The rise and quick fall of the theory of ancient economic imperialism

ECONOMIC HISTORY REVIEW, Issue 4 2009
SVIATOSLAV DMITRIEV
The theory of ancient economic imperialism has declined for two reasons. The first is the absence of any reliable evidence that the politics of ancient states was dictated by economic considerations. Additionally, the usual focus on the Roman provincial system limits the understanding of ,economic imperialism' to that of a ,formal empire' and ignores other ancient societies. The second reason, which so far has been neglected, is the changing vision of modern imperialism. Once the modern colonial system fell, the understanding of imperialism returned to that of the precolonial period, which saw imperialism in political and military terms. [source]

The paleoecology and archaeology of long-term water storage in a Hohokam reservoir, southwestern Arizona, U.S.A.

GEOARCHAEOLOGY: AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL, Issue 2 2004
James M. Bayman
Water storage reservoirs were an important feature of economic organization among ancient societies in the North American Southwest. Analyses of reservoir sediments from a Hohokam archaeological site in the Sonoran Desert yielded taxonomic species of ostracodes (microscopic crustaceans) and pollen grains that are indicative of a past water-rich environment. The discovery that this reservoir was capable of storing water on a long-term basis indicates that archaeological models for the region, which have relied on direct historic analogy, must be reexamined. In contrast to the local ethnographic record, paleoecological data generated by this study imply that the Hohokam could establish permanent desert settlements with water storage reservoirs away from perennial rivers and streams. Moreover, residents of these areas were geographically positioned to facilitate the circulation of marine resources (i.e., salt and shell) from the Gulf of California to territories within and beyond the Hohokam region. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [source]

COULD YOU TAKE A PICTURE OF MY BOAT, PLEASE?

OXFORD JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY, Issue 4 2008
THE USE AND SIGNIFICANCE OF MEDITERRANEAN SHIP REPRESENTATIONS
Summary Representations of ships, sailors and seafarers are common in many ancient societies. They were carved, drawn or painted on a great variety of raw materials , stone, wood, metal, textiles and pottery , and can be found in settings such as caves, tombs or royal palaces. Their presence at these sites raises the possibility that these images of maritime life have symbolic or ritual connotations. This paper presents examples of representations of Phoenician and Punic ships from the first millennium BC, in an attempt to understand the role of both their creators and their audiences. These images are subsequently analysed in more detail, focusing on their technical features and their historical contexts. This paper concludes with a consideration of the social and religious aspects of ancient Mediterranean navigation. [source]

Trauma in the city of Kerma: ancient versus modern injury patterns

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF OSTEOARCHAEOLOGY, Issue 1 2004
M. Judd
Abstract Injuries, whether accidental or intentional, have incapacitated humans and their primordial ancestors throughout time, although the injury mechanisms have become increasingly more technologically sophisticated. Interpretation of injury aetiology among past peoples is challenging, and often impossible, however, clinical research from developing countries provides a useful analogy with which to evaluate trauma or health patterns of an ancient society. This paper presents a systematic analysis of cranial and postcranial skeletal trauma among 223 adults who were excavated by George Reisner in 1923 from the city of Kerma (1750,1550 BC), Egypt's ancient nemesis in the struggle for control of the Nile River trade route. A total of 156 injuries (fractures, dislocations and muscle pulls among the skull, long bones, extremities and torso) were observed among 88 individuals, 48 of whom had one injury only. The skull was the most frequently traumatized element (11.2%) followed by the ulna (8.3%); 2.4% (48/2029) long bones were fractured. The modal distribution of the Kerma fractures was compared to the fracture distributions of two samples from India and Nigeria where falls were the most common cause of injury. Some characteristics of the three injury patterns were shared: males suffered the greatest frequency of injury, the economically active people (25 to 50 years of age) presented the most injuries among adults, and a small proportion of the victims had more than one major injury. However, the Kerma distribution of the fractured bones varied dramatically from the clinical injury distributions: the ulna and skull were among the least frequently injured bones in the modern samples, while the radius, humerus and lower leg were the most commonly traumatized elements among the modern people, but rare among the ancients. The configuration of the ulna and skull injuries at Kerma was characteristic of those associated with blunt force trauma in other clinical assessments and the absence of these specific lesions from the modern samples where accident was the primary injury mechanism presents a persuasive argument for interpersonal violence among the ancient Kerma people. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]