The fourth episode of Time Team America took the team to Range Creek Canyon in Utah. Range Creek Canyon possesses hundreds of archaeological sites attributed to Fremont peoples. The Fremont Indians occupied not only this area but were spread out all over Utah and also on the borders of nearby states such as Idaho, Colorado and Nevada. They lived here from around 700 CE through about 1300 CE. These people subsisted on a mixture of hunting/gather as well as farming. (More information about the Fremont can be found here and here) The previous owner of Range Creek Canyon, whose family has had possession of the land for generations, deeded the land to the Utah Division of Wildlife Resource, which will preserve and protect its resources. Due to the area's remoteness, very few people knew about the archaeological resources in the area until very recently. The area's dry environment has also done a wonderful job preserving invaluable artifacts and sites that would have otherwise been lost. Without its remoteness, dry environment, and excellent stewardship Range Creek Canyon might not be the amazing assemblage that we know today.
Time Team helped out on a site called Big Village, which consists of several pit houses, some of which can still be seen due to the circular pattern of rocks on the ground surface. The geophysics team really shined through at this site. With their techniques and equipment they managed to find what used to be the walls of one of the pit houses, along with a midden nearby. None of this could be seen on the surface and would have only been found otherwise by pure chance and hours of labor. Another unit that was previously thought to be some sort of a midden (trash pit) turned up evidence of being a structure so the team tried to figure out where the walls are and why it’s a different design than the other pit houses near by.
One of the more intriguing questions they look into at Range Creek is why the Fremont peoples built granaries on the cliff sides. In order to get a better understanding of these granaries a member of the team and a specialist decided to try to create their own granary based off ones present in the area. This is another example of experimental archaeology (which as been discussed more in-depth in a previous post) at work helping to understand how such structures were built and what they may have looked like at the time they were being used. The key difference here is that unlike earlier when experimental archaeology was used to reproduce tools, here you can see it being used to recreate structures through traditional methods. These granaries, as I mentioned before, where built on cliff sides and other places that were rather difficult to get too. They built these granaries all over in visible yet difficult spots to get to as a means of protection in order to ensure that they would always have a source of food for when times when it was not possible to hunt, gather or farm. It is really a quite interesting method of storing food but to learn how it was an effective means of protection you can go watch this episode and see for yourself.
An important thing that this episode shows, which is often lost in the more classical form of archaeological programming, is that fieldwork isn’t always comfortable. Here they had to deal with temperatures surpassing 100 degrees and long hours traveling to and from the site, among other difficulties. At previous sites they had to deal with bugs and rain. Dealing with the conditions at a site is an important reality that I think tends to get overlooked quite often when talking about archaeology. Even with perfect weather the process of excavation is still not always a comfortable one seeing as it involves a lot of physical labor. Having participated in an actual field school I think that the depiction given by Time Team America is probably one of the most accurate you will see through any sort of media, whether it be television or movies. Archaeology tends to be overly romanticized as can be easily seen in movies such as Indiana Jones. The actual practice of archaeology is not even close to what it is commonly depicted as. There is a lot more physical labor and effort that one would assume. Archaeology is also a lot more tedious than most would imagine. Because excavation destroys a site very detailed notes must be taken so that no information is lost. I think its important to realize that archaeology is often not the most comfortable or easy thing to do because it makes what we do have more important. It also makes that next exciting find that much more exciting knowing all the hard work that went into finding it.
More information about Range Creek can be found here.
Time Team America at New Philadelphia, IL and Fort James, SD
Mixing things up a bit now; this post will focus on the third and fifth episodes of Time Team America. Both episodes focused on historical archaeology so the concepts conveyed in each are similar enough to talk about them together. A post about the fourth episode (dealing with pre-historic archaeology) will follow. The third episode of Time Team America had the Team working at the area that used to be the town of New Philadelphia, Illinois. New Philadelphia was the first city founded by an African American, Frank McWorter, in 1836. It was also a place where blacks and whites lived without segregation, which was almost unheard of during that time period. This is an important site to everyone but especially to the founders’ ancestors because it is an important part of their social and cultural history. Time Team was invited here to help find the remains of the schoolhouse that was supposedly built there. Because the area has reverted to agricultural land for many years and was heavily disturbed by plowing the geophysical data was not as helpful as it has been at other sites but they still managed to get a good blueprint of the area where the schoolhouse was believed to have been built.
While the team didn’t end up finding the site of the schoolhouse in New Philadelphia, they still gathered some very important information. This episode offers an important, though often disappointing, lesson regarding archaeology: you won’t always find what you are looking for but also just an important thing to note is that what you don’t find can be just as valuable as what you do find.. They may not have found anything spectacular but it was still possible that they were looking in the right spot. The schoolhouse is believed to have been a structure composed of mostly wood. Due to this, very little material evidence would survive since the town was abandoned around 130 years ago. So even if they were digging in the correct location there may be no evidence left of the schoolhouse especially since the field has been plowed. More information about this project can be found here.
Next, The fifth and final episode of Time Team America had the team working on their last site, Fort James, in South Dakota. Fort James is one of the few forts built from stone in 1865. During its time the land where Fort James was built was considered to be the “Wild West” and was an important part of the expansion of the U.S. This fort was built by a cavalry unit for the purpose of keeping peace between the locals and the Sioux that lived in that area as well. Here the team had the challenge of trying to locate the perimeter of the fort to learn how large it actually was and if it actually followed the plans in which it was supposed to have been built. Sections of the stone walls could be seen on the surface but, for the most part, the wall was buried. Geophysics came in very handy at this site where they were able to find sections of buried walls as well as identify anomalous areas that were not in the original site plans.
What was interesting in the Fort James episode was the use of the geophysics equipment. The most interesting find was a rectangular area not on the plans that the team believed to have been the stables. On the geophysics maps it was clear that something was most definitely there but after digging a unit on a small section of the area nothing showed up archaeologically. The geophysics specialist still believes that this is the site of the stables and what the equipment picked up was soil that was more compacted from the constant presence of the horses in the stables. Of course at this point you can’t say that this was the stable with 100% certainty but there is a good chance that a more extensive archaeological excavation could corroborate the geophysical data. Although the geophysics data wasn't that spectacular at the New Philadelphia site, it did show that items as small as a few iron nails could be detected with their equipment, which is quite amazing to think about.
One thing that was interesting to me about these episodes were the histories behind the areas. They did a great job explaining everything in a fair amount of detail to give the viewer a very good idea of the area and its history. They used a lot of records and oral histories, as well as visual imagery from the team’s artist, to accomplish this understanding of the site. With historic archeology a fair amount can be learned about a site by looking at historical records like newspapers and military documents as well as reviewing the folk and oral histories of an area. This knowledge can be incredibly helpful by directing archaeologists to specific locations or events to investigate . Historical archaeology, like in these episodes, can help to test the accuracy of the records and see if things really were the same as what the records say.
While the team didn’t end up finding the site of the schoolhouse in New Philadelphia, they still gathered some very important information. This episode offers an important, though often disappointing, lesson regarding archaeology: you won’t always find what you are looking for but also just an important thing to note is that what you don’t find can be just as valuable as what you do find.. They may not have found anything spectacular but it was still possible that they were looking in the right spot. The schoolhouse is believed to have been a structure composed of mostly wood. Due to this, very little material evidence would survive since the town was abandoned around 130 years ago. So even if they were digging in the correct location there may be no evidence left of the schoolhouse especially since the field has been plowed. More information about this project can be found here.
Next, The fifth and final episode of Time Team America had the team working on their last site, Fort James, in South Dakota. Fort James is one of the few forts built from stone in 1865. During its time the land where Fort James was built was considered to be the “Wild West” and was an important part of the expansion of the U.S. This fort was built by a cavalry unit for the purpose of keeping peace between the locals and the Sioux that lived in that area as well. Here the team had the challenge of trying to locate the perimeter of the fort to learn how large it actually was and if it actually followed the plans in which it was supposed to have been built. Sections of the stone walls could be seen on the surface but, for the most part, the wall was buried. Geophysics came in very handy at this site where they were able to find sections of buried walls as well as identify anomalous areas that were not in the original site plans.
What was interesting in the Fort James episode was the use of the geophysics equipment. The most interesting find was a rectangular area not on the plans that the team believed to have been the stables. On the geophysics maps it was clear that something was most definitely there but after digging a unit on a small section of the area nothing showed up archaeologically. The geophysics specialist still believes that this is the site of the stables and what the equipment picked up was soil that was more compacted from the constant presence of the horses in the stables. Of course at this point you can’t say that this was the stable with 100% certainty but there is a good chance that a more extensive archaeological excavation could corroborate the geophysical data. Although the geophysics data wasn't that spectacular at the New Philadelphia site, it did show that items as small as a few iron nails could be detected with their equipment, which is quite amazing to think about.
One thing that was interesting to me about these episodes were the histories behind the areas. They did a great job explaining everything in a fair amount of detail to give the viewer a very good idea of the area and its history. They used a lot of records and oral histories, as well as visual imagery from the team’s artist, to accomplish this understanding of the site. With historic archeology a fair amount can be learned about a site by looking at historical records like newspapers and military documents as well as reviewing the folk and oral histories of an area. This knowledge can be incredibly helpful by directing archaeologists to specific locations or events to investigate . Historical archaeology, like in these episodes, can help to test the accuracy of the records and see if things really were the same as what the records say.
Time Team America at Topper, SC
In the second episode of Time Team America the team moved to the Topper site in South Carolina. This site is a controversial one due to possible evidence of human activity as far back as 50,000 years ago, which is far older than the earliest accepted habitation of North America. The most common theory is that humans first inhabited North America around 13,000 years ago. These earliest people are known as the Clovis people. The Topper site is a Clovis site, meaning Clovis points and related technology were documented in situ (in the ground as they were left), but it also appears that there may have been a much earlier occupation below the Clovis levels. Artifacts have been found well below what was the ground surface 13,000 years ago, which means that they were deposited more than 13,000 years ago. Not all archaeologists believe that these artifacts that were found are human made though and its possible they may just be natural rocks. More information about this site and the controversy can be found here and here.
This episode was of particular interest to me. While I am nowhere close to being an expert on the subject I do think it is quite possible that there were people in North America in pre-Clovis times, so learning about a site that holds evidence of earlier people is quite interesting. The problem with most of the evidence of pre-Clovis peoples is that the artifacts are hard to definitively say they were made by humans. In order for archaeologists to agree that people were in North America in pre-Clovis times something significant needs to be excavated. The site would have to contain indisputable artifacts, in an undisturbed context, and with unassailable radiometric dates older than 13,000 years BP in order to be considered evidence for the existence of Pre-Clovis people in North America.
Another thing of interest in this episode is the use of experimental archaeology. Experimental archaeology is the process of recreating past processes to produce artifacts or features in the same manner or form as they were by prehistoric people. Experimental archaeology serves as a method of learning more about the people, materials, and techniques used to produce prehistoric technology. Knowing how past people did things adds an extra level of information to help in better understanding life hundreds and thousands of years ago. In this episode they had a flintknapper making replicas of the tools that had been found at Topper. They also made and practiced throwing rabbit sticks to test a theory about wood working at large quarry sites and the effectiveness of the hunting system. The cool thing about experimental archaeology is that it gives good insight into how these ancient tools were made and how they may have been used. In some ways it also provides a direct connection with the past. You get to use technology that prehistoric people used and it gives you a much better picture of what life was like for them.
One more thing that caught my interest here was the context again. Depending on how an artifact is positioned in the ground can give clues as to how it got there. If it was simply dropped and forgotten it should be laying horizontally on the surface rather than vertical or in some other unnatural position. This bit of information at first might not seem incredibly important and it may not be in every case but it goes to show another aspect of how important it is to record of even the smallest details in an archaeological context.
This episode was of particular interest to me. While I am nowhere close to being an expert on the subject I do think it is quite possible that there were people in North America in pre-Clovis times, so learning about a site that holds evidence of earlier people is quite interesting. The problem with most of the evidence of pre-Clovis peoples is that the artifacts are hard to definitively say they were made by humans. In order for archaeologists to agree that people were in North America in pre-Clovis times something significant needs to be excavated. The site would have to contain indisputable artifacts, in an undisturbed context, and with unassailable radiometric dates older than 13,000 years BP in order to be considered evidence for the existence of Pre-Clovis people in North America.
Another thing of interest in this episode is the use of experimental archaeology. Experimental archaeology is the process of recreating past processes to produce artifacts or features in the same manner or form as they were by prehistoric people. Experimental archaeology serves as a method of learning more about the people, materials, and techniques used to produce prehistoric technology. Knowing how past people did things adds an extra level of information to help in better understanding life hundreds and thousands of years ago. In this episode they had a flintknapper making replicas of the tools that had been found at Topper. They also made and practiced throwing rabbit sticks to test a theory about wood working at large quarry sites and the effectiveness of the hunting system. The cool thing about experimental archaeology is that it gives good insight into how these ancient tools were made and how they may have been used. In some ways it also provides a direct connection with the past. You get to use technology that prehistoric people used and it gives you a much better picture of what life was like for them.
One more thing that caught my interest here was the context again. Depending on how an artifact is positioned in the ground can give clues as to how it got there. If it was simply dropped and forgotten it should be laying horizontally on the surface rather than vertical or in some other unnatural position. This bit of information at first might not seem incredibly important and it may not be in every case but it goes to show another aspect of how important it is to record of even the smallest details in an archaeological context.
Time Team America at Fort Raleigh, NC
The team worked on 5 different sites located around the U.S., from Utah to the Carolinas. These sites ranged from several hundred years old to some of the earliest evidence of humans in North America, that are at least 13,000 years old with the potential of being even older. The first of these 5 sites that the team worked at is the Fort Raleigh site in North Carolina on Roanoke Island. This site is where the first Europeans arrived to settle America. The first group of English settlers arrived in 1585 but soon abandoned their fort to return to Europe. The second group came 2 years later and set up their village near the fort left by the previous group. This is what Time Team came to help look for. The exact location of this village isn’t known so the team was trying to find it. Because they were looking for a village site they hoped to find post holes, which would indicate that buildings were once present. As well as looking for evidence of buildings they were looking for more domestic materials, such as buttons from womens clothing or childrens toys, that would help to determine that it was in fact a village rather than something else such as a fort. Along with looking for these items they hoped that what they did find would help give them a better understanding of the dates associated with the site.
They did a really good job explaining the history behind this area, which was helpful in understanding the importance of the site and the reasoning behind trying to learn more about it and actually locate it. They also did a great job in showing the digging process starting with a backhoe (to remove a layer of sand that had blown in since the 1587) and then moving to the shovel and trowel. What I thought was really interesting was the pottery sherds they found. To most people you wouldn’t be able to tell much about a piece of pottery no bigger, in some cases, than a stack of three quarters. The team had brought in pottery specialists who knew the pottery of the period and could tell numerous things such as what kind of object it was and where it came from all based off of the glaze and type of clay used. Some of the pottery sherds that were excavated were determined to be from places such as London and Venice.
Another thing that caught my interest with this episode is when they talked about context and how important it is. They found prehistoric (Native American) pottery along with pottery brought from Europe, which wasn’t unexpected because they knew the settlers used pottery from the areas original inhabitants. They then found part of a pipe that dated later than what should have been found in that layer of soil, which hinted to them that they could be digging in the plow zone, which is the layer of soil that has been mixed up by a plow, thus destroying the original layers which in turn makes the stratigraphic information difficult to interpret.
More information about Fort Raleigh can be found here.
They did a really good job explaining the history behind this area, which was helpful in understanding the importance of the site and the reasoning behind trying to learn more about it and actually locate it. They also did a great job in showing the digging process starting with a backhoe (to remove a layer of sand that had blown in since the 1587) and then moving to the shovel and trowel. What I thought was really interesting was the pottery sherds they found. To most people you wouldn’t be able to tell much about a piece of pottery no bigger, in some cases, than a stack of three quarters. The team had brought in pottery specialists who knew the pottery of the period and could tell numerous things such as what kind of object it was and where it came from all based off of the glaze and type of clay used. Some of the pottery sherds that were excavated were determined to be from places such as London and Venice.
Another thing that caught my interest with this episode is when they talked about context and how important it is. They found prehistoric (Native American) pottery along with pottery brought from Europe, which wasn’t unexpected because they knew the settlers used pottery from the areas original inhabitants. They then found part of a pipe that dated later than what should have been found in that layer of soil, which hinted to them that they could be digging in the plow zone, which is the layer of soil that has been mixed up by a plow, thus destroying the original layers which in turn makes the stratigraphic information difficult to interpret.
More information about Fort Raleigh can be found here.
An Introduction to Time Team America
Time Team America is a new “science-reality” series on PBS. They did a short series of five episodes this summer starting in early July and finishing up in early August. Time Team America has a website on PBS.org that you can find here. On their website you can watch all the complete episodes, find additional information and videos about each site, find information about each of the team members and even information about archaeology in general . Most of these extra online videos and content are quite helpful to get a better understanding of what Time Team America is doing. They send a group of archaeologists and other specialists to a site that is in need of help with such things as finding site boundaries, finding evidence of structures or to just get a better knowledge of the context of a particular site. The team gets three days to assist the archaeologists already on site, in an effort to answer certain questions posed prior to their visit. The team is able to bring in equipment, which is usually unavailable, and fresh minds to help archaeologists answer questions and uncover information that will lead to new insights about the site. While the main questions the team are trying to answer will of course vary from site to site, the main goal is to learn as much as possible and to leave more questions and hopefully more information so that future excavations on each site might be more successful.
The team has a regular group of ten experts/specialists from fields that vary from the obvious one of Anthropology (including several professors, research faculty, a Native American Studies Director, and several archaeologists with experience varying from 30 years to that of a graduate student), to Geophysics experts, to an artist (who also happens to be the show’s host). Along with the group that make up the team they bring in specialists to aid in the process of advancing the knowledge of the site.
The most prominent of the high-tech methods used by the team is the collection of geophysical data; a practice still uncommon on most archaeological digs. The team has two Geophysics specialists that use tools such as Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), resistivity meters and magnetometers to map out what lies below the ground surface. It’s actually quite surprising at what these devices can detect below the surface. Unlike a general surface survey, which involves looking for artifacts or features that are visible on the surface, that in turn suggest fruitful areas to dig. Geophysical testing devices can point to areas that the team would otherwise overlook due to the lack of surface indicators.
One of the great things about this particular show is that it’s not like a lot of the other shows about archaeological sites and archaeology. Time Team America shows the actual process of archaeology and its not just site-seeing like a majority of other shows out there. They show parts of all the processes from the not so exciting details of mapping and very tedious note taking, to the various methods of digging whether it be shovel and trowel or large machinery such as backhoes, and then of course there is the more exciting aspects of seeing artifacts that are found through the process. Undoubtedly, Time Team America makes archaeology look far more exciting than it usually is, but it provides much more information about what the site actually means. Along with providing a good view of actual archaeological work, they provide great visualizations of what the sites and artifacts may have looked like. While these visuals may not be correct in every aspect, they definitely help the viewer to get a better general understanding of the time periods, people, and sites that the team is investigating.
Overall I was quite impressed with this show. It gave a good perspective of the actual process of archaeological fieldwork. They gave an accurate view of a lot of different aspects of conducting archaeological work, which was nice to see along with seeing the sites and the artifacts that were found. It was nice to see a show that was more than just sight seeing. Along with being a very informative show it was actually entertaining to watch as well, which is always a good thing.
More information on Time Team American and all five of the sites can be found on the Time Team America website.
The team has a regular group of ten experts/specialists from fields that vary from the obvious one of Anthropology (including several professors, research faculty, a Native American Studies Director, and several archaeologists with experience varying from 30 years to that of a graduate student), to Geophysics experts, to an artist (who also happens to be the show’s host). Along with the group that make up the team they bring in specialists to aid in the process of advancing the knowledge of the site.
The most prominent of the high-tech methods used by the team is the collection of geophysical data; a practice still uncommon on most archaeological digs. The team has two Geophysics specialists that use tools such as Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), resistivity meters and magnetometers to map out what lies below the ground surface. It’s actually quite surprising at what these devices can detect below the surface. Unlike a general surface survey, which involves looking for artifacts or features that are visible on the surface, that in turn suggest fruitful areas to dig. Geophysical testing devices can point to areas that the team would otherwise overlook due to the lack of surface indicators.
One of the great things about this particular show is that it’s not like a lot of the other shows about archaeological sites and archaeology. Time Team America shows the actual process of archaeology and its not just site-seeing like a majority of other shows out there. They show parts of all the processes from the not so exciting details of mapping and very tedious note taking, to the various methods of digging whether it be shovel and trowel or large machinery such as backhoes, and then of course there is the more exciting aspects of seeing artifacts that are found through the process. Undoubtedly, Time Team America makes archaeology look far more exciting than it usually is, but it provides much more information about what the site actually means. Along with providing a good view of actual archaeological work, they provide great visualizations of what the sites and artifacts may have looked like. While these visuals may not be correct in every aspect, they definitely help the viewer to get a better general understanding of the time periods, people, and sites that the team is investigating.
Overall I was quite impressed with this show. It gave a good perspective of the actual process of archaeological fieldwork. They gave an accurate view of a lot of different aspects of conducting archaeological work, which was nice to see along with seeing the sites and the artifacts that were found. It was nice to see a show that was more than just sight seeing. Along with being a very informative show it was actually entertaining to watch as well, which is always a good thing.
More information on Time Team American and all five of the sites can be found on the Time Team America website.
Mines of Zawar
I don’t know about you, but I had quite the January. It was filled with fresh fruit, camels, wandering amongst buildings of past (and present) grandeur, and enjoying warm temperatures. No, I wasn’t in Iowa, but in India. Luther College provides us students with plenty of opportunities to study abroad during our January term, so I seized it. With nine other students and two professors we surveyed (or attempted to) Indian history. By having a hefty amount of background information on the sites we were seeing, we were transformed from tourists to travelers. One of the most interesting sites, by archaeological standards, were the mines of Zawar.Located in the ancient Aravalli hills, rich veins of lead and zinc ore course through the Zawar region just south of Udaipur, in Rajasthan. (670 km southwest of Delhi) The area sees continued exploration and mining efforts through several large mines operated by Hindustan Zinc. Radio carbon dating on wooden scaffolding in an ancient shaft has come back as 2120±60 years before present. While the mining of zinc and lead ore dates that far back, zinc smelting only appears just before the 7th c. CE. Zinc at one point in time was referred to as “Indian lead,” and for good reason too; zinc in its pure form was not produced in Europe until 1668 CE.
To extract pure zinc, the region became an inventor of the distillation and condensation smelting process. Zinc is notoriously difficult to refine to a pure metallic state, since zinc when melted escapes as vapor. The Rasaratnasamuccaya, a technical writing from the 14th century, provides a description of the distillation and condensation technique: "Place the chemicals in a vessel provided with a long tube, inserted in an inclined position which enters the interior of another vessel arranged as a receiver. The mouths of the vessels and joins should be luted with clay. Now urge a strong fire at the bottom of the vessel containing the chemicals whilst in the other vessels place cold water" (Ray 1956:190).
The retorts are truly formed as put forth by The Rasaratnasamuccaya. The upper retorts allow the melted zinc to flow into the collecting vessel of similar shape. Since the vessels filled with ore would be inverted, the fire would cover the entire smelting works. To avoid the heating of the coolant water, a large terracotta screen was placed on the coolant tank and under the retorts to be fired. The size of the retorts filled with ore provided a snug fit and further separated the fire from the screen.
One cannot walk without literally tripping over spent retorts. The retorts are so numerous that later locals built walls out of them (photo above), as their usefulness was exhausted. The furnaces in which the zinc was smelted also litter the landscape. Many lie buried in situ, undisturbed, but still quite visible.
Note: The Zawar region has a number of other sites and is an excellent day outing from Udaipur. Parts of the area have been excavated, mostly by the British Museum in the 1980s. The area is known for its “hundred” Jain temples and the Zawarmata temple.
P. T. Craddock, L. K. Gurjar, K. T. M. Hegde. Oct., 1983. Zinc Production in Medieval India. World Archaeology, Vol. 15, No. 2, Industrial Archaeology, pp. 211-217
Ray, P. 1956. History of Chemistry in Ancient and Medieval India. Calcutta. Indian Chemical Society.
Ancient Mummies Cause a Stir in Modern China
Recently an article was published in the New York Times discussing the Tarim mummy exhibit in Urumqi, located in the Chinese territory Xingjiang. They have on display 4 well-preserved mummies, some of which are nearly 4,000 years old. Because of the dry climate they were found in, these mummies are remarkably well preserved with most of them still having intact hair, skin and clothing. This preservation helps scientists to determine the age of the mummies as well as their area of origin. Surprisingly, many of these mummies have high cheekbones and light hair as well as a style of textiles that seems to imply a Central Asian origin (Georgia, Russia, or Turkey). This is potentially wonderful news to the Turkic speaking ethnic group, Uighur, but causes a problem for the Chinese government.
For hundreds of years, this area of China has been a great source of tension between the Chinese and the Uighur, a Muslim ethnic group numbering nine million in Xinjiang. The Uighur are a distinct ethnic group with origins in Central Asia. They are predominantly Muslim, which is a huge cause of conflict between them and the Chinese government. Although Islam is established as one of China’s 5 recognized religions, it is most heavily restricted in this area because of the large amount of Islamic practitioners. Some officials even believe that the Uighur are one of the biggest security threats to China today. However, the Uighur believe that it is their right to live in this area and a variety of insurgent groups have emerged. Not surprisingly, Chinese officials are unwilling to give up control of the area. One of the main reasons for this is because of the presence of oil and gas in this region. It is the hope of the Uighur that these mummies will show that their people have inhabited this land for thousands of years and therefore they claim possession of it.
The majority of research performed on these mummies seems to indicate that many have a Central Asian origin, which would support the Uighur claims on the area. Many of the mummies display light hair and high cheekbones, which are Central Asian features. The textiles found with the mummies also share resemblances to cloth found in Central Asia from this same period. However, some mummies do show East Asian characteristics, which suggest a greater mixing of people and do great damage to the claims of the Uighur.
This story is an example of how archaeology can be used by governments today as a political tool. In this case, both the Uighur and the Chinese want to claim the mummies as their ancestors because it will help show that their people have been in the area for thousands of years and therefore deserve to be in control of it and its resources. However, it is difficult to determine exactly who the mummies were because depending on who does the research and who is funding it, the results can turn out quite differently. The Uighur are hoping the mummies to be of a Central Asian origin and have even created a popular song about one of the mummies demonstrating these hopes. If it is decided that the mummies are their ancestors it gives them a stronger claim to the area. Yet, the Chinese scientists claim that the mummies show Eastern Asian characteristics and therefore come from Eastern Asia, which would give the Chinese the right to this area. Either way, it seems that both the Chinese and the Uighur believe that they are right and it will be quite some time before a consensus is reached.
Examples of Recent Human Evolution
The Seeds Article that I mentioned in my last post, about the basics of evolution, talks at length about the idea that natural selection is an ongoing process in modern human populations. Their information primarily comes from a publication in PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Science) written by John Hawks, Eric T. Wang, Gregory M. Cochran, Henry C. Harpending, and Robert K. Moyzis. Their article, “Recent acceleration of human adaptive evolution” argues that the rate of evolution has accelerated in modern humans because a larger population is capable of producing a greater number of random gene mutations. Hawks and colleagues suggest that between 7 and 10% of the human genome is currently evolving at the maximum rate. They argue that natural selection is still an active factor in human evolution because trends of change visible in HapMap (a massive survey of the genetic differences between selected populations from around the world) seems too consistent from person to person to be the result of genetic drift. You might say, “Yeah, that’s just common sense.” However, the idea that human evolution is still active is contradictory to the popular scientific thought of the past several decades that argued that the development of culture got rid of the need for evolution to adapt to our environments. Many scientists today are still arguing for this approach to human evolution. So where can we find evidence to support the newer theory that evolution is still active in modern humans? I can think of two relatively recent examples off-hand: the development of the ability for adult humans to digest milk and the development of the CCR5 gene variant that protects against HIV infection.
The first is probably the most well known to the general public just because of it’s prevalence in our daily lives. How often do you reach for a glass of milk with dinner, or pour milk over your cereal in the morning without thinking twice about it? The ability to drink milk without feeling sick as an adult doesn’t apply to everyone in the world. There’s an interesting table originally published in an article by Robert McCracken that shows the percentages lactose intolerant adults in different ethnic groups. According to McCracken, Sweden, at 4%, has the overall lowest percentage of lactose intolerant adults while Native Americans and Asian Americans have some of the highest percentages of lactose intolerant adults with 95% and 95-100% respectively. The National Digestive Disease Information Clearinghouse reports similar numbers with up to 80% or African Americans, 80-100% of Native Americans, and 90-100% of Asian Americans being lactose intolerant. The general trend overall is that European adults can drink milk while most adults in the rest of the world can’t. Why is this? Looking at the question from an evolutionary perspective we would probably immediately make a hypothesis that the ability to drink milk is the result of a genetic mutation in the past for certain human groups.
Scientists believe that before the domestication of cattle and other milk-producing herds all human adults were incapable of drinking milk because there was no need to drink milk. Children stopped drinking their mother’s milk after their first few years of life and in hunter-gatherer or foraging societies before herd domestication people didn’t have access to milk as a food source. Once nutrient-rich non-human milk became available to humans in pastoralist societies, adults with a genetic mutation that allowed them to consume milk had an additional food source, and thus a survival advantage over adults without the mutation in pastoralist societies. This mutation would then have been selected for because it provided a fitness advantage. Over time, probably the past 3,000-6,000 years, the percentages of adults with the ability to drink milk became what it is today. Two other, more technical hypotheses for why the ability to drink milk as an adult spread so successfully throughout many European societies are discussed in an article by Clare Holden and Ruth Mace.
A second interesting example is the CCR5 gene variant which might protect carriers against HIV. It is probably a much more recent mutation. Scientists believe today that this genetic mutation initially developed and was selected for in Europe during the time of the Black Death or bubonic plague. In their article, “Evaluating plague and smallpox as historical selective pressures for the CCR5-Δ32 HIV-resistance allele,” by Alison P. Galvani and Montgomery Slatkin provide a great discussion about this gene mutation and what scientists are discovering about its development and implication. Both of these mutations have developed and been selected for in recent human history, well after the development of culture. This suggests that using culture to adapt to our environments, technology, and modern medicine alone are not enough to stop evolution in its tracks. Perhaps Hawks and his colleagues are even correct in arguing that evolution is speeding up in humans today because our population size has gotten so big. We can look eagerly to seeing what scientists have to say about this hot topic in the coming future!
Here are some additional resources that I found helpful! -
Robert McCracken’s Article that I mentioned can be found here:
Robert D. McCracken, "Lactase Deficiency: An Example of Dietary Evolution,"
Current Anthropology 12 (Oct.-Dec. 1971, pp. 479-517) and Norman Kretchner, "Lactose
and Lactase," Scientific American 277 (Oct. 1972, pp. 71-78).
More information on Nutritional Adaptation:
http://anthro.palomar.edu/adapt/adapt_5.htm
Clare Holden and Ruth Mace’s article on the Lactase Gene:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3659/is_199710/ai_n8778998/pg_1?tag=artBody;col1
Evaluating plague and smallpox as historical selective pressures for the CCR5-Δ32 HIV-resistance allele:
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=299980
Review of the Archaeology Channels Recently Posted Videos with Regard to Pre-Clovis Evidence.
The Archaeology Channel recently posted two short videos to their website about pre-Clovis evidence that is just now gaining traction and beginning to challenge the long held ‘Clovis First’ theory that has long dominated North American archaeology. This new evidence points to an earlier time frame for the population of the Americas, contrary to the date that has accepted as fact for so long in American archaeology.
The first video, titled Ice Age Discoveries: New Evidence , deals with various theories associated with the population of the Americas. This includes a brief introduction to the Beringia theory (that humans migrated over the land bridge between Russia and Alaska, then spread through modern day Canada or along the coast to populate the lower regions of North America and into South America) and the Solutrean Hypothesis, both of which have holes. It’s argued that the Solutrean theory stands only on similarity found between lithic technologies in mainland Europe and remains found in the eastern regions of Canada. Where this hypothesis is unlikely due to the duration of such a voyage by sea and the harshness of traveling along glaciated ice packs, the Beringia theory lacks the technological continuity that should be found if people really did migrate from Europe though Asia and finally into North America. Pre-Clovis evidence begins with the Topper site in South Carolina is reviewed, for its wealth of Paleo-Indian artifacts (and the fact that it is a chert quarry) including a modest selection of Pre-Clovis stone tools (picture).
The real turning point for a pre-Clovis theory came with the opening of the Cactus Hill site in Virginia. Fortunately two independent expeditions converged on Cactus Hill, one lead by Joseph and Lynn McAvoy and the other headed by Michael Johnson. I say fortunately because these two teams worked independently of each other and were able to verify the others findings through stratigraphy, lithic analysis and absolute dating methods independently of one another. After Johnson’s team hit the Clovis level they stopped digging, because at this point pre-Clovis inhabitation was just a wild hunch. Where Johnson stopped, McAvoy’s team (Cactus Hill, AREA B) continued to dig below the Clovis level and discovered pre-Clovis blades. At which point Johnson’s team mounted another expedition to Cactus Hill in 96’ to continue work and eventually discovered more pre-Clovis artifacts in their original area (Cactus Hill, AREA A). Both teams demonstrated extreme caution in the uncovering and recording of artifacts, taking care to measure and plot every minute detail during the excavation, lending to the integrity of Cactus Hill as a pre-Clovis site.
The beautiful stratigraphy at Cactus Hill lent further credibility to the pre-Clovis supporters. The stratigraphy at Cactus Hill involved a sterile layer (layers containing no artifacts or evidence of human habitation) between the Clovis artifact bed and the pre-Clovis discovery, indicating no disturbance in the layers. This ensured there could be no doubt about whether or not the pre-Clovis artifacts were actually assemblage from another layer that had migrated into lower levels as critics might suggest. It is not unusual for artifacts to move, depending on soil density (dense artifacts can actually ‘sink’ in the earth toward denser soil horizons), vegetation (tree roots), or rodent burrowing.
While Cactus Hill is not the first site to suggest a pre-Clovis human habitation, it is the oldest accepted evidence of pre-Clovis peoples on the East Coast. The first discovery of Pre-Clovis artifacts was at the Meadowcroft rock shelter in Pennsylvania by Dr. Jim Adovasio, but where Meadowcroft was the first evidence of pre-Clovis assemblage, Cactus Hill helped to reinforce the idea that people inhabited the Americas long before 11,000 years ago. The Meadowcroft rock shelter covers a 30,000 year period but the stratigraphy is complex and contains several reversals (a detail not mentioned in the video) which cast some doubt on the credibility of its Pre-Clovis assemblage. Another problem with Meadowcroft is its proximity to a coal seam, and some worry coal dust from the seam has affected radiocarbon dates for the site.
The second video, titled Ice Age Discoveries: the Investigators, deals more with the proponents of the pre-Clovis theory. It also includes more discussion of the theory and evidence itself, rather than focusing on the debate between Clovis First and pre-Clovis. Although it isn't the first thing that comes up in the second video, the lithic technology found at Cactus Hill holds continuity with what a pre-Clovis technology (in this case reflected in spear points) should look like. The basic shape of a pre-Clovis spear point is similar to a Clovis spear point, only shorter, thinner, and less technically sophisticated. Pre-Clovis points do not exhibit the characteristic channel flake from its base (a hallmark of Clovis points) nor is there any evidence of basal grinding. Pre-Clovis tools also tend to be made of poorer quality stone than that used by Clovis peoples. This shift in stone quality may be attributable to people discovering and utilizing new and better stone sources. It makes sense, after all people had thousands of years between the pre-Clovis and Clovis markers to practice making better stone tools with finer stone.
All in all, the videos present a solid argument for pre-Plovis, the stratigraphy eliminates doubt about the integrity of Cactus Hill. Lithic technology fits into the pre-Clovis construct, moving from less technically proficient (pre-Clovis from Cactus Hill) to more technically proficient (Clovis type points from various areas.) Relative dating puts the pre-Clovis artifacts in the right area, absolute dating indicates pre-Clovis inhabitation and phytolithic concentrations seem to concur with all other lines of evidence that people were in North America before 11,000. All of these are well represented in the second of the two videos. The first video was less informative with regard to the pre-Clovis theory, choosing instead to explain the various theories with North/South American population and giving the viewer a sense of where the Clovis First and pre-Clovis theories with regard to the larger history of man. Although the later half of the video gets back on topic and focuses back in on pre-Clovis theory. Overall, the videos posted on the Archaeology Channel website are very informative, cover their bases with regard to the budding pre-Clovis theory but are blatantly for pre-Clovis. They neglect to mention the heated debate associated with much of the evidence advanced to support pre-Clovis theories.
Also, the music is atrocious.
Link to the Archeology Channels website.
"The Making of Black Harvest" and the Rights of Anthropologists
Recently in my ethnology class here at Luther College, we watched a film trilogy about the Ganiga tribe in Papua New Guinea. This trilogy is a series of documentaries created by the anthropologists Bob Connolly and Robin Anderson, which focus on the introduction of western culture to the indigenous Ganiga tribe. The first film, First Contact, centers on the exploration of inner Papua New Guinea by the Leahy brothers in the 1930s. While there, they encountered a group of indigenous people who had never seen white people before. First Contact tells this story by using actual footage from the 1930s expedition in addition to interviews gathered 50 years later from people who were there when the Leahy brothers arrived. The second film, Joe Leahy’s Neighbors, tells the story about the son of one of the explorers and a Ganiga woman, Joe Leahy, and his interactions with the local people. This film focuses especially on how Joe has assimilated into white culture and the troubles that creates. Black Harvest is the last film in this trilogy and it focuses on a business deal between Joe Leahy and the Ganiga where they enter a cooperative business agreement to co-own a coffee farm. Unfortunately, the coffee prices drop significantly, which produces incredible tension between Joe Leahy and the Ganiga, ultimately, causing him to leave the area by trying to move to Australia.
One of the most striking things about this series, especially in the last two films, is the technique used by anthropologists Bob Connolly and Robin Anderson. Instead of having a script, they let the events naturally unfold and tried to film them whenever possible. As one article puts it, “Their breakthrough observational film is so good that most Australian documentary filmmakers wish they had directed it themselves.” Very rarely do you hear the anthropologists themselves speaking. Instead, there are numerous interviews with Joe Leahy and other Ganiga tribe members in addition to images from their everyday life which tell the story. The final effect is a very moving documentary that lets the images and the people speak for themselves.
Although these films received rave critical reviews, the filmmakers themselves were unsure about whether they had the right to go in and document these people’s lives. A recent book by Bob Connolly, Making Black Harvest, explores the concept more in depth with the help of diaries recorded at the time of filming. In this book Connolly describes the guilt he and Robin Anderson felt in trying to remain objective and wanting things for the good of the movie even when it conflicted with the good of the people. He also writes about how when one of his friends was wounded during a fight, one of the first questions he asked was, “Can we film?” He says that this question still haunts him.
King Solomon’s Mines Found
Thomas Levy of UC San Diego and Mohammad Najjar of Jordan's Friends of Archaeology announced, on Oct. 28th, that their dig at a large-scale copper works, called Khirbat en-Nahas (Arabic for “ruins of copper”), in the biblical land of Edom is three hundred years older than previously thought. This readjusted timeline would place the extensive copper-smelting site squarely in the hypothesized reign of King Solomon, around 900 BC. Also, the dating challenges the long held assertion that Edom didn’t enter the Iron Age until 600 BC.
The three-stratum site has been dug down through 20 feet of slag and smelting waste to virgin soil. Egyptian artifacts found on the site leads Levy and Najjar to identify the source of the foreign goods as the military campaign of Pharaoh Sheshonq I, who’s vast campaign sought to control Egypt’s neighbors to the North, specifically Israel and Judah after the death of Solomon. The middle layer, from which the Egyptian artifacts were found, dates to 910 BC and identifies a pause in copper production.
The problem with the association of King Solomon is that there is uncertainty of his existence and the existence of his father King David. If one was to go into the field with a trowel and a Bible, the Bible is not going to explain everything one would find. The Bible has an overt message extolling the supremacy of the Israelites, if the text matches with the archaeological record or agrees with extra-biblical sources it would be assumed to be correct, but one cannot take everything for face value. Given the glorious reigns attributed to David and Solomon, in the Bible, one would notice that the kingdom of Israel is surprisingly absent from the records of neighboring states.
According to Israeli archaeologist Israel Finkelstein, "Taking the biblical description of King Solomon literally means ignoring two centuries of biblical research." What Finkelstein is referring to, is the evidence from the archaeological record so far and the scholarly analysis of the Bible. The biblical scholastic consensus is that Torah (first five books of the Hebrew Bible) and the histories (Joshua, Judges, 1 & 2 Kings and 1 & 2 Chronicles) are a compilation of various different sources, and written well after the events that they portray. In addition to the scholarly reasoning, it is also a question of to what level the Bible is taken literally, which varies between archaeologists. Levy maintains, "We're not answering the question" of Solomon’s existence. "But we've brought empirical data that shows we have to reevaluate those questions.” So, the argument between the biblical maximalists and the biblical minimalists continues, but with the expansion of archaeology and a site in Jerusalem being excavated by Dr. Eilat Mazar, perhaps the controversy will be solved within this millennium.
Related Sites:
ScienceDaily: King Solomon's Copper Mines?
Los Angles Times: Copper ruins in Jordan bolster biblical record of King Solomon
What is Evolution?
Seed Magazine recently published an article on recent human evolution that was prompted by a scholarly article by John Hawks, Gregory Cochran, Eric Wang, Henry Harpending, and Robert Moyzis. Recent Acceleration of Human Adaptive Evolution was published in December of 2007 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science vol. 104 no. 52. Seed raises some interesting points in the course of their article but before I discuss those I’d like to talk a little bit about the basics of evolution. The American Heritage Dictionary defines evolution in biology as, “a gradual change in the characteristics of a population of animals or plants over successive generations.” What does that mean though? It means that evolution is more than believing we share a common ancestor with chimpanzees. The theory of evolution is far more complex and subtle than that. I will focus on evolution as observable changes in populations over time. The fact of evolution is evidence that we can see; it is the change in trait ratios over observable periods of time. It is the observable evidence for evolution that leads scientists to speculate about long-term changes. It might be helpful to think of evolution as biological change since the term evolution has come to be so associated with “progress,” “improvement,” and “advancement.” This change is not inherently good or bad in the long run. Instead it is good or bad for certain circumstances or environments that exist in a particular place or time. Whether or not a change is good or bad can change over time as the environment changes. Typically the processes of evolution (mutation, migration, genetic drift, and natural selection) will produce changes that benefit an organism’s ability to reproduce and pass on its genes to future generations.
Scientists have discovered that genes mutate randomly at a predictable rate over time Mutations can be caused by gene copying errors, UV or radiation exposure, chemicals, or viruses. When several of these mutations occur to affect the same gene, a new variation of the gene is created. If a mutation becomes common enough in a population then the likelihood of the mutation occurring in the majority of the population over time increases. An example of this is the development of blue eyes. Scientists believe that blue eyes originated in a single individual in the Black sea region between 6,000 – 10,000 years ago. The trait was passed onto the individual’s children and eventually became common enough that 20-40% of all Europeans today have blue eyes.
Genetic drift is one of the most difficult concepts within evolution to understand. Genetic drift is a random change in the frequency of alleles within a population. That is to say, at any given point in time an allele that has a high frequency within a population may not actually confer any fitness benefits to individuals who possess the allele; rather the allele’s high frequency may be due to chance. The University of California – Berkley has a great example of how genetic drift can change allele frequency in a population. Say you have a group of beetles that is made up of 3 green beetles and 5 brown beetles. Here there are nearly equal numbers of green and brown beetles. However, if a person walked through the middle of the group of beetles and happened to step on two of the green beetles then the frequency of the brown allele will go up in relation to the whole population. The next generation of beetles in this case would be much more likely to be mostly brown because there is only one green beetle left, not because being brown helps a beetle’s fitness. Fitness here is an organism’s ability to reproduce and pass on its genes to future generations.
Natural selection is far less random than genetic drift. For natural selection to occur there must be diversity within a population. Diversity is a byproduct of gene mutation because it produces many different variations of alleles. An allele is a variation of a gene that serves the same basic function as another variation for the same gene. For example, eye color in humans is determined by allele variations. In a simplified version, each human has two alleles for eye color encoded in their DNA – one from each parent. If a baby’s mom and dad have green and brown eyes respectively then the baby will get one “brown” allele and one “green” allele. Thus, the baby could have either brown or green eyes depending on which allele is dominant. When the baby grows up he/she could pass on either the brown or green allele no matter which color the baby’s eyes actually are. Natural selection comes into play if one allele has a fitness benefit that the other alleles for the same gene don’t have.
To explain this I’ll go back to the beetle example. Say we have a population of 3 green beetles and 3 brown beetles. If the beetles live on trees that have brown bark, the brown beetles aren’t as visible to predators that eat beetles. If birds eat all the green beetles, then the next generation will get mostly brown alleles because being brown kept some beetles alive by camouflaging them against predators. On the flip side, if the beetles live in the grass then the brown ones might be more likely targets for hungry birds. Thus we can see that whether or not a certain allele confers a benefit to an organism is highly dependant on the organism’s environment. Another example of natural selection can be found in the bright colors of a male peacock’s feathers. Female peacocks are attracted to brighter color displays on a male’s feathers. This means that a male with very colorful feathers will get more mates than a male with less colorful feathers – which means his genes are more likely to be passed on to the next generation. In this sense natural selection can also be determined by sex appeal – whether or not an individual looks healthy or attractive to the opposite sex.
Migration is the last major mechanism for evolutionary change. Allele frequency can be changed in a population if enough members of the population that have one gene variation leave the population. The same is true of incoming members to a population. For example, if we start with a group of 4 green and 4 brown beetles and 3 of the brown beetles leave to go live with another group then the brown allele frequency of the original group has dropped significantly. If the 3 brown beetles that left the first group join another group that has 2 brown beetles and 3 green beetles to start with then the frequency of brown beetles in the second group will go up significantly.
These mechanisms of evolutionary change are always at work and can have drastic impacts on a population over time. This change is not necessarily good or bad overall; it just tends to represent a successful solution to the present environmental circumstances that exist at any given time. Of course evolution and the mechanisms of evolution tend to be much more complicated than how I’ve represented them here I hope that this post helps clear up some of the basic confusions of evolution so that we can go more in depth next time. In my next post I plan to discuss some of the issues raised in the Seeds article, “How We Evolve.”
As usual, here are some extra links to sites that you might find interesting or helpful for further clarification on the topic of Evolution:
University of California – Berkley, Evolution 101:
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evosite/evo101/index.shtml
How are human eye colors inherited?:
http://www.athro.com/evo/gen/inherit1.html
PNAS: Darwin’s greatest discovery – Design without designer:
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