Recent treatments of burial practices in prehistoric Europe have tended to emphasise the variety of practices that are apparent in any given period; contra previous views which tended to emphasise homogeneity over time. In the spirit of more recent considerations that emphasise a more holistic approach, the current article presents investigations of human remains interred within and around a single monument at Cranborne Chase, Dorset, UK. By taking a synthetic approach giving equal weight to taphonomy, archaeothanatology, histological analysis, scanning electron microscopy, micro-CT scanning, experimentation and contextual dating, a more nuanced picture has been revealed, where the dead were dealt with in ways that were both more complex and considerably more protracted than might otherwise be assumed. In particular, several lines of evidence point to practices aimed at the protracted curation of the dead as articulated bodies with at least some soft tissue persisting. This observation is of particular importance in light of previously published claims for 'mummification' in Bronze Age Britain. It suggests that such practices may have been both widespread and persistent over time. Introduction Traces of a MonumentCranborne Chase is an area of open chalk downland situated in central southern England with a rich and varied selection of well-preserved prehistoric remains and a long history of archaeological study. An area encapsulated by two modern farms, Down Farm and adjacent Canada Farm (Fig. 1b) is among the most comprehensively investigated parts of the landscape, containing a broad range of monuments, burials and occupation evidence stretching from the Mesolithic to the Romano-British period and beyond (Barrett et al. 1991a,b;Green and Allen, 1997;Green 2000;French et al., 2007). During the early part of one of the author's (MG) fieldwalking surveys of the upper Allen valley in Cranborne Chase in 1972 the soil mark of a plough-flattened barrow was recorded on Canada Farm (Fig. 1). This feature lay approximately 20 metres north of the Dorset Cursus (the longest prehistoric monument in Britain at approximately 10km). In 2007 the featured was identified again by a fluxgate gradiometer survey (by PC) which revealed a section of the enclosing ditch and 2 additionally a large central anomaly interpreted as a possible grave pit (Fig 1c). Due to the continuing plough-induced erosion of the area a decision was made to excavate, with the resulting work taking place in 2009 and an interim report following in 2012 (Green, in Jones et al. 2012). The excavations uncovered two phases of ditch which partly impinged on one another. The first phase ditch consisted of a penannular ring with a diameter of 13 metres with a 4 metre wide gap to the west, partly filled by an elongated pit (F7). The ditch was about 1 metre wide with an average depth of 0.4 m. The inner ditch was also penannular in shape with a metre wide gap to the southwest and of a similar width -with an overall diameter of 11.5 metres. The surviving dept...
Magnetometry and Slingram electromagnetic surveys were conducted at the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Songo Mnara, Tanzania, as part of a multinational programme of investigation to examine the uses of space within and outside of this stonetown. The town was a major Islamic trading port during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The surveys detected significant evidence for the containment of activities within the town walls, and previously unknown anthropogenic activity was revealed between the existing coral rag buildings, as well as within the open areas inside the town. Over 40 areas of magnetic disturbance were identified that corresponded directly with areas of high magnetic susceptibility in the Slingram electromagnetic in-phase responses. On excavation many of these anomalies were found to correlate with wattle and daub structures, indicating a hitherto unidentified population, and the location of the anomalies also suggests a potentially deliberate delineation of space within the open areas of the stonetown. The combined results of the three geophysical data sets indicate that there are clear delineations in the use of space within Songo Mnara. This, coupled with the presence of industrial activities and evidence of more ephemeral occupation, neither of which had previously been recorded at the site, indicates that the pre-existing town plan is in need of significant reappraisal. The current plan, based upon the remains of extant and collapsed coral buildings, can now be updated to incorporate the more ephemeral aspects of Swahili sites, including activity areas, and notably, the homes of the 'hidden majority' of the population. The results establish the benefit of a combined approach at these sites, and demonstrate that further invasive and non-invasive exploration is required in order to fully exploit the significance of the role of geophysical techniques in understanding Swahili towns.
In order to systematically investigate the potential of conventional near surface geophysical techniques to locate waterlogged archaeological targets in peatlands, the authors applied four conventional geophysical methodsearth resistance, groundpenetrating radar (GPR), magnetic gradiometry and frequency domain electromagnetics (FDEM)to four lowland peat archaeological test sites in Great Britain. In this article we demonstrate that a Neolithic trackway was identified in the GPR data in Somerset, with likely 'proxy' detections of chemical changes showing up in both electrical and magnetic surveys. This was determined by a coring programme and inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES) multi-element analysis of peat samples to determine the relative concentrations of geophysically relevant chemical elements. Though no Bronze Age timbers were detected at Flag Fen, a post-Bronze Age agricultural landscape was identified in both the GPR and gradiometer surveys. We conclude that GPR has the greatest potential for archaeological geophysical prospection in peatland environments, but that electrical and magnetic methods can usefully be employed as secondary sources of information and should not be discounted from future research. Further, this article argues that better understandings must be developed of the impacts of geochemistry on geophysical data if we are going to realistically pursue 'whole landscape' surveys.
The process of archaeological excavation is one of destruction. It normally provides archaeologists with a singular opportunity to recognise, define, extract and record archaeological evidence: the artefacts, features and deposits present in the archaeological record. It is expected that when archaeologists are excavating in a research, commercial or forensic setting the methods that they utilise will ensure a high rate of evidence recognition and recovery. Methods need to be accepted amongst the archaeological and scientific community they are serving and be deemed reliable. For example, in forensic contexts, methods need to conform to scientific and legal criteria so that the evidence retrieved is admissible in a court of law. Two standard methods of grave excavation were examined in this study with the aim of identifying the better approach in terms of evidence recovery. Four archaeologists with a range of experience each excavated two similarly constructed experimental 'single graves' using two different excavation methods. Those tested were the arbitrary level excavation method and the stratigraphic excavation method. The results from the excavations were used to compare recovery rates for varying forms of evidence placed within the graves. The stratigraphic excavation method resulted in higher rates of recovery for all evidence types, with an average of 71% of evidence being recovered, whereas the arbitrary level excavation method recovered an average of 56%. Neither method recovered all of the evidence. These findings raise questions about the reliability and so suitability of these established approaches to excavation.
Reappraisal of an early 20th century excavation at the Cronk yn How round barrow near Ramsey in the Isle of Man suggests that a stone pair was demolished during the 3rd millennium BC to make way for a round barrow with a single central burial. It is suggested that one of the stones from the original pair was decorated with a series of motifs before being incorporated into the barrow. Some of the motifs used find parallels amongst later Neolithic incised rock art on the walls of tombs and houses, and on stone plaques. Other motifs, including what appear to be representations of deer, serve to expand the repertoire of known designs and highlight the potential of this kind of this rather understudied category of rock art. Parallels for the zoomorphic motifs can be found in Scandinavia. A review of other rock art within the Isle of Man revealed more than 70 recorded panels at 55 individual sites making this one of the more densely populated rock art landscapes in the west of Britain. Two main styles are represented, the passage-grave style, which includes the Cronk yn How Stone, and the cup-mark dominated style, or Galician Style. The latter accounts for more than 95% of recorded sites which accords well with what is known of the Isle of Man's cultural relationships during the 4th and 3rd millennia BC.
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