Contributions of Bayesian Phylogenetics to Exploring Patterns of Macroevolution in Archaeological Data

Gjesfjeld, Erik; Jordan, Peter

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-11117-5_9

Cited by 9 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 53 publications

(58 reference statements)

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“…Instead, we use established classification schemes for material culture, which draw on decades of previous work by experts using a variety of evidence. We also do not attempt to infer phylogenetic patterns of inheritance [19][20][21][22][23][24][25]; this is not necessary for our scale of analysis, and it can be difficult to infer in many cultural contexts [26]. Broadly speaking, our approach can be used whenever a classification scheme (technological, economic, social) with appropriate lineage-like properties has been created.…”

Section: Units Of Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

A quantitative workflow for modeling diversification in material culture

et al. 2020

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Questions about the evolution of material culture are widespread in the humanities and social sciences. Statistical modeling of long-term changes in material culture is less common due to a lack of appropriate frameworks. Our goal is to close this gap and provide robust statistical methods for examining changes in the diversity of material culture. We provide an open-source and quantitative workflow for estimating rates of origination, extinction, and preservation, as well as identifying key shift points in the diversification histories of material culture. We demonstrate our approach using two distinct kinds of data: age ranges for the production of American car models, and radiocarbon dates associated with archaeological cultures of the European Neolithic. Our approach improves on existing frameworks by disentangling the relative contributions of origination and extinction to diversification. Our method also permits rigorous statistical testing of competing hypotheses to explain changes in diversity. Finally, we stress the value of a flexible approach that can be applied to data in various forms; this flexibility allows scholars to explore commonalities between forms of material culture and ask questions about the general properties of cultural change.

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Section: Units Of Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

A quantitative workflow for modeling diversification in material culture

et al. 2020

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“…Archaeological artefact morphologies are likely to have even more complex substitution processes. There are recent signs of archaeologists exploring Bayesian inference as an alternative to parsimony for phylogenetics, albeit using only discrete characters (Buckley, 2012;Buckley and Boudot, 2017;Gjesfjeld and Jordan, 2019;Matthews et al, 2011). Taking inspiration from Mesoudi et al (2006)'s proposal of equivalence between evolutionary archaeology and palaeontology Figure 2 , we find recent phylogenetic work by palaeontologists to be relevant for overcoming the limitations of past archaeological work using discrete characters and parsimony.…”

Section: Figure 1: A: Summary Of Phylogenetic Methods and Tools Used ...mentioning

confidence: 88%

Bayesian inference of material culture phylogenies using continuous traits: A birth–death model for Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age arrowheads from Northwestern Europe

Marwick,

Matzig,

Riede

2023

Preprint

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The twentieth century saw two modes of thinking spread through biological systematics: population thinking and tree thinking. Many archaeologists investigating ancient technologies have adopted the population thinking approach for archaeological systematics, as evident from the rise of work on quantifiable, attribute-based patterns of diversity in studies of past technological systems, much of it driven by application of geometric morphometrics. Yet, tree thinking, as one of the central concepts of phylogenetic biology, remains rare in the archaeological sciences. We review some of the obstacles that have impeded the uptake of this concept by archaeologists. Some of these are conceptual, but we also identify one specific methodological obstacle: the prevailing use of discrete character traits in phylogenetic analysis. This is a major challenge for archaeological applications where standardised trait-analytical protocols are scarce. To address this challenge, we present a case study that demonstrates a Bayesian framework for inferring phylogenies using continuous traits derived from artefact shape coefficients obtained via outline based geometric morphometrics. We use a previously published sample of Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age arrowheads from Northwestern Europe to demonstrate the efficacy and accessibility of our approach. We also sketch out the potential for phylogenetic comparative methods to address archaeological questions. From https://github.com/benmarwick/bayesinfmatcultphylo

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“…BP) with simultaneous and significant re-configurations of the archaeological record, where the former highlights population decline and cultural loss, and the emergence of cultural novelties and parallel population growth and stability in the latter. In the case of the Late Mesolithic population decline, bayesian phylogenetics (Gjesfjeld and Jordan, 2019; Prentiss et al, 2022) applied to radiocarbon dated lithic assemblages from this region and time period would allow for a synchronised analysis of the results presented here. As for the Early and Middle Neolithic, eco-cultural niche models (Whitford, 2019) would allow for a better understanding of the potential limitations or opportunities of dispersal, and to what extent such might have been affected by changes in demography.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Living through changing climates: Temperature and seasonality correlate with population fluctuations among Holocene hunter-fisher-gatherers on the west coast of Norway

Lundström

2023

The Holocene

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The use of archaeological proxy records representative of population dynamics is paramount for a richer understanding of prehistoric cultural change, but its use require a dialectic assessment between proximate climatic drivers and ultimate cultural responses. Focusing on the Stone Age archaeological record of Western Norway (11,500–4300 cal. BP), this paper presents an exhaustive empirical curation and statistical testing between changing climates and demographic responses among coastal hunter-fisher-gatherers. The results connect long-term demographic fluctuations with changes in annual mean temperatures and seasonality and the results are discussed in relation changes in technology, subsistence and mobility. The paper also highlights the process of population decline and cultural loss towards the end of the Late Mesolithic (ca. 7000–6000 cal. BP) and emerging cultural novelties and population re-growth during the Early and Middle Neolithic (ca. 6000–4300 cal. BP). However, despite its strong correlation, the archaeological record of Western Norway lacks sufficient detail to ascribe an exclusive explanatory role to climate change, especially in episodes of significant population decline. This helps to emphasise that changing climates, while evidently central, form but a part of a larger system of interactions leading to demographic fluctuations and cultural change, the substantiation of which requires significant empirical improvements to the archaeological record.

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Contributions of Bayesian Phylogenetics to Exploring Patterns of Macroevolution in Archaeological Data

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Cited by 9 publications

References 53 publications

A quantitative workflow for modeling diversification in material culture

A quantitative workflow for modeling diversification in material culture

Bayesian inference of material culture phylogenies using continuous traits: A birth–death model for Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age arrowheads from Northwestern Europe

Living through changing climates: Temperature and seasonality correlate with population fluctuations among Holocene hunter-fisher-gatherers on the west coast of Norway

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