Systems of Value and the Changing Perception of Metal Commodities, ca. 4000–2600<scp>bc</scp>

Stork, Leigh A.

doi:10.1086/679651

Cited by 19 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…The richness of goods in graves or hoards at Alaca Höyük, Horoztepe, and Eskiyapar has been mostly explained as elite groups controlling production and trade. The archival or sacrificial values of such ostentatious metals and their legitimacy through consumption of unique items have been discussed as important elements of value systems [ 21 – 23 ]. Arguments relating metals to elites are mostly based on the presence of fully flourishing trading activity in the early 2 nd millennium BC and the existence of certain nonlocal artifacts in Anatolia such as Syrian bottles, ivory, or lapis lazuli objects [ 4 ].…”

Section: The Archaeological Context: Social Inequality In the 3 ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Metal consumption of a middle-range society in the late 3rd millennium BC Anatolia: A new socioeconomic approach

Dardeniz

Yildirim

2022

PLoS ONE

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This article discusses the socioeconomic dynamics of metal consumption patterns in the 3rd millennium BC north-central Anatolian site of Resuloğlu (Çorum, Turkey). The socio-political structure of the site confirms a nonstate, socially complex community with a range of hierarchical and heterarchical expressions. This study presents the results of archaeological, compositional (n = 307), and isotopic (n = 45) analyses of the complete metal collection of Resuloğlu uncovered through two decades of systematic excavations with a well-established chronology. The elemental compositions of metal objects obtained with pXRF combined with lead isotope analysis denote a high diversity in alloy types and sources. The compositional analysis highlights the consumption of various binary and ternary alloys for different object types. The lead isotope ratios confirm the use of both in proximity to metallic sources and access to macro-regional trade extending from the Black Sea coast towards the Taurus Mountain range. The site appears as a part of linkages whereby goods and valuables were exchanged within decentralized networks of middle-range societies. The diversity in metal consumption suggests group-driven choices and networks rather than top-down control of social elites. This allows us to confront the conventional approach to the role of metals as the primary motivator for social complexity and inequality in all parts of the 3rd millennium BC Anatolia.

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Section: The Archaeological Context: Social Inequality In the 3 ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Metal consumption of a middle-range society in the late 3rd millennium BC Anatolia: A new socioeconomic approach

Dardeniz

Yildirim

2022

PLoS ONE

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“…A technological approach to metallurgy is visible in the other homelands of metallurgy, at the transition from the fifth to the fourth millennia bc . It is revealed by the small tools (chisels, awls, hooks and knives), weapons (projectile points, daggers, axes) or ornaments (rings, beads, pendants) produced in the earliest sites of extractive metallurgy (fifth millennium bc ) in Iran (Frame 2009), Anatolia and upper Euphrates (Stork 2013, 81; 2015, 117, 119), the Caucasus (Courcier 2014; Meliksetian 2011) and the Balkans (Antonovic 2002; Chernakov 2018; Jovanovic 2009). The absence of visible ritual dimension of metallurgy in these homelands, and the lack of processual artifacts, corroborate this premise.…”

Section: The Emergence Of the Technological Phasementioning

confidence: 99%

Cultural Metallurgy—A Key Factor in the Transition from the Chalcolithic to Bronze Age in the Southern Levant

Amzallag¹

2021

CAJ

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The causes of the disappearance of Late Chalcolithic society (Ghassulian) in the early fourth millennium bc remain obscure. This study identifies the collapse as the consequence of a change in the approach to metallurgy from cosmological fundament (Late Chalcolithic) to a practical craft (EB1). This endogenous transition accounts for the cultural recession characterizing the transitional period (EB1A) and the discontinuity in ritual practices. The new practical approach in metallurgy is firstly observed in the southern margin of the Ghassulian culture, which produced copper for distribution in the Nile valley rather than the southern Levant. Nevertheless, the Ghassulian cultural markers visible in the newly emerging areas of copper working (southern coastal plain, Nile valley) denote the survival of the old cosmological traditions among metalworkers of the EB1 culture. Their religious expression unveils the extension of the Ghassulian beliefs attached to metallurgy and their metamorphosis into the esoteric fundaments of the Bronze Age religions.

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“…In this contribution the adopted focus shifts from object to practice, from the use of metal-made artifacts in ritual contexts to the conferment of ritual symbolisms to metallurgical settings and practices. Building upon longstanding anthropological debates on the subject 2 , the primary aim is to trace ways in which ritual ontologies might 1 Among different examples, the increase of metal hoards and metalwork in funerary assemblages across Near Eastern societies during the 4th and 3rd millennia BC has been attentively studied by scholars in terms of the application of diverging systems of ritual and economic value (Stork 2015). Rather than a result of fluctuating access to raw materials and finished products, the deliberate removal of conspicuous quantities of metal from exchange and production networks (via hoarding and burial practices) has been seen as a direct reflection of the symbolic value of metal artifacts to mediate, impose, and/or express wealth and power by emerging elites in comparison to the more controlled investment through similar practices enacted during the MBA and LBA (Bachhuber 2011).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Smelting Metals, Enacting Rituals. The Interplay of Religious Symbolisms and Metallurgical Practices in the Ancient Eastern Mediterranean

Alberghina

2024

AsiAnA

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The archaeological discourse on the development of metallurgy in Anatolia, the Levant and, more generally, the Eastern Mediterranean region has extensively focused on crucial aspects such as procurement routes, technological developments, manufacturing strategies, and socio-economic connotations of metal consumption. On the other hand, potential symbolic and ritualistic aspects permeating mining and metal-making activities have rarely been taken into consideration, largely due to the ephemerality of such traditions and practices in the material record. Extensive studies have analyzed the ritual dimensions of iron and copper metalworking across different belief systems and social structures, from pre-industrial sub-Saharan Africa to pre-classical Andean cultures, from Bronze Age Central Europe to China. Drawing on the contemporary anthropological and archaeological debate on the subject, this contribution identifies and analyzes recurrent semantics of ritualization in metalworking processes, looking at different lines of epigraphic and material evidence from the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age Eastern Mediterranean. The aim is to discuss patterns of correlation between belief systems, ritual behavior, and socioeconomic organizations and to prompt more comprehensive analyses on the complementary technological and symbolic aspects of ancient metallurgical practices.

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Systems of Value and the Changing Perception of Metal Commodities, ca. 4000–2600bc

Cited by 19 publications

References 16 publications

Metal consumption of a middle-range society in the late 3rd millennium BC Anatolia: A new socioeconomic approach

Metal consumption of a middle-range society in the late 3rd millennium BC Anatolia: A new socioeconomic approach

Cultural Metallurgy—A Key Factor in the Transition from the Chalcolithic to Bronze Age in the Southern Levant

Smelting Metals, Enacting Rituals. The Interplay of Religious Symbolisms and Metallurgical Practices in the Ancient Eastern Mediterranean

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