The Wizard of Oz in reality?

Strolling through the archaeology magazine, I was lured in by the title of this article and was suckered into reading it. The thought of witchcraft is so mysterious in my books and well, when I saw the image of the shoe within the article, I instantly thought of the Wizard of Oz. Being one of my favourite movies of all time, how could I turn it down?

The site talked about in the article is called the Dritt Manion. Being unaware of this location, I researched it and found that it is located in York County, Pennsylvania. Also being so unfamiliar with the states in the U.S., I had to bring up a map to figure out the context in which the location of the mansion was in comparison to some Canadian cities.

The Dritt Mansion is a historic home that dates back to the mid 1700s.

The location of the Dritt Mansion in York County, PA, USA.

The article is quite interesting as it touches on subjects that aren't usually talked about. Some of the artifacts that were encountered within this mansion are a “W” carved in a wall, which leads to the attic, shoes in the walls, a flattened toad and a cat that appears as if it has been “freeze-dried.” Local archaeologist Jan Klinedinst discovered the “W” in the wall, which she claims looks a lot like the Volkswagen one. Research has apparently shown that this marking is indeed a ritual marking, “a symbol for the Virgirn Mary” which was “intended to protect the house against witches” said Klinedinst. The remainder of things found at the mansion, 10 years ago during an archaeological survey, Klinedinst are calling ritual marks. Klinedinst goes on to say that she believes the ritual marks are linked to the Hex symbols, which some believe were used to ward off evil.

A similar case to the Dritt Mansion is that of Schmucker Hall at the Lutheran Theological Seminary in Gettysburg, PA. Crews found some almost identical shoes – one of which was ritualistically cut – was concealed in a wall. Yet, the significance of these shoes is still unknown.

19th century shoe which was found inside a wall at Schmuck Hall at the Lutheran Theology Seminary.

It is also intriguing to see this side of the anthropological realm revealed… It is most definitely not talked about much and raises a lot of questions! This theme of witchcraft and rituals triggers my interest for further research on the ideas. The overall open-ended conclusion of the article also lures me in as it appears the mystery has not yet been solved!

The article can be found at the following site: http://www.ydr.com/history/ci_20215927/archeology-revealed-unusual-finds-at-dritt-mansion?source=most_viewed

The Dritt Mansion photos were taken from:

http://www.susquehannaheritage.org/aboutus/zimmermancenterforheritage.aspx

The map was taken from this site: http://landmarkhunter.com/138239-dritt-mansion/

Booze and Bling

          “If you wanted to get ahead in Iron-Age Central Europe you would use a strategy that still works today -- dress to impress and throw parties with free alcohol” (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2012).

This statement is whole-heartedly the best catcher I have ever come across. Why, you might ask? Well it is the perfect synthesis of humour and wit which clearly lures you into reading their article! None the less, that is not my task. I want to discuss this fascinating article!

Not only is this article wonderfully written, including many modern day analogies but it also includes some of the new modern day techniques that are used in the realm of archaeology. Not to mention, this article is also great testimony to the extraordinary work that comes from collaborations of University’s and other organizations.

Professor Bettina Arnold excavates Iron-Age burial mounds in southwest Germany of the Pre-Roman Celts. 

 The article talks about how the Pre-Roman Celtic people used to eagerly compete with their opponents for social and political status within their society, which was achieved with who-can-throw-the-best-party logic, through something Bettina Arnold, professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and co-director of the field excavation, calls “competitive feasting” (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2012). Some of the artifacts recovered from the site include things like vessels for alcohol, and pieces of personal adornment, such as bracelets and hairpins.

Looking at the vessels that had once contained alcohol, they were able to decipher what alcohol the people at the time were actually drinking, which is an obvious clue of the person’s social status. The article indicates that a honey-based wine, or mead, flavoured with herbs, which was made by the Celts themselves, would have been about middle rank, less than wine but more than beer. If the person had actual grape wine, it was a dead giveaway that the person of elite ranking. This is evident because grapes hadn’t been introduced yet to central Europe. Aside from the actual alcohol you consumed, the quantity was just as important as the quality. This conclusion was revealed with the unfolding of colossal cauldrons at the site, one of which could hold 10 pints!

The Celts were also have said to be the flashy fashionistas of the time period, coming from the Greeks and Romans. Despite the claims, it’s been really hard to prove, as cloth and leather don’t preserve. But because this site is so wonderful, they found some evidence of their swanky attitude and appearance!  Even though no bones did preserve, due the super acidic soil, the archaeologists on site were able to recover some hairpins, jewelry, weapons and clothing fasteners. One of the new techniques that is used in this article is casting fragile fossils or remains encased in blocks of earth and then placed in plaster and run through computerized scans. This technique was used to date these dainty artifacts.

Arnold also says that they "found fabulous leather belts in some of the high-status women's graves, with thousands of tiny bronze staples attached to the leather that would have taken hours to make.” She also states that she likes to call them the “Iron-Age Harley-Davidson biker chicks." This idea connects directly to Arnold’s next statement which insists that “"you could tell whether someone was male, female, a child, married, occupied a certain role in society and much more from what they were wearing." With these artifacts, they were able to work out the gender specific adornment. To their surprise, they were also able to save some of the textiles in the grave that were in close proximity with metal implements. From these samples, archaeologists were then able to recreate there colours and patterns of textiles with the use of microscopic inspection.

The article then strongly closes by saying “when you can actually reconstruct the costume, all of a sudden these people are ‘there’ – in three dimensions. They have faces. They can almost be said to have personalities at that point.” With modern day society and their very similar concepts to the Celts, in terms of bling and booze, will we be the exciting find for an archaeologist some day? 

This article can be found at the following website, which I strongly encourage you to read!

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/03/120319163710.htm

Kinship within Burials

Class discussions and lectures over the last week consisted of the theme of kinship. We looked at and discussed at length an article whose argument was that based on genetics, looking at dental morphology, age and sex, it is arguable that there are distinct and separate cemeteries based on kin groups in the Zuni settlement of Hawikku (Howell and Kintigh 1996). Considering that this paper was published in 1996, the dating methods are quite old and well, are out-dated (pardon the pun)! That being said I was on the look out for a more recent article, something that was published within the last 5 years, to compare some different approaches.

The more recent and relevant article that I found relating to burials and kinship is entitled “Kinship between burials from Grave Circle B at Mycenae revealed by ancient DNA typing” by A. Bouwman, K. Brown, J. Prag and T. Brown. Instead of focusing more on the statistics and dental traits like the older article, this one tends to focus more on the visible physical characteristics within the sites found. This article uses aDNA (ancient DNA) analysis to determine the relationships between all the individuals. This being said, the methods used in both articles are very different. The first paper is extremely dense with statistics of dental traits and lengthy compared to the simple explanation of genetic testing which produces the 4 different facial types as well as family relationships. I most definitely enjoyed the second article as I found it much simpler and quick to read through, unlike the first article. Although, since the article is so brief, it does leave a lot of room for questioning of their methods, results and conclusions.

In terms of approaches, the article published in 2008 obviously had the advantage of including some of the world’s newer approaches in archaeology. One of the newest tools that this article had the privilege of using is that of facial reconstruction. After taking bone samples and running the aDNA tests of individuals all while scrutinizing the skeletal remains, can the anthropologists at work can create a facial reconstruction of the individuals. This new approach is not only fantastic as it appeals to those visual learners but combines data with 2D skeletal pictures to create the best of both worlds.

This is a diagram indicating the facial reconstructions of individuals from different groups, indicating the 4 evident facial possibilities observed.

The Howell and Kintigh article that we analyzed in class can be found at the following website:

http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/openurl?issn=0002-7316&title=&volume=61&date=1996&issue=3&spage=537&

The newer article by Bouwman, Brown, Prag and Brown can be found at the following website:

http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/science/article/pii/S030544030800085X

The image provided was also taken from the Bouwman, Brown, Prag and Brown article, and can be found at the same link as above.

Jigsaw Mummies!

          With this weeks theme of lecture being kinship, I focused on finding an article to do with kinship! Through my search, I came across a compelling article that caught my attention. The article was entitled “Scottish prehistoric mummies made from jigsaw of body parts” and was published on the BBC News website, under the science and environment section.

This is a picture of one of the mummies found at the Scotland site.

The introduction of the article says that there were 4 bodies that were discovered in 2001 on South Uist, Scotland. The grabber of the article talks about how DNA testing on these mummies gave away that the mummies were actually composed of body parts from various different people and arranged to look like on person. Reading further on in the article it’s discovered that the mummies hadn’t been buried right after they were preserved! Extra testing revealed that the bodies had been placed in bogs for approximately a year to complete the mummifying process. After being mummified, it appears that the bodies, or mummies now, were buried in a fetal position. Yet, these bodies that were places in fetal position were not entirely of the same individual! For example, one of the females they found was comprised of 3 different people and even had the skull of a male. These bodies were also found within the foundations of abnormal Bronze Age terraced roundhouses. However, after some dating tests, all the bodies would have died 300-500 years before the houses were built.

Tying the article into the theme of kinship, it was thought that these mummies were related. Although, Professor Mike Parker of Stanford University does say that “these could be kinship components, they are putting lineages together, the mixing up of different people’s body parts seems to be a deliberate act.”

As intriguing as this article is though, it is also very apparent that this find still has a lot of research and interpretation to be done. That being said, I would like to see some more of the conclusions on this case once they are published!

To read the whole article and view the picture, you can go to this webpage:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14575729

Assessing Australia

         Using the rubric designed by fellow team member and myself, I will assess a website used by the general public that is related to our groups topic. This is very ingenious; as it will test our rubric-making abilities as well as generate any possible issues with the marking strategies we came up with or even show us some vital component that we are missing.

Below is a copy of our rubric that we constructed.

I chose a website entitled “The Aboriginal Memorial” which is by the National Gallery of Australia. The link to this website can we found at the bottom of the entry. Now breaking down the website into our rubrics categories, this is how I would grade it.

Organization: 4/4. The layout of the webpage is very clean and easy for the eye to follow, also giving the site a more professional look. All of the information is presented very appropriately with well-constructed paragraphs and subheadings.

Quality of Information: 4/4. All of the information discussed was relevant to the set topic. The writings include various examples and supporting details.

Cooperative Work: N/A. Since there is no way to tell who did what, who did and did not contribute to this website, the category can’t apply. In this case, I’ll exempt the category from the final score.

Content: 4/4. The information and theme of the website was clear and consistent throughout. No unnecessary or irrelevant information was presented.

Spelling and Grammar: 3/3. There were no spelling or grammar mistakes.

References: 1/4. This website was odd in the fact that it didn’t have any references. They did have a very small section on acknowledgements, but that was it. Within the acknowledgements, they did mention some of the people that they obtained data from, but lacked the specific details.

Total: 16/19 or 84.2%

Overall, I would say that the website is quite professional and informative. The clean layout of the website is very influential on the impression of the reader and leaves the reader with a positive experience. The inclusion of pictures is not only a pleasant plus, but also a useful tool. The information offered, although very interesting, is very questionable. The lack of source proof, the information could have all been fabricated for all we know!

My suggestion for improvement of this website would be to make sure that they use a proper method of referencing to cite their sources. With the verification of their sources, the reader can then be assured that the data is not counterfeit.

The website that was used to test the rubric can we found at http://nga.gov.au/AboriginalMemorial/home.cfm

First Gay Caveman?

            As of April last year there have been several reports in different newspapers around the globe about "the first homosexual caveman found." According to the article in the UK Telegraph "the male body – said to date back to between 2900-2500BC – was discovered buried in a way normally reserved only for women of the Corded Ware culture in the Copper Age. The skeleton was found in a Prague suburb in the Czech Republic with its head pointing eastwards and surrounded by domestic jugs, rituals only previously seen in female graves."

My initial reaction to the title was intrigue, as I hadn't really ever heard anything on the subject matter. After reading though several articles on the topic, I have come up with mixed emotions. The evidence presented by head archaeologist, Kamila Remisova, is quite believable as well as all of the information used in the argument validating that this being was a homosexual. One concern that I have with the article is the fact that it was flogged so fast on a global scale. Since the article was published so widely on a global scale as well as so rapidly, it makes me question the quality and bias of the article.

Having discussed the Corded Ware phase a lot in class, the assumptions made about this male seem to be rational. The fact the inhumation was oriented like that of a typical woman of the era makes sense that the archaeologists would assume that the person was a homosexual or transgender. I am quite curious as to this new information and would love to further research this very bold and affluent role that is very present in modern societies all the way back in history to the first emergences of the homosexual. Thinking about this controversial topic does also bring up many other questions but there are only so many judgments and conclusions that can be made about these things without being exposed to the culture. Since we have not been exposed to the social aspects of the society we can only guess as to the gendering of the man, but in actuality, who knows! For all we know, this burial could have been the result of miscommunication between members of the society at the time, or even an act of humiliation or punishment. As mentioned before with my concern of bias of this article, it is not the evidence that forces me to think that it could be bias, but the fact that homosexuality is so publicized in our existing society that it is possible the initial information from the anthropologists was mutated to cater to the taste of the media. The pictures below further support my thoughts as to the over glamorizing and glorifying of information.

This is what I think the media and general public thinks when they first hear of the article: 

When in actuality, this is what was really found: 

The Link to the article I focused on can be found through the following link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8433527/First-homosexual-caveman-found.html

The websites the pictures were taken from:

http://comediansofchelsealately.tumblr.com/post/4760978933/shesjustbeingrachie-gay-caveman-3-follow-on

http://popular-archaeology.com/issue/december-2011/article/archaeology-news-for-the-week-of-april-3rd

Monument Analysis of Infants within Ross Bay Cemetery

Upon entering the Ross Bay Cemetery, the astounding amount of graves becomes instantly overwhelming. Once my group partner, Courtney, and I had decided that we wanted our focus to be on infant graves, our first initial question was, is there any specific pattern(s) of placement for infant graves? After posing this question, the purpose of the map of Ross Bay Cemetery is to plot the placement of the infant graves we had chosen to examine and then analyze this data so we are able to come to some conclusions.

The scope of our dataset was infants and children within the cemetery. The limitations we had to consider was the fact that we were only a group of two, so we couldn’t have a large of monuments to analyze, causing us to limit ourselves to thirteen graves. The reasoning for picking these thirteen graves was completely random; we roamed the cemetery and simply stopped to record the first thirteen we came across. Compared to the other monuments at the cemetery, infant graves are few in numbers, that being said, we did not have to have a thoroughly confined or defined scope.

One of my research questions that came about when looking at these monuments was, are there symbolic aspects behind the features on some of the grave stones? If so, what are they? Another question that arose while meandering through the cemetery was, is social status evident within the cemetery?

The main research question that I wanted to answer was, is there any specific pattern(s) of placement for infant graves? After examining the graves and then plotting them online, on a map, it is quite evident that there is no particular section set aside solely for infant plots. Although, we did come across some graves that were clustered and in close proximity to each other, that was the closest visible representation to a section we detected. Below is a picture of the plotted monuments we studied in the cemetery, for further clarity. From our observations, we learned that it was the result of random occurrences rather than the pre-determined congregation of infant mortality.

My second research question was, are there symbolic aspects behind the features on some of the grave stones? If so, what are they? Once we had combined all of the images of the monuments we looked at, the different symbols that we came across were: a cross, a crown and cross, drapery of fabric, a lamb, a scroll and a vacant chair. After researching the symbolism of these different figures, the Association of Gravestone Studies revealed the meaning behind all but one of these figures. According to the Association of Gravestone Studies, the cross poses as a symbol of “religious faith; resurrection” (2005), which is quite sensible, seeing as the grave we looked at with a cross on it was in the religious Roman Catholic section.  The symbolism of the crown and cross represents “sovereignty of the Lord; triumph over death” in addition to “Christian faith” (2005). The drapery of fabric symbol illustrates the “mourning; death; sorrow” (the Association of Gravestone Studies, 2005). The figure of a lamb on a monument symbolizes the “innocence of a child; a Lamb of God” (the Association of Gravestone Studies, 2005).  The use of lambs on the two monuments we looked at makes perfect sense, as they were both in the Roman Catholic section of the cemetery in addition to the extremely young age at the time of death. The age of the gravestones are also from the same time frame, explaining the stylistic similarities. The presence of a scroll on a gravestone is apparently the “decorative way of presenting inscription” and/or the symbol of a “bible reference” (the Association of Gravestone Studies, 2005). This use of the scroll seems perfectly logical as the grave was placed in the Roman Catholic section. The symbolism of the vacant chair was not found through the information from the Association of Gravestone Studies, but was found on the Grave Addiction website. As claimed by the Grave Addiction site, the symbolism of a vacant chair “usually symbolizes the death of a child”(2003).

The snapshot below is a visual summary of all the different symbols that were reviewed. The symbolic representation examples from left to right are: a cross, a scroll with a lamb on the top, a cross and crown, drapery of fabric, and a vacant chair.

Another question that arose while meandering through the cemetery was, is social status evident within the cemetery? Not being able to appraise the human remains as well as not being able to see the grave goods that the individual is buried with, makes evaluating the social status of the individual extremely difficult. Despite the fact that we are ethically not able to assess the remains of these humans, we are able to use some other tangible aspects to depict the social standing of the individual. As we discussed in class time, like with the story Funeral of a Rus (Viking Answer Lady, 2012), it is extremely hard for Archaeologists to determine and interpret several cultural traditions even with material evidence. One factor that is evident of social status within the Ross Bay Cemetery is its divided sections. It is not tremendously stratified to the extent that every section within the cemetery has a specific rank, but rather that all the sections are on par with each other and the Potter’s field portion is the poorest, therefore lowest social standing. An additional depiction of social status among grave monuments is the type of inscription technique and the amount of detail that the markers possess. The more detailed the memorial, it can be said that the more time and therefore money was put towards this person, making them of higher status. This is very similar to the practices talked about in the journal article Mortuary practices in Bam after the earthquake. It was said in the article that “gravestones are [a] sign of the socioeconomic status of the deceased as well as that of his or her family” (Garazhian and Papoli Yazdi, 2008). A confirmation to this statement is shown with the graves decoration and design. In essence, the more ornamented the gravestone, the higher the social status of the individual/relatives, just like our examples from Ross Bay Cemetery.

These two monuments of the thirteen looked at, make for a clear distinction between individuals of low and high social standing. The gravestone on the left is of lower social status, which is clearly marked with the lack of detail, plain style and simple shape. The monument on the right is of higher social standing than that on the left as it is quite detailed, carved and constructed into an elaborate, unique shape. The fact that the whole “chair” component of the monument is then set on an additional table of stone, setting it higher off of the ground is odd and further sets it apart, distinguishing it’s high status.

My groups Monument Analysis of Infants within Ross Bay Cemetery map along with all the monuments pictures and descriptions can be found by clicking on this link.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jjabarton/sets/72157629205969831/map/

Works Cited:

The Association of Gravestone Studies, 2005. FAQ. [online] Available at: <http://www.gravestonestudies.org/faq.htm#Symbolism on Gravestones> [Accessed 17 February 2012].

Garazhian, O., Papoli Yazdi, L., 2008. Mortuary practices in Bam after the earthquake: An ethnoarchaeological study. Journal of Social Archaeology, 8 (1), 94-109.

Grave Addiction, 2003. Gravestone symbolism. [online] Available at: <http://www.graveaddiction.com/symbol.html> [Accessed 17 February 2012].

Viking Answer Lady, 2012. Risala: Ibn Fadlan’s account of the Rus. [online]  Available at: <http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/ibn_fdln.shtml#Risala> [Accessed 17 February 2012].