Archaeological Research in Asia

• Chemical analysis of ancient Chinese copper-based objects: Past, present and future

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: July 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volume 3
  
  Author(s): Ruiliang Liu, Peter Bray, A.M. Pollard, Peter Hommel
  
  The primary aim of this paper is to track the history of quantitative chemical analysis on Chinese copper-based metal objects and suggest a future outlook. The beginnings of this subject can be traced to the 1770s. Its overall history can be divided into five stages. By considering the different interpretational contexts in each of these stages, we show that all have made a significant contribution to our knowledge of the chemistry of copper alloy objects in China, and in broader terms to understanding the archaeology of China. Thanks to the sustained efforts of our predecessors, a substantial database of chemical and isotopic information has been created for present scholars, which we summarize here. We suggest, however, that this database contains a great deal of invaluable information which has yet to be fully explored. Moreover, given the scale of the Bronze Age in China, we also suggest that there is a great deal of more analytical work required before we can truly interpret the role of metal in Bronze Age Chinese society. This historical review also suggests that dialogue between related disciplines is a crucial factor in this area, and one which is vital in capitalizing the work already achieved. 
  
  
  
  
  
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• Moated sites of the Iron Age in the Mun River Valley, Thailand: New discoveries using Google Earth

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: July 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volume 3
  
  Author(s): Dougald J.W. O'Reilly, Glen Scott
  
  Archeological sites that are surrounded by moats in Northeast Thailand were identified in the early 20th century and have generated interest ever since. Subsequent research has revealed that these sites fluoresced during the Iron Age (c. 500B.C.–A.D. 600) but the purpose of the moats remains enigmatic. Pedestrian survey and aerial photographs have assisted in understanding the distribution of these sites across the landscape and has shown that they concentrate in the Mun and Chi Valleys of the Khorat Plateau. This paper presents the identification of 146 newly identified sites using Google Earth satellite imagery and identifies the presence of clusters of moated settlements in these regions through statistical analysis. 
  
  
  
  
  
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• The Buddhist occupation of Tchingiz Tepe (Termez, Uzbekistan) in the Kushan period through the ceramic contexts

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: July 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volume 3
  
  Author(s): Josep M. Gurt Esparraguera, Enrique Ariño Gil, Verònica Martínez Ferreras, Shakir R. Pidaev
  
  Termez was one of the great Buddhist religious centers in northern Bactria in the Kushan period, as evidenced by the notable monastic complexes sited in the city. The stratigraphic excavations and 14C analysis recently conducted at Tchingiz Tepe, in a monastic cell (sector RC) and in a space for worship (sector RA), provide new data on the complete occupational sequence. In the present study we examine the reliably dated pottery contexts from these two sectors, aiming to create a preliminary typological classification of the Kushan and early Kushano-Sasanian pottery from northern Bactria. The data related to the chrono-spatial context and all the formal, metric, decorative and functional attributes of the pottery wares were categorized and implemented in a database. By comparing the pottery from the two sectors we expected to ascertain the significance and functionality of the spaces and the formal evolution of the types between the mid-second and the mid-third centuries AD. We also compared the pottery with the vessels found in other monastic complexes at Termez (i.e. Kara Tepe) and in other contemporary sites from northern Bactria in order to assess the degree of singularity or standardization of the pottery types at a regional level. The study revealed that tableware (consisting mainly of reddish slipped cups, bowls, plates, platters and jars with or without burnishing, incised and stamped decorations), common wares (basins and storage pots), and large jars or containers were prevalent in the two sectors. Cooking wares appeared only in the monastic cell; in contrast to the high degree of technological standardization detected in the other wares, the cooking pots presented major formal and technological differences. However, all the pottery used at Tchingiz Tepe is consistent with the regional prototypes observed in other nearby sites, whether or not they were Buddhist religious centers. 
  
  
  
  
  
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• Relations between rock art and ritual practice: a case study from eastern India

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: July 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volume 3
  
  Author(s): Krishnendu Polley, Abhradip Banerjee, Arun Makal
  
  The ability of making art or artistic objects is one of the most important features of human being. The earliest evidence of artistic objects can be dated back to the Acheulian tradition of lower Paleolithic culture. Ethnographic evidences on the present day communities suggest that hunting, magic or ritual practices are the major causes behind the production of prehistoric arts. The present work attempts to find out relations between ritual practices and rock art production in a recently discovered prehistoric rock art site of eastern India. The supportive ethnographic data for the analysis of this rock art assemblage were largely unavailable. Due to this reason this study solely concentrates upon the arrangement, composition and context of the archeological assemblages and rock art itself to find out interrelations in between rock art and ritual structure. The outcome of the present work, with all its limitations, reveals that archaeological assemblages and context of a rock art site can give necessary information regarding the motives behind production of rock art. 
  
  
  
  
  
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• Editorial marking the inaugural issue of Archaeological Research in Asia

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: January–April 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volumes 1–2
  
  Author(s): Robert L. Bettinger
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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• Goals for Archaeological Research in Asia

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: January–April 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volumes 1–2
  
  Author(s): Anne P. Underhill
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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• Beyond culture history at Maski: Land use, settlement and social differences in Neolithic through Medieval South India

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: January–April 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volumes 1–2
  
  Author(s): Peter G. Johansen, Andrew M. Bauer
  
  The multicomponent site of Maski in northern Karnataka has long held a central position in the culture-historic narratives of archaeologists and historians alike. Yet since B.K. Thapar's correlation of archaeological deposits at Maski with Wheeler's culture history sequence in the 1950s, archaeological research at Maski has been largely absent. Our research at Maski has sought to build upon this important chronological foundation, expanding our understanding of late prehistoric social life by asking questions and collecting data that explore the entanglements of settlement, social life, land use and craft production during the South Indian Iron Age and Early Historic Periods. To date we have completed three seasons of archaeological survey in a 64km² area centered on the site of Maski and recoded 153 sites and numerous concentrations of “off-site” artifacts that are revealing temporally sensitive material patterning from which we can begin to address these objectives. Here we present preliminary patterns for Neolithic (3000–1200BC), Iron Age (1200–300BC), Early Historic (300BC–AD500), and Medieval (AD500–1600) period materials in the region. The results of the survey so far have documented significant temporally sensitive changes in the size, location, and distribution of settlement, metal production activities, agro-pastoral land use, and mortuary interments that point towards historical developments in regional land-use and socio-political practices. 
  
  
  
  
  
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• Burial ritual, agriculture, and craft production among Bronze Age pastoralists at Tasbas (Kazakhstan)

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: January–April 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volumes 1–2
  
  Author(s): Paula N. Doumani, Michael D. Frachetti, Rebecca Beardmore, Tekla M. Schmaus, Robert N. Spengler, Alexei N. Mar'yashev
  
  This article presents new archaeological research on the ritual and domestic life of pastoralists at the Bronze Age campsite Tasbas, Kazakhstan. We reconstruct the hitherto unrecorded economy of high mountain pastoralists who lived at the site from the mid-3rd to early 1st millennium B.C. We argue that within the broad dynamics of mountain pastoralism there is local variability as shown through multi-season residence, farming, and craft production. In bringing together multiple data sets to address how the site was used we 1) show that ceramics were locally produced with similar manufacture technology across eight centuries — which breaks significantly from the canonical cultural history and large-scale migration paradigms that have defined the regional archaeology for decades; 2) identify a new tradition of cremation ritual (3rd millennium B.C.), and; 3) present the earliest evidence (3rd millennium B.C.) for the local use of domesticated grains and then farming (2nd millennium B.C.) in northern Central Asia. We provide a unique case study to bear on debates concerning the relationship between long-term regional stability and technological innovations among early central Eurasian pastoralists. 
  
  
  
  
  
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• A report on the 2011–2012 excavation of Lovea: An Iron Age, moated settlement in Cambodia

  2015-09-11 18:52:43 PM

  Publication date: January–April 2015
  Source:Archaeological Research in Asia, Volumes 1–2
  
  Author(s): Dougald O'Reilly, Louise Shewan
  
  Archaeological mounds surrounded by moats and embankments are common in the Mun River valley of the Khorat Plateau in Northeast Thailand. Sites with a similar morphology have been identified in neighbouring Cambodia but they are far less common. While several of the Thai sites have been subject to investigation only one moated site, to date, has been excavated in Cambodia. This paper presents the findings of the recent excavations at Phum Lovea. 
  
  
  
  
  
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