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Funds for the research were generously provided by the Loeb Classical Library Foundation, Gerda Henkel Foundation, American Philosophical Society, Etruscan Foundation, Fondazione Lemmermann, University of Michigan and University of St Andrews. The lead author wrote this article while supported by an Early Career Fellowship from the Leverhulme Trust. A geoarchaeological coring survey of the Forum Boarium has shed considerable light on Rome's archaic landscape. We present the first empirical evidence that substantiates ancient and modern assumptions about the existence of a river harbour and ford in early Rome. Prior to the growth of the city, the riverbank-reconstructed as a high ledge at the base of the Capitoline Hill and a low-lying shore north of the Aventine-was particularly advantageous for river-related activities. However, the river valley changed significantly in the sixth century b.c.e., as a result of complex fluvial processes that were arguably spurred by urbanisation. Around the beginning of the Republic, Rome's original harbour silted up, and a high, wide riverbank emerged in its place. The siltation continued until the Forum Boarium was urbanised in the mid-Republic. In order to build their city and maintain river harbour operations, the Romans therefore had to adapt to dynamic ecological conditions. Publisher PDF

– Comprehensive geophysical assessment of huge pits; ERT, GPR, mag and EM. – Novel approach to testing and interpreting pits via coring. – Largest pit circuit confirmed in both the Stonehenge landscape and the UK. Publisher PDF

This study was funded by BA/Leverhulme Small Research Grants 2017-18 Round. Norse place-names for farms, individual landscape features and general landscape areas are ubiquitous throughout the Orkney Islands. These have an origin during the mediaeval period AD790–1350 when Orkney was ruled by Scandinavian earls. The oldest referenced maps for the parish of Harray (West Mainland, Orkney) suggests that in the past significant waterways crossed wetlands extending between the Loch of Harray and Houseby in an area associated with the earldom power base at Birsay. Subsequent drainage projects, changes in climate and sea level have since resulted in the loss of the waterways. An investigation of the wetlands using geophysical and geological analysis provided a reconstruction of the palaeo-environments. Comparison with place-names of significance allowed interpretation of possible routeways along navigable waters by shallow-draught Viking-Age vessels. The results allow for re-drawing the map of Norse Orkney and postulation of produce transfer corridors from estates in the south to the power centre at Birsay. Postprint

The authors would also like to acknowledge the support of the National Science Foundation, specifically the Arctic Social Sciences Program, and RANNIS (The Icelandic Center for Research). Archaeological records provide a unique source of direct data on long-term human-environment interactions and samples of ecosystems affected by differing degrees of human impact. Distributed long-term datasets from archaeological sites provide a significant contribution to establish local, regional, and continental-scale environmental baselines and can be used to understand the implications of human decision-making and its impacts on the environment and the resources it provides for human use. Deeper temporal environmental baselines are essential for resource and environmental managers to restore biodiversity and build resilience in depleted ecosystems. Human actions are likely to have impacts that reorganize ecosystem structures by reducing diversity through processes such as niche construction. This makes data from archaeological sites key assets for the management of contemporary and future climate change scenarios because they combine information about human behavior, environmental baselines, and biological systems. Sites of this kind collectively form Distributed Long-term Observing Networks of the Past (DONOP), allowing human behavior and environmental impacts to be assessed over space and time. Behavioral perspectives are gained from direct evidence of human actions in response to environmental opportunities and change. Baseline perspectives are gained from data on species, landforms, and ecology over timescales that long predate our typically recent datasets that only record systems already disturbed by people. And biological perspectives can provide essential data for modern managers wanting to understand and utilize past diversity (i.e., trophic and/or genetic) as a way of revealing, and potentially correcting, weaknesses in our contemporary wild and domestic animal populations. Postprint

Efforts to date the oldest modern human fossils in eastern Africa, from Omo-Kibish1-3 and Herto4,5 in Ethiopia, have drawn on a variety of chronometric evidence, including 40Ar/39Ar ages of stratigraphically associated tuffs. The ages that are generally reported for these fossils are around 197 thousand years (kyr) for the Kibish Omo I3,6,7, and around 160-155 kyr for the Herto hominins5,8. However, the stratigraphic relationships and tephra correlations that underpin these estimates have been challenged6,8. Here we report geochemical analyses that link the Kamoya's Hominid Site (KHS) Tuff9, which conclusively overlies the member of the Omo-Kibish Formation that contains Omo I, with a major explosive eruption of Shala volcano in the Main Ethiopian Rift. By dating the proximal deposits of this eruption, we obtain a new minimum age for the Omo fossils of 233 �� 22 kyr. Contrary to previous arguments6,8, we also show that the KHS Tuff does not correlate with another widespread tephra layer, the Waidedo Vitric Tuff, and therefore cannot anchor a minimum age for the Herto fossils. Shifting the age of the oldest known Homo sapiens fossils in eastern Africa to before around 200 thousand years ago is consistent with independent evidence for greater antiquity of the modern human lineage10., Leverhulme Trust Cambridge-Africa ALBORADA Research Fund SFI award 13/RC/2092

Palaeoenvironmental and historical approaches have often been used separately to investigate past land-use change, but they are still rarely combined, especially in places where the most suitable archives are sediment sequences. Here we used a transdisciplinary approach combining a multiproxy palaeoenvironmental study of two pedosedimentological sequences around a medieval Benedictine abbey at Samos in north-west Spain. A robust chronology was built using OSL apparent ages, conventional OSL and radiocarbon ages and used to date geochemical and palynological proxies which were then analysed alongside an exhaustive historical review of medieval and modern ecclesiastical records. The aims were to reconstruct the agrarian history of the place in a diachronic way and to deepen understanding of the interplay between palaeoenvironmental and historical sources. We demonstrate the potential value of using geoarchaeology, palynology and written sources together to address both the physical and socioeconomic aspects of land-use change., This research was funded by TERPOMED (2016-PG065) and ECOLOC (EUR2021-122009) projects funded by the Galician and Spanish governments. Innes Audrey, support staff at University of Aberdeen, assisted with pollen extracts preparation. Noemí Silva Sánchez is funded by a Juan de la Cierva-Formación Grant from the Spanish Government (ref: FJC2018-036266-I).

Authors acknowledge funding to RS from NSF under the Comparative Island Ecodynamics grant (no: 1202692). Medieval settlements in Iceland and Greenland were vulnerable to changes in spring (April-June) snow cover duration and depth. These would have adversely affected the viability of their pastoral farming systems, but the impact would have been spatially variable. We use a physical-based model of snow distribution and melt to model spring snow cover and depth at a scale relevant to human activities across four sites: southern and northern Iceland, and inner and middle fjord sites in South Greenland, using both present day and simulated climate data from the HadCM3 GCM-model. Our climate scenarios cover the period CE 1000–1500, encompassing a climate shift to cooler conditions. We find that under average present climate conditions the inner fjord site in Greenland has similar spring snow conditions to sites in Iceland, but that the middle fjord site has notably greater snow cover, and as climate cools spring snow cover at this site becomes extensive (>60 days). The largest increase in snow cover duration between current average climate conditions and the coolest climate scenarios (47 days increase) is experienced at our Iceland sites. Inner and middle fjord sites in Greenland diverge in terms of snow cover under all scenarios, a potential driver of the growing importance of marine wild resources and the end of the Norse Greenland settlement. Publisher PDF

AOC Archaeology Group would like to thank Historic Environment Scotland for funding the work. Human remains uncovered across Atlantic Scotland have displayed a variety of burial rites practised throughout the Iron Age. An excavation on the island of Islay, as part of the Historic Environment Scotland Human Remains Call-Off Contract, has uncovered a crouched inhumation eroding out of sand dunes near the western shore of Loch Gruinart. Osteological analysis of the skeleton revealed it is that of an adult male, aged between 26 and 35 years. The body was found in a crouched position on its left-hand side, aligned south-east to north-west, with the head raised up and turned to face the west. No artefacts or grave goods were found in association with the burial. Radiocarbon dating has established that the remains relate to the Mid-Iron Age. The evidence uncovered here adds to the evolving narrative of the nature and date of the varying burial rites practised throughout this region during the Iron Age. Publisher PDF

We review the sampling and results of the radiocarbon dating of the archaeological cloth known as the Shroud of Turin, in the light of recent statistical analyses of both published and raw data. The statistical analyses highlight an inter-laboratory heterogeneity of the means and a monotone spatial variation of the ages of subsamples that suggest the presence of contaminants unevenly removed by the cleaning pretreatments. We consider the significance and overall impact of the statistical analyses on assessing the reliability of the dating results and the design of correct sampling. These analyses suggest that the 1988 radiocarbon dating does not match the current accuracy requirements. Should this be the case, it would be interesting to know the accurate age of the Shroud of Turin. Taking into account the whole body of scientific data, we discuss whether it makes sense to date the Shroud again.

The work was supported by Historic Environment Scotland (Grant Title: ‘Final publication and archiving of Uig Landscape Project’; PI: MJC), Durham University and the University of Edinburgh. This paper considers the timing and mechanisms of deforestation in the Western Isles of Scotland, focusing in particular on the landscape around the Calanais stone circles, one of the best preserved late Neolithic/early Bronze Age monumental landscapes in north-west Europe. We present new archaeological and palaeoenvironmental evidence from a soil and peat sequence at the site of Aird Calanais, which spans the main period of use of the Calanais circles. We then draw on a new synthesis of archaeobotanical and palynological evidence from across the Western Isles and a review of comparable data from the wider North Atlantic zone, before assessing the role of early farming communities in clearing the wooded landscapes of the region. Pollen and radiocarbon dating at the site of Aird Calanais reveal that a layer of birch branches, dating to the late Neolithic (2912-2881 cal bc), was contemporaneous with a decline in woodland at the site, as well as with the major phase of Neolithic activity at the Calanais stone circle complex. However, our synthesis of the pollen and plant macrofossil evidence from across the Western Isles suggests that the picture across these islands was altogether more complex: woodlands declined both before, as well as during, the Neolithic and deciduous woodlands remained sufficiently abundant for Neolithic fuel procurement. Finally, we consider the implications of the results for understanding the interactions between first farmers and woodlands in the wider North Atlantic region. Publisher PDF

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Nothing has so characterized the British School at Rome's approach, from its inception, as the commitment to landscape archaeology in one form or another. This paper discusses the origins of this commitment in the work of Thomas Ashby, but focuses on the major contribution of J.B. Ward-Perkins and the South Etruria Survey. This survey is set in the context both of intellectual developments in landscape archaeology, and the specific circumstances of the BSR, and its Director, after the Second World War. The article traces the impact of this work on subsequent landscape archaeology. Postprint

This work was supported by the Max Planck Society, the Leverhulme Trust (through a Leverhulme prize to C.S.), the Mäxi Foundation Zurich (to F.R.), and the National Science Foundation (BCS-1516633 to C.W.). During the European Middle Ages, the opening of long-distance Asian trade routes introduced exotic goods, including ultramarine, a brilliant blue pigment produced from lapis lazuli stone mined only in Afghanistan. Rare and as expensive as gold, this pigment transformed the European color palette, but little is known about its early trade or use. Here, we report the discovery of lapis lazuli pigment preserved in the dental calculus of a religious woman in Germany radiocarbon-dated to the 11th or early 12th century. The early use of this pigment by a religious woman challenges widespread assumptions about its limited availability in medieval Europe and the gendered production of illuminated texts. Publisher PDF

Despite its closure prior to the beginning of the 21st century, echoes of the county and district asylum system still remain across Britain. These grand architectural monoliths housed hundreds of people in various sites at their peak, across the countryside of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, and offered care to mental health patients for over a century. Despite this, many will know the asylum complexes from whistle-blower accounts or newspaper articles declaring them unfit for purpose and highlighting incidents where negligence was commonplace. Furthermore, the fictional renditions of asylums in films, novels and video games has resulted in a lingering disparity between the asylums’ heritage, and the history as more commonly depicted and digested by the public. The cultural perception of asylums is such that the sites now act as a focal point for perceived wrongdoing in past mental health care. Consequently, the sites retain a negative ambiance, brought about by the stigma shown towards these vast institutions, now lying derelict. This thesis will focus on the architecture of the asylum buildings, which will allow a discussion in to the stigma of asylums and the extent to which it is unfounded, instead based on the fictional portrayal of the asylum sites, and not the institutions themselves.

Funding for this project wasprovided by the Etruscan Foundation, Fondazione Lemmermann, and the University of Michigan. Following a brief discussion of the literature and intellectual history of Rome’s river port, this article presents preliminary results from a mechanized coring survey of the Forum Boarium valley. Conducted in 2015, this survey produced empirical evidence on prehistoric human activity Rome’s floodplain and acquired substantial data on the paleolandscape of the region, including the shifting position of the Tiber River and the discovery of lacustrine deposits in the valley. Additionally, consideration is given to the advantages and limitations posed by the natural landscape during the origins of settlement and early urban development at Rome. Publisher PDF

Excavations at Les Varines were funded by Jersey Heritage through the States of Jersey Tourism Development Fund (https://www.gov.je/Leisure/Events/TourismDevelopmentFundTDF/pages/abouttdf.aspx) in 2013-15 and in 2017 (BS received the funding), by the British Museum research fund in 2016-18 (https://www.britishmuseum.org/research) (Grant nos EC164/EC208) (BS received the funding), in 2016 by British Academy (https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk) small grant SG152868 (CC received the funding) and Society of Antiquaries (https://www.sal.org.uk/) Research Grants R121086 in 2017 and BH181355 in 2018 (CC received the funding). Funding from the Universities of Manchester, Southampton and UCL supported student training at the excavation. Silvia Bello’s work was part of the ‘Human Behaviour in 3D’ Project funded by the Calleva Foundation. Beccy Scott’s work was also supported by the Calleva foundation (Pathways to Ancient Britain project). The Upper Palaeolithic is characterised by the appearance of iconographic expressions most often depicting animals, including anthropomorphic forms, and geometric signs. The Late Upper Palaeolithic Magdalenian saw a flourishing of such depictions, encompassing cave art, engraving of stone, bone and antler blanks and decoration of tools and weapons. Though Magdalenian settlement exists as far northwest as Britain, there is a limited range of art known from this region, possibly associated with only fleeting occupation of Britain during this period. Stone plaquettes, flat fragments of stone engraved on at least one surface, have been found in large quantities at numerous sites spanning the temporal and geographical spread of the Magdalenian, but they have been absent so far from the archaeological record of the British Isles. Between 2015 and 2018, ten fragments of stone plaquettes extensively engraved with abstract designs were uncovered at the Magdalenian site of Les Varines, Jersey, Channel Islands. In this paper, we report detailed analyses of these finds, which provide new evidence for technologies of abstract mark-making, and their significance within the lives of people on the edge of the Magdalenian world. These engraved stone fragments represent important, rare evidence of artistic expression in what is the far northern and western range of the Magdalenian and add new insight to the wider significance of dynamic practices of artistic expression during the Upper Palaeolithic. Publisher PDF

This thesis carries out a palaeoepidemiological study examining the representation of pathological conditions from an 18th-19th Century Gloucester skeletal collection (13/83). This skeletal assemblage contains 82 individuals, including 37 burials from a non-parochial church (Southgate Congregational Church) and 45 burials from Gloucester Infirmary (GI). Biological profiling was carried out to determine sex, estimate age-at-death and stature of individuals to aid in palaeoepidemiological study. This information was compared to the biological information obtained from the 1784-1837 burial register of Southgate Congregational Church (SCC). Significant differences were identified between the known age at death of the individual in the register and the age estimations of the church burials. This may be due to age bias in techniques applied in biological anthropology specifically as there is difficulty in ageing adults over 50 years. There was a significant difference in the numbers of adult males and females between SCC and GI cemeteries. There was also a significant difference age-at-death estimation between the SCC and GI. The high representation of subadults within the church cemetery compared to the Infirmary may contribute to this. Therefore different cemetery organisation is indicated by these results. Pathologies were categorised into groups for analysis, these were dental and skeletal pathologies (Trauma, congenital, joint, infectious, metabolic and neoplastic conditions). The frequencies of dental and skeletal pathologies were higher in Gloucester Infirmary. However, this was only found to be statistically significant in the dental and traumatic conditions. This was expected due to individuals within Gloucester Infirmary receiving treatment prior to death and suffering general poorer health than individuals from Southgate Congregational Church. Metabolic and neoplastic conditions were found in similar frequencies indicating that these conditions affected the individuals of Gloucester equally. Trends showed increased risk of infectious and metabolic conditions compared to earlier populations. Joint conditions were the most common group of skeletal conditions recorded in the 13/83 skeletal assemblage. The 18th-19th century saw great social economic changes within Britain. This was the also that case in Gloucester, although skeletal analysis indicated that this was less extreme than in larger cities. Access to universal health care and control of infectious disease within the modern population has led to longer life expectancies and therefore different disease prevalence with such as increases in cancer, osteoporosis, diabetes mellitus, and secondary pathologies. These increases are predicted to continue with the emergence of new and old infectious conditions arising as a result of antibiotic resistance and global pandemics.

Sequencing of ancient DNA with low preservation is still a major challenge, despite the immense progress that the field of ancient genetic studies has made since its inception over thirty years ago. The main aim of this study was to reassess the DNA preservation of ancient medieval material from Poulton, Cheshire, UK, using standard dsDNA library preparation methods. We targeted cementum of teeth as the optimal substrate for DNA extraction, along with long bones for comparison. A second aim, using a newer single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) library method, namely Capture and Amplification by Tailing and Switching (CATS) was also tested for the potential of isolating/obtaining higher levels of endogenous DNA from Poulton material. Ten libraries built by the double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) method were sequenced successfully, displaying well-preserved DNA with good potential for high- coverage genome studies. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and haplogroup data suggests that the Poulton samples group within modern European variation, though with some affinity to Southeastern Europe relative to modern British people. Sex determination of the Poulton samples presented four males and three females. The ssDNA CATS method holds potential for further development, but in our study did not perform better than the standard dsDNA library preparation method. We also compared the sequence quality of samples that were washed upon excavation with samples that were not washed. These results highlighted the sensitivity of ancient samples to washing and importance of following up-to-date guidelines for optimal protection of DNA in excavated ancient material.

Nonmetric traits (NMTs) are often used by osteoarchaeologists in the study of human variation. Some NMTs are affected by environmental factors whereas others are genetic in origin. Such genetic variants have long been used to support the hypotheses on the history and divergence of human populations suggesting that some population groups can be genetically distinguished. However, when genetic NMTs occur in higher than expected frequency these can be interpreted as possible indicators of relatedness. This method is applied to a sample of 977 individuals from the Medieval Poulton Chapel, St. Owen’s Church and Norton Priory Collections, U.K. One hundred and twenty-six cranial and postcranial NMTs were examined to determine: 1) the prevalence, 2) whether there are significant differences between the sexes and/or by age category, 3) if there is variation in mechanical and genetic NMT frequency between the three samples and, 4) to explore possible familial relationships through hierarchal cluster analysis and burial spatial distribution. It is thought that family members are often buried near one another, suggesting that individuals sharing similar genetic NMTs would be buried within close proximity to each other. This thesis has revealed the frequency of 126 NMTs for each sample. No significant differences were reported between the sexes at Poulton Chapel whereas significant differences were noted at St. Owen’s Church and Norton Priory, especially for NMTs considered genetic in origin. For all samples, significant differences were found among the age categories. Intra-populational differences were explored between the three samples. The results of these comparisons highlight that 60 NMTs are shared between the Poulton Chapel and Norton Priory Collection, while St. Owen’s Church only shares few traits with both sites. This suggests a probable geographical north-south divide between the three sites. Finally, the hierarchal cluster analysis identified probable familial relationships for the Norton Priory sample. This is supported by the burial spatial distribution and historical documentary evidence. Unfortunately, this analysis was unsuccessful for St. Owen’s Church with limited results for the Poulton Chapel sample. Future research is required to incorporate aDNA analysis to confirm the likelihood of familial links within these sites, supporting the use of certain NMTs is the use of establishing familial relationships.

A holistic approach to palaeopathological studies using historical documentation and clinical, archaeological and epidemiological literature can provide important information as to the health, lifestyles, socioeconomic and occupational status of individuals from the past. Applying this approach, the study provides an overview and comparative analysis of the spinal health of two contemporaneous British skeletal samples from the medieval period; St Owen’s Cemetery, an urban based population from Gloucester (n=68) and Poulton a rural, agrarian community from Cheshire (n=70). Sex and age at death were estimated using a variety of osteological techniques and descriptive statistics and Chi-square statistical tests were computed to identify and assess inter- and intra-population differences. Although some significant differences were observed, both skeletal samples had similar types and anatomical locations of the pathological conditions observed. St Owen’s Cemetery exhibits higher frequencies of degenerative conditions and vertebral fractures, whereas Poulton displays higher frequencies of congenital conditions such as lumbosacral anomalies and cervical vertebral synostosis (possible Klippel-Feil Syndrome). Age of onset of degenerative conditions is markedly earlier in Poulton indicating occupational status from a younger age than their contemporaries in St Owen’s. Females are more affected by degenerative conditions and vertebral fractures than the males in both samples. The frequency of the aforementioned conditions increases dramatically with age suggesting the fractures could be related to osteoporosis. Significant differences were observed between population samples in the frequency of osteoarthritis in the thoracic segment of middle adult males and females in which St Owen’s exhibit double the amount. This indicates that biomechanical stresses were more likely to have been placed on the thoracic segment such as carrying heavier loads and repetitive bending and twisting in a singular occupational role in an urban setting such as a craft (cordwainer) or working for a merchant guild. Frequency of infectious lesions is comparable in both samples, indicating similar exposure to pathogens albeit there may be differences in the type of infections present. Males are more affected than the females in the rural sample suggesting that pathogens in the soil and livestock may be the cause of the lesions observed. The findings of this study are generally consistent with other published data, although frequency of vertebral trauma in the urban sample far exceeds other contemporary sites. The study presented here provides a glimpse into medieval life in both the large town and the rural farming community in the British Isles. Further studies include comparing data from more contemporary urban and rural populations to produce a more holistic study on medieval health and lifestyle in the British Isles including further analysis of larger skeletal samples from Poulton and St Owen’s. Additional observation of complete skeletons including body mass and stature and radiographic analyses will give further supportive evidence for some diagnoses.

This thesis surveys the ninth-century metallic threads decorating silks discovered at Famen temple in Shaanxi province, China. In this research, metallic threads decorating Famen silks have been studied and documented in detail in order to understand how they were produced and how they were applied. Samples of metallic threads were selected and optical microscope and SEM/EDS were used to determine their morphology and composition. Problems regarding the current terminology used to describe metallic threads are briefly considered, and a systematic renaming of different types of metallic threads is suggested. Analysis results show that most Famen metallic threads were made of gold strips without substrate wound around a fibrous core, and that very few are silver strips without substrate wound around a fibrous core. Silver strips with paper substrate wound around a fibrous core are found among Famen silks, providing very early examples of this type of metallic thread in the world. Technical evidence demonstrates that the Famen metallic strips were cut from hammered metallic foil. It was found that metallic threads of different metal composition with different physical characteristics were selected according to the decoration techniques used and the function of the silks. The use of metallic threads with different grades of evenness in dimension and morphology for different decoration techniques was also found. The gold contents of these gold threads are all very high, and the thicknesses of the gold strips are large. All these characteristics are probably related to the function of Famen silks as objects of Buddhist worship that had been donated to the temple by members of the Tang imperial family and other high-ranking people. Technical investigation into the manufacture of modern traditional Chinese metallic threads was carried out in this research. Combined with analysis of the morphological, structural, and material nature of Famen metallic threads, the key technical characteristics of modern traditional metallic threads were found, which provided important evidence for deducing the manufacturing techniques of Famen metallic threads. Successful reconstructive experiments that produced metallic threads similar to Famen metallic threads were carried out in the laboratory by the author. The use of other known related techniques to produce Famen metallic threads was eliminated on technical grounds. With the above evidence, the manufacturing of Famen metallic threads, especially how the metallic strips were wound around the fibrous core, are reasonably deduced here. By investigating a number of currently accessible Chinese historical metallic threads from other periods, the evolutionary principles of Chinese metallic threads are concluded. The special characteristics of Famen metallic threads, the reasons determining these characteristics are better understood, and their role in the development of Chinese metallic threads is assessed.

This work examines the use of memory and tradition in the Christianization of the Peloponnese based on the evidence of the location and topography of churches. The different processes of conversion in the area have already been discussed, and the focus of this work is to show the extent of continuation of religious practice from the Roman to Late Antique periods. A diachronic analysis of the evidence for towns and sanctuaries from the fourth to seventh centuries is presented. It is argued that throughout the different Christianization processes memory and tradition were managed by the church in terms of its location, architecture, and rituals. It is likely that the church consciously maintained certain traditions of place, imagery, and action in order to retain and use memory traces from the established religious structures, which helped situate the Christian church as a central element of community life and identity. Therefore, it is contended that an essential element of the Christianization process was to maintain earlier memories and traditions not only to enable an efficiently unobtrusive conversion for its long-term success but also to ensure the maintenance of existing social structures, which in turn sustained the church. Publisher PDF

The archaeology of religion is underdeveloped. Research into particular regions and periods favours specific theoretical paradigms and research questions. These problems are compounded by theory-laden archaeological investigations’ tendency to present only vague relationships between data and the theories utilised. Meanwhile, studies of religion in Ancient Israel has been overwhelmingly carried out by textual scholars, resulting in text-led, homogenising reconstructions of religious communities. Where archaeology is consulted it largely serves only to confirm or deny textually attested practices. To tackle these problems this dissertation develops a new theoretical model that allows the explicit connection of archaeological data to theory-laden interpretations, highlights the embeddedness of religion in day-to-day routines, and foregrounds the individual agent whilst allowing societal conclusions. This original and innovative framework is then used to present a reconstruction of Iron II Negev religion as a highly contextual phenomenon, interacted with idiosyncratically by individuals whilst retaining shared social meanings reproduced and developed through everyday experiences.

Temple-church conversion was a deeply meaningful process that took many different forms throughout the Eastern Mediterranean. It was not simple triumphalism, nor was it motivated purely by expedience. No such single, overarching explanations are found. Instead, many factors influenced the process, with factors local to specific sites key to understanding why conversion took place and why different forms were taken. This variety led, both intentionally and not, to a vast array of created, appropriated and adapted user experiences. Unlike many previous studies, I believe one can only understand temple-church conversion by considering user experience, not by categorising them by type, e.g. direct, indirect, cella-church, and related types. Indeed, I actively divorce analysis from such types and demonstrate throughout the necessity of doing so. Rather, I develop a theoretical approach and thematic method in Part One that allows for in-depth analysis of specific sites in terms of user experience. This focusses upon phenomenological analysis, with memory, landscape, materiality and biography important. By placing this theoretical basis at the fore, I repopulate often sterile architecture. In so doing, the terms temple-church and temple-church conversion are reconsidered and new definitions that focus upon user understanding and experience are created that replace those that rely heavily on architectural continuity. I am then able to tackle the three central research questions of this thesis: why conversion took place; why examples took the forms that they did; and what the process actually meant to users. I focus upon three regions of the Eastern Mediterranean: the Levant; Asia Minor; and Greece, which constitute Parts Two, Three and Four. Within each, analysis is divided into a number of sections that focus upon themes of experience and use, e.g. Temple replacement, Experiences of temple inversion, and Appropriation of associations and spaces, enabling analysis to focus upon user experience and understanding. By examining examples in depth within these thematic sections reinterpretations and new analyses of specific sites are provided and key local factors explored, enabling questions of motivations, forms and user understandings to be considered. Broader Eastern Mediterranean-wide comparisons are discussed in the final part, Part Five. Data is gathered from architectural, archaeological and literary sources. Architectural study is brought together with archaeological context and theory, the two too often kept separate. Similarly, literary evidence, often excluded or marginalised in archaeological studies, is used critically to enable comparisons between literary and archaeological data to be made and to allow for analysis of the often quite different narratives each created. In turn this enables the experiences of readers and listeners to be added to the evolving biographies of sites. By focussing upon user experience and developing and utilising a new theoretical approach, this thesis demonstrates the inadequacy of any typology of temple-church forms and its use in analysing the phenomenon, while also demonstrating that temple-church conversion did not in many ways constitute a unified phenomenon; a vast array of forms, experiences and interpretations were created and appropriated.

It would be churlish (as well as difficult), when my own work is treated so generously in this article, to object to its thrust too strongly. But agreement does not make for much of a dialogue! Let me state my agreements briefly, then.1.Versluys has nailed the terminological impasse: ‘Romanization’ is far worse than Romanization, because it has all the sins of the former without its conviction. But I have less sympathy for those TRAC speakers ‘ordered’ not to use the concept by their supervisors. If they can answer the many criticisms made of the concept, and make it work for them on their material, let them demonstrate this. If not, they need to find something better.2.Versluys also seems to me quite correct that some postcolonial approaches have often ended up in an unsatisfactory anti-colonialism. Yvon Thébert (1978) made a similar objection when he asked whether Bénabou (1976) had decolonized the history of Africa in the Roman period or simply turned it on its head. Denouncing ancient imperialism, colonialism and racial and sexual abuse might make us feel more comfortable, but it does not improve our analysis. I would add that it has also allowed British Romanists to return to a very traditional preoccupation: rewriting the Roman chapters of ‘our island's story’ in dialogue with contemporary imperial preoccupations.3.Versluys argues that we should ‘focus on “cultural transformation taking place in the context of empire” rather than on “imperialism and colonialism”’ (p. 8). This too makes very good sense. But I wonder what the word ‘cultural’ adds to this programme? Does it operate to exclude the study of other kinds of change (economic? technological? agricultural?). I doubt that this is what Versluys advocates and cannot see the advantage of arbitrarily demarcating one sphere of life as ‘cultural’ and excluding discussion of other changes. And I doubt that it would be possible to do this in any case. How would we talk about bathing without aqueducts, engineering and hydrology, as well as euergetism, notions of the body and foodways? Or about wine without thinking about techniques of agriculture, exchange systems and so on. If the abundant recent literature on entanglement – along with Hodder (2012) I am thinking particularly of Thomas (1991), Dietler (2010) and Garrow and Gosden (2012) – has taught us nothing else, it is that we cannot easily separate ‘the cultural’ from the rest of life. Or does ‘cultural’ give holistic accounts of change a particular flavour? Or does it designate some particularSchwerpunktefor study? I have more sympathy with this position, but I suspect that it now obstructs more than it illuminates our projects. Now that ‘culture’ is no longer the final chapter of a book which has already dealt with conquest, administration, politics, the army, agriculture, manufacture and trade, town and country, and late antique decline (the traditional format of volumes in the genre ‘provincial history’), perhaps we no longer need to signal so strongly that culture is all-encompassing and can simply study together the whole set of changes with which we are concerned?All the same, I am wary of signing up at once to Romanization 2.0. My commentary is an attempt to articulate my reasons for this reluctance.

A bodkin arrowhead was recovered from within the thorax of a human skeleton (SK535) from the medieval cemetery at Poulton, Cheshire. This skeleton was a single burial with an east-west orientation. The skeleton had an unusual burial position with the right arm flexed at the elbow and the antebrachium crossing the thorax. The left arm was in the more usual extended position. A metal object was recovered from under the right arm within the thorax. This was identified as a Type M7 bodkin arrowhead, likely 12th or 13th century. The arrowhead was conserved at the Metals Department, Conservation Centre, Liverpool. Radiocarbon dates the skeleton as most likely 1280AD – 1320AD AND 1350AD – 1390AD which is in agreement with the probable age range for the arrowhead. Osteological examinations estimated that SK535 was an adult male with an age at death of 35-39 years of age and a stature of 1.68m. The only pathology observed was a well healed fracture of the right distal ulna. The individual represented by SK535 could have been wounded by an arrow carrying the Type M7 bodkin arrowhead, possibly during the English-Welsh border skirmishes during this period.

This thesis concerns the analysis of the socio-economic transformation of communities in Bronze Age southwestern Cyprus. Through the adoption of a dialectical perspective of analysis, individuals and environment are considered part of the same unity: they are cooperating agents in shaping society and culture. The Bronze Age is a period of intense transformation in the organization of local communities, made of a continuous renegotiation of the socio-economic roles and interactions. The archaeological record from this portion of the island allows one to go beyond the investigation of the complex and articulated transition from the EBA-MBA agro-pastoral and self-sufficient communities to the LBA centralized and trade-oriented urban-centres. Through a shifting of analytical scales, the emerging picture suggests major transformations in the individual-community-territory dialectical relations. A profound change in the materials conditions of social life, as well as in the superstructural realm, was particularly entailed by the dissolution of the relation to the earth, due to the emergence of new forms of land exploitation/ownership and to the shift of the settlement pattern in previously unknown areas. One of the key points of this thesis is the methodological challenge of working with legacy survey data as I re-analysed a diverse archaeological legacy, which is the result of more than fifty years of survey projects, rescue and research-oriented excavations, as well as casual discoveries. Source critique and data evaluation are essential requirements in an integrative and cross-disciplinary regional perspective, in the comprehensive processing of heterogeneous archaeological and environmental datasets. Through the estimation of data precision and certainty, I developed an effective - but simple - method to critically evaluate existing datasets and to inter-correlate them without losing their original complexity. This powerful method for data integration can be applied to similar datasets belonging to other regions and other periods as it originates from the evaluation of larger methodological and theoretical issues that are not limited to my spatial and temporal focus. As I argue in this thesis, diverse archaeological legacies can be efficiently re-analysed through an integrative and regional methodology. The adoption of a regional scale of analysis can provide an excellent perspective on the complexity of transformations in ancient societies, thus creating a fundamental bridge between the local stories and grand landscape narratives.

This dissertation considers Viking Age Scandinavian inscribed runestones in order to determine their societal origins and the impacts they had on Viking Age religious cultural changes. The three types of monuments discussed are: runestones with religious inscriptions and magical texts; runestones with mythic, legendary and religious imagery; and runestones with political and religious intentions. By comparatively examining Pagan and Christian runestones, the question of which culture initially drove the production of these memorials is addressed. Twenty-five runestones are examined in detail, including the stones of kings Gormr Gamli and Haraldr Blátönn in Jelling, Denmark which serve as primary case studies and representative examples. While religion is the dominating motif of Scandinavian runestones, the evidence shows that no conclusive answer exists on the Pagan or Christian origins of inscribed runic culture. This study proposes that religious hybridization or syncretism is the strongest possibility, yet further research into more precise dating methods needs to be conducted.

The purpose of this study is ultimately to analyze the influence of cultural attitudes on the treatment of the Scottish estate in the first half of the 18th century (c.1715 – c.1776), making particular reference to the ideology of improvement, through the use of Sir Archibald Grant of Monymusk as a case study. Grant’s improvement of his estate is not understood as literally agricultural or economic development alone, but as a complex ideological commitment to the transformation of land, landscape and society. Whilst Grant of Monymusk has been discussed with reference to economic improvement, the relationship between his role as a publically acknowledged improver and his patronage of art and architecture, as well as his attempts at publication, has not been subject to similar interest. This thesis uses an innovative interdisciplinary approach which draws on archaeological as well as art historical methodologies. It discusses a wider range of estate commissions, in particular Grant’s patronage of the portrait artists John Smibert and William Robertson, the poet John Ogilvie, his commission of the architectural surveyors Alexander Jaffray and Robert Robinson, as well as his work to construct planned villages at Kirktown of Monymusk and Archiestown. The thesis attempts to place these commissions within the context of recent studies of improvement which emphasize its role as an ideology with cultural implications. The use of an individual case study allows for a more in depth discussion of specific reactions to historical and ideological change, providing a narrative of a specific site and thus creating an individual response towards broader cultural and scientific developments.

X-ray Fluorescence Spectroscopy was performed to characterize pigment materials in a preliminary study of two mural paintings in the Catacombs of San Giovanni. XRF was one non-invasive, analytical technique employed as part of a comprehensive examination, which also included multispectral imaging and 3D modeling. XRF analysis contributed towards a better idea of the materials present, but definitive assignments for the pigments were not possible. The murals show some signs of degradation products including a calcium sulfate surface encrustation, and a bluish-black copper based pigment, which we suspect is the degradation of azurite into tenorite.

The central proposition of this work is that a battlefield’s location sits at the intersection of three interlinked variables of terrain, tactics, and force composition, which exist in a symbiotic relationship. Furthermore, this intersection can be located through qualitative modelling within GIS against an informed digital landscape reconstruction. The hypothesis assumes that tactics and force composition are culturally relative. Moreover, they are temporally constrained aspects of a tri-poled dialectic, and state changes in the nature of these aspects will result in correlative shifts in the types of terrain that are chosen for conflict. To analyse these aspects, a theoretical framework of human agency in the selection of terrain for conflict, was developed. This theoretical position utilises a modified version of the military terrain analysis KOCOA for the purposes of visualising abstract theory, and highlighting Key Terrain aspects as a means of predicting conflict locations. To apply this theoretical framework, a phased methodology for historic landscape reconstruction within GIS was created, allowing the modelling of possible locations as a desk-based assessment approach. To model likely battlefield locations within the wider landscape, the theoretical framework posits a culturally and temporally relative habitus, experientially formed through regular experience with conflict. By analysing the digitally reconstructed battlescapes with the theoretical approach, we can model and highlight the Key Terrain an agent’s habitus would have inculcated them to choose. This Key Terrain will be distinct for each time period, reflecting culturally and temporally distinct ways of warfare, and reflexive choices of ideal terrain. The theory and method were tested through application to Scottish battlefields, with general locations known, from each major period of warfare. A study of the praxis of warfare for each period was undertaken, to fully understand the underlying structure of the habitus of conflict for each period. The historic battlescapes were reconstructed, and analysed within GIS using Culturally Relative KOCOA, projecting the agent’s habitus onto the landscape, modelling areas that were probable as focuses for conflict. This modelling process was applied to the medieval battles of Dunbar (1296), Roslin (1302), Bannockburn (1314), the Post-Medieval battles of Flodden (1513), Ancrum (1545), Pinkie (1547), and the Early Modern battles of Kilsyth (1645), Philiphaugh (1645), and Dunbar II (1650). After the modelling process was completed in GIS, selecting the most likely location of conflict within the battlescape, distributions of battle-related artefactual evidence—where available—were used to check the locations suggested by the model against artefact data. Based on these results, I argue that the theoretical and methodological approach herein can be utilized as a desk-based approach to find forgotten fields. It is a modelling process that can be performed utilizing the theoretical and methodological framework as a desk-based assessment, prior to any fieldwork, and would function to focus any investigations-on-high-priority-areas.

Between AD c.860 and c.970, hundreds of thousands of silver coins (dirhams) from Central Asia reached Scandinavia, where evidence suggests adoption within market environments as commodity-money within a hacksilver currency. Although several hundred dirhams are found in hoards and as single-finds in Britain and Ireland, the extension of this ‘economic’ phenomenon here is rarely discussed due to a focus on social exchange. This bias comes from a failure to incorporate market-based network theory developed in recent Scandinavian Baltic studies on the back of that region’s dirham influx, and the excavation there of market sites like Birka, Hedeby, and Kaupang probably responsible for their further dissemination. Considered for the first time, then, this study allows an Insular dirham dataset assembled in a new database to be interpreted beyond the restrictive corpus of Viking-Age Insular exchange literature. The Baltic perspectives, centred on the nodal network role of hub markets like Hedeby in Jutland, offer the best model of how long-distance exchange operated in the period c.850-950. Accordingly, the nodal Insular Scandinavian import and export sites of Dublin and York are contextualised within the distribution of Insular dirham deposits to characterise the economic and social context of this network. Beyond the dirhams, this ‘Silver Route’ network is considered responsible for the bi-directional trade of high-value commodities between Insular Scandinavia, England, and the Baltic. Thus, a new non-numismatic database includes pieces considered to have arrived in Britain and Ireland in concert with the dirhams. This database – included in a CD alongside the dirham data – includes metrological equipment, jewellery, amber, silk, and silver of Scandinavian Baltic, Eastern European, and Central Asian origin. Like the numismatic material, the non-numismatic data support a model of network kingdoms, defined as polities based on control of nodal/hub markets and influence over the trade routes connecting them, with the latter aspect requiring royal co-operation with independent long-distance and regional traders. From this point of departure, a case is made for Ívarr and the Uí Ímair using control of Dublin and York to introduce an import and currency package to Britain and Ireland from a possible homeland in a ‘Danish Corridor’ focussed on Kaupang and Hedeby. This idea of market-centric polities is alloyed by the use of post-substantivist economic theory, which argues that nodal-market sites encouraged the social and exchange conditions where market economics and production could flourish. While it is accepted that socially-embedded exchange dominated Viking-Age Scandinavia, post-substantivism allows for the increasing import of market exchange, and it is applied to Insular Scandinavia for the first time here.

This thesis considers the perception of maritime space in the SW Aegean area of Greece during the Late Bronze Age, analysing and linking issues of coastline morphology and harbour location and maritime ideology. Drawing heavily on the concept of the maritime cultural landscape, the thesis reviews the state of knowledge about the nature of coastal settlement during the Mycenaean period in the SW Aegean and how the coastline has altered since antiquity due to geomorphological processes. The thesis presents the results of a coastal and offshore (snorkeling) survey carried out along several stretches of coast in Messenia and Laconia in the Peloponnese, the island of Kythera and in West Crete with the aim of assessing the location of possible harbours/anchorages dating to the Late Bronze Age. These results are compared with those available for comparable harbour locations in the Cyclades, Central and East Crete, the Dodecanese, East Aegean and parts of Italy dating to the Late Bronze Age period. The survey included the coastal sites of Pavlopetri and Epidauros Limera in the South Peloponnese and Kastelli, Chania and Phalasarna in West Crete. In the research presented in this thesis, harbours/anchorages of the Late Bronze Age should be considered as located at promising ancient sandy beaches, river outfalls and promontories. As there are no stone built harbour structures the default landing place was the beach. This thesis adopts a maritime perspective, viewing the coastal littoral from the sea. It examines various parameters including natural processes on the coast and hinterland that were, and remain, vital to the connectivity of cultures through the sea during the Late Bronze Age and thereafter. The intention is to contribute to a fuller understanding of seascapes and the maritime cultural landscape as seen through the evidence of potential harbours, and to gain insight into how maritime space may have impacted on the issue of harbour installations in the Late Bronze Age Aegean world.

This article examines the place of archaeology in the second wave of Irish cultural nationalism, and how archaeological findings were appropriated by rival ethno-religious communities in Ireland. In particular, it focuses on George Petrie, who was the founder of ‘scientific’ archaeology and was also one of the leading figures in the nineteenth-century Celtic revival that sought a moral regeneration of the Irish nation In Ireland, as elsewhere, archaeology was important in reconstructing an early history of the nation where few written records existed and in making this visible through material artefacts. However, archaeology was only significant as part of a wider cultural revival that presented artefacts and sites as national symbols to an island undergoing rapid social change. This article will explore the relationship between archaeology and this national revival, and how the material objects recovered by archaeologists extended and transformed the existing repertoires of how the nation was imagined and felt. It will assess the different reception of these images in the rival Catholic and Protestant communities. Finally, it will comment on the capacity of a medieval ‘Celtic’ repertoire to provide the basis of a dynamic modern Irish national culture.

Prehistoric Sardinia is best known for its Bronze Age Nuragic culture which lasted from the mid-2nd millennium until the early 1st millennium. The Iron Age and later prehistory of the island are often subsumed into discourses that emphasise the colonising Phoenicians (8th-6th centuries BC) and Carthaginians (6th-2nd centuries BC). In the north of the island the local communities, being neither part of the Bronze Age Nuragic culture nor of the colonized world of the south, are seen in relation to foreign communities rather than from local perspectives. This thesis uses postcolonial theoretical frameworks of island identity, consumption and materiality to examine the local/foreign interactions that take place in north Sardinia in the period between 900 – 200 BC. The main focus is to set the interrelationships between the local Sardinian communities and the Phoenician, Etruscan, Greek and Carthaginian traders and settlers who frequented the shores in a context that emphasises local and indigenous agency. At the same time this topic provides an opportunity to re-examine the scholarship that has led to north Sardinia being overlooked. This thesis covers a long time period and the project is divided geographically between three different zones of north Sardinia (the north-west, the central-east and the Olbia area) and chronologically between the 9th- 7th centuries, the 7th – 5th centuries and the 4th-2nd centuries BC. The data set includes the archaeological material from 51 north Sardinian sites that contain evidence of local/foreign interactions during these periods. Using this data a few well excavated sites are studied in greater detail to examine and question the models of acculturation and resistance that form the traditional perspectives of scholars working in the north. For example, the presence or lack of foreign material culture on indigenous sites has often been understood from the perspective that desire for foreign goods was natural. This approach overemphasises the role that foreign communities had in contact situations and at the same time underemphasises the agency and choices of the local inhabitants. Indeed an examination of the data shows how local practices continued and that the foreign presence had a limited impact. One of my aims in this thesis is to avoid a dualistic position which sets the local communities against foreign ones; in fact local/foreign interactions can result in the creation of ‘hybrid’ products, practices and communities and I explore how far we can see the hybridization of north Sardinian communities in the different phases of the 1st millennium through the material culture that informed their actions. A second aim is to explore what types of changes took place in north Sardinian identities through the types of objects they consumed. Some of the larger Iron Age sites were sanctuaries and thus I examine how far local communities used ritual as a way of mediating the exchanges between them and foreign people through their selection of the material culture. Thirdly, this thesis approaches the social identities of the Sardinians using a bottom-up approach to the interactions. This allows me to compare the different ways in which local communities experienced foreign contacts and culture over a broad period and the evidence illuminates the variety of ways that island identities were developed in the various regions of north Sardinia.

The centrepiece of this thesis is a comparative study of the stone rows of Dartmoor and northern Scotland, a rare, putatively Bronze Age megalithic typology. It is argued that these should be defined as cairn-and-rows monuments that ‘symbolise’ long mounds, and avenues in the case of Dartmoor — a circumstance that ‘explains’ the interregional similarities; other aspects of their semantic structures are also analysed using rigorous semiotic theory. An evolutionary approach is taken, drawing on biological theory to explain the active role of these monuments in social evolution, and to understand the processes at work in producing long term change in monument traditions. New theory is developed for analysing such archaeological sequences, and for understanding and explaining material culture in general. The concepts of adaptation and environment in archaeological theory to date are criticised, and environmental construction theory, and aspects of the Extended Phenotype theory, are forwarded as alternatives. The local sequences are contextualised by examining European megalithic origins, tracing the long mound ‘concept’ back to the Bandkeramik longhouses. The question of diffusion or convergence is tackled by examining the mechanisms at work during the transitions from longhouse to long mound and then to the cairn-and-rows; the explanations forwarded for the social function of the monuments is integrated with mechanisms for explaining their spread (or ‘diffusion’). It is argued that all of these related forms — longhouses, long mounds, and the cairn-and-rows — are implicated in a process of competitively asserting ancestral affinities, which explains the constraint on cultural variation, and thus the formation of remarkably stable monument traditions, and the convergence between Dartmoor and northern Scotland in the Early Bronze Age.

This thesis explores the portable, non-indigenous material culture strongly related, but not exclusive, to one specific ethnic group in the medieval period. It is based on the idea that people from different cultural backgrounds cannot come into contact with each other without their identities being altered in some significant way, and these altered identities will be expressed in their material culture. During the period c.800-1100, the Vikings initiated contact with the inhabitants of Britain, first by raiding and attacking, then by trading and settling amongst the local populations. Whereas most research of Viking and local interaction has focused on Viking settlements in the Northern and Western Isles or the Anglo-Scandinavian town of York, this thesis focuses on the peripheral areas of Viking political control: northern England and southern Scotland. It is in these regions where there are increasing amounts of evidence of Viking activities and interactions with the local peoples. Three key research questions are asked of the materials found within the study area: 1) how and why did items of ‘Viking’ material culture enter regions outside of the centres of traditional Viking settlements? 2) How and why were these items used to conduct meaningful contacts and interactions with those people already inhabiting this land? 3) How and why were identities constructed in these regions where multiple cultural traditions came into contact with one another? A multifaceted approach is adopted to answer these questions. First, the historical sources are analysed for different contexts of contact and interaction between Vikings and non- Vikings in the study area. Second, a postcolonial approach to studying the interactions between groups was adopted in order to move away from simplistic assimilation or acculturation narratives where one group subsumes the other. Rather, this approach argues for the creation of a new social dimension in which people’s actions, routines, and identities are altered in order to negotiate and thrive within the new cultural landscape. It is argued that the hybridization seen in many of the artefacts, as well as other sources utilised throughout the thesis, is the material articulation of this new space. Finally, this thesis includes data recovered through the Portable Antiquities Scheme and Treasure Trove Scotland in addition to excavated finds. In the study region, 499 items are identified and catalogued as Viking or hybrid-Viking, many of which have no archaeological context as they are stray or metal-detected finds. Through the course of searching, three major concentrations were identified along major maritime inlets: the Solway Firth, the River Clyde, and the Forth and Tay Basins. These concentrations were turned into three case-study areas based upon concentrations of finds as well as the contextual aids of historical sources, place-names, and stone sculpture. The first case study examines the Solway Firth and determines that the Vikings were a very important part of the population, and a hybridized society is seen there. The second case study of Strathclyde also determines that the Vikings were active there; the evidence indicates smaller, more concentrated communities of Vikings that integrated into the British population of the region. The final case study of the Forth and Tay basins establishes the Vikings as important actors there, although not only in the traditional view of their attacks opening up the Pictish throne for Cinaed mac Alpin. The Vikings settled in this region and aided the formation of the new kingdom of Alba. Overall, it is shown that Vikings were much more active on the peripheries of their political establishments than has previously been realised. It is also demonstrated that people in contact with others from different cultural backgrounds will alter their routines, practices, materials, and identities in order to negotiate the new social sphere that is created by such interaction. The key to understanding this negotiation is recognising the multiple contexts in which people interact and that each situation will result in different hybridized routines, materials, and identities that are unique to that specific context.

The purpose of this research is to chart the archaeological evolution of Pollok Country Park in the south side of Glasgow from its medieval inception through to the 20th century. While the format and function of medieval secular land holdings are well understood within their English and Welsh context, the Scottish medieval secular estate has not been as well researched in terms of its underlying archaeological structure and design. The continuous ownership by the Maxwell and Stirling-Maxwell family of the Nether Pollok estate as a private residence and the administrative centre of the larger estate for 700 hundred years has meant that much of the medieval and even prehistoric environment is still directly accessible within the modern country parkland. An archaeological biography of the park has been developed; this has been set against a series of key historical events. These are readily defined as the estate’s inception in the 13th century, and its alteration during the mid to late 18th century and its 20th century form. Each of these periods is set against the archaeological material recorded and recovered from the parklands to develop an understanding of the utilisation of the environment and also to investigate the driving forces behind three transitional periods in the 13th, 18th and 20th centuries. Additionally the issues surrounding the effective study of these environments using archaeological techniques and the validity of the research model used for this type of study will also be discussed.

The goal of this thesis is to investigate the manufacture of metalworking ceramics in late prehistoric Scotland (ca 1000BC – AD800) from the perspective of ceramic technology and with the aim to reconstruct social and material trajectories. This has been implemented through the use of an integrated analytical methodology, interpreted by developing current theories on technology. Previous studies of metalworking ceramics in Scotland have rarely paid full attention to ceramic technology; research has instead focused on metallurgical issues such as metal identification and material morphology. This is central for answering questions regarding metallurgical processes, but fails to answer important questions regarding the technology and manufacture of the ceramic material. The successful production of moulds and crucibles requires that a craft specialist has expert skills in the preparation and firing of clay as well as understanding of the process and design of metal casting. This makes metalworking ceramics an important resource for investigating variation in individual skill and experience, cultural traditions, and scale of production. The main focus is on moulds and crucibles, but parallels, both in terms of method and theory, are made to other types of metalworking ceramics and pottery. The technological relationship between pottery and metalworking ceramics is therefore a vital link in the assessment of production and technological traditions. In addition, clays from a number of sites have been sampled, with the goal to monitor the utilization of clays for the production of different ceramic materials. Materials from nine primary sites, from Traprain Law (East Lothian) in the south to Mine Howe (Orkney) in the north, are central to the discussion of ceramic technologies. The context of casting and crafts from further sites in Scotland and beyond has been essential in the reconstruction of casting production in the late prehistoric period. Developing from ideas of technology as an active process, this study has investigated the collection and preparation of clays to make different ceramic materials. This investigation has employed a range of analytical techniques frequently applied to the study of archaeological ceramics, including ceramic petrography, Scanning Electron Microscopy, X-Ray Spectrometry and X-Ray Diffraction. The focus has been on technology; studies of provenance are auxiliary to the broader questions. It is a central conclusion of this work that the production of metalworking ceramics saw a development towards a more specialised function and technology during the late prehistoric period, and that this development was closely related to material traditions, to some extent transcending wider social trajectories. This research, highlighting particular and general technologies, has showed that the study of ceramic technology of moulds and crucibles can be a valuable resource for the study metallurgical production and technology.

This thesis incorporates a reassessment of Roman pottery from non-Roman contexts in southern Scotland to investigate the complex processes of interaction between Romans and provincial societies. Modern theoretical constructs form the interpretive framework for the discussion to explore how Roman objects functioned in their new social settings. A detailed database has identified a total of 168 sites containing c. 1766 Roman pottery sherds and other objects, while Roman non-ceramic objects have been recovered from an additional 234 sites. The insertion of this data into the ArchGIS program has produced detailed distribution maps to graphically display material spreads and facilitate the identification of material foci. A lack of clearly definable central nodes suggests that the concept of elite access to and control over incoming Roman exotica may be inadequate explanations for the complex and multifarious processes by which the material culture of Empire moved through provincial communities. The hillfort at Traprain Law, East Lothian, is often used to epitomise elite restriction of prestige goods (Hunter 2009) and a detailed study of the Roman ceramics from Traprain is used as a case study (see Chapter 9) to determine the viability of this model. The incorporation of robust and demonstrably appropriate social theories is suggested as an effective means of investigating these processes in a region that conventional wisdom has traditionally deemed to be marginal. The concept of Romanisation is critically deconstructed in favour of a more nuanced approach to the issue of culture contact. Modern postcolonial approaches, most of which have been applied predominantly to Mediterranean colonial situations, are tested against the data to determine their suitability in the context of the aggressive territorial expansionist policies of Rome in northern Britain. These paradigms consider the different ways in which Roman and frontier societies may have experienced the same events and how these communities selectively adopted, adapted or reused foreign material culture. The effects of the conquest are shown to have been differently experienced in Scotland compared to other parts of the Empire and the research proposes methods of recognising the active participation of local people in past events. Rather than viewing northern societies as passive recipients of the imposition of oppressive Roman cultural values, an attempt is made to strip away widespread Romanocentric biases inherent in traditional approaches to the subject. The research adopts a bottom-up approach to the material remains to determine the demonstrable realities of interaction between Romans and northerners, the chronologically restricted and geographically variable extent of contact over time and the role of material culture in negotiating such contact as well as potential resultant cultural transformations. A detailed contextual analysis of Roman pottery from non-Roman contexts has confirmed the variable character of contact across time and space. The study further recognises the potentially lengthy curation of culturally significant objects and traces material biographies to determine alternative social functions of Roman objects in their new cultural settings through their contexts of deposition. Roman objects are confirmed as being appropriated into local ritual and ideological practices, having been subjected to culturally specific physical and symbolic redefinition and structured votive deposition. The research also confirms the heterogeneous, inter and intra regionally variable character of local contact with the Empire and serves as model against which the data from other frontier regions can be tested.

In the early Middle Ages, when settlers began to leave Scandinavia to find new homes for themselves and their families, they began a process that impacted their lives dramatically. Research on modern population movements has demonstrated that migration-induced stresses change the lives of immigrants, and shape how they adapt to their new homes. Migration affects societies and people in a number of ways: it changes family and household organisation; gender relations and roles shift; and general social and cultural structures are altered through the integration of different practices and beliefs. While the identification of the societal changes caused by migration has been the focus of research in a number of fields, it has yet to be directly addressed in archaeology. This thesis seeks to examine the ways in which various social identities were displayed through funerary rituals and the associated material culture in the Norse North Atlantic, and to identify how these changed through the course of migration. The analysis is conducted by comparing burial data collected from two regions of Norway, representing the homeland of the migrants, and Scotland and Iceland, representing two critical destination points. Approximately 500 graves are catalogued and assessed using multivariate statistics. Six case studies, selected from the study areas, are used for comparative purposes. The analysis of the overall data-set and the case study sites indicates that there are key differences between the homeland and the communities of the Viking diaspora. Moreover, the results indicate that the circumstances of migration, such as location, resource availability, and the presence of a local population, results in society changing in different, yet significant, ways: gendered burial practices are altered; new manifestations of traditional rites appear; and migrant identities emerge.

Traditional and well-established applications of airborne remote sensing to archaeology involve standard aerial photographic recording, either oblique or vertical, of archaeological phenomena visible as shadow, soil or cropmarks, all of which require particular conditions before they become visible. Cropmarks have made the most important contribution to archaeological site discovery and are the most complex of the phenomena, whose occurrence relies upon the differential availability of moisture to a crop growing over buried archaeological remains, reflecting different soil depths and precipitation, to create differential growth patterns in times of moisture stress. Consistently successful aerial photographic reconnaissance for cropmarks relies on dry weather and well-drained soils in arable agriculture. There is, thus, in Scotland a bias in the discovery of archaeological sites in favour of drier eastern districts, supporting arable agriculture, compared to the west with its wetter climate focussed on pastureland. Because cropmarks are linked to moisture stress in growing plants they are potentially detectable in bands outside the visible part of the electro-magnetic spectrum. Although historically cropmark detection has used film, whose sensitivity closely approximates the human eye, hyperspectral scanning allows consideration of a wider range of different wavelengths, beyond the visible spectrum, many of which are more sensitive to changes in vegetation status. The main objectives of this research are to test to what extent hyperspectral and multispectral imagery can reveal otherwise invisible archaeological sites surviving as cropmarks; to assess the relative usefulness of the different sensors employed; and to investigate the potential of hyperspectral and multispectral imagery to augment cropmark detection rates in areas less conducive to their production. It uses a range of imagery (CASI 2, ATM and digital vertical photographic data) acquired by NERC ARSF from two case study sites in Lowland Scotland, one in the east and one in the west, selected to facilitate comparison between areas of good and poor cropmark production. Following processing, comparison and detailed analysis of this data, this thesis has demonstrated the high efficacy of this imagery in the identification of archaeological cropmarks; has established the most appropriate range of bandwidths and processing methods applicable to that imagery; has demonstrated its potential for the discovery of previously unrecognised archaeological sites in areas of lowland pasture; and has reinforced the value of systematic block coverage as compared to traditional ‘observer-directed’ archaeological aerial reconnaissance.

This thesis is a study of the earliest masonry church towers in Alba, the historic core of the kingdom of Scots. The towers at Abernethy, Brechin, Dunblane, Muthill and Markinch have been briefly considered in architectural histories with dating construction as their principal concern. I maintain that there is no equivalent archaeological presence in the study of medieval churches as there is in England and Ireland. Where church archaeologies are produced in Scotland they generally do not progress past data description. As a consequence, Scottish contributions to church archaeology publications are largely written by architectural-historians, particularly Richard Fawcett, who is the sole modern authority on Scotland’s medieval churches. To distinguish my archaeology from previous research I do three things. Firstly, I review other ecclesiastical research from the past 30 years to provide a deeper historical context for these buildings. Architectural histories begin their narrative of church building from the late eleventh century based largely on extant remains. Yet from excavations and sculptural assemblages the tradition of building in stone can be dated with confidence from the late eighth century. Secondly, this study provides close fabric analyses of each tower and its immediate context, describing more architectural features than have previously been noted. These include masonry re-use at Dunblane and Abernethy indicating that stone churches pre-dated these towers. I link these architectural observations to changes in liturgical practice using Anthony Giddens’ theory of structuration, as modified for the study of archaeological remains by John Barratt. These case-studies are used to describe the material settings of religious and social practice in the eleventh and early twelfth centuries. In line with recent research on church towers in Lincolnshire and Ireland I challenge the belief that these structures were ancillary to their associated churches and were instead the focus of liturgical practice.

This thesis examines the late mediaeval Church in the Hebrides from 1266 until 1472. The late mediaeval Church was culturally significant: it imposed rules and regulations on lay society throughout western Christendom. Hitherto, studies of the Hebridean Church have focused on its organisation and its bishops. My research goes beyond these studies to examine the effectiveness of the Church in bringing Christian religion and piety to mediaeval Hebridean society. This is accomplished through a prosopographical study of the clergy in the Hebrides and analysis of the church and chapel sites. The mediaeval Church transcended countries and peoples and through the provision of parish clergy, it managed to establish and maintain a certain level of Christian faith and belief. The majority of the recorded clergy were Gaels who came from the dioceses of Sodor and Argyll and were therefore able to communicate with their parishioners. Some of the clergy can be identified as belonging to the territorial, professional and ecclesiastical kindreds and can be described as of high social status. Determining educational status is particularly tricky, given the absence of any evidence for any schools in the Hebrides. However, we can reasonably conclude that the high status clergy undoubtedly were educated, although not all to university level. The scarcity of accusations of non-residence implies that non-residence was not widespread. An examination of rectors and perpetual vicars at the parish churches reveals that there was usually one or the other at the parish churches. A more common accusation regarded pluralism, although we have to acknowledge that sometimes the accusations might be exaggerated. Whilst allegations of offences such as simony are rare, failure to comply with canon law on clerical celibacy is clear from all supplications seeking dispensation for illegitimacy as the son of a priest. The churches, chapels and grave-yards were a focal point for these priests and for secular society. As important as the provision of clergy are the adequate numbers of, and maintenance of, church buildings. The church building had enormous significance for both mediaeval theologians and the laity. The parish church, in particular, was very important as the central focus for baptism and burial and therefore access is very important. The key issues are, therefore, access to the parish church, the visibility of the churches and their relationship with secular settlements. Access is determined by location and the location of the forty-three parish churches in the Hebrides can, on the whole, be described as accessible. None of them are inaccessible locations, indeed most can be accessed both from land and from the sea. They are relatively visible, but not outstandingly so. However, their visibility would have been enhanced with use of plaster on the exterior of the buildings. Secular settlements were dispersed and consequently there were always some settlements nearby the parish church and others more distant. A major issue which has arisen is the identification of categories of chapels. Using models established by Orme, there are four main categories of chapel – dependent, cult, locational and oratory chapels. Effectively, the numerous small chapels meant that, in general, it can be said that people were never very far from some kind of church building. Identifying the type of chapel allows us to understand how the parishes functioned. The final two chapters consist of case-studies of the islands of Tiree, Coll and Skye. There are a total of 12 parishes on these islands and within these parishes 68 church and chapel sites. The relationships between parish church and chapel have been analysed in each and we have been able to identify some dependent chapels. It is also clear that we have a number of early mediaeval chapel sites which may have been abandoned by the late Middle Ages. However, other early mediaeval sites may have continued in use, perhaps as cult chapels for particular saints. The cults of saints such as St Columba, St Comgan and St Maelrubha were especially strong in Skye whilst St Columba, St Finnan and St Findoca were popular on Tiree and Coll. Above all else, this study demonstrates the vitality of the late mediaeval Church in the Hebrides; its parish churches were not overwhelmingly appropriated and there were sufficient numbers of apparently educated clergy available to serve the churches. The range of ecclesiastical sites also shows the breadth of provision.

Monuments of stone, earth and wood were built for the first time at the beginning of the Neolithic period in Scotland (4000 BC). While archaeological attention and investigation has focused upon monuments of stone and earth, those of timber have generally received much less attention and remain to be fully accepted and integrated into wider understandings of the Neolithic. This is despite a rich record of cropmark timber monuments held within the aerial archives of the National Monuments Record of Scotland (NMRS) and an increasing number of excavated timber monuments. This thesis is an attempt to remedy this imbalance. It examines all the evidence for timber monuments of Neolithic date currently recorded in Scotland, integrating those recorded as cropmarks with those uncovered during excavation and considers their place within the wider Neolithic repertoire. As the majority of timber monuments have been recorded as cropmarks, this thesis strives to move beyond cropmarks and the morphology of sites and argues that strict typologies serve to constrain the archaeological record. Instead a more contextual approach is taken whereby other factors, such as materialities or the use of space are taken into account. This is particularly put into practice within three case study areas where a landscape approach, employing field visits and a bodily engagement with the location of sites, is combined with GIS analysis and the consideration of the case study areas as a whole. Consideration of timber monuments, both at a country-wide level and at the more detailed level of the three case study areas, demonstrates the wide range of timber monuments that were constructed and the important part they had to play within the wider monumental repertoire of Neolithic Scotland. Timber monuments can be suggested to reflect wider values and ideals shared by Neolithic communities as well as more local concerns and engagements by individual groups and communities. The monuments built may reflect some of the ways in which communities thought through and transformed their relationships to the forest and the wider environment and provide perspectives upon the importance of place and memory, the influence and important role of the environment, and the regional nature and diversity evident throughout Neolithic Scotland. Ultimately, this thesis demonstrates that timber monuments were important spaces and places that were used by Neolithic communities for many different purposes and so should form an important part of any consideration of the Neolithic period in Scotland.

La necessità di disporre di mappe di probabilità di sito archeologico è un tema attualmente al centro di un rinnovato interesse anche grazie alla disponibilità di una moltitudine di informazioni territoriali gestite ed elaborate con l’ausilio della tecnologia GIS. Gli studi che finora si sono occupati del problema, hanno fatto riferimento a modellistiche di tipo regressivo od autoregressivo che, sebbene centrate sulle peculiarità del fenomeno, si sono dimostrate sensibilmente dipendenti dalla presenza di dati anomali nella stima dei parametri e da ipotesi specifiche sui casi in esame. L’intento del presente lavoro è invece quello di proporre una soluzione più robusta e generalizzabile in linea con i recenti sviluppi nel campo della modellistica non parametrica la quale potrebbe dare un forte impulso all’uso congiunto della statistica e della tecnologia GIS. L’informazione geografica ricavabile dai dati fisici e satellitari relativi all’area di studio rappresenta infatti, grazie al dettaglio che la caratterizza, una fonte ausiliaria insostituibile per spiegare la presenza o meno di un sito in una data posizione della mappa. L’approccio proposto è stato sviluppato ed applicato per l’area test di Cures Sabini ottenendo dei risultati abbastanza incoraggianti, soprattutto se letti in termini della estrema facilità di interpretazione dei risultati da parte di non statistici e della riscontrata possibilità di rendere automatico il processo di produzione delle mappe di probabilità. Questa evidenza permetterebbe ad operatori del settore non professionalmente preparati da un punto di vista metodologico, di estendere il modello a situazioni anche molto diverse da quella analizzata.

This work was supported by Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, Spain [grant number MINECO HAR2012-35022]. To understand why historic landscapes changed in the past researchers need to identify when and where changes took place, but in rural landscapes, the origins and development of many historic elements including field systems, roads, terraces and other earthworks remain poorly understood. This paper outlines a practical interdisciplinary method using GIS-based historic landscape characterisation (HLC) to integrate data from different sources and model how historic character varies in space. It pilots an innovative approach using luminescence profiling and dating that can underpin the HLC with significantly improved knowledge of historic processes of change. We focus on four case studies of terraced agricultural landscapes in western Catalonia and demonstrate for the first time that existing terrace systems often have medieval or early modern origins. Publisher PDF