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The article examines the evidence of architecture recovered from the Late Prehispanic Period of the Sierras de Córdoba (∼1220–330 cal BP), Argentina. We explore the relationship between household architecture and the level of residential mobility, arguing that a flexible subsistence and mobility pattern followed the adoption of plant cultivation and not entirely sedentary farming. The architectural evidence presented structures made using low-energy construction techniques that were not intended for an anticipated long-term occupation. This architecture meets the expectation of a settlement pattern left by groups that were occasional food producers and used specific locations as seasonal campsites, indicating a flexible landscape-use organization.

During the Middle Preclassic period (c. 1000-350 BCE), the people of the Maya lowlands transitioned fromamobile horticulturalist to sedentary farming lifestyle, exemplified by permanent houses arranged around patios and rebuilt over generations. Early evidence of this change has been found in northern Belize, in the Belize Valley, and at Ceibal, Guatemala. At Cuello and other sites in northern Belize, mortuary rituals tied to ancestor veneration created inequality from the beginning of sedentary life. There, relatively dense populations facilitated the emergence of competitive sociopolitical strategies. However, Maya communities in different regions adopted different aspects of sedentism at different times and employed different power strategies. Unlike Cuello, Ceibal was founded as a ceremonial center by semi-mobile people. Middle Preclassic ritual practices at Ceibal and in the Belize Valley were associated with more collective leadership. At the end of this period, increased population densities contributed to a shift to more exclusionary rituals and political strategies throughout the lowlands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The production of pottery in East Asia can be traced back to approximately 20,000 years ago. Hunter-gatherer communities utilised pottery for many years before transitioning to agriculture in regions such as China, Japan, and the Russian Far East. While there has been much debate surrounding pottery production in hunter-gatherer societies, little attention has been given to the role of ceramic vessels in the shift to sedentism and agriculture. This research explores the technological aspects of pottery production in both hunter-gatherer societies and societies in the midst of transitioning to agriculture. The study focuses on ceramic assemblages from two sites in the Fuxin Area of Liaoning province, China. The earlier site represents a small semi-sedentary society that relied solely on hunting and gathering, while the later site, around 400 years later, is a village that also incorporates the use of millet. Using petrography, X-ray diffractometry, X-ray florescence, and thermo-gravimetric analyses, the study identifies differences in ceramic production between the two sites, including the use of selective clay and temper types and improved firing techniques at the later site. These technological changes are believed to be due to specific changes in the preferences of sedentary groups, possibly related to food processing during the onset of agriculture. The findings shed light on the relationship between social, economic, and technological variation in prehistoric societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the Middle Preclassic period (c. 1000–350 BCE), the people of the Maya lowlands transitioned from a mobile horticulturalist to sedentary farming lifestyle, exemplified by permanent houses arranged around patios and rebuilt over generations. Early evidence of this change has been found in northern Belize, in the Belize Valley, and at Ceibal, Guatemala. At Cuello and other sites in northern Belize, mortuary rituals tied to ancestor veneration created inequality from the beginning of sedentary life. There, relatively dense populations facilitated the emergence of competitive sociopolitical strategies. However, Maya communities in different regions adopted different aspects of sedentism at different times and employed different power strategies. Unlike Cuello, Ceibal was founded as a ceremonial center by semi-mobile people. Middle Preclassic ritual practices at Ceibal and in the Belize Valley were associated with more collective leadership. At the end of this period, increased population densities contributed to a shift to more exclusionary rituals and political strategies throughout the lowlands.

Authorities have often seen pastoralist mobility as a challenge for public health and veterinary disease control. While the movement of humans and animals can influence disease transmission, authorities often overlook the complexity of these epidemiological relations and ignore the ecological and economic trade-offs of restricting pastoral mobility. This study reviews the Covid-19 response at the border between Turkana County (Kenya) and Moroto District (Uganda), with particular focus on the Kenyan side. Drawing on interviews with Kenyan public health officials, NGOs’ practitioners and pastoral households, we examine the treatment of pastoralist mobility in the Covid-19 response. Our findings suggest that, while there is special attention to and investment in extending health services to pastoralists, most of the thinking focuses on their rural location and household dispersal, rather than their mobility. In fact, pastoral transhumance was at times treated as a threat to disease control and national public health while other forms of cross-border mobility continued. We apply the concept of ‘sedentist bias’ to suggest that this understanding of pastoral mobility has become entrenched in the technics of public health planning.

The recognition that pastoralism is well-suited to conditions of variability and uncertainty is growing among academics and policy-makers. With the notion that schooled individuals with pastoralist backgrounds could influence political decisions regarding support and providing services for mobile pastoralism, this paper questions the sedentist bias among schooled Tuareg in the Agadez region. In the first part, the history of schooling for nomads in Niger is discussed in the context of schooling for mobile people. Compared to experiences elsewhere, boarding schools can either encourage sedentarisation or support mobility. The same holds in the case of service centres for mobile populations, which are making their way back to regional planning. Ideas regarding the development of schooled Tuareg from caravan and gardening backgrounds in Aïr and from pastoralist communities in the west and south of Aïr are not only influenced by schooling, but relate to different development trends and depend on individual experiences, identity and affective relation to pastoralism. While on the one hand, certain schooled Tuaregs have embraced a sedentist vision of development, those who enjoy active relationships with nomadic pastoralists nonetheless recognise the value of their customary knowledge and practices, including herd mobility. Schools could participate in transmitting a favourable image of pastoralism as a productive system for sustainable futures and thereby equip future generations of diverse policymakers to engage meaningfully with mobile pastoralists.

Livestock identification and traceability systems (LITS) are an increasingly prominent component of national livestock development policies around the world. In theory, LITS allow governments to track and respond to disease and livestock theft efficiently. However, this paper argues that LITS are suffused with sedentist assumptions that are at odds with the livestock management practices of pastoralist communities. Drawing on qualitative interviews with implementing bureaucrats and affected pastoralist communities as well as one author’s experience of growing up and managing cattle in a pastoralist community, we review the sedentist assumptions that animate the Namibian Livestock Identification and Traceability System (NamLITS) and describe how pastoralists in north-western Namibia perceive that NamLITS has affected their economic, social and political lives. We then show the strategies that pastoralists use to comply and circumvent NamLITS, and conclude with lessons for governments and development practitioners considering livestock tracing systems and mobile communities affected by them.

This article examines the process of securing land rights for pastoralists in Kenya, applying the concept of sedentism to understand the impact of two recent changes in Kenyan land governance. In 2010, the Government of Kenya passed a new constitution, which devolved government power to the local level. A declared aim was to give communities greater influence over governance of their lands. Then, in 2016, the Government passed the Community Land Act, which aims at formalising community ownership of land through group registration. Drawing on fieldwork among pastoralists living in Samburu County in Northern Kenya, we show that despite ostensibly aiming to empower local pastoralist communities and provide better recognition of their land rights, these two changes interact to promote the sedentarisation of pastoralists. The Community Land Act has treated communal grasslands as clusters of discrete parcels rather than as integrated rangeland ecosystems. In combination with devolution, this runs counter to the flexible and negotiated forms of land governance upon which pastoralists’ livelihoods rely, thereby making them susceptible to sedentarism and dispossession.

Fourteenth-century Cliff phase Salado (AD 1300–1450) villages in southwest New Mexico show interesting contrasts with earlier villages in the same region from the Classic Mimbres period (AD 1000–1130). One of the most intriguing differences is that although people in both time periods relied heavily on maize agriculture, Salado period villagers may have employed a more mobile land-use strategy in comparison to Classic Mimbres period residents of the same areas. Researchers in the 1980s suggested that "short-term sedentism" characterized Salado period sites but had limited comparative data. This study reexamines evidence for mobility and sedentism in the Classic Mimbres and Salado periods using burial and architectural data from 49 excavated archaeological sites in the Mimbres region, including recent work on Salado villages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the process of securing land rights for pastoralists in Kenya, applying the concept of sedentism to understand the impact of two recent changes in Kenyan land governance. In 2010, the Government of Kenya passed a new constitution, which devolved government power to the local level. A declared aim was to give communities greater influence over governance of their lands. Then, in 2016, the Government passed the Community Land Act, which aims at formalising community ownership of land through group registration. Drawing on fieldwork among pastoralists living in Samburu County in Northern Kenya, we show that despite ostensibly aiming to empower local pastoralist communities and provide better recognition of their land rights, these two changes interact to promote the sedentarisation of pastoralists. The Community Land Act has treated communal grasslands as clusters of discrete parcels rather than as integrated rangeland ecosystems. In combination with devolution, this runs counter to the flexible and negotiated forms of land governance upon which pastoralists' livelihoods rely, thereby making them susceptible to sedentarism and dispossession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recognition that pastoralism is well-suited to conditions of variability and uncertainty is growing among academics and policy-makers. With the notion that schooled individuals with pastoralist backgrounds could influence political decisions regarding support and providing services for mobile pastoralism, this paper questions the sedentist bias among schooled Tuareg in the Agadez region. In the first part, the history of schooling for nomads in Niger is discussed in the context of schooling for mobile people. Compared to experiences elsewhere, boarding schools can either encourage sedentarisation or support mobility. The same holds in the case of service centres for mobile populations, which are making their way back to regional planning. Ideas regarding the development of schooled Tuareg from caravan and gardening backgrounds in Aïr and from pastoralist communities in the west and south of Aïr are not only influenced by schooling, but relate to different development trends and depend on individual experiences, identity and affective relation to pastoralism. While on the one hand, certain schooled Tuaregs have embraced a sedentist vision of development, those who enjoy active relationships with nomadic pastoralists nonetheless recognise the value of their customary knowledge and practices, including herd mobility. Schools could participate in transmitting a favourable image of pastoralism as a productive system for sustainable futures and thereby equip future generations of diverse policymakers to engage meaningfully with mobile pastoralists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Authorities have often seen pastoralist mobility as a challenge for public health and veterinary disease control. While the movement of humans and animals can influence disease transmission, authorities often overlook the complexity of these epidemiological relations and ignore the ecological and economic trade-offs of restricting pastoral mobility. This study reviews the Covid-19 response at the border between Turkana County (Kenya) and Moroto District (Uganda), with particular focus on the Kenyan side. Drawing on interviews with Kenyan public health officials, NGOs' practitioners and pastoral households, we examine the treatment of pastoralist mobility in the Covid-19 response. Our findings suggest that, while there is special attention to and investment in extending health services to pastoralists, most of the thinking focuses on their rural location and household dispersal, rather than their mobility. In fact, pastoral transhumance was at times treated as a threat to disease control and national public health while other forms of cross-border mobility continued. We apply the concept of 'sedentist bias' to suggest that this understanding of pastoral mobility has become entrenched in the technics of public health planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Livestock identification and traceability systems (LITS) are an increasingly prominent component of national livestock development policies around the world. In theory, LITS allow governments to track and respond to disease and livestock theft efficiently. However, this paper argues that LITS are suffused with sedentist assumptions that are at odds with the livestock management practices of pastoralist communities. Drawing on qualitative interviews with implementing bureaucrats and affected pastoralist communities as well as one author's experience of growing up and managing cattle in a pastoralist community, we review the sedentist assumptions that animate the Namibian Livestock Identification and Traceability System (NamLITS) and describe how pastoralists in north-western Namibia perceive that NamLITS has affected their economic, social and political lives. We then show the strategies that pastoralists use to comply and circumvent NamLITS, and conclude with lessons for governments and development practitioners considering livestock tracing systems and mobile communities affected by them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Permanent settlement began in southwest Asia across the end of the Pleistocene (the Epipalaeolithic) and the beginning of the Holocene (the Neolithic). Aggregation represents a transformation of the cultural niche, involving major social and cultural innovations and profound developments of the strategies of subsistence. At first, the scalar stress of living in large, permanent communities was diffused through corporate effort in the construction and maintenance of monumental communal buildings, a complex material symbolism, and increasing intensity of communal rituals; participation demonstrated commitment and conformity to community norms. As cultivated crops and managed herds of sheep and goat gradually became the predominant source of subsistence, the old sharing ethos was overtaken by the household as the central socio-economic unit; the household became the focus for ritual and symbolism. As population aggregations grew larger, their supra-regional networks of socio-economic sharing and exchange also became more complex, extensive and intensive. The new cultural niche based on networked aggregations produced a marked acceleration in both the rate of cultural accumulation and the rate of demographic growth. At the end of the Neolithic, plow-agriculture began in place of horticulture; there are the first signs of mixed agro-pastoral economies, the marking of private property, new technologies (ceramics and copper metallurgy), and, in southern Iraq, irrigation agriculture. At this time, too, the accelerating expansion of the population of farmers is marked by the appearance of their new settlements in all directions.

Vegetal matter undergoing digestion in herbivores' stomachs and intestines, digesta, can be an important source of dietary carbohydrates for human foragers. Digesta significantly increases large herbivores' total caloric yield and broadens their nutritional profile to include three key macronutrients (protein, fat, and carbohydrates) in amounts sufficient to sustain small foraging groups for multiple days without supplementation. Ethnographic reports of routine digesta consumption are limited to high latitudes, but the practice may have had a wider distribution prehistorically. Including this underappreciated resource in our foraging hypotheses and models can substantively change their predictions. Assessing the explanatory power of kilocalorie‐centered models relative to ones that attend to humans' other nutritional requirements can help us better address major questions in evolutionary anthropology. This paper explores the foraging implications of digesta in two contexts—sex‐divided subsistence labor and archaeologically observed increases in plant use and sedentism—using estimates of available protein and carbohydrates in the native tissues and digesta, respectively, of a large ruminant herbivore (Bison bison). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the archaeological tradition of what is today Peru, studies of sedentary agricultural groups have accorded a minor role to the analysis of stone tools relative to other suites of material culture. Here, we illustrate the value of such lithic collections via a case study of settlement sites from the Chachapoyas region of northern Peru (AD 300–1500). This study demonstrates the potential of methods such as use-wear microscopy and raw material analysis to address questions of theoretical interest to archaeologists studying sedentary society, such as subsistence, household behavior, and ceremonial practices. A set of generalized linear models of the spatial distribution of volcanic stone indicates that lithic raw material acquisition at these ceramic period sites was likely embedded in other activities. In addition, we examine an unusual set of limestone and carbonate-patinated artifacts that suggest that lithic procurement and selection were informed and strategic, if not conforming to expected technological priorities. We suggest that, by taking the potential value of lithic artifacts into consideration from project design through field collection and assemblage sampling, researchers can minimize biases that may otherwise limit the value of lithic assemblages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Objectives Modern biocultural environments continue to place selective pressures on our skeletons. In the past century, a major cultural pressure has been the rise in sedentism. However, studies considering the effects of sedentism on the foot have largely considered pathological changes to the gross foot without particular regard for the pedal skeleton. To address this gap in the literature, temporal trends in the development of osteoarthritis and entheseal changes on the tarsals and metatarsals were analyzed in the context of biodemographic data for recent modern humans. Methodology The sample utilized for this project is comprised of 71 individuals from the William M. Bass Donated Skeletal Collection, with birth years ranging from 1909 to 1993. Temporal trends in osteoarthritis and entheseal changes were determined via ANCOVA, using year of birth as the explanatory variable and biodemographic variables (age, sex, stature, body mass index and tibial robusticity) as covariates. Results Results indicate that entheseal changes and osteoarthritis have decreased over time, and these trends are statistically significant. Temporal trends in pedal entheseal changes and osteoarthritis vary by sex. Conclusions and Implications The increase in sedentary behavior over time has usually been framed as a net negative for human health and well-being. However, considered in isolation, the decrease in entheseal changes and osteoarthritis presented here might be considered a positive development as they suggest overall less stress on the modern human foot. This study also has the potential to inform the health sciences and general public about biocultural contributors to modern foot health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many researchers assume that until 10–12,000 years ago, humans lived in small, mobile, relatively egalitarian bands. This "nomadic-egalitarian model" suffuses the social sciences. It informs evolutionary explanations of behavior and our understanding of how contemporary societies differ from those of our evolutionary past. Here, we synthesize research challenging this model and articulate an alternative, the diverse histories model, to replace it. We review the limitations of using recent foragers as models of Late Pleistocene societies and the considerable social variation among foragers commonly considered small-scale, mobile, and egalitarian. We review ethnographic and archaeological findings covering 34 world regions showing that non-agricultural peoples often live in groups that are more sedentary, unequal, large, politically stratified, and capable of large-scale cooperation and resource management than is normally assumed. These characteristics are not restricted to extant Holocene hunter-gatherers but, as suggested by archaeological findings from 27 Middle Stone Age sites, likely characterized societies throughout the Late Pleistocene (until c. 130 ka), if not earlier. These findings have implications for how we understand human psychological adaptations and the broad trajectory of human history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Peoples living in the Eastern Woodlands of North America domesticated a suite of small‐seeded crops between five thousand and two thousand years ago, making this region one of roughly ten independent centers of domestication across the globe. In the Southern Appalachian region, foraging peoples began cultivating these native crops around thirty‐five hundred years ago (during the Late Archaic period [3000–800 BCE]); by the start of the Early Woodland period (800–200 BCE), they had significantly altered their lifeways and surrounding landscape. This included a change in the physical landscape, as demonstrated by paleoethnobotanical data, with an increase in weedy plants at the expense of bottomland forests. Groups also significantly shifted their lifeways, becoming more sedentary, as evidenced by an increase in storage pits, more substantial structures, and the adoption of ceramic vessels. Storage pits also tend to be smaller, indicating a shift from community‐based food procurement and storage to the household level. This may reflect the development of private property and distinctions among households with differential access. Community‐based rituals, as evidenced in several caves and rock‐shelters in the region, may have been established to strengthen group ties in the face of the broader changing social and physical landscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Osteoarthritis (OA) is a common joint disease whose causes are not fully understood, but a longstanding hypothesis is that OA stems primarily from the cumulative effects of joint mechanical loading throughout life. Based on this wear and tear hypothesis, anthropologists have assumed that the presence of OA in archeological human skeletons can be interpreted as evidence of a highly physically active lifestyle. Here, we use guinea pigs to experimentally test the hypothesis that higher levels of routine physical activity result in greater OA degeneration. Materials and methods: Guinea pigs are a useful model for OA research because they spontaneously develop the disease in a manner similar to humans. One group of growing animals was housed for 22 weeks in a large room that promoted voluntary physical activity (4.8 km of movement per day, on average), while animals in another group were housed in small cages that restricted their mobility (n = 15/group). After the experiment, histological and microcomputed tomographic analyses were conducted focusing on the knees. Results: Rather than causing greater OA degeneration, elevated levels of routine physical activity resulted in significantly less knee cartilage deterioration, less synovial inflammation, smaller osteophytes, and maintenance of greater epiphyseal trabecular bone quantity. Discussion: These results are inconsistent with the hypothesis that high levels of routine physical activity drive the pathogenesis of OA and call into question typical interpretations of OA in studies of archeological human skeletons. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the beginning of sedentary life in the Near East, the practice of burying the dead, which was exceptional throughout the Palaeolithic period, became widespread. From then on, an enduring relationship became established between the living and the dead coexisting in the same settlement, and it seems that the boundary that separated them began to blur. As many burials were excavated long ago, the spatial and stratigraphic evidence and the treatment of corpses are often imprecise. However, there are still indications that a dynamic of interdependence between the living and the dead became more marked over time. We show that, well beyond their passive occupation of the territory of which they are presumed to have been the guardians, the dead took on a decisive role in the foundation and the subsequent restructuring of settlements. The location of the graves and the succession of activities and constructions are evidence of deliberate planning of the dwelling space, in which the role of each actor became sustained over time. The alternation of individual and collective treatments of the deceased seems to correspond to changes in the occupation of each settlement. It can then be seen that if the relationship between graves and dwellings is loosened, the funerary time span lengthens and the boundary between the living and the dead becomes permeable.

This article's polemical thrust begins with Georges Bataille's 1956 critique of Tristes Tropiques, where Lévi-Strauss omits the Palaeolithic while extolling the Neolithic advent of agriculture and sedentism. Whereas Lévi-Strauss describes his own thinking as Neolithic, he characterizes it in ways that resemble the behaviour of hunter-gatherers and nomads. I trace this contradiction to current scholarship willing to challenge the long-standing narrative bias that either ignores the Palaeolithic and/or derides it in favour of the Neolithic, now subject to refutations of its alleged advantages. Further theoretical backbone is provided by Ibn Khaldun and Bataille on the centrality of luxury. Thus, Palaeolithic cave art's social dimension as the expression of a privileged few is contrasted with the view of scholars who see it as the product of an egalitarian society indifferent to material gain. Bataille remains a key reference due to his exceptional commitment to prehistory, a relatively underexploited facet of his work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ethnicity of the Nagaibaks originated in 1736 after the establishment of the Nagaibak fortress, in which inorodtsy of different backgrounds from adjacent areas were gathered and given the status of Cossacks (on condition of their baptism). Later, after their resettlement to the New Line in 1842–43, the Nagaibaks formed a peculiar community: their membership in a military estate and their inclusion of peoples of different traditions and creeds helped them to become “a border people” in spatial and sociocultural dimensions. In turn, this “liminality” allowed the Nagaibaks to unite opposing features within their ethnicity—hospitality and rivalry, openness to innovation (in terms of active participation in ethnic projects) and closeness in traditions (in terms of preserving rituals of kinship). At various points in their history, the Nagaibaks turned to either openness or closeness, or a combination of both. In the Soviet period, an emphasis on closeness allowed them to preserve their culture (“introvert mode”). In the post-Soviet period, on the contrary, the Nagaibaks mobilized their ethnicity through openness (“extrovert mode”). This dynamic ethnicity made possible a transition from the spatial mobility of the past to the activization of ethnicity in the present. Through their development at the crossroads of different types of cultures (nomad and sedentary, Christian and Muslim, European and Asia) the Nagaibak culture became open-minded and adaptable, while the nomad and Cossack sociocultural heritage led to mobility and flexibility in their actions.

En el presente artículo se reporta el hallazgo de varios contextos arqueológicos tempranos descubiertos e investigados recientemente en el noroeste de la ciudad de Quito, en el sector urbano denominado Rancho Bajo. Se trata principalmente de un cementerio relacionado con una superficie de uso de muy antigua fecha para la región, que presentó también un área de actividad dedicada a la talla de obsidiana. Los datos estratigráficos, así como las dataciones radiocarbónicas, ubican estos contextos en un momento de transición (3600-3400 cal. AP) entre el periodo Precerámico y el Formativo Temprano. Este último se consideraba, a través de los materiales culturales de filiación Cotocollao, el asentamiento sedentario más antiguo de Quito, caracterizado por la presencia de cerámica desde su inicio. Los hallazgos de Rancho Bajo muestran una ocupación sedentaria acerámica anterior estratigráficamente a la ocupación de la fase Cotocollao y dan razón, de esta manera, sobre los primeros quiteños conocidos hasta el momento. En el texto se discuten aspectos cronológicos y terminológicos que concluyen en la necesidad de añadir un nuevo periodo en la tabla cronológica quiteña. ENGLISH: This paper reports on the recent discovery and investigation of early archaeological contexts in the northwest section of Quito, in the urban sector named Rancho Bajo. The principal context is a cemetery associated with a paleosurface that dates to an early moment for the region. Additionally, an activity area dedicated to working obsidian also was found in association with the paleosurface. The stratigraphy and radiocarbon dates indicate that these contexts pertain to a moment of transition (3600–3400 cal BP) between the Preceramic and Early Formative periods. Based on cultural material affiliated with Cotocollao, the latter period was considered to include the oldest sedentary settlement in Quito with ceramic vessels present from the beginning of the occupation. The discoveries at Rancho Bajo document an aceramic sedentary occupation in a stratigraphic context below Cotocollao materials, indicating that the aceramic inhabitants of the site are the earliest known Quiteños to date. In this paper, I discuss chronological and terminological issues that demonstrate the necessity of adding a new period to the chronology of Quito.

The archaeological site of Checua is located on an isolated hill in the Checua river valley in the Sabana de Bogotá, Northern South America. Archaeological data obtained at the site two decades ago, suggested that it was occupied by groups of hunters and gatherers since Early Holocene. Good preservation of cultural materials allowed researchers to study several aspects of ancient inhabitants of the site including subsistence strategies as well as lithic and bone technologies to manufacture artefacts. Since 2015, a research program has been carried out at Checua in order to obtain relevant data to clarify chronology and to suggest a more detailed sociocultural characterisation of the people dwelling the place. We obtained new and complementary information about chronology, subsistence and mortuary practices. Radiocarbon data allowed us to assess the earliest and latest occupation of the site, showing that while it was used since ca. 9500 years BP, mortuary practices where carried out only between 7580 and 7475 years cal BP (2σ) and 5190-5052 years cal BP (2σ). We also discuss how these data can be used to explore permanence of human occupation at places in the landscapes during the process of sedentism among hunter and gatherers groups in Northern South America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The transition from the dart to the arrow, and the commensurate changes in lithic technology is poorly understood in the American Southwest. This transition has often been linked to shifts in sedentism and the increasing use of expedient flake tools. However, the relationship between the use of bifacial and core reduction strategies are conditioned by a variety of factors, and not primarily in response to the use of the bow-and-arrow, or simply sedentism. We, therefore, evaluate a series of potential factors which can be used to understand the variability exhibited in the use of biface and flake technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With reference to Jeffrey C. Kaufmann's concept of a 'sediment of nomadism', for which pastoralism is still, implicitly or not, referenced and essentialised to 'pure' degrees of mobility and 'pure' food economies centred around livestock, this article argues that, in pastoral settings, sedentism is equally essentialised. This article reverses the traditional critique of the nomadism/sedentism dichotomy by questioning the relevance of ideal types of 'pure sedentism'. Based on fourteen months of ethnographic fieldwork in the Northern Kenya arid lands, this article looks away from big cities and regional urbanities to focus on small settlements springing up along improved roads and telecommunications infrastructure, showing that places are never motionless, despite measures of emplacement promoted by national and local governments and the international community. The drilling of boreholes, the construction of health centres and schools, the distribution of aid does not stop the mobility of places nor of their inhabitants. Until places remain mobile, they are alive; otherwise they clot. This argument makes it possible to move beyond a dichotomic definition of sedentism and nomadism to value changes, flexibility, and plasticity as important features of places created and recreated by mobile pastoralists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To investigate whether and how a sedentary lifestyle contributes to knee osteoarthritis (OA) incidence and severity.Design: An experiment was conducted using Hartley guinea pigs, an established idiopathic knee OA model. To simulate a sedentary lifestyle, growing animals (n = 18) were housed for 22 weeks in small cages that restricted their mobility, while another group of animals (n = 17) received daily treadmill exercise to simulate moderate physical activity. After the experiment, histological assessments, biochemical assays, and mechanical testing were conducted to compare tibial articular cartilage structure, strength, and degree of OA degeneration between sedentary and physically active animals. Groups were also compared based on body weight and composition, as well as gut microbial community composition assessed using fecal 16S rRNA gene sequencing.Results: Prevalence of knee OA was similar between sedentary and physically active animals, but severity of the disease (cartilage lesion depth) was substantially greater in the sedentary group (P = 0.02). In addition, during the experiment, sedentary animals developed cartilage with lower aggrecan quantity (P = 0.03) and accumulated more body weight (P = 0.005) and visceral adiposity (P = 0.007). Groups did not differ greatly, however, in terms of cartilage thickness, collagen quantity, or stiffness, nor in terms of muscle weight, subcutaneous adiposity, or gut microbial community composition.Conclusions: Our findings indicate that a sedentary lifestyle promotes the development of knee OA, particularly by enhancing disease severity rather than risk of onset, and this potentially occurs through multiple pathways including by engendering growth of functionally deficient joint tissues and the accumulation of excess body weight and adiposity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hafting is an important part of lithic technology that can increase our understanding of socioeconomic behavior in the past. In this article, we develop a holistic approach to studying hafting by using the concept of curation within a broader assessment of lithic technological organization in early villages. Early villages were loci of socioeconomic transformation as part of the shift from mobile foraging to more sedentary cultivation lifeways. We suggest that an examination of hafting can provide new insights into how early villagers negotiated technological requirements, economic decision making, and social interactions in these novel contexts. As a case study, we develop a curation index and apply it to an archaeological context of hafted and unhafted pointed tools from the early Neolithic village of Dhra', Jordan. This curation index allows for a discussion of the technological, economic, and social dimensions of hafting strategies at Dhra'. The presence of multiple hafting traditions within early Neolithic villages of Southwest Asia is evidence of persistent social segmentation despite food storage and ritual practices that emphasized communal integration. Through the lens of lithic technological organization, we demonstrate that hafting and curation patterns can increase our understanding of technological, economic, and social strategies in early villages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many archaeological models describe the development of restricted residential mobility, or sedentism, in prehistoric settings. Sedentism is often part of a suite of cultural changes, often accompanied by seed intensification, storage, population increase, environmental degradation, establishment of social hierarchy, and agriculture. Most models describe these changes as a series of events, with one precipitating the next. As a result, sedentism is interpreted as either a direct byproduct or a causative trigger of other societal changes. Results of excavations at the village site of Sunga'va (CA-INY-3806) are used to examine the timing of sedentism in relation to the development of storage and seed intensification in the Owens Valley of California. The site, which has evidence for two separate occupations from a period that has heretofore not been the subject of intensive research, suggests that sedentism developed at the same time or just before storage and some 800 years before seed intensification. Data do not support social models, such as the activity of aggrandizers or the stabilization of long-distance exchange networks, in these developments.

This paper reports on the recent discovery and investigation of early archaeological contexts in the northwest section of Quito, in the urban sector named Rancho Bajo. The principal context is a cemetery associated with a paleosurface that dates to an early moment for the region. Additionally, an activity area dedicated to working obsidian also was found in association with the paleosurface. The stratigraphy and radiocarbon dates indicate that these contexts pertain to a moment of transition (3600-3400 cal BP) between the Preceramic and Early Formative periods. Based on cultural material affiliated with Cotocollao, the latter period was considered to include the oldest sedentary settlement in Quito with ceramic vessels present from the beginning of the occupation. The discoveries at Rancho Bajo document an aceramic sedentary occupation in a stratigraphic context below Cotocollao materials, indicating that the aceramic inhabitants of the site are the earliest known Quiteños to date. In this paper, I discuss chronological and terminological issues that demonstrate the necessity of adding a new period to the chronology of Quito. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We compare domestic architectural features in New England and the Maritime Peninsula to investigate the relationship between the adoption of horticulture and its relationship to social and settlement change during the Woodland Period. Horticulture was not practiced on the Maritime Peninsula until after European contact, despite cultural and environmental similarity to New England. In New England, horticulture has been implicated in profound social and settlement changes. However, aggregated villages, a unit typically investigated for evidence of social change, have proven elusive in the archaeological record. We compiled and analyzed a dataset of dwelling features instead of relying on identifiable villages. This novel quantitative approach uses dwelling feature shape and size as a proxy for social and settlement change, considering these changes at the scale of the house. We find that, during the Woodland Period, dwelling size was overall slightly larger in New England than on the Maritime Peninsula, but ranges heavily overlapped. After the introduction of horticulture, however, dwellings in New England grew in size overall and assumed bimodally distinct larger and smaller forms, which likely necessitated a restructuring of social and economic behavior. This pattern correlates maize horticulture with changes in social and economic lifestyle in Late Woodland New England. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I deal with different modes of population movement, as well as the ethnic ramifications of such movement. The discussion is set in the Straits of Melaka, Singapore and Riau, the waterways separating Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. Prior to the formation of these nation-states, the three straits, which flow into one another, provided a unifying focus for successive Malay kingdoms. International boundaries now run through them, but the populations form part of an Alam Melayu, Malay world, that transcends national borders. These indigenous populations may be land or sea oriented, sedentary or nomadic, with varying social and economic circumstances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]