Search

We use a sedimentological approach to examine the formation and deformation processes associated with the accumulation of shell deposits in two major clusters of shell mounds, the Weipa group in the monsoonal environment of Albatross Bay in the Cape York Peninsula of northern Queensland, Australia, and the Farasan Islands group in the semi-arid environment of the southern Red Sea sector of Saudi Arabia. The comparison of such disparate case studies is deliberate, intended to highlight generic issues of shell accumulation and degradation irrespective of the taxonomic composition of the shells or cultural and environmental histories. It also reflects recent fieldwork in both regions conducted in parallel with collaborative arrangements for sharing of ideas and approaches and exchange of personnel in order to establish a common baseline for comparison. Comparative analysis of shell composition, fragmentation, and accumulation highlights similarities despite the different cultural and environmental contexts of the two case studies. These similarities suggest that the size and form of shell deposits are altered by a combination of processes reflecting ongoing changes in deposit composition unrelated to human actions of shell discard. Even where large shell deposits are visible and available for sampling, what is preserved is neither a static reflection of initial deposition nor of undisturbed or “completed” form. We consider the influence of such processes on assessments of rates of deposition and the interpretation of variations in the shape and size of shell deposits.

The twentieth-century excavations of stratified deposits at Kom W, adjacent to Lake Qarun in Fayum north shore, Egypt, led to a variety of interpretations, including the argument for the presence of a Neolithic village. This has influenced the evaluation of early to mid-Holocene occupation in Egypt. Here, we report our recent study of the erosion and deposition processes at the site and its environs in order to reassess these interpretations. Changes in the level of Lake Qarun, evidence for wind erosion, deflation, and deposition, and analyses of artifact density provide a geomorphic context for Kom W and its immediate environs. Radiocarbon determinations from surface hearths that surround the Kom are reported. From the time of its initial formation, Kom W was subject to post-depositional processes, particularly wind erosion, which have affected the site’s current form, and the preservation of features and artifact within the deposits. These changes need to be considered when deriving behavioral interpretations from the archaeological record at Kom W and in the surrounding area. The composition of deflated deposits that surround Kom W suggests that the site is not as unique as once imagined. Remains that might have allowed interpretations of a village occupation have not survived. Instead, deposits are consistent with other early to mid-Holocene occupations interpreted as locations with the use of domesticates but without villages.

Shell mounds are a prominent part of the Cape York Peninsula archaeological record. A short period of fieldwork allowed initial assessment of their presence, size, and shape in the Kwokkunum region, Albatross Bay. Shell mounds found in this area vary in size with some examples amongst the largest found in the Cape York Peninsula. Comparison of terrestrial and airborne LiDAR data suggests that shell mounds in areas like Kwokkunum may be identified remotely where mound slopes exceed 5–10°. However, vegetation provides significant challenges for shell mound recording and vegetation on the mounds impacts on their form and preservation. Some of the challenges the largest mounds pose for investigation are reviewed.

This chapter interrogates the contemporary dominance of a “What Works” approach in studies of the police. It examines and finds wanting the methodological and theoretical foundations of this orientation. Instead, it argues that researchers should begin with an understanding of human beings, adopting research methods resonating with their conclusion. Ethnography is based on the meanings human beings attribute to the social world; it is concerned with a systematic, detailed description and analysis of the police and policing. After this introduction, major ethnographic studies of the police are discussed, and their main findings analyzed. Studies conducted beyond Anglo-American societies are covered. Each study reveals a key feature of policing that would not have been identified if ethnographic, participatory methods had not been used. The consequences of each finding for policing and for academic knowledge are discussed briefly, and somewhat ironically, key implications for police policy are considered.

Stone artifacts are often the most abundant class of objects found in archaeological sites but their consistent identification is limited by the number of experienced analysts available. We report a machine learning based technology for stone artifact identification as part of a solution to the lack of such experts directed at distinguishing worked stone objects from naturally occurring lithic clasts. Three case study locations from Egypt, Australia, and New Zealand provide a data set of 6769 2D images, 3868 flaked artifact and 2901 rock images used to train and test a machine learning model based on an openly available PyTorch implementation of Faster R-CNN ResNet 50. Results indicate 100% agreement between the model and original human derived classifications, a better performance than the results achieved independently by two human analysts who reassessed the 2D images available to the machine learning model. Machine learning neural networks provide the potential to consistently assess the composition of large archaeological assemblages composed of objects modified in a variety of ways.

Movement and mobility are key properties in understanding what makes us human and so have been foci for archeological studies. Stone artifacts survive in many contexts, providing the potential for understanding landscape use in the past through studies of mobility and settlement pattern. We review the inferential basis for these studies based on archeological practice and anthropological understanding of hunter-gatherer bands. Rather than structured relationships among band size, composition, and mobility, anthropological studies suggest variability in how hunter-gatherer groups were organized. We consider how stone artifact studies may be used to investigate this variability by outlining a geometric approach to stone artifact analysis based on the Cortex Ratio. An archeological case study from Holocene semi-arid Australia allows consideration of the potential of this approach for understanding past landscape use from stone artifact assemblage composition more generally.

Significance Fossil evidence shows that Polynesians introduced the tropical crop taro (Colocasia esculenta) during initial colonization of the subtropical South Pacific islands and temperate New Zealand after 1200 CE, establishing garden ecosystems with similar commensal plants and invertebrates. Sedimentary charcoal and fossil remains indicate how frequent burning and perennial cultivation overcame the ecological constraints for taro production, particularly the temperate forest cover of New Zealand. An increase in short-lived plants, indicating a transition toward higher-intensity production, followed rapid woody forest decline and species extinctions on all islands. The relatively recent fossil records from the subtropical and temperate islands of Polynesia provide unique insights into the ecological processes behind the spread of Neolithic crops into areas marginal for production., Polynesians introduced the tropical crop taro (Colocasia esculenta) to temperate New Zealand after 1280 CE, but evidence for its cultivation is limited. This contrasts with the abundant evidence for big game hunting, raising longstanding questions of the initial economic and ecological importance of crop production. Here we compare fossil data from wetland sedimentary deposits indicative of taro and leaf vegetable (including Sonchus and Rorippa spp.) cultivation from Ahuahu, a northern New Zealand offshore island, with Raivavae and Rapa, both subtropical islands in French Polynesia. Preservation of taro pollen on all islands between 1300 CE and 1550 CE indicates perennial cultivation over multiple growing seasons, as plants rarely flower when frequently harvested. The pollen cooccurs with previously undetected fossil remains of extinct trees, as well as many weeds and commensal invertebrates common to tropical Polynesian gardens. Sedimentary charcoal and charred plant remains show that fire use rapidly reduced forest cover, particularly on Ahuahu. Fires were less frequent by 1500 CE on all islands as forest cover diminished, and short-lived plants increased, indicating higher-intensity production. The northern offshore islands of New Zealand were likely preferred sites for early gardens where taro production was briefly attempted, before being supplanted by sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas), a more temperate climate-adapted crop, which was later established in large-scale cultivation systems on the mainland after 1500 CE.

New Zealand was first settled by Māori soon after 1200 CE, however the age, and so the social and environmental contexts of the rock art they made remains uncertain. We report the first attempts at the direct dating of New Zealand rock art through radiocarbon analysis focusing on the return of an unexpectedly early date. Historical information and pigment testing indicates that the particular figures that returned the early date were retouched with modern crayons. We report the use of portable X-ray fluorescence to identify rock art figures that have been retouched in this way. Results emphasise the need to consider historical information in future assessments of material for dating Māori rock art.

One of the greatest difficulties with evolutionary approaches in the study of stone tools (lithics) has been finding a mechanism for tying culture and biology in a way that preserves human agency and operates at scales that are visible in the archaeological record. The concept of niche construction, whereby organisms actively construct their environments and change the conditions for selection, could provide a solution to this problem. In this review, we evaluate the utility of niche construction theory (NCT) for stone tool archaeology. We apply NCT to lithics both as part of the ?extended phenotype? and as residuals or precipitates of other niche-constructing activities, suggesting ways in which archaeologists can employ niche construction feedbacks to generate testable hypotheses about stone tool use. Finally, we conclude that, as far as its applicability to lithic archaeology, NCT compares favorably to other prominent evolutionary approaches, such as human behavioral ecology and dual-inheritance theory.

The stone artifact record has been one of the major grounds for investigating our evolution. With the predominant focus on their morphological attributes and technological aspects of manufacture, stone artifacts and their assemblages have been analyzed as explicit measures of past behaviors, adaptations, and population histories. This analytical focus on technological and morphological appearance is one of the characteristics of the conventional approach for constructing inferences from this record. An equally persistent routine involves ascribing the emerged patterns and variability within the archaeological deposits directly to long-term central tendencies in human actions and cultural transmission. Here we re-evaluate this conventional approach. By invoking some of the known concerns and concepts about the formation of archaeological record, we introduce notions of aggregates and formational emergence to expand on the understanding of how artifacts accumulate, what these accumulations represent, and how the patterns and variability among them emerge. To infer behavior that could inform on past lifeways, we further promote a shift in the focus of analysis from the technological and morphological appearance of artifacts and assemblages to the practice of stone use. We argue for a more rigorous and multi-level inferential procedure in modeling behavioral adaptation and evolution.

If archaeology is to deal with the “big questions” of the human past, large datasets are required with common data structures that allow for comparison of data derived from markedly different times and places. However, archaeological comparisons using datasets consisting of lots of detailed records remain elusive. Large archaeological datasets are difficult to integrate because it is often functional and therefore interpretative categories that are recorded rather than the phenomena upon which these interpretations are based. Here, we describe a system that maintains a structural separation between recording a simple set of archaeological phenomena, and the functional, behavioral meanings, and temporal associations of these phenomena. Rather than construct a schema that integrates the description of high-level units and relationships, we consider what minimum data entities that might be needed to integrate datasets in relation to archaeological phenomena while still offering the flexibility needed to allow for regional variability in unit construction. We describe the implementation of this system to field recording on Ahuahu (Great Mercury Island), New Zealand, and consider examples of comparative analyses of material recorded using this system from our projects in Australia and Egypt.

Evidence for changes in human mobility is fundamental to interpretations of transitions in human socioeconomic organization. Showing changes in mobility requires both archaeological proxies that are sensitive to movement and a clear understanding of how different mobility configurations influence their patterning. This study uses computer simulation to explore how different combinations of reduction, selection, transport, and discard of stone artifacts generate patterning in the “cortex ratio,” a geometric proxy used to demonstrate movement at the assemblage level. A case study from western New South Wales, Australia, shows how cortex ratios are used to make inferences about movement. Results of the exploratory simulation show that redundancy in movement between discards reduces variability in cortex ratios, while mean assemblage values can be attributed to the relative proportions of artifacts carried into and out of the assemblages. These results suggest that raw material availability is a potentially crucial factor in determining what kinds of mobility are visible in assemblages, whereby different access to raw material can shift the balance of import and export of stone in an otherwise undirected movement configuration. These findings are used to contextualize distributions of cortex ratios from the raw material–rich study area, prompting suggestions for further fieldwork.

Sourcing studies usually focus on interpreting movement from source to place of deposition. These studies typically use materials like obsidian that lend themselves to chemical characterization. Less attention has been paid to sourcing materials that are also abundant in the archaeological record such as ceramics. Most studies of ceramics are destructive which limits their application. Portable x-ray fluorescence (pXRF) is a non-destructive alternative that can be used to determine the geochemical composition of a material. The ability to characterise ceramic materials non-destructively and rapidly permits the analysis of large numbers of vessels and sherds, but the nature of ceramics does not allow sourcing data to be interpreted in the same way as for other materials. An approach proposed looks for groups based on relative differences among objects in order to identify materials that fall outside of the most common geochemical composition within an assemblage. A total of 1626 ceramic artefacts from four assemblages from middle Holocene contexts in Egypt are assessed to determine inter and intra assemblage geochemical variability. The results are used to interpret mobility and settlement patterns indicating more variability than previously thought.

From 1924–1928, Gertrude Caton-Thompson and Elinor Gardner surveyed and excavated Epipalaeolithic and Neolithic sites across the Fayum north shore in Egypt, publishing a volume entitled The Desert Fayum (1934). Since then, a number of researchers have worked in the Fayum (e.g. Wendorf & Schild 1976; Hassan 1986; Wenke et al. 1988; Kozłowski & Ginter 1989), and most recently the UCLA/RUG/UOA Fayum Project. The long history of research in the area means that the Fayum is a testament to changing archaeological approaches, particularly regarding the Neolithic. Caton-Thompson and Gardner's study is recognised as one of the most progressive works on Egyptian prehistory, and their research provided the foundation for many subsequent studies in the region (e.g. Wendrich & Cappers 2005; Holdaway et al. 2010, 2016; Shirai 2010, 2013, 2015, 2016a; Emmitt 2011; Emmitt et al. 2017; Holdaway & Wendrich 2017). A recent article in Antiquity, however, uses Caton-Thompson and Gardner's preliminary interpretations of their excavations at a stratified deposit in the Fayum, Kom W, to generate a series of speculative statements concerning agricultural origins in the region (Shirai 2016b). The majority of these statements are very similar to conclusions initially made by Caton-Thompson and Gardner in the first half of the twentieth century, and new data and theory needed to reassess earlier conclusions are not considered. Recently published studies concerning the Fayum north shore and adjacent regions provide a different view of the state of research in this region and the Egyptian Neolithic in general. Here we acquaint Antiquity readers with current archaeological approaches to the Fayum north shore Neolithic, with the intent of stimulating academic debate.

Large mounded deposits of shell are prominent archaeological features across much of the north Australian tropical coast. Many of the shell mounds are composed almost entirely of the bivalve Anadara granosa (Linnaeus 1758), a food source for Aboriginal people in the past. A relatively long history of inquiry into the nature and significance of the shell mounds has focussed primarily on analysing the shell component as clues to Australian Aboriginal coastal economies in the past. This paper presents results of new analyses on the non-shell sediments, examining the physical and chemical signatures of depositional and post-depositional processes within shell mounds near Weipa in far north Queensland, Australia, with a view to obtaining insights into how they formed and for what purposes, and how their morphology, structure and content may have changed since they ceased accumulating. We also consider how such changes might relate to past and present environmental conditions. Physical and chemical analyses indicate that the primary purpose of mound building was most likely to discard the large volumes of shell resulting from A. granosa harvesting and consumption. Post-depositional diagenetic alteration has strongly influenced the present day composition and form of the shell mounds, in particular the accession of carbon and silica to the mounds by environmental burning aided by strong leaching under the seasonal high rainfall conditions. As such the mound chemistry is more likely to reflect modern environmental conditions rather than provide an archive of, or an opening to, the past.

Silcrete flakes and cores are abundant in the surface assemblages from western New South Wales, Australia but retouched tools made from silcrete are much less frequent, especially the heavily retouched forms like flake adzes. The distribution and abundance of these forms together with other silcrete retouched tools is investigated. While heavily retouched forms are present, forms thought to represent the intermediate stages of rejuvenation reduction are largely absent. This absence is used to consider how archaeological sites from the region should be interpreted. It is concluded that sites should not be interpreted as though they represent a material record of activities that occurred only at the place where archaeological sites are identified.

A case study from western New South Wales, Australia, illustrates the age, preservation, and distribution of late Holocene heat-retainer hearths that are abundant in the semiarid archaeological record in the region. These hearths were constructed as underground ovens with stone heat retainers. They appear archaeologically as eroded concentrations of heat-fractured stone sometimes protecting charcoal deposits. We explore geomorphic processes influencing hearth temporal and spatial distributions using a neutral agent-based model. Parallels between model outcomes and the distribution of hearths in space and time suggest that processes of sediment erosion and deposition are having complex effects on hearth survivorship and therefore on patterns of hearth frequency. We consider the various processes that explain why hearths were made in the past and how they manifest in the present. Despite the relatively recent age of the hearths when compared with evidence for fire use in the Paleolithic record, the presence and absence of these fire features reflect the outcome of a large number of processes interacting together, not all of them related to human behavior. We use the results of the case study to comment on current behavioral models for the presence and absence of fire use in the distant past.

The early and middle Holocene of North Africa was a time of dramatic climatic and social change, including rapid shifts in vegetation communities and the introduction of domesticated plants and animals. Recent research from the Fayum basin of Egypt, which holds archaeological evidence for early use of domesticates, aims to place inhabitants of that region within their contemporary environmental setting. We present here results of wood charcoal analysis from three early- and middle-Holocene deposits on the north shore of the Fayum and reconstruct both contemporary woodland ecology and patterns of anthropogenic wood use. In total, three woodland communities likely existed in the area, but inhabitants of this region made heavy use of only the local lakeshore woodland, emphasizing tamarisk ( Tamarix sp.) for fuel. While seasonally watered wadi woodlands were not harvested for fuel, more arid locations on the landscape were, evidencing regional mobility between ecological zones. Results indicate that wood was locally abundant and that inhabitants were able to select only preferred species for fuel. This study provides further evidence for low-level food production in the Fayum that preserved critical ecosystem services, rather than dramatic niche construction to promote agriculture as seen elsewhere in middle-Holocene Southwest Asia.

The excavation of the site of Kom W in the Fayum region of Egypt during the 1920s by Caton-Thompson and Gardner resulted in the loss of the original surface topography. Detailed section drawings recorded the surface and bottom of excavation, but it was previously difficult to interpret the published images. This article reports on the use of these images to create a three-dimensional representation of the site as it was before and after excavation in the 1920s. This visualization aids the interpretation of the formation processes that shaped Kom W in ways that were previously unachievable due to limitations in the original data. Archaeological sites are under increasing threat of destruction, especially in the Near East. This method could be applied to legacy data in order to reconstruct a site with the data available.

In this chapter I describe and analyse the history of EBP within wider, historical debates about the relationship between research and public policy; the broad aims and related methods of research practiced in criminology in the United States and in Europe and the different ways in which police officers have engaged with academics and their research. The social context within which contemporary ideas about EBP have been articulated will then be considered, in particular the context of the police as a profession. Attention will also be given to the contemporary idea that social science research in general and criminology in particular is an instrumental activity to inform police policy. The chapter ends with an analysis of the problems this historical context poses for contemporary EBP.

Recycling of lithic artifacts, including both lithic scavenging and secondary recycling, is a widely recognized phenomenon in the Paleolithic archaeological record, in some instances creating tools with morphological signatures characteristic of multiple time periods or technological systems. These types of tools often define transitional industries including those at the Middle-to-Upper Paleolithic transition, suggesting a variety of behavioral interpretations for the supposed evolution of Middle Paleolithic toolkits to Upper Paleolithic toolkits. Here we test an alternative hypothesis that transitional assemblages formed via secondary recycling of stone artifacts produced by two technologically divergent populations. Results from the application of an agent-based model indicate how ordered sets of assemblages resembling archaeological transitional sequences can result from the combination of simple recycling behaviors and periods of sediment deposition and erosion. This implies that some transitional assemblages could have formed without the interaction of different populations and/or without technological evolution.

Evidence for changes in human mobility is fundamental to interpretations of transitions in human socioeconomic organization. Showing changes in mobility requires both archaeological proxies that are sensitive to movement and a clear understanding of how different mobility configurations influence their patterning. This study uses computer simulation to explore how different combinations of reduction, selection, transport, and discard of stone artifacts generate patterning in the “cortex ratio,” a geometric proxy used to demonstrate movement at the assemblage level. A case study from western New South Wales, Australia, shows how cortex ratios are used to make inferences about movement. Results of the exploratory simulation show that redundancy in movement between discards reduces variability in cortex ratios, while mean assemblage values can be attributed to the relative proportions of artifacts carried into and out of the assemblages. These results suggest that raw material availability is a potentially crucial factor in determining what kinds of mobility are visible in assemblages, whereby different access to raw material can shift the balance of import and export of stone in an otherwise undirected movement configuration. These findings are used to contextualize distributions of cortex ratios from the raw material–rich study area, prompting suggestions for further fieldwork.

Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) is a laser-based surveying system that enables rapid measurement of x,y,z coordinate points, creating an accurate representation of objects in three-dimensional space. We apply this technique to the survey and analysis of mounded shell matrix deposits (SMDs) near Weipa in far north Queensland, Australia. Eleven parameters were used to characterise the size and shape of 51 shell mounds located in one geographical area. The results demonstrate substantial variation in mound size and shape, and suggest patterning in mound form related to age as well as position on the landscape. Radiocarbon chronologies developed for a sample of the 51 mounds demonstrate that the mounds do not conform to a model of linear formation of a shell deposit, suggesting mound histories are variable in both the nature of shell deposition as well as post-depositional processes. These results have important implications for interpreting the processes responsible for shell mound formation.

Both quartz and silcrete cobbles are abundant in the stony desert regions of western New South Wales, Australia and were used by Aboriginal people who occupied these regions from the mid to late Holocene. Archaeologists often characterise quartz as an inferior material for flaking when compared to silcrete, but Aboriginal people made intensive use of both materials. Here, we investigate the degree to which archaeologists can draw inferences about the choices people made in the past regarding the selection and use of different raw materials. Different types of raw material (i.e. microcrystalline silcretes and macrocrystalline quartzes) were flaked more or less intensively, but it is the utilization of the products of this flaking, not simply their manufacture, that allows inferences to be made about past intentions.

While lithic objects can potentially inform us about past adaptations and behaviors, it is important to develop a comprehensive understanding of all of the various processes that influence what we recover from the archaeological record. We argue here that many assumptions used by archaeologists to derive behavioral inferences through the definition, conceptualization, and interpretation of both individual stone artifact forms and groups of artifacts identified as assemblages do not fit squarely with what we have learned from both ethnographic sources and analyses of archaeological materials. We discuss this in terms of two fallacies. The first is the fallacy of the “desired end product” in stone artifact manufacture, which also includes our ability to recognize such end products. The second fallacy has to do with the notions that lithic assemblages represent simple accumulations of contemporary behaviors and the degree to which the composition of the depositional units we study reliably match the kinds of activities that took place. Although it is beyond the scope of this paper to offer a comprehensive set of new methodologies and theoretical perspectives to solve these problems, our goal here is to stress the importance of rethinking some of our most basic assumptions regarding the nature of lithic objects and how they become part of the archaeological record. Such a revision is needed if we want to be able to develop research questions that can be addressed with the data we have available to us.

The oldest records for Southwest Asian domesticated livestock species in Egypt date to the late 7th but mainly the 6th millennium cal BC and are among the earliest known evidence from the African continent as a whole. The records were obtained from Egypt's Eastern and Western Desert, where only cattle and caprines are present, and are not associated with evidence for cultivated crops. It takes until the 5th millennium cal BC before significant numbers of sites, with significant numbers of bones of domesticated species appear. In the Fayum Oasis, the sites of Kom K and Kom W date to this period and these have generally received most attention in the context of early stock keeping. However, older evidence for domesticated stock has also been found in the Fayum. We describe new faunal data from the early and middle Holocene, at and around the E29H1 locality, including the oldest remains of domesticated caprines recorded from the Fayum up to now (ca. 5600 cal BC). Based on the new finds, we emphasise the need to also investigate surface sites. We argue that much of the earliest history of stock keeping in Egypt is skewed by a lack of evidence. The remaining fauna from E29H1 shows the importance of fish. This is a common feature of all prehistoric sites of the Fayum and indicates adaptations to the local environment.

Egypt is considered a Neolithic without villages, yet despite this characterisation, settlement pattern remains one of the more uncertain aspects of prehistoric lifeways. Reconstruction of settlement pattern often relies on environmental factors, subsistence strategies or typo-chronological associations to dictate likely modes of human settlement. Here, we examine the period from around 6,500 cal. bp to the late Neolithic in the Egyptian Nile Valley compared to selected examples from the Western Desert. Descriptions of regional settlement patterns have largely focused on divisions between Upper and Lower Egypt and the Western Desert based on a difference in subsistence strategies. We consider the features of the archaeological record in both these regions to determine whether such a dichotomy is warranted, and what this might mean in terms of the relationship between environment and socio-economic change. We suggest an alternative approach to the archaeological record to better understand the nature of Neolithic settlement pattern.

As a field of social science research, policing has been fortunate to have a number of influential academic researchers and a rich history of significant writing. This is something to be celebrated...

Discussion concerning the origins of the Egyptian Neolithic is often framed in terms of a Neolithic package or ‘Neolithisation’ that appears late in Egypt via diffusion from southwest Asia. Here we propose an alternative approach using the results of new fieldwork in the Fayum north shore. We summarise a detailed study of the Fayum archaeological landscape interpretable at different temporal and spatial scales using an expanded version of low-level food production to organise observations concerning palaeoenvironment, socioeconomy, settlement, and mobility. While domestic plants and animals were introduced to the Fayum from elsewhere, when a number of aspects of the archaeological record are compared, a settlement system is suggested that has no obvious analogues with the Neolithic in southwest Asia.

The original version of this article unfortunately contained mistake in the presentation of the author’s name.

We welcome Barber’s (1) comments and are grateful for the opportunity to respond. Our study of wetland taro ( Colocasia esculenta ) gardens during the initial colonization period (ICP) (1200 to 1500 CE) in New Zealand did not overlook the evidence from the Aupouri Peninsula (2⇓–4). We agree that gardens were probably established on mainland New Zealand, within the climate envelope shown in figure 1 of our paper (4), but in areas that lacked large-statured forests at Polynesian arrival. However, the fossil evidence from Motutangi does not meet the 3 criteria for defining ICP taro gardens met in our study of Ahuahu and subtropical French Polynesia: [↵][1]1To whom correspondence may be addressed. Email: matthew.prebble{at}anu.edu.au. [1]: #xref-corresp-1-1

Research Article The Effects of Holocene Landscape Changes on the Formation of the Archaeological Record in the Fayum Basin, Egypt Annelies Koopman, 1 ,* Sjoerd Kluiving, 1,2,3 Simon Holdaway, 4 and Willeke Wendrich 5 Department of Geo- and Bioarchaeology, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Faculty of Humanities, Department of Archaeology, Ancient History of Mediterranean Studies and Near Eastern Studies, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Department of Earth Sciences, Cluster Earth and Climate, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Department of Anthropology, School of Social Sciences, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures, University of California, Los Angeles, California Correspondence author; E-mail: koopman.annelies@gmail.com * Corresponding Received 29 January 2015 Revised 12 June 2015 Accepted 19 June 2015 Scientific editing by Jamie Woodward Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com). doi 10.1002/gea.21538 Geoarchaeological research was performed across an archaeological landscape along the hyperarid northern paleoshores of the modern Lake Qarun, Fayum Basin, Egypt. Objectives were to record sedimentary variability and to con- sider the correlation between the paleoenvironmental interpretations of these sedimentary data and the observed archaeological record dated to the early and mid-Holocene. Our approach combines hand-drilling and stratigraphic de- scriptions with detailed studies of sediments (grain size analysis, analyses of CaCO 3 , and organic matter contents), densities of stone artifacts and bones, and chronometric data from associated contexts (AMS 14 C dates on charcoal from hearths). Analysis of deposits indicates initiation of lake deposition, re- working of lake deposits, and subsequent accumulation of wind-blown de- posits occurred prior to the deposition of archaeological materials. Correlations between sediment and the archaeological deposits indicate a different use of areas covered by relatively coarse-grained sediment (sand) compared to areas where relatively fine-grained deposits are exposed (clay and silt). Reassess- ment of the associations between archaeological materials and sediments in the Fayum Basin is required to improve knowledge of the interrelationships between the Nile flood history, regional climatic changes, oscillations in levels of paleo-Lake Qarun, compared to the chronology of human occupation in the C 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Fayum Basin. INTRODUCTION The sedimentary record of the Fayum Basin, northern Egypt, provides evidence for periods of wind and water erosion that led to the development of a patchwork of hard land surfaces of different ages on which abundant archaeological material have been preserved. The archae- ological remains, mostly stone artifacts, pottery, faunal remains, and associated hearths, are distributed in vari- able densities at different elevations along the hyperarid northern Fayum paleobasins of the modern Lake Qarun. In the past, these remains have been used to reconstruct paleolevels of Lake Qarun during past human occupa- tion phases (e.g., Caton-Thompson & Gardner, 1934; Said et al., 1972; Wendorf & Schild, 1976; Kozlowski, 1983; Ginter & Kozlowski, 1986; Hassan, 1986; Kozlowski & Geoarchaeology: An International Journal 31 (2016) 17–33 Ginter, 1993). However, despite this intensive research, there is a lack of consensus on the nature of the rela- tionship between environmental change, particularly in relation to lake level changes, and early to mid-Holocene settlement (e.g., Phillipps et al., 2012). Among the many reasons for this is a lack of understanding of the geomor- phological processes that have exposed the archaeological material at today’s surface and how these relate to any proposed paleolake level changes. The aims of this paper are therefore to document geomorphic processes, sedimentary environments, and sources responsible for the spatial-temporal variabil- ity of sediments within a specific region of the north shore where surface archaeological materials are abun- dant, and to consider the relationship between the C 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Copyright

Archaeologists make inferences about past human behaviour based on patterned material residues in various depositional contexts, including existing landsurfaces. These deposits are generated by processes that may obscure patterns at some observational scales while highlighting others, and interpretive differences can arise from a lack of explicit models of deposit formation. Here, an exploratory agent-based model based on the concept of the palimpsest is used to examine the effects of episodic sediment transport on the visibility and preservation of surface archaeological deposits in a fluvial context. Outcomes from the model indicate that the compound influences of preservation and visibility are capable of transforming a static radiocarbon record into one of increasing intensity towards the present, while simultaneously displaying periodic chronological gaps – features that have been used in our Australian study area to argue for demographic change driven by social or environmental factors. To differentiate between interpretations, expectations derived from the model are assessed against a second proxy from the same study area: Optically Stimulated Luminescence dates from hearth stones in surface contexts. Results indicate that patterns in the chronometric proxies from the study area are more consistent with episodic geomorphic change than explanations invoking changes in the local organization of human activity.