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Conference Review: TRAC, a Place for an Experiment in Roman Studies 2018

Author(s)
Lee Graña 1 ✉
Publication Date
The annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference (TRAC) took place from the 11th to the 15th of April 2018 alongside the biannual Roman Archaeology Conference (RAC) at the University of Edinburgh. As the title suggests, the underlying objective of this workshop was to re-examine the role of experimental archaeology in Roman studies...

Conference Review: SAA General Session, Experimental Archaeology 2018

Author(s)
Yvette A. Marks 1 ✉
Publication Date
The Society for American Archaeology is, perhaps with the exception of the World Archaeology Congress, the largest meeting of archaeologists in the world. The 2018 annual meeting was held in Washington DC and was attended by approximately 5000 archaeologists. Delegates were primarily from the States, but there was also a good international showing with attendees coming from around the world...

‘Re-rolling’ a Mummy: an Experimental Spectacle at Manchester Museum

Author(s)
Lidija McKnight 1 ✉
Publication Date
10th EAC Leiden 2017
***Ancient Egyptian animal mummies and votive statuettes were often wrapped in linen, concealing the contents and conferring sanctity to the remains. Mummy autopsies were commonplace in 19th century Europe, when ancient mummified bodies were unwrapped to reveal what lay beneath the linen bandages. Similarly, votive statuettes were often unwrapped upon discovery, either by...

The Mechanics of Splitting Wood and the Design of Neolithic Woodworking Tools

Author(s)
Anthony Roland Ennos 1 ✉,
João A Ventura Oliveira 1
Publication Date
Because of the anisotropy of wood, trunks and branches can be vulnerable to splitting along the grain, especially radially. This fact was widely exploited in pre-industrial times, when wood was mostly cut and shaped by splitting it along the grain while still green, rather than by sawing...

Now we’re Cooking with Gas! How Experimental Archaeology Challenges Modern Assumptions about Metal Recycling

Author(s)
E. Giovanna Fregni 1 ✉
Publication Date
It is accepted knowledge that when re-melting alloys, some of the metal with a lower melting temperature is lost through oxidation, and more metal must be added in order to maintain the desired alloy proportions. In order to understand the changes in alloy content when recycling using Bronze Age technology, experiments were undertaken by the author and others...

Broken Rocks, Fired Clay and Soured Milk – A Summer of Experiments with the Bamburgh Research Project at the Bradford Kaims Site

Author(s)
Rebecca Rutheford 1 ✉,
R. Brewer 1,
R. Moss 1
Publication Date
The Bamburgh Research Project operates an archaeological field school every summer in Northumberland, England. We have two sites: one located at seaside Bamburgh Castle and the other a few miles away inland at the Bradford Kaims. The Bradford Kaims is located on the edge of a wetland and has shown evidence for prehistoric seasonal human occupation...

Book Review: The Arte Militaire. The Application of 17th Century Military Manuals to Conflict Archaeology by Warwick Louth

Author(s)
Thit Birk Petersen 1 ✉
Publication Date
The book consists of the rewritten essay of a master thesis. The author got his master's degree as a battlefield and conflict archaeologist from the Centre of Battlefield Archaeology at University of Glasgow founded by Professor Dr. Tony Pollard in 2006. I myself have studied at the Centre of Battlefield Archaeology back in 2007, and it was a pleasure to dive back into my old field...

Book Review: Forensic Archaeology: the Application of Comparative Excavation Methods and Recording Systems by Laura Evis

Author(s)
Ceilidh Lerwick 1 ✉
Publication Date
This book is a rewrite of Evis’ PhD thesis compiled between October 2010 and March 2014 at Bournemouth University (University of Exeter 2017). The study was an evaluation of the archaeological excavation methods and recording systems used in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australasia and North America...

Build It and They Will Come: Managing Archaeological Open-Air Museums in Britain for Stability

Author(s)
Lydia Woolway 1 ✉
Publication Date
Museums are among the most visited attractions in the UK (ALVA 2015), and with interactive displays and active engagement becoming more commonplace, this success can be capitalised on by archaeological open-air museums. Some European archaeological open-air museums entertain many visitors per year, although most are smaller institutions (Paardekooper 2012)...

Book Review: the Lifecycle of Structures in Experimental Archaeology – An Object Biography Approach by L. Hurcombe and P. Cunningham

Author(s)
Peter Bye-Jensen 1 ✉
Publication Date
This book is made up of 16 papers that are a collection of results from a European Culture Project (OpenArch) that ran from 2010-2015. It was edited by Linda Hurcombe and Penny Cunningham. This work is dedicated to the late shipwright Brian Cumby, who was deeply involved with making replicas of several prehistoric boats...