EXARC Journal Issue 2019/2
23 Articles | DOAJ | Open Access
ISSN: 2212-8956
Publishing date: May 21, 2019
📄 EXARC Journal 2019/2 Table of Contents
Copyrights: EXARC, 2019
Summary
The second EXARC Journal of this year is as thick as the first one. The 12 reviewed articles cover subjects like ancient beer, firing pottery with camel dung, antler working and bead making, or reconstructing ornamentation on Russian pottery. A hot issue is skills shortage in experimental archaeology, and... what do we actually mean by experimental archaeology? Can we take archaeological concepts outside class? We go from Jordan to Canada, from India to Poland, going underground in Ireland or making Iron Age jewelry in Italy. Finally, we also discuss the use of volunteers in Living History. Several articles are from EXARC meeting in Kernave in September 2018.
Then we also have 11 unreviewed short articles, mainly reviews of events, books and interviews with people we find interesting. Here you will find some articles on CRAFTER, our EU project. It’s a whole lot!
Reviewed Articles
De Re Cervisia et Mulso, “on The Subject of Beer and Mulsum”
Publication Date
Beer has a long and ubiquitous history. Today it is the most consumed alcoholic beverage in the world; it is also the most popular drink after water and tea (Swot, 2016). But little consideration is typically given to how beer developed with respect to taste, and even less is given to why beer is thought of in the way that it is. There have been developments in this regard: the craft beer movement, ...
Experimental Bonfirings of Pottery with Camel Dung Fuel, Jordan, July 2018
Publication Date
The objective of this series of experimental pottery firings with camel dung fuel was to isolate the function of this fuel type within the context of a simple mode of pottery firing for data applicable to studies of ancient pottery manufacture...
Skills Shortage: A Critical Evaluation of the Use of Human Participants in Early Spear Experiments
Publication Date
Hand-delivered spears are the earliest clear hunting technology in the archaeological record, with origins from 400,000 years ago, before the evolution of our own species. Experimental archaeological approaches to early weaponry continue to grow, and both controlled and naturalistic experiments are making significant contributions to interpreting such technologies...
Going Underground: An Experimental Archaeological Investigation of an Early Medieval Irish Souterrain
Publication Date
During the summer of 2018 I completed a master’s degree in experimental archaeology and material culture at University College Dublin, this research was carried out for the final dissertation. The project was to build and test a 1:1 model of an early medieval Irish souterrain. The subterranean structure is based on one of over 3,500 examples of this feature identified in Ireland...
Wives, Queens, Goddesses: Reconstructing the Outfit of a 8th-7th Century BC Picenian Woman
Publication Date
The present work is a reconstruction which was made with two objectives in mind. Thee first was to experiment with heat-treating of amber, a technique already hypothesised by Von Eles (1995), in order to verify possible resin alteration due to heating. Although already tried in the past (Fiorentini, 2018b) after having conducted some cold-working experiments (Fiorentini, 2018a)...
Popularisation of Experimental Archaeology in the Activity of Harjis - Project under the Patronage of the Institute of Archaeology of the University of Lodz (PL)
Publication Date
2018 EXARC in Kernave
***This article outlines our experiences gained during the implementation of activities at the Society of Experimental Archeology Harjis. Our society aims to recreate dress, weaponry and the realities of the Przeworsk culture, that is, people living in the first centuries of Common Era in the territory of present-day Poland...
***This article outlines our experiences gained during the implementation of activities at the Society of Experimental Archeology Harjis. Our society aims to recreate dress, weaponry and the realities of the Przeworsk culture, that is, people living in the first centuries of Common Era in the territory of present-day Poland...
Experience and Discovery: Engaging the Public in Research. A Survey on Experimental Archaeology Contemporary Practice and Meaning – Preliminary Results
Publication Date
2018 EXARC in Kernave
***The traditional way of engaging the public with the past has changed: now, through experimental archaeology, we can have a direct, physical contact with the “past”. But, as researchers know, the means used to engage the public are the fruits of an active process of investigation, especially in experimental archaeology. Could it be possible to enable visitors to actively engage in the questioning of the past, to let them experience the discovery process?
***The traditional way of engaging the public with the past has changed: now, through experimental archaeology, we can have a direct, physical contact with the “past”. But, as researchers know, the means used to engage the public are the fruits of an active process of investigation, especially in experimental archaeology. Could it be possible to enable visitors to actively engage in the questioning of the past, to let them experience the discovery process?
A Preliminary Attempt to Reconstruct some Tools and Techniques of Ornamentation of the Comb-Pit Ware from the Site of Hepojarvi (Karelian Isthmus, Leningrad Oblast, Russia)
Publication Date
The site of Hepojarvi is located on the northern coast of Hepojarvi lake, near Saint Petersburg, Russia. The site is a multi-layer settlement with different types of Neolithic pottery (from Sperrings to late Comb-Pit Ware); the settlement functioned in 5314 cal BC – 2342 cal BC. It was excavated in 1978 by I. V. Vereschagina.
Taking Archaeological Concepts outside the Social Science Class in Indian Schools
Publication Date
In Indian classrooms, social sciences receive disproportionately less attention than natural sciences and mathematics (Dahiya, 2003; Lall and House, 2005; Roy, 2017). History features within the social science textbooks in India, and is perceived as boring and uninteresting by school children (Roy, 2017; Dahiya, 2003); archaeology is taught as part of the history lessons and is most often not seen as...
Have you got the tine? Prehistoric Methods in Antler Working
Publication Date
Antler working was prevalent throughout prehistory, with a breadth of intricately detailed and technologically complex antler artefacts observed within the archaeological record. In particular, during the Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic, antler working with flint tools would have been a time-consuming process. While the chaîne opératoire of producing certain antler artefacts has previously been explored...
The Mother of All Bead Furnaces: Testing a Hypothesis about a Natural Draft Bead Furnace
Publication Date
As a part of the ongoing exploration of Viking Era glass bead production, the Dark Ages Re-creation Company (DARC) team perform new pilot experiments on a regular basis. These experiments provide a preliminary understanding of a specific construct or research question, allowing us to judge the validity of further experiments, as well as what equipment or additional questions may be necessary as a part of...
How to Make a Medieval Town Come Alive – the Use of Volunteers in Living History
Publication Date
2018 EXARC in Kernave
***For over 25 years The Medieval Centre/Middelaldercentret in Nykøbing F. Denmark has used volunteers to inhabit the reconstructed medieval town of Sundkøbing. To combine the use of volunteers and living history is not easy or something that happens spontaneously. It is hard work and requires patience, strength and firmness, but also...
***For over 25 years The Medieval Centre/Middelaldercentret in Nykøbing F. Denmark has used volunteers to inhabit the reconstructed medieval town of Sundkøbing. To combine the use of volunteers and living history is not easy or something that happens spontaneously. It is hard work and requires patience, strength and firmness, but also...
