Suchergebnisse

One of the most important transitions in human evolutionary history is the emergence and development of large-scale complex societies. The role of copper and bronze in the context of the emergence of Bronze and Iron Age states in the Near East is poorly understood due to a relative lack of comprehensive analysis of diachronic archaeometallurgical data. Excavations from Boğazköy and Kerkenes Dağ in central Anatolia have recovered one of the largest, diverse, and stratified corpora of copper objects and metal production debris, spanning the period from the Early Bronze Age, ca. 2300 BC, until the Late Iron Age, mid-5th century BC. Analysis of over 1100 objects employing energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence (EDXRF), in field portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF), and select lead isotope analyses using multiple collector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (MC-ICPMS) demonstrate that the rise of political complexity is closely tied to increases in trade and the management of commodity chains. Textual evidence illustrates how the Hittite state in particular managed the mobilization of metal commodities and finished goods as taxes, gifts, and payments for labor. Metal trade is further linked to state finance systems to explain how production and trade are tied to strategies of economic integration and interregional networking in Anatolia and beyond in the Near East and Mediterranean regions.

The paper is written as a part of project 'The Trojan Catalogue (Hom. Il. 2.816-877) and the Peoples of western Anatolia in the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age. A Study of the Homeric Text in the Light of Hittite Sources and Classical Geographical Tradition' (2015/19/P/HS3/04161), which has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 665778 with the National Science Centre, Poland. This paper deals with both, archaeological evidence for cultural links between the Mycenaean world and western Anatolia in the Late Bronze Age, and the Ahhiyawa problem that is based on nearly thirty Hittite texts (among the thousands that had been found in the archives of the Hittite capital Hattusa, modern Boğazkale about 150 km as the crow flies east of Ankara), in which the term "Ahhiya(wa)" appears.² Both issues are indeed connected and must not be treated separately, although there are still many scholars to do so. What is more, concerning the former "there is an unfortunate tendency in much., (angielski) ; The European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 665778 with Narodowe Centrum Nauki, Polonez 1, 2015/19/P/HS3/04161

The authors describe the westernmost metallurgical center of the 5th—2nd centuries BC left by the aboriginal Itkul' culture of the forest Trans-Urals in 8th/7th—3rd/2 nd centuries BC. It was founded in the upper reaches of the Ufa river, in Serny Klyuch tract, on top of a high (20—25 m) limestone rock with three steep edges, on the ruins of sites and settlements of the Eneolithic and Bronze Age. After the construction of the first copper-smelting complexes, the site of the settlement from the floor side was fenced with a log defensive wall with an external moat 40—42 m long. The ancient settlement is miniature, with an area of about 1,000 sq. m. Two excavations (502 sq. m) explored half of the site and 26 m of the fortification line. The remains of 19 adobe blast furnaces, three adobe platforms for metal processing, several pits and fireplaces for melting metal, three industrial and residential buildings of a frame-and-pillar structure were uncovered. In addition to the clan of metallurgists of the aboriginal Itkul' culture, the population of the settlement included small groups of newcomers: initially, the descendants of the taiga communities of the Gamayun culture, who migrated from the north, from the upper reaches of the Iset' river, later — the bearers of the Gorokhovo culture, who fled from the Tobol region and the lower reaches of the Iset' river under the pressure of the warlike Sargat tribes, the ancient ancestors of the Hungarians who came from the east, from the Ishim-Irtysh forest-steppe. Traces of full cycle metallurgical production were revealed on the site — from copper smelting to casting and forging of finished products. The main part of non-ferrous metal produced by metallurgists of the mountain-forestry Trans-Urals was intended for export to neighboring and more distant territories. A blank of an iron knife-dagger found in one of the furnaces, and a series of Itkul' iron products found in other places, confirm the hypothesis of the emergence of its own ferrous metallurgy in the forests of the Middle Urals around the 5 th—4 th centuries BC.

This thesis addresses continuity and change in the manufacture and use of decorative metalwork in the Iron Age (200-1900 AD) of southern Africa, within a framework of archival studies and artefact studies theory. The thesis adopted a direct historical approach which exploited the huge database of existing information to create typologies of objects and processing techniques that are prominent in ethno-historical sources of the 19th and 20th centuries. This process enabled for the first time, a comprehensive mapping of object typologies and techniques of manufacture by ethnic groups thereby allowing cross cultural comparisons. Subsequently, the study explored the typology of objects utilized further back in the time of the Early Iron Age using archaeological evidence. It demonstrated that most of the objects used in the Iron Age were similar to those that were used in the 19th century. However, new innovations were made along the way with metals and alloys being constantly added to the range of materials worked. A dedicated visual study of fabrication techniques employed in the manufacture of ethnographic materials housed at Iziko Museum of Cape Town was carried out. The techniques gleaned from the macroscopic study were compared with those metallographically documented in the literature for the manufacture of Iron Age objects, further exposing continuity and change in metal fabrication. The social, economic and political role of decorative metalwork was hardly static, and varied from context to context and group to group.