Archaeology Brown Bag Workshops provide an informal, interdisciplinary venue for presentations of work in progress by faculty, graduate students, and visiting scholars, and discussion of developments in recent archaeological literature. Workshops convene four to five times per semester, on Fridays from 4:00-5:15 in the Brooks Hall Conference Room (2nd floor) unless otherwise noted below.
Want to volunteer a talk or discussion topic? Email Adria LaViolette or Fraser Neiman.
For the archive of past Brown Bag Workshops, click HERE
Want to volunteer a talk or discussion topic? Email Adria LaViolette or Fraser Neiman.
For the archive of past Brown Bag Workshops, click HERE
Spring 2021
(all Brown Bags will be held via Zoom)
Feb. 19
Michael Frachetti, Department of Anthropology, Washington University in St. Louis
Talk title: “Remapping the Silk Roads from Prehistory to the Medieval Era"
Mar. 5
Chris Downum and Leszek Pawlowicz, Northern Arizona University
Talk title: “Can Deep Learning Solve The Problems With Southwestern Prehistoric Decorated Ceramic Typologies?”
Decorated ceramic typology plays an important role in dating archaeological sites in the American Southwest, as well as evaluating cultural affiliations and trade networks. Despite over 100 years of work in this field, substantial levels of disagreement on artifact type identifications can exist, even between archaeologists with decades of experience. We will review the history of Southwestern decorated ceramic typology, and the current problems associated with it. We will then present our research on the use of Convolutional Neural Network deep-learning methods as a potential tool for decorated ceramic classification, analysis and visualization.
Special Event
Monday, March 22, 9:00 am
Carla Jaimes Betancourt, University of Bonn
Presentation title: “The Ancient Amazon: Pre-Columbian Monumental Architecture and the Origins of Complex Societies in the Llanos de Mojos, Bolivia.” (Join HERE)
Special Event
Monday, March 25, 5:30 pm | Virtual
A. Asa Eger, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
George M. A. Hanfmann Lecture "The Islamic-Byzantine Frontier: Interaction and Exchange among Muslim and Christian Communities."
The retreat of the Byzantine army from Syria in around 650 CE, in advance of the approaching Arab armies, is one that has resounded emphatically in the works of both Islamic and Christian writers, and created an enduring motif: that of the Islamic-Byzantine frontier. For centuries, Byzantine and Islamic scholars have evocatively sketched a contested border: the annual raids between the two, the line of fortified fortresses defending Islamic lands, the no-man's land in between and the birth of jihad. In their early representations of a Muslim-Christian encounter, accounts of the Islamic-Byzantine frontier are charged with significance for a future 'clash of civilizations' that often envisions a polarized world. I examine the two aspects of this frontier: its physical and ideological ones. By highlighting the archaeological study of the real and material frontier, as well as acknowledging its ideological military and religious implications, he offers a more complex vision of this dividing line than has been traditionally disseminated. With analysis grounded in archaeological evidence as well the relevant historical texts, Eger brings together a nuanced exploration of this vital element of medieval history.
April 9
Patricia McAnany, Department of Anthropology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Seminar Discussion: “Imagining a Maya Archaeology That Is Anthropological and Attuned to Indigenous Cultural Heritage”
April 23
Justin Anthony Mann, Department of Art, University of Virginia
"Commanding the Sacred: Structures of Authority and the Sacred on the Byzantine Monastic Landscape'
Recent scholarship portrays the Byzantine monastery as a cultural microcosm that embodied broader social structures. However, the view of such structures is often focused on the core monastic complex, and not on how monastic communities could greatly alter natural and cultural landscapes, or, on the other hand, be influenced by the same landscapes. The work presented here envisions the landscape created and maintained by monasteries (i.e., the monastic landscape) as a composite entity composed of interwoven cultural landscapes of authority, economy, the sacred, and natural topography. Using extensive archaeological survey and both art historical and textual evidence, seven case studies from Central Greece are used to push the boundaries of the monastery beyond the katholikon (central church), and onto a complex monastic landscape.
This talk will focus specifically on two components of the monastic landscape, the authoritative and the sacred, and their layering through the lens of Middle Byzantine monastic communities in Central Greece. The goal here is twofold: to highlight the importance of less commonly studied monastic sites, such as outlying chapels, towers, footpaths, and the natural landscape, and to furthermore emphasize the multivalent purposes of monastic sites. Churches, for example, can be used both to sacralize topography and as a means to delimit, navigate, and control. The last portion of this talk will be to present future directions for this research and to suggest other usages for monastic sites that will be explored in further depth in my dissertation project, “Assembling a Monastic Landscape: Structures of Authority, Economy, and the Sacred in Middle Byzantine Greece.”
Special Event
Monday, May 3, 2:00 pm.
Sofia Chacaltana Cortez, Universidad Antonio Ruiz de Montoya, Peru
Presentation title: “Bodily Gender Politics in the Colonial Andes: Indigenous Sexuality under Class and Gender Transformations - The Case of the Colonial Tambarrias.”
(Zoom link forthcoming)
Abstract: When the Spaniards arrived at the Andean territory, they encountered diverse ethnic identities and a complex social hierarchy. They imposed racial hierarchies to indigenous populations that transformed class, ethnic and gender dynamics. In general, historical investigations have focused on studying elite indigenous women, and the strategies utilized in navigating the new colonial order. Although the experiences of non-privileged indigenous women are often overlooked or silenced, they also utilized a range of transcultural and hybrid strategies. How these new concepts of gender, class and race transformed the lives and sexual experiences of non-elite indigenous women? How these women navigated the new colonial condition? In this talk, I will focus on the institution of tambos (Inca waystations), which continued to function during the colonial period under the new market system and colonial requirements. Under this situation, tambos (tambarrias) opened new opportunities for non-elite indigenous women, although the female body was under suspicious in these institutions as demonstrated by emerging colonial laws.
Michael Frachetti, Department of Anthropology, Washington University in St. Louis
Talk title: “Remapping the Silk Roads from Prehistory to the Medieval Era"
Mar. 5
Chris Downum and Leszek Pawlowicz, Northern Arizona University
Talk title: “Can Deep Learning Solve The Problems With Southwestern Prehistoric Decorated Ceramic Typologies?”
Decorated ceramic typology plays an important role in dating archaeological sites in the American Southwest, as well as evaluating cultural affiliations and trade networks. Despite over 100 years of work in this field, substantial levels of disagreement on artifact type identifications can exist, even between archaeologists with decades of experience. We will review the history of Southwestern decorated ceramic typology, and the current problems associated with it. We will then present our research on the use of Convolutional Neural Network deep-learning methods as a potential tool for decorated ceramic classification, analysis and visualization.
Special Event
Monday, March 22, 9:00 am
Carla Jaimes Betancourt, University of Bonn
Presentation title: “The Ancient Amazon: Pre-Columbian Monumental Architecture and the Origins of Complex Societies in the Llanos de Mojos, Bolivia.” (Join HERE)
Special Event
Monday, March 25, 5:30 pm | Virtual
A. Asa Eger, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
George M. A. Hanfmann Lecture "The Islamic-Byzantine Frontier: Interaction and Exchange among Muslim and Christian Communities."
The retreat of the Byzantine army from Syria in around 650 CE, in advance of the approaching Arab armies, is one that has resounded emphatically in the works of both Islamic and Christian writers, and created an enduring motif: that of the Islamic-Byzantine frontier. For centuries, Byzantine and Islamic scholars have evocatively sketched a contested border: the annual raids between the two, the line of fortified fortresses defending Islamic lands, the no-man's land in between and the birth of jihad. In their early representations of a Muslim-Christian encounter, accounts of the Islamic-Byzantine frontier are charged with significance for a future 'clash of civilizations' that often envisions a polarized world. I examine the two aspects of this frontier: its physical and ideological ones. By highlighting the archaeological study of the real and material frontier, as well as acknowledging its ideological military and religious implications, he offers a more complex vision of this dividing line than has been traditionally disseminated. With analysis grounded in archaeological evidence as well the relevant historical texts, Eger brings together a nuanced exploration of this vital element of medieval history.
April 9
Patricia McAnany, Department of Anthropology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Seminar Discussion: “Imagining a Maya Archaeology That Is Anthropological and Attuned to Indigenous Cultural Heritage”
April 23
Justin Anthony Mann, Department of Art, University of Virginia
"Commanding the Sacred: Structures of Authority and the Sacred on the Byzantine Monastic Landscape'
Recent scholarship portrays the Byzantine monastery as a cultural microcosm that embodied broader social structures. However, the view of such structures is often focused on the core monastic complex, and not on how monastic communities could greatly alter natural and cultural landscapes, or, on the other hand, be influenced by the same landscapes. The work presented here envisions the landscape created and maintained by monasteries (i.e., the monastic landscape) as a composite entity composed of interwoven cultural landscapes of authority, economy, the sacred, and natural topography. Using extensive archaeological survey and both art historical and textual evidence, seven case studies from Central Greece are used to push the boundaries of the monastery beyond the katholikon (central church), and onto a complex monastic landscape.
This talk will focus specifically on two components of the monastic landscape, the authoritative and the sacred, and their layering through the lens of Middle Byzantine monastic communities in Central Greece. The goal here is twofold: to highlight the importance of less commonly studied monastic sites, such as outlying chapels, towers, footpaths, and the natural landscape, and to furthermore emphasize the multivalent purposes of monastic sites. Churches, for example, can be used both to sacralize topography and as a means to delimit, navigate, and control. The last portion of this talk will be to present future directions for this research and to suggest other usages for monastic sites that will be explored in further depth in my dissertation project, “Assembling a Monastic Landscape: Structures of Authority, Economy, and the Sacred in Middle Byzantine Greece.”
Special Event
Monday, May 3, 2:00 pm.
Sofia Chacaltana Cortez, Universidad Antonio Ruiz de Montoya, Peru
Presentation title: “Bodily Gender Politics in the Colonial Andes: Indigenous Sexuality under Class and Gender Transformations - The Case of the Colonial Tambarrias.”
(Zoom link forthcoming)
Abstract: When the Spaniards arrived at the Andean territory, they encountered diverse ethnic identities and a complex social hierarchy. They imposed racial hierarchies to indigenous populations that transformed class, ethnic and gender dynamics. In general, historical investigations have focused on studying elite indigenous women, and the strategies utilized in navigating the new colonial order. Although the experiences of non-privileged indigenous women are often overlooked or silenced, they also utilized a range of transcultural and hybrid strategies. How these new concepts of gender, class and race transformed the lives and sexual experiences of non-elite indigenous women? How these women navigated the new colonial condition? In this talk, I will focus on the institution of tambos (Inca waystations), which continued to function during the colonial period under the new market system and colonial requirements. Under this situation, tambos (tambarrias) opened new opportunities for non-elite indigenous women, although the female body was under suspicious in these institutions as demonstrated by emerging colonial laws.
Fall 2020
Sept. 11
Introductory meeting
Sept. 18
Uniformity, Variability, and Genres in Tiwanaku Ceramic Iconography, A.D. 500-1100. Jonah Augustine, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Abstract: Tiwanaku, located in western Bolivia, was among the largest cities in the Americas during the Middle Horizon (c. AD 500 to 1100) and the capital of an eponymous Andean state. During the consolidation of Tiwanaku, people began to produce a variety of novel ceramic forms that were decorated with elaborate, polychrome iconography. These materials were ubiquitous throughout Tiwanaku, the city and state. Archaeologists today find them in a variety of contexts, ranging from offerings left on the steps of pyramids to household trash heaps. What types of images were depicted upon these key media? What forms of archaeological analysis are available to evaluate and compare iconographic conventions between social spaces at Tiwanaku? Importantly, how do the characteristics of the forms and iconography of Tiwanaku ceramics reflect their variable social roles and political significances within Tiwanaku? This talk will address these questions, presenting the results of an analysis of polychrome ceramics from Tiwanaku.
Oct. 2
Water and Sensory Experience: Revisiting the Procession of the Eleusinian Mysteries in Roman Greece. Dylan Rogers, McIntire Dept. of Art, UVA
Abstract: The Eleusinian Mysteries that took place at the Sanctuary of Demeter and Kore at Eleusis (outside of Athens, Greece) were a mystery cult that stretched back as far as the Bronze Age. While we do not know the full details of what occurred when a pilgrim was initiated into the cult, we have been able to reconstruct the procession initiates took from Athens to Eleusis--a 22-km-long sensorial tour de force. In the Roman period, particularly in the second century CE, with the arrival of an aqueduct commissioned by the emperor Hadrian, the forecourt of the sanctuary, where the procession culminated before the initiation, was drastically altered with the addition of a fountain. Employing the tenants of sensory archaeology, this talk will revisit the procession of the Mysteries to emphasize the role of flowing water and its impact on past encounters in the space, not only illustrating the complex experience initiates had in the Roman period, but also the unique expressions of Greek and Roman identity.
Oct. 30
Rethinking the Prestige Economy in Trade and Exchange: The Dominance Economy in Contact-Era New Guinea. Paul Roscoe, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Maine
Abstract: Archaeological discussion commonly links the trade and exchange of precious metals, shells, feathers, and other exotics to the demands of a prestige-goods economy. These claims are sometimes challenged, but attempts to investigate them run into difficulty because so many dimensions of prehistoric prestige economies are archaeologically invisible. In this talk, I try to shed ethnographic light on the functioning of prestige economies and their relation to trade and exchange in egalitarian and trans-egalitarian societies. Using data from contact-era New Guinea, I argue that, in these communities, prestige economies did not function as commonly imagined. Rather, prestige goods were embedded in conspicuous ceremonial displays that managed conflict by serving as honest signals of fighting strength. The system produced a dominance hierarchy that prescribed who should defer to whom when conflicts of interest arose, but it benefited everyone, even those obliged to defer, because they retained the benefits of sociality while avoiding the risk of physical harm or death. Prestige economies and prestige goods, in other words, are really dominance economies and dominance goods, a perspective that has implications for our understanding of leadership in small-scale societies, what constitutes valuables in a dominance economy, what gives them value, and why prestige (read “dominance”) economies are so often coupled to trade and exchange.
Introductory meeting
Sept. 18
Uniformity, Variability, and Genres in Tiwanaku Ceramic Iconography, A.D. 500-1100. Jonah Augustine, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Abstract: Tiwanaku, located in western Bolivia, was among the largest cities in the Americas during the Middle Horizon (c. AD 500 to 1100) and the capital of an eponymous Andean state. During the consolidation of Tiwanaku, people began to produce a variety of novel ceramic forms that were decorated with elaborate, polychrome iconography. These materials were ubiquitous throughout Tiwanaku, the city and state. Archaeologists today find them in a variety of contexts, ranging from offerings left on the steps of pyramids to household trash heaps. What types of images were depicted upon these key media? What forms of archaeological analysis are available to evaluate and compare iconographic conventions between social spaces at Tiwanaku? Importantly, how do the characteristics of the forms and iconography of Tiwanaku ceramics reflect their variable social roles and political significances within Tiwanaku? This talk will address these questions, presenting the results of an analysis of polychrome ceramics from Tiwanaku.
Oct. 2
Water and Sensory Experience: Revisiting the Procession of the Eleusinian Mysteries in Roman Greece. Dylan Rogers, McIntire Dept. of Art, UVA
Abstract: The Eleusinian Mysteries that took place at the Sanctuary of Demeter and Kore at Eleusis (outside of Athens, Greece) were a mystery cult that stretched back as far as the Bronze Age. While we do not know the full details of what occurred when a pilgrim was initiated into the cult, we have been able to reconstruct the procession initiates took from Athens to Eleusis--a 22-km-long sensorial tour de force. In the Roman period, particularly in the second century CE, with the arrival of an aqueduct commissioned by the emperor Hadrian, the forecourt of the sanctuary, where the procession culminated before the initiation, was drastically altered with the addition of a fountain. Employing the tenants of sensory archaeology, this talk will revisit the procession of the Mysteries to emphasize the role of flowing water and its impact on past encounters in the space, not only illustrating the complex experience initiates had in the Roman period, but also the unique expressions of Greek and Roman identity.
Oct. 30
Rethinking the Prestige Economy in Trade and Exchange: The Dominance Economy in Contact-Era New Guinea. Paul Roscoe, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Maine
Abstract: Archaeological discussion commonly links the trade and exchange of precious metals, shells, feathers, and other exotics to the demands of a prestige-goods economy. These claims are sometimes challenged, but attempts to investigate them run into difficulty because so many dimensions of prehistoric prestige economies are archaeologically invisible. In this talk, I try to shed ethnographic light on the functioning of prestige economies and their relation to trade and exchange in egalitarian and trans-egalitarian societies. Using data from contact-era New Guinea, I argue that, in these communities, prestige economies did not function as commonly imagined. Rather, prestige goods were embedded in conspicuous ceremonial displays that managed conflict by serving as honest signals of fighting strength. The system produced a dominance hierarchy that prescribed who should defer to whom when conflicts of interest arose, but it benefited everyone, even those obliged to defer, because they retained the benefits of sociality while avoiding the risk of physical harm or death. Prestige economies and prestige goods, in other words, are really dominance economies and dominance goods, a perspective that has implications for our understanding of leadership in small-scale societies, what constitutes valuables in a dominance economy, what gives them value, and why prestige (read “dominance”) economies are so often coupled to trade and exchange.
Spring 2020
Feb. 7
Uncovering the Foundations of a Greek Colony: Ancient Selinus. Andrew Farinholt Ward, Classical Studies, College of William and Mary.
Abstract: Founded on the southwestern coast of Sicily by settlers from mainland Greece in the seventh century BCE, the ancient "colony" of Selinus (modern Selinunte) quickly became a wealthy and populous city-state, famed even in antiquity for its many monumental temples and its conflicts with Athens and Carthage. The early history of the settlement has remained controversial for much of the twentieth century, with the scant early remains used to support a variety of often opposing interpretations. This talk will highlight recent discoveries in the Selinus’ main urban sanctuary, sponsored by the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, and the Università degli Studi di Milano, that have unearthed a wealth of new evidence for understanding the early history of this Greek settlement, and the importance of religion in ancient Mediterranean migration.
April 17
Understanding Variation in Internal Markets among Slave Societies in the British Caribbean. Fraser D. Neiman, Department of Archaeology, Monticello. Note: Thanks to the pandemic, this talk is being being given via Zoom. Please contact Adria LaViolette for information on how to connect.
Abstract: This paper offers a simple model of the causes and consequences of variation in the subsistence strategies that evolved in British Caribbean slave societies and their implications for the shifting organization of internal markets and island economies. To evaluate the model, I analyze two independent sources of archaeological evidence: 1) data from the DAACS database on typological variation assemblages from St. Kitts, Nevis, Jamaica, and Dominica and 2) the chemical characterization of coarse earthenware pastes sampled from ceramic assmblages from St. Kitts, Nevis, and Jamaica.
Postponed
Roman Water and Sensory Experience: Revisiting the Processions of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Dylan Rogers, McIntire Department of Art, University of Virginia. Location: Brooks Hall Commons.
Abstract: Founded on approaches related to sensory archaeologies (particularly regarding the multisensory element of water), this paper explores the processions of the Eleusian Mysteries from Athens to Eleusis in the second century CE. While the Mysteries had been active since the Bronze Age, in the Roman period, with the addition of at least two fountains in the Sanctuary of Demeter and Kore's Forecourt, the sensorial experience of an ancient pilgrim was drastically altered with the addition of flowing water at the end of the famous processions. Paying attention to ancient literary sources on water and fountians (especially in regard to the senses), the processions themselves, and the fountains themselves at Eleusis, this paper will argue for a more nuanced interpretation of the role of fountains at the ancient sanctuary--one that successfully straddled both Greek and Roman identities--while advocating for an increased use of sensory archaeology in Classical Archaeology.
Postponed
Iron production and Regional Variation in Machili: Recent Archaeological and Geophysical Survey in Western Zambia. Zachary McKeeby, Department of Anthropology, University of Virginia.
Abstract: The Machili Valley in Western Zambia after 700CE is exemplary of the type of "in-between" places that made up large portions of the African continent where states did not develop, but which were anything but isolated and undifferentiated. Limited archaeological surveys in the late 1960s tentatively fit the Machili Valley into a larger context of Iron Age life in Zambia, and into south-central Africa more broadly. This paper details early results from recent survey work in Machili. A combination of geophysical and shovel-test survey methods were used to re-survey previously documented sites, identify new sites, and to study localized variations in iron production practices in the Machili Valley in the absence of, and on the periphery of, state-level control. Results suggest geographic and temporal changes in settlement patterns and iron production practices, and in the spatial relationships between domestic areas and iron smelting and smithing locations.
Uncovering the Foundations of a Greek Colony: Ancient Selinus. Andrew Farinholt Ward, Classical Studies, College of William and Mary.
Abstract: Founded on the southwestern coast of Sicily by settlers from mainland Greece in the seventh century BCE, the ancient "colony" of Selinus (modern Selinunte) quickly became a wealthy and populous city-state, famed even in antiquity for its many monumental temples and its conflicts with Athens and Carthage. The early history of the settlement has remained controversial for much of the twentieth century, with the scant early remains used to support a variety of often opposing interpretations. This talk will highlight recent discoveries in the Selinus’ main urban sanctuary, sponsored by the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, and the Università degli Studi di Milano, that have unearthed a wealth of new evidence for understanding the early history of this Greek settlement, and the importance of religion in ancient Mediterranean migration.
April 17
Understanding Variation in Internal Markets among Slave Societies in the British Caribbean. Fraser D. Neiman, Department of Archaeology, Monticello. Note: Thanks to the pandemic, this talk is being being given via Zoom. Please contact Adria LaViolette for information on how to connect.
Abstract: This paper offers a simple model of the causes and consequences of variation in the subsistence strategies that evolved in British Caribbean slave societies and their implications for the shifting organization of internal markets and island economies. To evaluate the model, I analyze two independent sources of archaeological evidence: 1) data from the DAACS database on typological variation assemblages from St. Kitts, Nevis, Jamaica, and Dominica and 2) the chemical characterization of coarse earthenware pastes sampled from ceramic assmblages from St. Kitts, Nevis, and Jamaica.
Postponed
Roman Water and Sensory Experience: Revisiting the Processions of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Dylan Rogers, McIntire Department of Art, University of Virginia. Location: Brooks Hall Commons.
Abstract: Founded on approaches related to sensory archaeologies (particularly regarding the multisensory element of water), this paper explores the processions of the Eleusian Mysteries from Athens to Eleusis in the second century CE. While the Mysteries had been active since the Bronze Age, in the Roman period, with the addition of at least two fountains in the Sanctuary of Demeter and Kore's Forecourt, the sensorial experience of an ancient pilgrim was drastically altered with the addition of flowing water at the end of the famous processions. Paying attention to ancient literary sources on water and fountians (especially in regard to the senses), the processions themselves, and the fountains themselves at Eleusis, this paper will argue for a more nuanced interpretation of the role of fountains at the ancient sanctuary--one that successfully straddled both Greek and Roman identities--while advocating for an increased use of sensory archaeology in Classical Archaeology.
Postponed
Iron production and Regional Variation in Machili: Recent Archaeological and Geophysical Survey in Western Zambia. Zachary McKeeby, Department of Anthropology, University of Virginia.
Abstract: The Machili Valley in Western Zambia after 700CE is exemplary of the type of "in-between" places that made up large portions of the African continent where states did not develop, but which were anything but isolated and undifferentiated. Limited archaeological surveys in the late 1960s tentatively fit the Machili Valley into a larger context of Iron Age life in Zambia, and into south-central Africa more broadly. This paper details early results from recent survey work in Machili. A combination of geophysical and shovel-test survey methods were used to re-survey previously documented sites, identify new sites, and to study localized variations in iron production practices in the Machili Valley in the absence of, and on the periphery of, state-level control. Results suggest geographic and temporal changes in settlement patterns and iron production practices, and in the spatial relationships between domestic areas and iron smelting and smithing locations.