For over half a millennium, the megalithic ruins of Tiwanaku in the highlands of the Andes mountains have stood as proxy for the desires and ambitions of various empires and political agendas; in the last hundred years, scholars have attempted to answer the question "What was Tiwanaku?" by examining these shattered remains from a distant preliterate past.This volume contains twelve papers from senior scholars, whose contributions discuss subjects from the farthest points of the southern Andes, where the iconic artifacts of Tiwanaku appear as offerings to the departed, to the heralded ruins weathered by time and burdened by centuries of interpretation and speculation. Visions of Tiwanaku stays true to its name by providing a platform for each scholar to present an informed view on the nature of this enigmatic place that seems so familiar, yet continues to elude understanding by falling outside our established models for early cities and states.

Visions of Tiwanaku (Monographs (78))

History

Americas

The Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press

For more than four thousand years, empires have been geographically the largest polities on Earth, shaping in many respects the human past and present in different epochs and on different continents. Covering the time span from the second millennium B.C.E. to the sixteenth century C.E., and geographic areas from China to South America, the case studies included in this volume demonstrate the necessity to combine perspectives from the longue durée and global comparativism with the theory of agency and an understanding of specific contexts for human actions. Contributions from leading scholars examine salient aspects of the Hittite, Assyrian, Ancient Egyptian, Achaemenid and Sasanian Iranian, Zhou to Han Dynasty Chinese, Inka, and Mughal empires.

Empires and Diversity: On the Crossroads of Archaeology, Anthropology, and History (Ideas, Debates, and Perspectives (7))

Ancient Civilizations

An account of the remarkable decade of Chinese archaeology from 1972 to 1981, as abstracted from Chinese journals. Volume 2, Prehistoric to Western Zhou, contains abstracts of over 110 articles describing excavations at sites ranging from Paleolithic through Western Zhou.

Chinese Archaeological Abstracts, 2: Prehistoric to Western Zhou (Monumenta Archaeologica) (English and Chinese Edition)

Asia

Excavation of the Chinatown that was destroyed in the building of Union Station provides a rich picture of the people and life in nineteenth and early twentieth century Los Angeles. Intensive historical research, oral history, and laboratory analyses have been synthesized into a comprehensive reconstruction of a community that was isolated socially, economically, and geographically.

Down by the Station : Los Angeles Chinatown, 1880-1933

Greenwood, Roberta S.

Few open-air sites of this age have the same extent, complexity and diversity of deposits, as was found at the site of Solvieux in southwest France. The history of the project, methodologies, results and analysis of finds are complemented by a large number of drawings, outlines of typologies and essays on Upper Palaeolithic traditions and the contribution of the Solvieux results in this regard.

The Archaeology of Solvieux: An Upper Paleolithic Open Air Site in France (Monumenta Archaeologica)

Sackett, James

This volume presents translations of essays by three German scholars who were preeminent in the social and natural science study of Central America in the early part of the twentieth century. Their research areas included ethnology, archaeology, geography, linguistics, and epigraphy. Their detailed observations of traditional cultures and archaeological remains provide important primary data. Because their writings have been available only in the original German-language journals, the work of these scholars is unfamiliar to many researchers. The chapters report on specific visits to parts of Central America but also include more synthetic coverage of topics such as the influence of Bartolomé de las Casas on Indian life in Guatemala and food and drink as well as religion of the Q'eqchi' in Guatemala. The visited places include Pacific coastal and highland Guatemala, the Pech area of Honduras, and zones of Costa Rica inhabited by the Guatuso, Chirripo, and Talamanca Indians.

Early Scholars' Visits to Central America: Reports by Karl Sapper, Walter Lehmann, and Franz Termer (Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA, Occasional Paper 18)

Marilyn Beaudry-Corbett

Ted Gutman

E. T. Hardy

Studies of Pompeian material culture have traditionally been dominated by art-historical approaches, but recently there has been a renewed and burgeoning interest in Pompeian houses for studies of Roman domestic behavior. This book is concerned with contextualized Pompeian household artifacts and their role in deepening our understanding of household behavior at Pompeii. It consists of a study of the contents of thirty so-called atrium houses in Pompeii to investigate the spatial distribution of household activities, both within each architectural room type and across the house. It also uses this material to investigate the state of occupancy of these houses at the time of the eruption of Mt Vesuvius in AD 79. It thus examines artifact assemblages within their spatial and decorative contexts for a more material cultural approach to these remains and for the information which they provide on living conditions in Pompeii during the last decades. In this it takes a critical perspective the textual nomenclature which is traditionally applied to Pompeian room types.

Pompeian Households: An Analysis of the Material Culture (Monographs)

Allison, Penelope M.

As the center for the religious cult of Quetzalcoatl, Cholula played a prominent role in shaping events of central Mexico's Postclassic period. Yet confusion over historical events in Cholula itself have limited its place in recent archaeological considerations of Mesoamerica. Since ceramic sequences are the backbone of archaeological chronologies, this confusion ultimately relates to problems in previous attempts to order archaeological time with ceramics. This book provides an innovative new classification of Cholula ceramics, based on artifact assemblages from primary depositional contexts recovered from the UA-1 excavations. A detailed and well-illustrated description of ceramic types is provided to construct a new classification system. These types are then seriated using collections from house floors and trash middens to suggest a new sequence spanning the Tlachihualtepetl (700-1200 CE) and Cholollan (1200-1550 CE) periods. The polychrome ceramics of Cholula have been described as among the most beautiful of Mesoamerica, employing vibrant colors to represent complex religious iconography of the Mixteca-Puebla stylistic tradition. By defining type and subtype variations in the polychrome ceramics, a foundation is created for a refined chronology as well as for recognizing intra-societal variability.

Ceramics of Postclassic Cholula, Mexico: Typology and Seriation of Pottery from the UA-1 Domestic Compound (Monographs)

Arts & Photography

McCafferty, Geoffrey G.

History & Criticism

The use of instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) in ceramic research in the American Sothwest has become widespread over the last ten years. This volume presents case studies of Southwestern ceramic production and distribution in which INAA is used as the primary analytical technique. These studies use provenance determination to explore such issues as exchange, migration, social identity, and economic organization. Case studies from the Southwestern periphery provide a comparative perspective from which to view the range of variation in Southwestern ceramic circulation patterns. Several of the case studies use mineralogical approaches to supplement chemical sourcing data. And, a case study using petrographic analyses provides a counterpoint to the emphasis on chemical approaches (INAA) in this volume. This volume documents the cumulative contribution of INAA-based ceramic characterization to knowledge of the prehistory of the Southwest.

Ceramic Production and Circulation in the Greater Southwest: Source Determination by INAA and Complementary Mineralogical Investigations (Monographs)

This volume explores the social and economic processes involved in the manufacture of obsidian prismatic blades, one of the sharpest cutting instruments ever produced in the prehistoric world. Focusing on ancient Mesoamerica, contributors examine the variation in the way the blades were manufactured and the causes behind their variation.

Pathways to Prismatic Blades: A Study in Mesoamerican Obsidian Core-Blade Technology (Monographs)

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