This page intentionally left blank Archaeological Theory and Scientific Practice Is archaeology an art or a science? This question has been hotly debated over the last few decades with the rise of archaeological science At the same time, archaeologists have seen a change in the intellectual character of their discipline, as many writers have adopted approaches influenced by social theory The discipline now encompasses both archaeological scientists and archaeological theorists, and discussion regarding the status of archaeology remains polarised Andrew Jones argues that we need to analyse the practice of archaeology Through an analysis of archaeological practice, influenced by recent developments in the field of science studies, and with the aid of extensive case studies, he develops a new framework, which allows the interpretative and methodological components of the discipline to work in tandem His reassessment of the status and character of archaeology will be of interest to students, scholars and professionals A N D R E W J O N E S is a Lecturer in the Department of Archaeology, Southampton University He has worked extensively on British prehistory (especially the Neolithic and Bronze Age) Among his many research interests are the history of representation in archaeology, the role of art and memory in archaeological research, and the archaeology of animals and food He has contributed to a number of journals and edited volumes This is his first book Topics in Contemporary Archaeology Series Editor Richard Bradley, University of Reading This series is addressed to students, professional archaeologists and academics in related disciplines in the social sciences Concerned with questions of interpretation rather than the exhaustive documentation of archaeological data, the studies in the series take several different forms: a review of the literature in an important field, an outline of a new area of research or an extended case study The series is not aligned with any particular school of archaeology While there is no set format for the books, all books in the series are broadly based, well written and up to date The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge, United Kingdom The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 2RU, UK 40 West 20th Street, New York, NY 10011-4211, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia Ruiz de Alarcón 13, 28014 Madrid, Spain Dock House, The Waterfront, Cape Town 8001, South Africa http://www.cambridge.org © Cambridge University Press 2004 First published in printed format 2001 ISBN 0-511-03136-X eBook (Adobe Reader) ISBN 0-521-79060-3 hardback ISBN 0-521-79393-9 paperback Archaeological Theory and Scientific Practice Andrew Jones Department of Archaeology, Southampton University Contents List of illustrations List of tables Preface Acknowledgements The archaeology of ‘two cultures’ page viii x xi xiv Science as culture: creating interpretative networks 23 Archaeology observed 39 Materials science and material culture: practice, scale and narrative 63 Material culture and materials science: a biography of things 83 A biography of ceramics in Neolithic Orkney 103 Making people and things in the Neolithic: pots, food and history 145 Before and after science 168 References Index 183 203 vii Illustrations 2.1 2.2 3.1 3.2 4.1 4.2 4.3 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 6.6 6.7 6.8 6.9 6.10 6.11 6.12 6.13 viii GC retention graph of sample SF 2,000 from a GC integrator page 31 Histogram of sample SF 2,000 from GC plot 32 Exploding excavations 43 The transformation of artefacts as data from excavation to laboratory 48 The changes of perception allied to changes in analytical scale 67 Artefacts and their contexts as boundary objects 75 A schematic view of the Haya furnace 79 A selection of Neolithic material culture exhibiting similar curvilinear motifs 108 Map showing Orkney archipelago 109 The spatial layout of the Later Neolithic house in Orkney 110 The spatial homology between passage grave, house and henge 112 The distinction between incised Grooved ware and applied Grooved ware 113 Map of the central area of Mainland Orkney indicating position of principal monuments 114 Plan of the Later Neolithic settlement at Barnhouse 116 Graph of fabric plotted against wall thickness 121 Large Grooved ware vessel from Barnhouse 123 Two medium-size vessels from Barnhouse with characteristic decorative schemes 124 Medium-size vessel from Barnhouse with serpentine applied cordons 125 Sherds from small vessels from Barnhouse with passage grave art motifs 126 Plan of the central area at Barnhouse 127 192 References Hingley, R 1996 Ancestors and identity in the later prehistory of Atlantic Scotland: the reuse and reinvention of Neolithic monuments and material culture, World Archaeology 28, 231–43 Hinton, P 1995 Plant macrofossil report from Barnhouse Orkney, unpublished manuscript Hodder, I 1982a Symbolic and structural archaeology Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1982b Toward a contextual approach to prehistoric exchange, in J E Ericson and T K Earle (eds.) 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Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 20–7 Index abstraction, 68–9 acculturation, accumulation, 100–1 agency, 20, 71, 170, 171, 172, 176–7, 179–81 animals, 157, 158–60, 161, 179–81 animate objects, 34, 35, 83, 100, 161, 176, 177, 178 anthropology, xiii, 8, 35, 59, 60, 65, 81 archaeological laboratory, 49–50, 54, 60, 63 site-as-laboratory, 49 archaeological practice, 38, 39, 40, 45, 53, 55, 58–62, 63, 168 as a science, 49 linear structure of, 40–4, 46, 56, 62, 77 archaeological record, 10–22, 23–4, 37, 95, 178 physical model, 11–17, 20, 23, 37, 100 textual model, 17–20, 23, 37 archaeological science, xi, xiii, 2, 3, 14, 17, 20–2, 38, 39, 45–6, 47, 63–4, 78, 173, 175–6 practice of, 16, 49, 173–6, 182 XXXX, xi, 70, 74, 81, 103, 173, 175–6, 178, 179, 181, 182 processual (or New), 11, 12, 14, 15–16, 26, 37, 70 social, theoretical, 1, 2, 3, 20–2, 23, 37–8, 169 art history, 65 arts, 1–3 associations, 35–6 Barnhouse, 111, 113–17, 152, 166, 175 house, 135–8, 141, 148–9, 166 links to wider landscape, 150–7 middens, 140–2 spatial arrangement, 115–17 structure, 138–9, 149–50, 163, 166 see also Grooved ware, at Barnhouse Barnhouse Odin, 150, 152 Barton Court Farm, 98 biography, xiii, 82, 83–5 of artefacts, 83–5, 96, 99 102, of humans, 83, 84 see also Grooved ware, biography ‘black boxes’, 29, 33, 34, 37–8, 46, 57–8 Blackhammer, 159 botanical analysis, 14, 16, 19, 42, 46, 47, 64, 98 ‘boundary objects’, 75, 178–9 Broken K Pueblo, 93 carved stone balls, 107, 163 categorisation, 5, 7, 8, 35, 54, 76, 97, 168 cattle milk, 30, 33 ceramics, 30, 33, 42, 46, 55, 67–8, 104 and identity, 105–7 as cultural indicator, 105 biography of, 106 ecology, 86 neolithic, 105–7 production of, 68, 87, 91, 92, 93, 94, 97 scientific analysis of, 76, 88, 91 see also Grooved ware chaˆınes op´eratoires, 90, 120, 138 clay, 87, 89 see also ceramics cognitive psychology, consumption, xiii, 52, 62, 85, 95, 96–9, 157–61, 165–7 and social identity, 96, 119, 163–4 see also biography context, 18–19, 40, 41, 44, 45, 47, 50, 51, 52, 55, 56, 61, 62, 63, 74–5, 76, 78, 84, 101, 175, 181 and artefacts, 74–5, 78, 84, 97, 102, 106–7 see also decontextualisation culture, 1, 11, 26–9, 36–7, 169 culture-history, 11, 51, 70, 117 cultural evolution, 14, 15, 70, 92 Cuween Hill, 159 203 204 Index Darwinian theory, 36–7, 64, 180 decontextualisation, 41, 42, 44, 50, 55, 56, 74 see also context deposition, 85, 99–102, 105 structured, 19, 55, 99–100 votive, 100 see also biography design studies, 65 domestication, 52 ecological theory, 14, 15, 16–17, 64, 86, 87 embodiment, 94 empiricism, 13, 14, 20, 21, 23, 37, 45, 46, 51, 72–3 energy dispersive analysis by x-ray (EDAX), 91 environment, 15, 55, 86 ethnoarchaeology, 13–14, 79, 93–4 ethnobotany, 36 ethnozoology, 36 excavation, 39–46, 47, 49, 53–5, 56, 58–9, 62, 77 as archaeology, 45 as ethnography, 59 exchange, 85, 87, 88, 95–6, 149, 174–5 see also biography distribution, 107 fabric, 118, 120–2, 126–8, 130, 138, 142, 150–1, 154 form, 117–18, 120 function, 107, 118 production, 122–8, 130–1, 161–2 habitus, 20 Harris matrix, 54 see also systems analysis hermeneutics, 6, 18, 38 hierachy, 40, 44–6, 49, 56–7, 60 houses, 110–11, 117, 158, 162, 163 see also Grooved ware, and houses identity, xiii, 84, 86–7, 90, 93, 96, 106–7, 161 inductively coupled plasma spectroscopy (ICPS), 66, 73, 88 instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA), 68, 71 iron age, 55, 85 Isbister, 158, 159, 160 isotopic analysis, 17, 88 Knowe of Ramsay, 159 Knowe of Yarso, 159 faunal analysis, 14, 16, 42, 46, 47, 51, 63, 98 feasting, 100, 152, 165, 166 food, 62, 104, 119, 131–2, 135, 136–7, 138, 149, 152, 154, 157–61, 164, 165–7 fragmentation, 40–6, 49, 54–8, 60, 99–102 landscape, 86–7, 89, 105 see also place language, 3–4, 5, 17, 65, 181–2 lead isotope analysis (LIA), 88–9, 174 life cycle: see biography Links of Noltland, 163 lithics, 42, 55, 137–8, 163 Gas Chromatography (GC), 30–3, 42, 73, 98, 105–6, 119, 131–2, 135, 142, 146 gender, 106 graffiti, 100 Grooved ware, 106, 107–13, 164–5 analysis of, 117–20, 131–5 and houses, 161–3 and identity, 117, 130–1, 143–4, 148–50, 155–7, 161, 164, 165–6 at Barnhouse, xi, 117–44, 145–50, 157, 160–1, 177–8 biography, 113, 120, 143–4, 145–8, 150–7, 158, 163 consumption, 131–9, 148, 154, 157, 160–1 decoration, 107, 111–12, 117, 122, 123, 130–1, 135, 138, 148, 150–1, 154, 163 deposition, 140–3, 144 Maes Howe, 115 Marxist theory, 12 mass spectrometry (MS): see gas chromatography material culture, 39, 59, 64–6, 72, 82, 179 and social relations, 65, 83–5, 93–5, 105, 118–19, 176–81, 181 materiality, 65, 101, 169, 179 materials analysis, 39, 51–3, 55, 63, 73, 76, 81, 85, 91–2, 95, 101–2, 103 memory, 131, 156, 158 metalwork, 42, 85 deposition of, 100 production of, 92 scientific analysis of, 42, 55, 76, 88–9, 91, 173–5 metaphor, 5, 19, 177 microwear analysis, 67 Index Middle Range Theory, 13–14, 25 monuments, 104, 105, 110, 111, 150, 158, 164, 165 mortuary rituals, 100, 158 museum studies, 65 narratives, 61–2, 69–72 fact and fiction, 69, 169–70, 172 scale of, 70, 72, 74, 76, 78, nature, 3–4, 28–9, 36–7, 169 networks, 25, 26, 29, 33, 35–6, 55, 62, 70–1, 171, 175 neolithic, 85, 103–5, 167 agriculture, 104 artefacts, 105 as social change, 104, 164–7 British, 51, 84 economy, 104 European, 84–5, 104 Orcadian, 110–17, 163–4 neutron activation analysis (NAA), 42, 66, 73, 88 objectivity, xiii, 3–6, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16, 20, 21, 23, 25, 37, 40, 44, 45, 46, 49, 50–3, 54, 55–8, 59, 65, 60, 171–2, 175 obsidian, 88 optical emission spectroscopy (OES), 88 Orkney, 51, 107–10 osteology, 19, 47 otherness, 59 Otzi, 70 palaeobotany: see botanical analysis paradigms, 9, 24, 26, 170 passage grave art, 107, 122, 163 petrology, 17, 42, 51–2, 63, 68, 72, 88, 89, 91, 102, 120, 126–8 phenomenalism, phenomenology, 65 place, 86–7, 87, 130, 163, 165 and artefacts, 87, 89 and memory, 86–7, 131 see also landscape plants, 157–8 plasma emission spectrometry, 42 positivism, xiii, 2, 25, 37 logical, post-excavation, 39, 40, 42–4, 45, 46–9, 53–5, 56, 58, 59, 61 on-site, 77–8 post-modernism, xiii post-structuralism, 2, 20 pottery: see ceramics 205 primitivism, 79 production, 62, 85, 86, 87, 89, 96 social organisation of, 93–5 see also biography and ‘chaˆınes op´eratoires’ proton-induced x-ray emission spectroscopy (PIXE), 93 publication, 39, 40, 42, 43–4, 45, 46, 50–3, 55, 56, 58, 59–60, 62 Quanterness, 115, 152–6 artefacts, 154 human remains, 153 rationalism, xiii, 6–10, 16, 20, 21, 27, 28, 35, 36, 37, 44, 54 relationism, 36 relativism, xiii, 6–10, 20, 24, 25, 28, 35, 171 representation, 41, 44, 49, 55, 57, 59, 73, 178 resource procurement, 86–9, 122, 128–31, 174–5 Ring of Bookan, 115 Ring of Brodgar, 111, 115 Rinyo, 111, 115, 146 sampling, 41, 66–9, 72, 75–7, 89, 95, 99 of artefacts, 75–6 scale, 35–6, 62, 66–9, 81–2, 98 of analysis, 67, 68, 69, 70–2, 85, 178, 179–81 of resolution, 67 geographical, 68, 76 macroscale, 66, 68, 70–2, 74, 76, 98–9, 164, 181 microscale, 66–7, 68, 70–2, 75, 81–2, 88, 93, 95, 98–9, 119, 164, 181 see also narratives, scale of scanning electron microscopy (SEM), 66, 67, 91 science and society, xii, 2, 27–9, 34–5 anthropology of, 27–9, 35–7, 38, 168 discipline of, xii–xiii, 1–3, 26–9, 34, 35 history of, 8, 9, 65, 69, 89 natural science, 1–10, 22, 27, 29, 33–4, 53–4, 74, 169, 181 practice of, 3, 26, 29, 35, 63–4, 69, 168, 170, 172, 176 scientific texts, 29–30 scientism, 21 scientists, 1, 4, 6, 26, 171–2 archaeological, xiii, 1, 12, 17, 19, 23, 37, 42, 45, 52–3, 56, 60, 64, 66, 74, 77, 173, 178, 179 206 Index semiotics, 5–6 settlements, 111, 115–17 signs, 17–18 site catchment, 86 site formation, 13–14 Skara Brae, 111, 115, 146, 163 social practice, 6, 19–20 in the past, 62, 67, 68, 73–4, 168, 176, 178, 179, 181 social science, 1–10, 22, 26, 29, 53–4, 64, 169, 181 soil micromorphology, xiii, 63 specialist reports: see publication specialists, 42, 46, 47, 51–3, 54, 55, 56, 78 stable isotope analysis, xiii, 67, 72 stone tools, 42, 46, 51, 55, 104, 137–8, 163 consumption and exchange of, 99, 149 scientific analysis of, 87, 88, 102 Stones of Stenness, 111, 115, 150–1, 152, 156, 157, 166 structuralism, 5, 19–20 structural linguistics, 17–18 structuration, 20, 34 structure macrostructure, 66, 72, 83 microstructure, 66, 72, 74, 75, 180 subjectivity, xiii, 3–6, 10, 11, 12–13, 20, 24–5, 35, 58–62, 65, 172 symbols, 17–18, 19 systems theory, 14–15, 16–17, 54, 58 taphonomy, 14, 16, 178 technology, xiii, 12, 33, 34, 35, 38, 64, 65, 89–93 and society, 38, 80–1, 88, 90–3, 103, 170–1 iron production, 78–82 see also ‘chaˆınes op´eratoires’ testability, 49–50 theory: and methodology, xi, 2, 17, 21, 22, 26, 29, 61, 64, 103, 175 thermoluminescence, 91 ‘thick description’, 25 trace element analysis, 67, 72 ‘two cultures’, 1–3, 182 typology, 105–6 Unstan, 115, 130, 154 use, 85, 105 see also biography use-life, 84, 85, 97 see also biography use-wear analysis, 98 xeroradiography, 91 x-ray flourescence spectroscopy (XRF), 42, 66, 88, 89 zooarchaeology: see faunal analysis ... both text and author The subject matter – the relationship between archaeological theory and archaeological science – arose from my doctoral research between 1993 and 1997 at Glasgow University, ... Institute for Archaeological Research, Cambridge In Cambridge I came into contact with a growing number of people who were attempting to utilise both archaeological theory and archaeological. .. archaeology; that is, that archaeological scientists and theoretical archaeologists are quite simply speaking in different languages and have Archaeological theory and scientific practice quite different