Pub Date : 2022-10-02DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157624
Juliet V. Spedding
ABSTRACT This article presents the results of chemical analysis using SEM-EDS on 136 vitreous bead and vessel samples found at Faras and Qasr Ibrim (Lower Nubia), and Gabati and Meroe (Upper Nubia) in Sudan dating to the Meroitic (c. 350 BC–AD 350) and Early Nobadian (c. AD 350–600) periods. The results revealed a great variety of chemical groups and types, indicating the presence of glass from multiple origins. Many of these glass samples match the known Mediterranean glass groups to suggest a potential provenance for some of the glasses. However, a number of samples from Gabati did not fit within these groups and the presence of glassy faience at Qasr Ibrim may highlight further nuances of vitreous material production and the potential for more locally based practices.
{"title":"SEM-EDS identification of glass groups in Meroitic period and Early Nobadian Nubia","authors":"Juliet V. Spedding","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157624","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157624","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article presents the results of chemical analysis using SEM-EDS on 136 vitreous bead and vessel samples found at Faras and Qasr Ibrim (Lower Nubia), and Gabati and Meroe (Upper Nubia) in Sudan dating to the Meroitic (c. 350 BC–AD 350) and Early Nobadian (c. AD 350–600) periods. The results revealed a great variety of chemical groups and types, indicating the presence of glass from multiple origins. Many of these glass samples match the known Mediterranean glass groups to suggest a potential provenance for some of the glasses. However, a number of samples from Gabati did not fit within these groups and the presence of glassy faience at Qasr Ibrim may highlight further nuances of vitreous material production and the potential for more locally based practices.","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"76 1","pages":"500 - 531"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"88100722","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-02DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2144049
A. LaViolette
{"title":"African islands: a comparative archaeology","authors":"A. LaViolette","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2144049","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2144049","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"91 1","pages":"560 - 563"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86808636","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-02DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157626
T. Hattingh, M. Bamford, M. Schoeman
ABSTRACT Even though numerous studies have explored the layout, location, and chronology of Bokoni settlements of the second millennium AD (Mpumalanga province, South Africa), relatively little is known about the type of food cultivated by its people. In pursuit of direct evidence for crops and to understand the environmental conditions that prevailed during the site’s occupation we conducted a phytolith analysis of sediments collected from a terrace at Buffelskloof (BFK1). While we were able to determine that Zea mays (maize) was not cultivated in the sampled terrace, we were not able to determine if any African domesticates were grown on the terraced area. Iph and Ic indexes were used to determine that BFK1 received more rainfall during the site’s occupation than at present and temperatures fluctuated. The Broadleaf index (D/P°) was used to determine the amount of tree cover and showed that BFK1 was situated in an open grassland during some periods of the site’s occupation.
{"title":"A preliminary phytolith analysis of terrace soils from Buffelskloof, Mpumalanga, South Africa","authors":"T. Hattingh, M. Bamford, M. Schoeman","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157626","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157626","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Even though numerous studies have explored the layout, location, and chronology of Bokoni settlements of the second millennium AD (Mpumalanga province, South Africa), relatively little is known about the type of food cultivated by its people. In pursuit of direct evidence for crops and to understand the environmental conditions that prevailed during the site’s occupation we conducted a phytolith analysis of sediments collected from a terrace at Buffelskloof (BFK1). While we were able to determine that Zea mays (maize) was not cultivated in the sampled terrace, we were not able to determine if any African domesticates were grown on the terraced area. Iph and Ic indexes were used to determine that BFK1 received more rainfall during the site’s occupation than at present and temperatures fluctuated. The Broadleaf index (D/P°) was used to determine the amount of tree cover and showed that BFK1 was situated in an open grassland during some periods of the site’s occupation.","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"1 1","pages":"532 - 554"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86687561","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-02DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2169441
Joanna A. Ciesielska
{"title":"Social inference from mortuary remains in medieval Nubia: a multidisciplinary approach to the analysis and interpretation of Christian cemeteries at Ghazali, northern Sudan","authors":"Joanna A. Ciesielska","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2169441","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2169441","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"56 1","pages":"556 - 558"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77223211","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-02DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157623
D. Green
ABSTRACT The investigation of gender and gender roles is crucial to understanding past lifeways. San rock art provides an important opportunity to do this because the paintings are specific, emic representations of how people were thinking and doing in the past. A gendered analytical lens can potentially provide new insights for an in-depth appreciation of the identities and personhood that San chose to depict and the stereotypes that were favoured. To explore this potential, quantitative and qualitative methods were used to record and analyse a selection of sites in two adjacent mountain regions of southern Africa: the southern Maloti-Drakensberg and the eastern Stormberg. This was done because we cannot merely assume that people living in adjacent areas identified in the same ways. Paintings of women were prioritised to show that with careful analysis of iconographic commonalities it is possible to clarify the nature of ‘indeterminism’ for the research areas. A binary understanding of gender can be identified in San ethnography and the San paintings of these areas in how men and women are presented. Significantly, the small number of images painted with either breasts or penises might on analysis show that specific aspects of their identities are being emphasised by these painted physical features and be a type of identity marking. In addition, there are significant differences in the number of women depicted in these mountain areas that may refer to variances in what stereotypes were favoured in space, and perhaps time. The paper argues that these paintings are multiplex because the importance of women ritual specialists, the reinforcement of specific conditioning behaviours and the status of individuals and groups of individuals are all highlighted in certain sites. Gender in humans and animals and the analysis of the variances in how gender is portrayed between different regions may have important implications for understanding differences in San personhood, individual and collective identities, identity marking and the roles of women and men.
{"title":"San rock paintings of women in the southern Maloti-Drakensberg and eastern Stormberg, Eastern Cape Province, South Africa: ritual specialists, potency and social conditioning","authors":"D. Green","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157623","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2157623","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The investigation of gender and gender roles is crucial to understanding past lifeways. San rock art provides an important opportunity to do this because the paintings are specific, emic representations of how people were thinking and doing in the past. A gendered analytical lens can potentially provide new insights for an in-depth appreciation of the identities and personhood that San chose to depict and the stereotypes that were favoured. To explore this potential, quantitative and qualitative methods were used to record and analyse a selection of sites in two adjacent mountain regions of southern Africa: the southern Maloti-Drakensberg and the eastern Stormberg. This was done because we cannot merely assume that people living in adjacent areas identified in the same ways. Paintings of women were prioritised to show that with careful analysis of iconographic commonalities it is possible to clarify the nature of ‘indeterminism’ for the research areas. A binary understanding of gender can be identified in San ethnography and the San paintings of these areas in how men and women are presented. Significantly, the small number of images painted with either breasts or penises might on analysis show that specific aspects of their identities are being emphasised by these painted physical features and be a type of identity marking. In addition, there are significant differences in the number of women depicted in these mountain areas that may refer to variances in what stereotypes were favoured in space, and perhaps time. The paper argues that these paintings are multiplex because the importance of women ritual specialists, the reinforcement of specific conditioning behaviours and the status of individuals and groups of individuals are all highlighted in certain sites. Gender in humans and animals and the analysis of the variances in how gender is portrayed between different regions may have important implications for understanding differences in San personhood, individual and collective identities, identity marking and the roles of women and men.","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"34 1","pages":"463 - 499"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87989751","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-02DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2152990
E. Hallinan
ABSTRACT The Late Pleistocene and Holocene settlement record of southern Africa shows clear discontinuities both through time and across space. While there is considerable variability between different ecological biomes, the sub-continent’s interior arid zones show particularly unstable occupation histories. However, understanding the nature of and reasons for these discontinuities is hampered by substantial spatial gaps in our archaeological knowledge. This paper presents evidence from the Tankwa Karoo region — intermediate between the well-studied Western Cape Cederberg Mountains and the interior Upper Karoo — to capture Later Stone Age (LSA) behaviour at the interface between Cape and Karoo environments. Off-site surveys recorded surface artefacts across a 100 km-long study area, documenting LSA settlement at a landscape scale and testing expected patterns against settlement records of regions to the west and east. The results indicate that in contrast to the strongly pulsed occupation evidence from the Cederberg Mountains and the Upper Karoo, no LSA phases show particularly high site densities or sustained use of longer-term sites. Additionally, the most arid parts of the eastern Tankwa Karoo show very limited LSA evidence. This suggests that this marginal environment was occupied only ephemerally during the LSA, potentially serving as a corridor between more reliably resourced regions.
{"title":"Landscape-scale perspectives on Later Stone Age settlement in the Tankwa Karoo, South Africa","authors":"E. Hallinan","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2152990","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2152990","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The Late Pleistocene and Holocene settlement record of southern Africa shows clear discontinuities both through time and across space. While there is considerable variability between different ecological biomes, the sub-continent’s interior arid zones show particularly unstable occupation histories. However, understanding the nature of and reasons for these discontinuities is hampered by substantial spatial gaps in our archaeological knowledge. This paper presents evidence from the Tankwa Karoo region — intermediate between the well-studied Western Cape Cederberg Mountains and the interior Upper Karoo — to capture Later Stone Age (LSA) behaviour at the interface between Cape and Karoo environments. Off-site surveys recorded surface artefacts across a 100 km-long study area, documenting LSA settlement at a landscape scale and testing expected patterns against settlement records of regions to the west and east. The results indicate that in contrast to the strongly pulsed occupation evidence from the Cederberg Mountains and the Upper Karoo, no LSA phases show particularly high site densities or sustained use of longer-term sites. Additionally, the most arid parts of the eastern Tankwa Karoo show very limited LSA evidence. This suggests that this marginal environment was occupied only ephemerally during the LSA, potentially serving as a corridor between more reliably resourced regions.","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"49 1","pages":"419 - 462"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"91119491","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-07-03DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115280
I. Mesfin, Ulla Mussgnug, E. Hallinan
ABSTRACT Mining operations in Africa have played a considerable role in the reconstruction of human evolution. These contributions would not have been possible without co-operation between the mining industry, archaeology and palaeontology. However, closer scrutiny of their initially fortuitous relationship reveals limitations and fundamental differences in approach. A compelling case study is that of palaeontologist and archaeologist Gudrun Corvinus, employed by Consolidated Diamond Mines in the Sperrgebiet region of Namibia between 1976 and 1980. Corvinus wrote numerous internal mine reports and scientific publications, but also left behind an exhaustive body of private records along with palaeontological and archaeological museum collections. By contrasting this legacy, this paper presents a rich narrative of her attempt to reconcile the fulfilment of her contract requirements with her scientific principles. It sketches a progressively conflict-laden relationship between her and the profit-centred management of a multi-national company. The scientific legacy of Gudrun Corvinus and the historiographical facts and ramifications of this loss of co-operation are discussed in terms of cultural heritage, scientific knowledge and dissemination. Assessing her fight in the naturally and culturally rich environment of the Sperrgebiet, the paper concludes by considering the threat that mining poses to Pleistocene heritage sites in Namibia.
{"title":"Southern African Stone Age archaeology and palaeontology in a mining context: the example of Gudrun Corvinus in the diamond mines of the Sperrgebiet, Namibia (1976–1980)","authors":"I. Mesfin, Ulla Mussgnug, E. Hallinan","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115280","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115280","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Mining operations in Africa have played a considerable role in the reconstruction of human evolution. These contributions would not have been possible without co-operation between the mining industry, archaeology and palaeontology. However, closer scrutiny of their initially fortuitous relationship reveals limitations and fundamental differences in approach. A compelling case study is that of palaeontologist and archaeologist Gudrun Corvinus, employed by Consolidated Diamond Mines in the Sperrgebiet region of Namibia between 1976 and 1980. Corvinus wrote numerous internal mine reports and scientific publications, but also left behind an exhaustive body of private records along with palaeontological and archaeological museum collections. By contrasting this legacy, this paper presents a rich narrative of her attempt to reconcile the fulfilment of her contract requirements with her scientific principles. It sketches a progressively conflict-laden relationship between her and the profit-centred management of a multi-national company. The scientific legacy of Gudrun Corvinus and the historiographical facts and ramifications of this loss of co-operation are discussed in terms of cultural heritage, scientific knowledge and dissemination. Assessing her fight in the naturally and culturally rich environment of the Sperrgebiet, the paper concludes by considering the threat that mining poses to Pleistocene heritage sites in Namibia.","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"12 1","pages":"365 - 391"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82284342","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-07-03DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115262
Jordan R. Scholfield, Robert T. Nyamushosho, Cornelius T. Mushangwe, S. Chirikure
ABSTRACT In southern Zambezia, the early second millennium AD witnessed socio-political transformations within local agropastoralist societies. Research continues to unearth evidence of multiple places that likely functioned as the centres of state-based polities. This paper reports on surveys and excavations undertaken at Mtanye, located about 50 km east of Gwanda in southwestern Zimbabwe and approximately 90 km north of the Shashi-Limpopo Confluence Area where Botswana, South Africa and Zimbabwe meet. Fieldwork identified local expressions of prestige such as stone walling, exotic items such as glass beads and evidence of long-term occupation with a successive layering and mix of K2, TK2 and Mapungubwe facies. Based on this evidence, it is therefore suggested that the similarities in material culture between Mapungubwe, Mtanye and other neighbouring sites like Mapela and Mananzve reflect social networks of shared ideas and practices rather than the existence of a single hegemonic state. Furthermore, the community at Mtanye deployed different strategies to survive and thrive in seemingly inhospitable drylands.
{"title":"Mtanye revisited: new insights into the Middle Iron Age of southern Zambezia","authors":"Jordan R. Scholfield, Robert T. Nyamushosho, Cornelius T. Mushangwe, S. Chirikure","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115262","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115262","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT In southern Zambezia, the early second millennium AD witnessed socio-political transformations within local agropastoralist societies. Research continues to unearth evidence of multiple places that likely functioned as the centres of state-based polities. This paper reports on surveys and excavations undertaken at Mtanye, located about 50 km east of Gwanda in southwestern Zimbabwe and approximately 90 km north of the Shashi-Limpopo Confluence Area where Botswana, South Africa and Zimbabwe meet. Fieldwork identified local expressions of prestige such as stone walling, exotic items such as glass beads and evidence of long-term occupation with a successive layering and mix of K2, TK2 and Mapungubwe facies. Based on this evidence, it is therefore suggested that the similarities in material culture between Mapungubwe, Mtanye and other neighbouring sites like Mapela and Mananzve reflect social networks of shared ideas and practices rather than the existence of a single hegemonic state. Furthermore, the community at Mtanye deployed different strategies to survive and thrive in seemingly inhospitable drylands.","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"62 1","pages":"335 - 364"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79628643","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-07-03DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2111077
E. Lyaya
ABSTRACT This paper focuses on Bena iron production in southern Tanzania to determine the geochemistry of smelted iron ore, verify liquid slag tapping mechanisms, explore the efficiency of iron production and identify the nature of final smelting products. To this end, chemical and mineralogical analytical techniques were used. Analytical results indicate that the Bena smelted titanium-rich iron ores to produce iron. It appears that liquid smelting slag was tapped out of the furnace through mlepulo, a local name for a channel or tunnel dug a few centimetres below the tuyères at a horizontal level. The slag microstructures strongly indicate that smelting tap slag cooled rapidly. This study also shows that the reduction process of Bena iron production was efficient in many respects due to the absence of high iron oxides in the slag microstructures. Based on the smelting slags’ chemistry and mineralogy, this paper argues that the Bena produced iron instead of carbon-rich steel.
{"title":"Twentieth-century Bena iron production in the Njombe district of Tanzania","authors":"E. Lyaya","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2111077","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2111077","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This paper focuses on Bena iron production in southern Tanzania to determine the geochemistry of smelted iron ore, verify liquid slag tapping mechanisms, explore the efficiency of iron production and identify the nature of final smelting products. To this end, chemical and mineralogical analytical techniques were used. Analytical results indicate that the Bena smelted titanium-rich iron ores to produce iron. It appears that liquid smelting slag was tapped out of the furnace through mlepulo, a local name for a channel or tunnel dug a few centimetres below the tuyères at a horizontal level. The slag microstructures strongly indicate that smelting tap slag cooled rapidly. This study also shows that the reduction process of Bena iron production was efficient in many respects due to the absence of high iron oxides in the slag microstructures. Based on the smelting slags’ chemistry and mineralogy, this paper argues that the Bena produced iron instead of carbon-rich steel.","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"13 1","pages":"297 - 315"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78486005","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-07-03DOI: 10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115686
K. Fowler, L. V. van Schalkwyk
ABSTRACT The archaeology of the Zulu kingdom in southeastern South Africa has recently seen renewed interest after a long dormancy. Most of what we know about the kingdom comes from oral tradition and historical records. Archaeological research has been limited to the excavation of battlefields, the preserved primary residences of three kings and limited non-systematic survey. Beyond the battlefields and king’s capitals there is considerable opportunity for archaeology to provide evidence that complements written records and oral traditions and that informs us about questions where these records are incomplete, vague or silent. Against the historical record, archaeological research can establish a more secure understanding of settlement pattern, settlement organisation, ecology and landscape use, economics, the nature of non-élite lifeways and how the network of relations amongst social groups and strata that comprised the kingdom’s populace was materialised. The ‘heartland’ of the Zulu kingdom, the emaKhosini Basin, has long been considered an area of high archaeological potential for understanding settlement and society during the nineteenth century AD. Here, we report the results of a reconnaissance survey aimed at relocating reported sites, evaluating their size and layout and establishing their potential for further detailed, systematic survey and excavation in preparation for future long-term work in the emaKhosini.
{"title":"Reconnaissance survey of Zulu kingdom period amakhanda in the emaKhosini Basin, South Africa","authors":"K. Fowler, L. V. van Schalkwyk","doi":"10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115686","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0067270X.2022.2115686","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The archaeology of the Zulu kingdom in southeastern South Africa has recently seen renewed interest after a long dormancy. Most of what we know about the kingdom comes from oral tradition and historical records. Archaeological research has been limited to the excavation of battlefields, the preserved primary residences of three kings and limited non-systematic survey. Beyond the battlefields and king’s capitals there is considerable opportunity for archaeology to provide evidence that complements written records and oral traditions and that informs us about questions where these records are incomplete, vague or silent. Against the historical record, archaeological research can establish a more secure understanding of settlement pattern, settlement organisation, ecology and landscape use, economics, the nature of non-élite lifeways and how the network of relations amongst social groups and strata that comprised the kingdom’s populace was materialised. The ‘heartland’ of the Zulu kingdom, the emaKhosini Basin, has long been considered an area of high archaeological potential for understanding settlement and society during the nineteenth century AD. Here, we report the results of a reconnaissance survey aimed at relocating reported sites, evaluating their size and layout and establishing their potential for further detailed, systematic survey and excavation in preparation for future long-term work in the emaKhosini.","PeriodicalId":45689,"journal":{"name":"Azania-Archaeological Research in Africa","volume":"51 1","pages":"392 - 418"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73512804","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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