Archaeology

[CabVet]

Oh, I'm sorry ... did I step on the toes of those that blamed it on Doom™?

Not at all, I just find your suggestion that God somehow punished children by killing them because what they were being taught disgusting.

 

[AV1611VET]

Not at all, I just find your suggestion that God somehow punished children by killing them because what they were being taught disgusting.

... What???

 

[Standing_Ultraviolet]

If you are hoping to dig up a human artifact over a million years old you are either going to disappointed or famous.

I kind of assumed that she was using hyperbole, although you can find some fairly sophisticated tools used by lower hominids that go back that far. I don't know whether you would consider that archaeology, since it's not part of the study of human history, but paleoanthropology does have some overlap.

 

[Strathos]

Yes, I consider what you would call H. habilis to be human -- but I don't consider humans H. habilii.

There's a difference.

I wasn't asking you.

 

[Mystman]

If you personally want to find stuff, your best bet is probably to get involved when there is a large building project in areas that have been inhabited by city building cultures for a long time. You can't seem to dig a hole in some parts of the Middle East without stumbling across stuff from biblical times (and even older!).

Archaeology in western Europe is already a different beast, with most of the finds being pottery or simple tools etc, until you get the influence from the Romans.

I'm not familiar with archaeology in the US (although you've prompted me to look it up on wikipedia), but as far as I know the native americans in the US weren't active in city building, and while apparently some of them lived in agricultural villages (I thought that was exclusive to South/Central America.. You learn something new every day.), it wasn't widespread enough to reach the level of "dig a hole and you'll find pots and tools and remains of buildings".

 

[durangodawood]

If you personally want to find stuff, your best bet is probably to get involved when there is a large building project in areas that have been inhabited by city building cultures for a long time. You can't seem to dig a hole in some parts of the Middle East without stumbling across stuff from biblical times (and even older!).

Archaeology in western Europe is already a different beast, with most of the finds being pottery or simple tools etc, until you get the influence from the Romans.

I'm not familiar with archaeology in the US (although you've prompted me to look it up on wikipedia), but as far as I know the native americans in the US weren't active in city building, and while apparently some of them lived in agricultural villages (I thought that was exclusive to South/Central America.. You learn something new every day.), it wasn't widespread enough to reach the level of "dig a hole and you'll find pots and tools and remains of buildings".

There was a pretty major civlization happenning here in the southwestern USA, around 1000-1200 ce.

 

[Mystman]

There was a pretty major civlization happenning here in the southwestern USA, around 1000-1200 ce.

:o

do they have a name?

I just found out about this place:
Cahokia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The wiki includes the claim that the city might have housed between 6000 and 40000 people at its peak (quite a large spread), but I haven't found how they came to that conclusion.

Having the stereotypical idea of native americans as tent-dwelling nomads, I'm tempted by the idea that there is a bit of wishful thinking going on by US archaeologists who might be a bit envious of all the large (preserved...) cities in South America and the Middle East. Nah, it's cool they found all these things. I love this stuff (although to be honest I prefer written records and/or clear physical artefacts to the guestimating that comes with reconstructing history from pottery shards)

 

[durangodawood]

:o

do they have a name?

I just found out about this place:
Cahokia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The wiki includes the claim that the city might have housed between 6000 and 40000 people at its peak (quite a large spread), but I haven't found how they came to that conclusion.

Having the stereotypical idea of native americans as tent-dwelling nomads, I'm tempted by the idea that there is a bit of wishful thinking going on by US archaeologists who might be a bit envious by all the large (preserved...) cities in South America and the Middle East. Nah, it's cool they found all these things. I love this stuff (although to be honest I prefer written records and/or clear physical artefacts to the guestimating that comes with reconstructing history from pottery shards)

Chacoan or "ancestral puebloan" is the name we give them.

Look up Chaco Canyon.

 

[Mystman]

Chacoan or "ancestral puebloan" is the name we give them.

Look up Chaco Canyon.

Thanks, off to Wikipedia

 

[durangodawood]

Thanks, off to Wikipedia

For sure. Also, these days the place is called Chaco Culture National Historical Park.

 

[Standing_Ultraviolet]

We have a few large Mississippian sites in other parts of the southeast, too. Here's a list on Wikipedia, if you're curious. The large empire building civilizations were more toward the south, in Meso- and South America, but North America has quite a few interesting sites. Agriculture was pretty widespread (the Cherokee, where I live, replaced some of the Mississippians when they were apparently killed by disease, and practiced agriculture prodigiously in river valleys). Most construction was relatively unstable, unfortunately, and didn't last down through the years very well. You can still find arrow-heads all over the place, though, and some occasional household implements.

 

[CabVet]

... What???

Short term memory problems?

I don't know, but I would assume our cholerages & blasversities, on the day Columbine went down, were right there teaching their students that we are animals; but then, when they got the news, shook their heads in wonderment as to why it happened.

 

[AV1611VET]

Short term memory problems?

I don't see the connection; but then, I don't want to either.

I'm sure it's something you're manufacturing in your own mind.

You're certainly the only one making waves about it.

 

[Mr Strawberry]

I don't see the connection; but then, I don't want to either.

This would make a very apt signature for you.

 

[SkyWriting]

If you're a YEC, archaeology will challenge your faith.

I'm a YEC and archaeology has no more effect on my faith than any other field of study. Of course one should be aware of who they are learning ANYTHING from and take the source into consideration.

With my previous "study" of science fiction, I learned how to identify fiction, especially fiction-science, very easily. And most of science dealing with history is fiction based. By nature. Every hypotheses is fiction.

 

[Mr Clean]

I'm a YEC and archaeology has no more effect on my faith than any other field of study. Of course one should be aware of who they are learning ANYTHING from and take the source into consideration.

You mean like if one learned their view of the world on a 2000 year old book written by people that thought the night air was posionous to breathe?

With my previous "study" of science fiction, I learned how to identify fiction, especially fiction-science, very easily. And most of science dealing with history is fiction based. By nature. Every hypotheses is fiction.

2+2 = 4
Gravity
Speed of light

If you can show that any one of those constants is fiction, I'll never post in here again.

 

[Mr Clean]

:o

do they have a name?

I just found out about this place:
Cahokia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The wiki includes the claim that the city might have housed between 6000 and 40000 people at its peak (quite a large spread), but I haven't found how they came to that conclusion.

Having the stereotypical idea of native americans as tent-dwelling nomads, I'm tempted by the idea that there is a bit of wishful thinking going on by US archaeologists who might be a bit envious of all the large (preserved...) cities in South America and the Middle East. Nah, it's cool they found all these things. I love this stuff (although to be honest I prefer written records and/or clear physical artefacts to the guestimating that comes with reconstructing history from pottery shards)

I live in St Louis. Cahokia Mounds is a fascinating site. There is evidence of a large (for its day) population of people that lived in and around the Mounds area, including a large pallisades that surrounded the city.

The Mississippian peoples built mounds for various reasons up and down the Mississippi and Ohio rivers. Among the ruins of many sites they have found things like seashells from Pacific Ocean species and from South American species. There was an active trading culture that existed apparently. In fact some have theorized that the mound builders got some of their knowledge from Central and South American tribes.

But it is pretty neat stuff, you should read up on it if that sort of thing interests you.

 

[Mystman]

But it is pretty neat stuff, you should read up on it if that sort of thing interests you.

Thinking about it a bit more (and analysing my own wikipedia behavior..), I love chronology. Knowing event X caused event Y which preceded event Z. Seeing how cultures emerge, develop, decline, and morph into a successor.

Mysterious gaps in chronology can also be fascinating (the Roanoke Colony - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia was a nice find, though maybe outside the scope of archaeology), but when a culture's history appears to be "they suddenly turn up, leave a few artefacts, and disappear again", it's almost.. frustrating. I want to be able to give the culture a place in my mental map of world events, and instead it's a bit of a loose fragment, at best connected to other cultures and events via guestimates based on pottery shards.

(edit: or, alternatively, the amount of new info needed to properly place an event/artefact in the chronology of a continent that's completely unknown to me, can be a bit overwhelming.)

Ok, so maybe archaeology (the majority of which is concerned with pottery shards instead of the fancy stuff like pyramids and tombs and buried cities), isn't the field for me.

 

[Cheeky Monkey]

I'm a YEC and archaeology has no more effect on my faith than any other field of study.

That's not uncommon but neither is it something to be proud of.

 

[Cheeky Monkey]

(Hi, I have no idea where a thread about archaeology fits in; if you are a moderator and you think it doesn't fit here then just move it to another forum.)



Recently got interested in archaeology (thought it would be cool to dig around in the dirt and come up with an artifact that was over a million or so years old), but I'm not really that experienced, I just began reading a few magazines about the subject. With that being said, I was looking for a few experienced archaeologists that might be willing to train me in this discipline.

I've had nearly two decades in Australian indigenous archaeology and anthropology so maybe I can help. My personal glib definition of archaeology is "the anthropology of dead people"