Naomi F. Miller – författare

Cultivation and land use practices the world over reflect many aspects of people's relationship to each other and to the natural world. The Archaeology of Garden and Field explores the cultivation of land from prehistoric times to the nineteenth century through excavation, experimentation, and the study of modern cultural traditions. The Archaeology of Garden and Field contains a wealth of information distilled from the combined experiences of the editors and contributors. Whether one's interest is the Old World or the New, prehistory or the present, this book provides a starting point for anyone who has ever wondered how archaeologists find and interpret the ephemeral traces of ancient cultivation.

A collection of essays put together by colleagues, friends, and students of William M. Sumner to honor his contribution to Iranian archaeology and archaeological field methodology. Topical contributions emphasize the methodological aspects of analysis of survey data, while regional contributions focus on two of the main geographical areas studied by archaeologists in Iran: the southwest and the northwest. This volume is published in association with The American Institute of Iranian Studies and The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.

The archaeological site of Gordion is most famous as the home of the Phrygian king Midas and as the place where Alexander the Great cut the Gordian knot on his way to conquer Asia. Located in central Anatolia (present-day Turkey) near the confluence of the Porsuk and Sakarya rivers, Gordion also lies on historic trade routes between east and west as well as north to the Black Sea. Favorably situated for long-distance trade, Gordion's setting is marginal for agricultural cultivation but well suited to pastoral production. It is therefore not surprising that with the exception of a single Chalcolithic site, the earliest settlements in the region are fairly late-they date to the Early Bronze Age (late 3rd millennium B.C.). The earliest known levels of Gordion, too, date to the Early Bronze Age, and occupation of at least some part of the site was nearly continuous through at least Roman times (second half of the 1st century B.C.). This work is a contribution to both the archaeobotany of west Asia and the archaeology of the site of Gordion. The book's major concern is understanding long-term changes in the environment and in land use. An important finding, with implications for modern land management, is that the most sustainable use of this landscape involves mixed farming of dry-farmed cereals, summer-irrigated garden crops, and animal husbandry. The large number of samples from the 1988-89 seasons analyzed here make this a rich source for understanding other materials from the Gordion excavations and for comparison with other sites in west Asia.

Sustainable Lifeways addresses forces of conservatism and innovation in societies dependent on the exploitation of aquatic and other wild resources, agriculture, and specialized pastoralism. The volume gathers specialists working in four areas of the world with significant archaeological and paleoenvironmental databases: West Asia, the American Southwest, East Africa, and Andean South America, and contributing to research in three broad time scales: long term (spanning millennia), medium term (archaeological time, spanning centuries or a few thousand years), and recent (ethnohistoric or ethnographic, spanning years or decades). By bringing an archaeological eye to an examination of human response to unpredictable environmental conditions, informed by an understanding of contemporary traditional peoples, the contributors to this volume develop a more detailed picture of how societies perceive environmental risk, how they alter their behavior in the face of changing conditions, and under what challenges the most rapid and far-reaching changes in adaptation have taken place. Sustainable Lifeways enhances our understanding of both the forces of conservatism and innovation which may have been in play in major transitions in the past, such as the development of complex society, and the expansions of early empires. Studies present examples of cattle herders in East Africa, hunter-gatherers and pastoralists in the Levant, South American fisher/farmers, and farmer/hunters of the U.S. Southwest.

Archaeological interpretations are built on many types of evidence. While no one method or analysis can fully reveal an extinct economic system, the papers in this volume are each focused on a single category of data to elucidate different aspects of ancient economy and settlement: settlement pattern (Khurban plains), trace elements in sealing clays (Tepe Gawra), seeds and charcoal (Tepe Hissar, Malyan, Kurban Hoyuk), economic texts (Nippur).