Οι πρώτες επιστημονικές
έρευνες της Νεολιθικής Εγγύς Ανατολής, όπως οι ανασκαφές στην Ali Kosh και τη Chagha
Sefid, του Ιράν, το 1960, ήταν πρωτοποριακές για την εποχή τους.
Αλλά νεώτερες έρευνες έχουν
φέρει ανατροπές…
Τα δίκτυα ανταλλακτικού
εμπορίου δημιουργήθηκαν από την νεολιθική εποχή…
Οι Ellery Frahm και Christina
M. Carolus ανέλυσαν την χημική σύνθεση περισσότερων από 2.000 τεχνουργημάτων
οψιδιανού, που ανακαλύφθηκαν πριν από περισσότερα από 50 χρόνια, στις τοποθεσίες
Ali Kosh και Chagha Sefic, οι οποίες ευρίσκονται στην πεδιάδα Deh Luran στη
νότια Ζάκρο / Zagros του Ιράν.
Τα αντικείμενα, που σήμερα υπάρχουν
στο Μουσείο Yale Peabody (!!!) είναι περίπου 12.000 χρόνων!
Η νέα μελέτη, που διεξήχθη με
φορητά όργανα φθορισμού ακτίνων Χ, δείχνει ότι ο οψιδιανός προερχόταν από 7
ξεχωριστές πηγές, συμπεριλαμβανομένου του Nemrut Dağ, ενός ηφαιστείου που είναι
πλέον αδρανές, και που βρίσκεται περίπου 1.000 μίλια μακριά από τους οικισμούς!
ΠΗΓΗ: E. Frahm, Chr. M. Carolus «Identifying
the origins of obsidian artifacts in the Deh Luran Plain (Southwestern Iran)
highlights community connections in the Neolithic Zagros», https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2109321119,
119 (43) e2109321119, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the
United States of America / PNAS, 17.10.2022. M. Cummings «New analysis of
obsidian blades reveals dynamic Neolithic social networks», Πανεπιστήμιο Yale, 17.10.2022. ΑΡΧΕΙΟΝ ΠΟΛΙΤΙΣΜΟΥ, 18.10.2022.
Abstract
Early scientific investigations of the Neolithic Near East, such as the
excavations of Ali Kosh and Chagha Sefid during the 1960s, were pioneering for
their time. Modern, critical reexaminations of these (and other) sites have led
to substantially different interpretations. New insights with respect to fauna,
flora, and chronology have overturned widely held ideas about the emergence of
food production. Chemically determining the geological origins of all lithic
artifacts made from obsidian has hitherto been overlooked. The observed
accelerating diversity in these obsidian assemblages indicates intensifying
connections among Neolithic sites, highlighting intercommunity contacts as a
mechanism for social change as populations grew during a demographic transition
purported to have occurred within food-producing societies worldwide, from
western Europe to Mesoamerica.
Exchange networks created by Neolithic pastoral transhumance have been
central to explaining the distant transport of obsidian since chemical analysis
was first used to attribute Near Eastern artifacts to their volcanic origins in
the 1960s. Since then, critical reassessments of floral, faunal, and
chronological data have upended long-held interpretations regarding the
emergence of food production and have demonstrated that far-traveled, nomadic
pastoralists were more myth than reality, at least during the Neolithic.
Despite debates regarding their proposed conveyance mechanisms, obsidian
artifacts’ transport has received relatively little attention compared with
zooarchaeological and archaeobotanical lines of investigation. The rise of nondestructive
and portable instruments permits entire obsidian assemblages to be traced to
their sources, renewing their significance in elucidating connections among
early pastoral and agricultural communities. Here we share our findings about
the obsidian artifacts excavated from the sites of Ali Kosh and Chagha Sefid in
the southern Zagros. In the 1960s and 1970s, 28 obsidian artifacts from the
sites were destructively tested, and the remainder were sorted by color. Our
results emphasize a dynamic, accelerating connectivity among the Early and Late
Neolithic communities. Here we propose and support an alternative model for
obsidian distribution among more settled communities. In brief, diversity in
the obsidian assemblage accelerated diachronically, an invisible trend in the
earlier studies. Our model of increasing population densities is supported by
archaeological data and computational simulations, offering insights regarding
the Neolithic Demographic Transition in the Zagros, an equivalent of which is commonly
thought to have occurred around the world.
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