Thinking through the Body: Archaeologies of Corporeality

262 Pages·2002·3.91 MB·English

by  Yannis Hamilakis

Thinking through the Body
Thinking through the Body
Archaeologies of Corporeality
Edited by
Yannis Hamilakis
University of Southampton
Southampton. Eng/and
Mark Pluciennik
University of Wales
Lampeter, Wales
and
Sarah Tarlow
University 0/ Leicester
Leicester; Eng/JJnd
Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Thinking through the body: archaeologies of corporeality/edited by Yannis Hamilakis,
Mark Pluciennik, and Sarah Tarlow.
p. cm.
Based on the Thinking through the Body workshop held at the University of Wales,
Lampeter, June 1998.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4613-5198-6 ISBN 978-1-4615-0693-5 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4615-0693-5
I. Social archaeology-Congresses. 2. Body, Human-Social
aspects-History-Congresses. 3. Body. Human- Symbolic aspects-History-Congresses.
4. Prehistoric couples-Congresses. 5. Human remains (Archaeology)-Congresses. 6.
Material culture-History-Congresses. 7. Excavations (Archaeology)-Congresses. I.
Hamilakis, Yannis. 1966- II. Pluciennik. Mark, 1953- III. Tarlow, Sarah, 1967-
CC72.4 .T47 2001
930.1- dc21
2001038599
ISBN 978-1-4613-5198-6
02002 Springer Science+Business Media New York
Originally published by Kluwer Academicl Plenum Publishers. New York in 2002
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1s t edition 2002
http://www.wkap.com
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
A C.I.P. record for this book is available from the Library of Congress
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by
any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording, or otherwise, without written
permission from the Publisher
EDITORS' PREFACE
This book is based on the Thinking through the Body workshop held at the
University of Wales, Lampeter, in June 1998. We would like to thank the
University of Wales, Lampeter, and in particular the Department of
Archaeology for financial and other support; the student volunteers for their
help in organizing the conference; and the participants for co-operating in
preparing their papers for pre-circulation. An exhibition of works by
contemporary artists dealing with the body was also held in conjunction with
the academic conference and contributed greatly to the intellectual, aesthetic
and social atmosphere. We would like to thank all the artists, Ron Dukelow
and Cambria Arts for agreeing to participate in the workshop and for
organizing and mounting the exhibition.
CONTENTS
List of Figures and Tables ix
List of Contributors xi
Introduction: Thinking Through the Body
Yannis Hamilakis, Mark Pluciennik and Sarah Tarlow..................... 1
Part 1: Bodies, Selves and Individuals
Introduction
Sarah Tarlow......................................................................................... 23
1 Archaeology's humanism and the materiality oft he body
Julian Thomas.................................................................................. 29
2 Body Parts: personhood and materiality in the earlier Manx
neolithic
Chris Fowler..................................................................................... 47
3 Moralities ofd ress and the dress oft he dead in early medieval
Europe
Jos Bazelmans........ .......................................................................... 71
4 The aesthetic corpse in nineteenth-century Britain
Sarah Tarlow.................................................................................... 85
Part 2: Experience and Corporeality
Introduction
Yannis Hamilakis..... ....... .................................................. .................... 99
5 Feeling through the body:gesture in Cretan Bronze Age Religion
Christine Morris and Alan Peatfield................................................ 105
6 The past as oral history: towards an archaeology oft he senses
Yannis Hamilakis................ ................. ......... .......... ......... ........... ..... 121
vii
viii Table of Contents
7 Ways of eating/ways of being in the later epipalaeolithic
(Natufian) Levant
Brian Boyd.................................................................................... 137
8 Time and Biography: Osteobiography of the Italian neolithic
lifespan
John Robb.................................................................................... 153
Part 3: Bodies in/as material culture
Introduction
Mark Pluciennik................................................................................ 173
9 (Un)masking Gender - goldfoil (dis)embodiments in late Iron
Age Scandinavia
lng-Marie Back Danielsson......................................................... 179
10 Re-arranging History: the contested bones oft he Oseberg
grave
Elisabeth Arwill-Nordbladh........................................................ 201
11 Art, artefact, metaphor
Mark Pluciennik........... ................................................................ 217
12 Marking the body, marking the land: body as history, land as
history: tattooing and engraving in Oceania.
Paul Rainbird............................................................................... 233
Notes on Contributors..... ........ .............. ....................... ... ................. 249
List of Figures and Tables
Figure 1. The chambered tomb of Ascott-under-Wychwood,
Oxfordshire (after Chesterman) ..................................................... 39
Figure 2. Primary skeletal deposits in the chambers of the West
Kennet long barrow (after Piggott)................................................ 40
Figure 3. Map of the Isle of Man including locations of Neolithic
sites.................................................................................................. 49
Figure 4. Plan of Ballaharra................................................................ 52
Figure 5. Schematic rendition of Mull Hill, illustrating approximate
location of deposits and passage orientation................................... 53
Figure 6. Plan of Cashtal-yn-ard......................................................... 54
Figure 7. Incised plaques from Ronaldsway and Ballavarry.............. 55
Figure 8. Plan of King Orry's Grave south-west................................ 60
Figure 9. Plan of Ballateare...................................... .......... ................. 62
Figure 10. Schematic renditions of Ballateare and most Manx
megaliths................ ... ........ ........ ....................... ..... .................... ..... 62
Figure 11. The Beowulf A ritual-cosmological model of the
relationship between lord and warrior-follower.............................. 80
Figure 12. Catignano 1... ................ ........................ .............................. 162
Figure 13.Alternative biographical pathways..................................... 166
Figure 14. A queer bird shaman from Eketorp Hill Fort, Grasgard
parish, Oland, Sweden, embodying becoming/waning................... 189
Figure 15. A gold foil, representing a bear, perhaps an ancestor,
animal spirit or a shape-changed shaman.............. ................................ 189
Figure 16. A sumptuously dressed figure with a disc-on-bow brooch
shown consuming sacred drugs from a drinking horn.... ...... .......... 190
Figure 17. A gold foil from Hannge, Bolmso parish, SmAland,
Sweden, found in a grave. The sitting, old shaman embodies the
socially neuter................................................................................ 190
Figure 18. A 'heteronormative', allegedly 'loving' couple found on
Helgo, Ekero parish, Sweden.. .................................. ................ ..... 191
Figure J9.A 'homosubversive' couple found in a grave with no
apparent superstructure in Norsborg, Botkyrka parish, Sweden..... 194
Figure 20. Another 'homosubversive' couple. Single fmd from
Roskilde, Denmark......................................................................... 195
Figure 21. Gabriel Gustafsson and his staff in front of the excavated
burial ship in September 1904........................................................ 204
Figure 22. The bones of the two women laid out on a board before
the reburial in August 1948............................................. 206
Figure 23. The board with the bones as it is pushed into an
aluminium coffin at the Universitetets Oldsaksamling....................... 211
ix
x Figures and Tables
Figure 24. The location of major finds of cave art in Sicily............... 218
Figure 25. The 'scene' from the cave at Addaura.............................. 219
Figure 26. An example of incised animals in the Grotta della Cala
dei Genovesi on Levanzo...... ....................... ....................... ........... 221
Figure 27. The neolithic painted figures from the Grotta della Cala
dei Genovesi on Levanzo...................... ..................... ...... ....... ....... 224
Figure 28. An example of a neolithic face-pot with eye motifs ........ 226
Figure 29. View from the main outcrop at Pohnpaid................. ........ 234
Figure 30. Petroglyphs from Pohnpaid: A) 'Swaddles'. B) Rayed
circle and enveloped cross. C) Anthropomorphs with head-
dresses. D) Footprint....................................................................... 239
Tables
Table 1. Some ranges of time......................................................... 154
Table 2. The life trajectory of Etoro males and females ............... 157
List of Contributors
Dr Elizabeth Ardwill-Nordbladh
Goteborg University, Box 200
SE 405 30 Gothenburg
Sweden
Dr lng-Marie Back Danielsson
Hallandsgaten 40
SE-118 57 Stockholm
Sweden
Dr Jos Bazelmans
Touwslagersgang 13
NL-2312, EN Leiden
The Netherlands
Dr Brian Boyd
Department of Archaeology
University of Wales Lampeter
Lampeter, Ceredigion
Wales SA48 7ED
UK
Dr Chris Fowler
School of Archaeology and Art History
Architecture Building
University of Manchester
Oxford Road, Manchester M 13 9PL
UK
Dr Yannis Hamilakis
Department of Archaeology
University of Southampton
Highfield, Southampton SO 17 IBJ
UK
Dr Christine Morris
c/o Department of Classics
University of Dublin
Trinity College, Dublin 2,
Ireland, UK
xi
xii Contributors
Dr Alan Peatfield
c/o Department of Classics
University of Dublin
Trinity College, Dublin 2
Ireland, UK
Dr Mark Pluciennik
Department of Archaeology
University of Wales Lampeter
Lampeter, Ceredigion
Wales SA48 7ED
UK
Dr Paul Rainbird
Department of Archaeology
University of Wales Lampeter
Lampeter, Ceredigion
Wales SA48 7ED
UK
Dr John Robb
Department of Archaeology
University of Southampton
Highfield, Southampton SO 17 IBJ
UK
Dr Sarah Tarlow
School of Archaeological Studies
University of Leicester
University Road
Leicester LE 1 7RH
UK
Dr Julian Thomas
School of Art History and Archaeology
Architecture Building
University of Manchester
Oxford Road, Manchester M 13 9PL
UK