Simultaneous and non-simultaneous, life rhythms and proper times in the past and present - comments on the uncertainty relation of archaeological time observations

Die chronologische Bewertung des archäologischen Untersuchungsmaterials sowie dessen Deutung gehen eine enge Symbiose ein. Ihr Bindeglied ist das europäische Entwicklungsdenken. Dessen verbreitete Akzeptanz macht archäologische Forschung in seiner heutigen Ausprägung erst möglich. Wegbereiter dieser Form des Zeitverstehens waren geologische, paläontologische und ethnografische Feldbeobachtungen. Insbesondere das ethnografische Präsens wurde auf die menschliche Vor- und Frühgeschichte ausgedehnt. So entstand das Bild der kulturellen Statik der Steinzeit und der sich zur Gegenwart hin beschleunigenden Geschichte. Dieser Gegensatz resultiert letztlich aus der Verschmelzung der Plausibilitäten ‚unserer‘ kulturellen Eigenzeit mit der der wissenschaftlichen Beobachtungssituation. Die eigenen Zeitkonventionen wirken sich auf den fachlichen Umgang mit kultur- und naturwissenschaftlichen Datierungen und Chronologiesystemen aus. Sie führen zu der hier untersuchten inhaltlichen Unbestimmtheit des archäologischen Deutens. Vergleichbares gilt auch für den Umgang mit dem archäologischen Quellenmaterial. Hier ist auf zwei Ebenen eine wissenschaftliche Unbestimmtheit zu konstatieren. Einerseits ist es die chronologische Unschärfe, andererseits beinhaltet das Untersuchungsobjekt (Befunde und Funde) selbst in sich verschiedene Zeitdimensionen. Diese werden im Rahmen der archäologischen Forschung als objektcharakterisierende Eigenschaften erfasst. Hinzu kommen noch weitere Einflussfaktoren, die ebenfalls zur Unbestimmtheit wissenschaftlicher Aussagen beitragen. Im Rahmen dieses Beitrags werden die Auswirkungen dieser Einflussfaktoren auf den archäologischen Umgang mit Zeit hinterfragt.The chronological assessment of archaeological material as well as its cultural and historical interpretation incurs a close symbiosis. Their tie is the European development thinking, whose widespread scientific and social acceptance made archaeological research in its contemporaneous shape possible. Trailblazers of this form of time comprehension were geological, paleontological and ethnographic field observations. Especially the so-called ethnographic present was generalised in terms of stages of human pre- and proto-history and created pictures of phases of long-term cultural stasis: The past was perceived as static and unprogressively. It was opposed antithetically to an accelerating modernity. This opposition was an out-put the fusion of “our” proper time with the scientific situation of watching. Our commonly agreed time conventions have an effect on the scientific handling of cultural and scientific age determination and chronological systems. They cause in respect of content indeterminacy in archaeological interpretation. A comparable indetermination can be stated while dealing with archaeological source material itself. On the one hand archaeological research has to deal with chronological blur or lack of definition. One the other hand the archaeological source material incorporates different time dimensions. These have to be detected in the realm of archaeological research as object characterizing attribute or quality. Further influencing factors contribute to the indeterminacy of scientific conclusion. This contribution questions the effects of these mentioned influencing factors on archaeological practice and its relation to “time” and “time observations”

Bilder von Archäologen, Bilder von Urmenschen - ein kultur- und mentalitätsgeschichtlicher Beitrag zur Genese der prähistorischen Archäologie am Beispiel zeitgenössischer Quellen

Ziel dieser Arbeit ist die qualitative und quantitative Untersuchung der Wirkungsgeschichte der prähistorischen Archäologie am Beispiel zeitgenössischer Medien (wissenschaftlichen Publikationen, Werbung, bildende Kunst, Presseorgane sowie Romane, Filme und Comics mit Archäologen und Urmenschen). Im Ergebnis konnte gezeigt werden, dass die prähistorische Archäologie ein gesellschaftlich mitprägendes Element der Moderne ist, dessen Entstehung eng mit der Ausbildung neuer Wirtschafts- und Sozialstrukturen in westlich geprägten Gesellschaften zusammenhängt. Das Image des Archäologen und das des Urmenschen werden als soziale Leitbilder herausgestellt, deren integrative Wirkung auf den auf der Vergangenheit basierenden und auf die Zukunft ausgerichteten Prozess der Identitätsfindung abzielt. Dieser wurzelt im Abendland in der mit der Säkularisierung einhergehenden Historisierung der Landschaft, als dessen Konsequenz das westliche Ursprungsdenken zu sehen ist. Es ist, da es auf die Legitimierung der eigenen Gegenwart abzielt, immer politisch (z.B. nationale Archäologien, Marxismus usw.), auch wenn es manchmal transzendental (Druidenkulte, Bibelarchäologie, New Age usw.) verklausuliert ist.AIM of the STUDY. A qualitative and quantitative study of the influence of archaeology on western civilization as recorded in contemporary media, i.e. as pictures or mention of archaeologists and/or prehistoric Man in scientific publications, adverts, art, the press, books, films, and comics. RESULTS. Archaeology is seen as one of the factors that helps to shape the modern age, whose development is very closely related to the emergence of the economic thinking and social structures that characterise western civilization. Images of the archaeologist and prehistoric Man, in view of their many-faceted treatment by contemporary western society, basically reflect the values and norms of western societies. METHODS. Taking images of the archaeologist and prehistoric Man portrayed in the various media, it is possible to demonstrate the integrating effect (e.g. national identity) that archaeological research has had and still has on western societies. THESIS. Acceptance of the results of archaeological research constitutes a very specific portion of western perception of space and time and helps to provide a framework for present-day human behaviour, which is primarily based on ideas of progress and evolution. SOCIAL FUNCTION. Images of the archaeologist and prehistoric Man are apparently used as a social inspiration (Leitbild), whose integrative potential is concerned with the search for an identity at all levels, a process that is based on the past but concerns the future. In the western world, this process is rooted in the historisation of the landscape (which is part of the processes of secularisation and laizism). The western quest after origins is seen as a consequence of this. Since this quest hangs together with a certain legitimatisation of one’s own society, it is invariably politically tinted (e.g. national archaeology, Marxism etc.) and even sometimes transcendental (Druid cult, biblical archaeology, New Age, etc.). SOCIAL INSPIRATION. With the help of a social inspiration (Leitbild) based on archaeology, social constraints can be removed and make social relations and communication more flexible, particularly at the present time when western society as a whole is disintegrating. Against the background of acceleration of the process of differentiation in western society, inspiration has its effect on both the national and international levels. With its help the increasingly unstable social structure can be adequately explained, since in a globalised world social hierarchy in the western world is becoming based on evolutionary biology, geology and archaeology instead of religious beliefs. The popular modern argument in this connection is the principle of unequal equality, which is based on progress-oriented thinking. The social consequence of this thinking is expressed as the dogma of inequality.von Ulf F. Ickerod

The spatial dimension of history: propagation of historical knowledge via open-air museums, leisure parks and motion pictures

Man's environment is full of references to history. Archaeological sites and cultural landscapes are examples. History is a constituent of our social identity. In this sense, on a social level, it has an integrating function and helps to structure and canalize social behaviour. In this paper we shall examine, taking archaeological sites, open-air museums, leisure parks and motion pictures as examples, how this form of promotion of history works and what effect it has on society.</jats:p

Medieval Overexploitation of Peat Triggered Large-Scale Drowning and Permanent Land Loss in Coastal North Frisia (Wadden Sea Region, Germany)

Along the southern North Sea coast from the Netherlands to Denmark, human cultivation efforts have created a unique cultural landscape. Since the Middle Ages, these interactions between humans and natural forces have induced major coastal changes. In North Frisia (Germany), storm floods in 1362 AD and 1634 AD turned wide areas of embanked cultural land into tidal flats. Systematic geoarchaeological investigations between Nordstrand and Hallig S&uuml;dfall comprise coring, trenching, sedimentary, geochemical and microfaunal palaeoenvironmental parameter analyses and radiocarbon dating. Together with geophysical prospection results and archaeological surveys, they give insights into the landscape&rsquo;s development and causes for land losses. Results reveal that fens and bogs dominated from c. 800 BC to 1000 AD but are mostly missing in the stratigraphy. Instead, we found 12th to 14th cent. AD settlement remains directly on top of a pre-800 BC fossil marsh. This hiatus of c. 2000 years combined with local &lsquo;Hufen&rsquo; settlements implies an extensive removal of peat during cultivation eventually resulting in the use of underlying marshland for agricultural purposes. Fifteenth cent. AD tidal flat deposits on top of the cultivated marsh prove that human impact lowered the ground surface below the mean high water of that time, clearly increasing the coastal vulnerability. We consider these intensive human&ndash;environment interactions as a decisive trigger for the massive loss of land and establishment of the tidal flats in North Frisia that are currently part of the UNESCO World Heritage &ldquo;Wadden Sea&rdquo;

Automated facies identification by Direct Push‐based sensing methods (CPT, HPT) and multivariate linear discriminant analysis to decipher geomorphological changes and storm surge impact on a medieval coastal landscape

In ad 1362, a major storm surge drowned wide areas of cultivated medieval marshland along the north‐western coast of Germany and turned them into tidal flats. This study presents a new methodological approach for the reconstruction of changing coastal landscapes developed from a study site in the Wadden Sea of North Frisia. Initially, we deciphered long‐term as well as event‐related short‐term geomorphological changes, using a geoscientific standard approach of vibracoring, analyses of sedimentary, geochemical and microfaunal palaeoenvironmental parameters and radiocarbon dating. In a next step, Direct Push (DP)‐based Cone Penetration Testing (CPT) and the Hydraulic Profiling Tool (HPT) were applied at vibracore locations to obtain in situ high‐resolution stratigraphic data. In a last step, multivariate linear discriminant analysis (LDA) was successfully applied to efficiently identify different sedimentary facies (e.g., fossil marsh or tidal flat deposits) from the CPT and HPT test dataset, to map the facies' lateral distribution, also in comparison to reflection seismic measurements and test their potential to interpolate the borehole and CPT/HPT data. The training dataset acquired for the key site from coring and DP sensing finally allows an automated facies classification of CPT/HPT data obtained elsewhere within the study area. The new methodological approach allowed a detailed reconstruction of the local coastal landscape development in the interplay of natural marsh formation, medieval land reclamation and storm surge‐related land losses.Presenting a new approach of automated facies identification based on palaeoenvironmental parameter (PEP) analyses of vibracores, Direct Push‐based Cone Penetration Testing (CPT) and the Hydraulic Profiling Tool (HPT) sensing data, linear discriminant analysis (LDA) and seismic measurements, gradual as well as extreme landscape changes associated with major storm surges in ad 1362 and ad 1634 are reconstructed for a study area in the Wadden Sea of North Frisia (Germany). imageDeutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100001659Research Foundation http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/10000593