Winter and the life archaeological, redux

Last year, I posted a wintertime picture showing a tell-tale sign that an archaeologist might be living close to you in a city that receives regular snowfall. Well, it's been snowing lightly for two days in Denver, but it's nothing compared to the recent Snowmaggedon (a worse name I could not come up with even if I tried) in the eastern US. However, I've received a 'life archaeological' dispatch from one of my partners in crime currently stranded near Pittsburgh, that comprised the following picture and caption:

"It's hard to tell, but that's a perfect 1m trench with a beautiful profile
that I dug. No lithics though. Just snow."

It's reassuring to know it's not just me, sometimes!

Creationism, Sopranos-style

I love The Sopranos. Not only did the show feature great acting and compelling storylines, it also is riddled with seemingly pointless lines that actually capture the essence of some current societal tensions. To wit, this exchange between Tony and Christopher that neatly encapsulates the creationist world view (from the episode "The Fleshy Part of the Thigh").

Tony: "Get this... It says here that if the history of the planet was represented by the Empire State Building, the time that human beings have been on earth would only be a postage stamp at the very top. You realize how insignificant that makes us?"

Chris (pauses for a sec and then): "I don't feel that way."

There you have it!

Denver beat

I've already talked about some of the stuff I love about Denver. Having now had several months to settle in, I have to say that my appreciation just keeps growing. For one thing, there's a lot of interesting archaeological activity going on in the city and the immediate area (including M. Glantz's talk on Neanderthal biogeography this Friday in the UC Denver department of anthropology!). And, while to the south of us Colorado Springs is apparently doing its best to emulate the fine urban model of Bartertown, in Denver the Museum of Nature and Science just received the largest donation in its 109 year long history.

The Denver Museum of Nature & Science has received the largest donation in its 109-year history, an $8 million gift from the Morgridge Family Foundation for the construction of a new Science Engagement Center on the south side of the Museum building.

The 40,000-square-foot, three-story Science Engagement Center will feature two floors of innovative, high-tech science activity facilities designed for preschool through 8th grade children, as well as their teachers, parents, and other caregivers. The center will provide a dynamic, hands-on learning environment and deliver programs that will have a profound impact on children’s understanding of science. The third floor of the building will contain a large, new temporary exhibition gallery.

“We want to change the way people think about science education here at the Museum,” said George Sparks, the Museum’s president and CEO. “Our goal is to complement what children learn at school by offering the types of memorable experiences they can only have at our great Museum. We want to give these kids the inspiration they need to become lifelong fans of science and learning, and we are grateful to the Morgridge Family Foundation for making a significant contribution to the fulfillment of this vision.”

Fostering an appreciation of science and the natural world from an early age is a noble goal indeed! Just one more reason to appreciate the fine work the DMNS is doing.

Neanderthals news - Feb. 1 edition

Some interesting Neanderthal tidbits in the news today:

First, there's a report of the first Neanderthal remains to be found in Poland, indeed in all of Eastern Europe north of the Carpathians Mountains. The remains consist of three teeth thought to date to ca. 100-80,000 BP and found associated with abundant faunal and lithic material. I'll be writing about this report in detail very soon.

Second, an analysis of the TAS2R38 gene in the El Sidrón 1253 Neanderthal sample, indicates that Neanderthals, like modern H. sapiens, were able to taste the bitter chemical phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) found in certain green vegetables and some poisonous plants. That the gene could be expressed similarly (thought not always, which is very intriguing) in modern humans and Neanderthals "indicates that variation in bitter taste perception predates the divergence of the lineages leading to Neanderthals and modern humans." The actual study (available free, btw) has been out for a while, but had somehow slipped by my attention, hence its inclusion in today's Neanderthals tidbits.

Neanderthal toothpicking - 100,000 year-old evidence from Poland

There's an interesting newsreport that summarizes a recent paper on the discovery, context and characteristics of three Neanderthal teeth recovered from Stajnia Cave, in southern Poland. Urbanowski et al. (2010) suggest that, on the basis of the associated fauna, which comprises mostly reindeer as well as some red deer, horses and ibex, as well as some cut-marked cave bear bones, the most likely age for these remains falls towards the end of Oxygen Isotope Stage 5, somewhere between 80-100,000BP, which doesn't contradict the results of an infinite AMS radiocarbon date of >49,000BP. The report mentions three teeth, all of which are described has displaying a majority of features usually found in Neanderthal teeth, but only one (S5000) is described in detail in the paper. The supplementary evidence provided with the paper on the Naturwissenschaften web page provides solid information on the provenience of the teeth and their association with Micoquian stone tool assemblages.

This find is significant for a number of reasons, the first being that it represents the first set of hominin remains north of the Carpathians in Eastern Europe. Previously, while many Mousterian assemblages had been found in Poland, no human fossils had been associated with any of them.

Second, S5000, a permanent upper second molar, shows a degree of abrasion that, when the potentially faster Neanderthal enamel formation rate is factored in, suggests an age at death estimate of ca. 20 years or maybe a tad older for this individual. What DNA they were able to collect from the sample also indicates that the individual was a male, although it was too fragmentary to definitely establish that it similar to other Neanderthal mtDNA patterns.

Third, S5000 bears a "mesial interproximal groove" similar to that found on many other Neanderthal posterior teeth. The authors report that the morphology of the groove "was probably made by thin, stiff and hard objects used as toothpicks" (Urbanowski et al. 2010: 4). Long-time readers of AVRPI may remember a post I wrote on the discovery of two Neanderthal molars at Pinilla del Valle, Spain that also bore groove indicative of habitual toothpicking. Now, as I argued then, there is strong evidence that toothpicking may go back as far as 1.8 million years BP, based on the presence of a similar groove on the Omo L 894-1 RP³ specimen (Hlusko 2003). Further, and perhaps more interesting with regards to Neanderthals, Agger et al. (2004) pointed out that the reason people toothpick is that the teeth and gum are very sensitive to small irritants that get lodged between them mainly because the nerves critically important to the fine lingual control necessary for speech are located just below them. Thus, evidence of toothpicking in Neanderthals may represent circumstantial evidence of their capacity for speech.

Beyond this, the study is also interesting in that it briefly mentions the presence of tools and Levallois products made on "high quality flint form the southern part of the Polish Jura" (Urbanowski et al. 2010:2), which is interesting since the cave also apparently yielded "dozens of flint nodules" collected up to 12km away from the cave. This strongly suggests that raw material stockpiling was going on at the site, and that the site was used for prolonged periods of time, as suggested also by the density of artifacts recovered. Likewise, the presence of exotic, high quality raw material reinforces what is known about Neanderthal long-distance lithic raw material procurement patterns at certain sites. Unfortunately, not enough information is presented in the paper to assess the proportional importance of this behavior. Finally, and very intriguingly, the supplementary information to the paper underscores that bone technology might have been important for the occupants of Stajnia Cave, which is rarely associated with Neanderthals.

"The bone artefacts are now under taphonomical study, which reinforces the preliminary impression about the great importance of bone working in the Stajnia LMP assemblage. Numerous cut-marks have been revealed along with rich traces of reindeer antler processing." Urbanowski et al. 2010: Supp. 6)

Again, however, this is mentioned, with no additional provided, which forces one to take this with due caution until more thorough analyses are published. That said, both in terms of human paleontology and archaeology, this new site is yielding very important information that, it seems, will be very important in understanding Neanderthals and their behavior at the northern edge of their range.

References

Agger, W. A., T. L. McAndrews, and J. A. Hlaudy. 2004. On Toothpicking in Early Hominids. Current Anthropology 45:403-404.

Hlusko, L. J. 2003. The Oldest Hominid Habit? Experimental Evidence for Toothpicking with Grass Stalks. Current Anthropology 44: 738-741.

Urbanowski, M., Socha, P., Dąbrowski, P., Nowaczewska, W., Sadakierska-Chudy, A., Dobosz, T., Stefaniak, K., & Nadachowski, A. (2010). The first Neanderthal tooth found North of the Carpathian Mountains Naturwissenschaften DOI: 10.1007/s00114-010-0646-2

Quote of the day

"I always though that it was a shame that, when they dug the Panama Canal, they didn't screen!"

Bob Kelly in Boulder on 01/29/2010, answering a question about whether a coastal Paleoindian settlement along the western coast of North America might have allowed people to cross into the Caribbean Sea using the isthmus of Panama.

Mica Glantz - Neandertal Paleobiogeography Colloquium at UC Denver

Next Friday, February 5 2010 (2:30PM, in AD 200), the UC Denver Anthropology Department is hosting a colloquium by Dr. Mica Glantz on Neandertal paleobiogeography in Central Asia (here'a link to a 2007 interview on her work on John Hawks' blog). Details below.

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Neandertal paleobiogeography in Central Asia: Testing the validity of the Neandertal range

Prof. Mica Glantz
Department of Anthropology
Colorado State University

Abstract:

The present study is primarily concerned with outlining the possible biogeographical limits of the Neandertal range. Until recently, the site of Teshik-Tash Cave in Uzbekistan was considered the eastern outpost of European Neandertals. In 2007, the mtDNA sequence of one Okladnikov Cave hominin was found to be similar to that of the Teshik- Tash child. Okladnikov Cave in southern Siberia is roughly 15 degrees to the north and east of Teshik-Tash. The working hypothesis is that the geographical region due east of Okladnikov and Teshik-Tash Caves expresses biogeographical factors that significantly differ from the region due west of these Neandertal sites. If this hypothesis is upheld, then these factors may define the limits of the Neandertal range. Results indicate that the biogeography of the region and the existing archaeological and hominin fossil records contain no clear evidence of a delimitation of Neandertal territory and that of East Asian archaics.

When: Friday February 5, 2010 – 2:30PM
Where: Administration Building, Rm. 200, University of Colorado Denver

Housekeeping January 2010

I'll soon be doing a bit of housekeeping here at AVRPI. That will mainly entail cleaning the blogroll section to the right-hand side of the blog. As part of this mid-winter cleaning, I'll be removing dead links, and links to blogs that haven't been active in a while. Also, if you have an archaeo/paleo/anthro themed blog and you'd like to see it included in the blogroll, feel free to contact me or leave a comment here. And speaking of comments, the blog's been getting quite a bit of spam lately, which is why I will keep comment moderation on for the time being, even if this slightly slows down some of the stimulating discussion that's been going on in several threads, especially the prehistoric ballistics and the Paleolithic island colonization ones.

Archaeology and jobs never seen in movies

Here's a humorous breakdown of the most common occupations held by the protagonists of most Hollywood movies. Having enlightened us about what jobs are usually seen in movies, the writers also provide a 'top ten' of jobs never seen in movies. And what clocks in at #10? You guessed it, archaeologist!

Archaeologist of really tedious, perpetually unfruitful digs: Movies tend to distort the profession of archaeologist and make it seem more glamorous than it really is. Instead of a swashbuckler rescuing ancient treasures from snake-pits, we’d like to see an archaeologist who digs tediously for months on end to unearth, say, one shoe horn from the Bronze Age every 11 years. Again, in keeping with this cinema verite approach, the archaeologists should not be played by actors fulfilling the screen portion of their good looking pop idol contract, but rather the type of personal-care avoiding sloppy intellectual whose own ears are a few missed cleanings away from being dig-worthy.

Actually, that's not completely true... The Royal Tenembaums had Anjelica Huston playing Etheline Tenenbaum, an archaeologist shown doing reasonably realistic archaeological things at a couple of points in the movie. Of course, Wes Anderson's mother was an archaeologist, so he may have had a slightly less "Indiana Jones-ized" view of what we do than most directors. Can you, kind reader, think of other realistic depictions of archaeologists in movies/TV shows?

Four Stone Hearth #85: Cold Wind Edition

A cold wind's blowing into Denver, bringing with it clouds and the promise for snow in the morning... what better time to inch ever closer to the Four Stone Hearth to warm one's anthropological body and soul!

I mean, it probably won't get as cold as Stockholm during the Middle Ages (as described at Testimony of the Spade), or Sweden in the Bronze Age, no matter how sweet their hoards of metal goods, at least as described at Aardvarchaeology! And, hey, at least it's still further south than, say, Wyoming, where you can find very interesting patterns in the distribution of archaeological remains, courtesy of Matt at Neolithic Revolutions.

But still, I'm sure some bundling up will be in order and, of course, this will require appropriate clothing. So why not get yourself a good discussion of ancient pants, courtesy of Kris Hirst. Of course, pants alone won't do... you'll probably need some shoes as well and a post on prehistoric footwear (or reconstructions thereof) at Middle Savagery might be just what you need.

No matter how good your clothes, though you ultimately will need some kind of shelter. Maybe something like the Neanderthal structures at Abric Romani, as described earlier here at AVRPI? Or maybe something in a warmer clime, like the open-air Lower Paleolithic site of Gesher Benot Ya'aqov, in Israel, as summarized by Tim at Anthropology.net? Of course, why live in a rockshelter or campsite when you could live in a Roman-age city, like Iruña-Veleia, where debate rages over the potential forgery of some inscriptions, as discussed in depth by Maju at Lehrensuge.

All this talk about authenticity and urban settings might prompt you to engage in some deeper reflections about the nature of the city and the human-built environment. If so, what better place to start than this reflection on balancing progress and history prompted by some of the art at Penn Station in New York, brought to you by Krystal at Anthropology in Practice? And while pondering this and other probing questions of anthropological import, consider Afarensis' thought-provoking post on the place of Melville Herskovits in the history of American anthropology and his work on the history and anthropology of African American. And speaking of introspective reflections on the development of anthropology as a discipline, definitely take the time to read Steve Chrisomalis' fantastic discussion of linguistic anthropology's place in a four-field discipline, and the state of that ideal today.

Well, that does it for today... while a cold wind's not always a bad thing (especially as channeled by BRMC!), it's nonetheless time to go warm myself up for real and say goodbye until next time at the Four Stone Hearth, which Magnus will have burning strong at Testimony of the Spade!