Past fragments

From ceramics to social practices in later prehistoric Iberia

Dados Bibliográficos

ID2405397
AutoresAntonio Blanco-González (0000-0003-4502-9651, Universidad de Valladolid, autor correspondente)
Ano2015
Volume15
Fascículo3
Páginas342-365
Data de publicação2015-10-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoJournal of Social Archaeology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1469-6053 • E-ISSN: 1741-2951
EditoraSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1469605315591256
OpenAlexW2336249017
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas8
Referências citadas47

Sunken features backfilled with domestic refuse represent the prevailing depositional context-type in later prehistory worldwide. Despite being so, this evidence remains poorly understood and has only received sporadic attention, chiefly within Anglophone archaeologies. This paper focuses on ceramics from a suite of such intricate contexts (cut features, burials, settlements, barrows) from Iberia in a diachronic and comparative perspective, from the Early Neolithic to the Late Bronze Age (5500-1100 BC). A total of 10,800 potsherds were examined with a taphonomic and refitting protocol attentive to formation dynamics and tracking intentionality. Results suggest that most of the studied assemblages are unplanned by-products of social life. From the earliest pottery-using communities, habitual actions conditioned the eventual preservation of the extant archaeological record. Fragmentation and deposition were key social practices, ultimately representing enduring trans-cultural phenomena. This research challenges uncontested interpretive premises, namely the 'reflectionist' standpoint, and disproves consensual and undue concepts frequently used in mainstream accounts of later prehistory

Archaeological record · Archaeology · Bronze Age · Context (archaeology · Ethnology · Geography · Pottery · Prehistoric archaeology · Prehistory · Social complexity · Sociology · Taphonomy · Anthropology · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Historical and Cultural Archaeology Studies · History · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology