R Skeates
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 12943 |
|---|---|
| NOME | R Skeates |
| PRENOMES | R |
| SOBRENOME | Skeates |
| ASSINATURA | SKEATES R |
| AFILIAÇÕES | Durham University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2059-4921 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 28 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 58 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 28 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 1990 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2022 |
| ÍNDICE H | 4 |
Caves, Senses, and Ritual Flows in the Iberian Iron Age
This article seeks to contribute to recent scholarship on ritual performances in caves, sensory archaeology and ritual journeys, and to stimulate fresh questions and debate about society, ritual, and mobility in the Iberian Iron Age. It uses an updated methodology for recording and interpreting – more contextually, holistically, and systematically – the multisensory affordances of caves and their landscapes on embodied human movements, experience…
Words that Archaeologists Choose
Writing is the means by which archaeological knowledge is produced, shared and negotiated, which is why, as part of a wider reflexive archaeology, writing within the discipline has come under scrutiny. When writing, archaeologists make choices about what words to use to express their ideas about the past (even if these choices are sometimes subconscious). This study examines such choices via the application of methods from two linguistic subdisci…
Rethinking Collective Burial in Mediterranean Caves
Drawing on the results of new multi-method research in Grotta Regina Margherita-the largest known Middle Bronze Age mortuary cave in west-central Italy (ca. 1650-1450 b.c.)-this article helps to replace the generic idea of "collective burial" with a more precise understanding of how the bodies of the deceased were transformed into potent social, symbolic, and sensuous resources housed in caves. It contextualizes this process within a nuanced unde…
Early Islamic North Africa
This volume proposes a new approach to the Arab conquests and the spread of Islam in North Africa. In recent years, those studying the Islamic world have shown that the coming of Islam was not marked by devastation or decline, but rather by considerable cultural and economic continuity. In North Africa, with continuity came significant change. Corisande Fenwick argues that the establishment of Muslim rule also coincided with a phase of intense ur…
Mobile elites at Frattesina
Mobility and Place Making in Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene Italy
This paper offers a revised overview and model of Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene hunter-gatherers in Italy, one that questions and extends existing materialist, evolutionary and ecological perspectives through an emphasis on the socio-cultural dynamics of mobility and place making. Particular attention is paid to selected caves and rock shelters, which gained an anchoring power through the repeated performance of mundane and ritual practices…
Soundscapes of Temple Period Malta
During the later prehistoric Temple Period (c. 3400–2500 bc) we can begin to discriminate some of the diverse sounds and soundscapes that characterized the Maltese Islands. For example, we can imagine the sounds of the early farming communities, particularly in relation to the architecturally bounded spaces of their dwelling places. These combined the background noise of the subtly distinct island environment with the foreground noise familiar li…
Towards an Archaeology of Everyday Aesthetics
The concept of aesthetics has long been marginalized in archaeology. It was originally formulated in the eighteenth century as part of an appreciation of Greek art and was fundamentally concerned with appreciating a quasi-universal idea of beauty; and as archaeologists and anthropologists recognized the distortion created by applying it to material from non-Western and pre-modern art, it fell into disfavour. An alternative anthropological approac…
Fetishism and visual culture in Later Neolithic Southeast Italy
The term ‘fetish’ has been used since the sixteenth century to refer to indigenous ‘power objects’, perceived to embody positive supernatural energy. This concept is explored here with reference to the visual culture of the Later Neolithic in Southeast Italy (5800–4100 bc). During this period, many aspects of the material world were ascribed a greater visual significance, being modelled into more varied art-forms and highlighted by more innovativ…
The Cultural Life of Caves in Seulo, Central Sardinia
This paper seeks to refine understandings of the cultural life of caves—especially later prehistoric caves—in Sardinia, with particular reference to the themes of landscape and ritual performance. It also highlights significant local diversity within this category of archaeological site, drawing upon the results of archaeological research into an extraordinary group of over ten ritual caves in the territory of Seulo in central Sardinia, including…
The Cultural Life of Caves in Seulo, Central Sardinia
This paper seeks to refine understandings of the cultural life of caves—especially later prehistoric caves—in Sardinia, with particular reference to the themes of landscape and ritual performance. It also highlights significant local diversity within this category of archaeological site, drawing upon the results of archaeological research into an extraordinary group of over ten ritual caves in the territory of Seulo in central Sardinia, including…
On the Noble Digger's Ode to the Trowel
"On the Noble Digger's Ode to the Trowel." Norwegian Archaeological Review, 45(1), pp. 102–103
Making sense of world art
This article explores the methods through which the anthropology of the senses or sensual culture studies might be extended to world art studies. Reflexivity, inventory, experimentation, thick description and creative writing are all recommended. The potential contribution of these methods is illustrated with reference to recent archaelogical research on the sensual cultures of prehistoric Malta
Making Sense of the Maltese Temple Period
This paper attempts to formulate a culturally specific sensory inventory of the Maltese islandscape during the distinctive Temple Period (c. 3400–2500 BC), with particular reference to the sensory stimuli and constraints of three dynamic types of place on the islands (houses, caves, and temples), in order to explore the islanders' full-bodied experiences and perceptions of their lived-in world, and to add to our understanding of their sensational…
Embodiment and visual reproduction in the Neolithic
This paper explores the cultural and conceptual dimensions of ceramic (and stone) stamps found at Neolithic and Copper Age sites in Western Asia and Southern Europe, dating to between the eighth and third millennia BC. Based upon a recent study of their archaeological deposition contexts, their surviving forms and regional variations in their style, they are discussed here in terms of their biographies, their reciprocal relations with people, and…
Neolithic Stamps
Decorated clay stamps carrying a culturally filtered range of abstract designs are one of the most visually striking but problematic categories of portable art found at Neolithic and Copper Age sites in western Asia and southern Europe. This article proposes a revised account of their production, consumption and changing values across space and time, by emphasizing their biographies, human relations and cultural embeddedness. They were sometimes …
Prehistoric chert exploitation in the Valle del Cesolone (Macerata)
LO SFRUTTAMENTO DELLA SELCE IN ETÀ PREISTORICA NELLA VALLE DEL CESOLONE (MACERATA): RELAZIONE PRELIMINARE Questo articolo descrive i risultati di un progetto diretto dall'autore tra il 1992 e il 1995, volto allo studio del procacciamento di selci in età preistorica, della produzione di utensili e dello scambio di attivita grave;esercitate nell'area dell'importante risorsa di pietra siliceà alia sommita della Valle del Cesolone, vicino Serrapetron…
Speaking for the past in the present
This paper examines the development of debates surrounding the nature of curatorial authority and of public education in archaeology museums, with particular reference to texts accompanying exhibitions of prehistoric material in England and Scotland. Traditionally, such texts have been conceived of as authoritative aids to museum education and communication. However, since the late 1980s, they have been criticised, particularly on the grounds of …
Axe aesthetics
Highlighting a theme of visual culture, this paper examines the physical and conceptual transformation of ground‐stone axes in the Maltese islands between 5300 and 1500 cal BC: from tools and well‐travelled valuables into symbolically‐charged objects of social display, spiritual power and ritual sacrifice
Visual Culture in Prehistoric South-east Italy
Using the approach of visual culture, which highlights the embeddedness of art in dynamic human processes, this paper examines the prehistoric archaeology of the Lecce province in south-east Italy, in order to provide a history of successive visual cultures in that area, between the Middle Palaeolithic and the Bronze Age. It is argued that art may have helped human groups to deal with problems in subsistence and society, including environmental c…
The Social Dynamics of Enclosure in the Neolithic of the Tavoliere, South-east Italy
The Neolithic ditched enclosures of the Tavoliere have been subject to various interpretations since their initial identification during the Second World War. The first part of this paper provides a critical review of these interpretations. The second part then sets out to re-write the history of the ditched enclosures, drawing upon a new radiocarbon chronology, the results of recent archaeological excavations, and developments in interpretative …
Towards an absolute chronology for the Copper Age in central Italy
VERSO UNA CRONOLOGIA ASSOLUTA PER L'ETÀ DEL RAME IN ITALIA CENTRALE Con la recente pubblicazione di dodici nuove determinazioni radiocarboniche per Conelle d'Arcevia nella regione Marche, è ora possibile, da una parte, collocare la sequenza cronologica di questo importante sito dell'età del rame su una base più solida, e, dall'altra, cominciare a costruire una struttura cronologica assoluta per l'età del rame in Italia centrale. Per l'età del ram…
Animate objects
This paper considers some of the relationships between people and things. It develops a broadly-based model of the later life-histories of prehistoric stone axes in the south-central Mediterranean region, taking account of their production, circulation, and consumption, and their cumulative transformation by physical and conceptual processes, of which the latter may have included personification, sacralisation, and animation. Attention is focused…
Fieldwork Grants
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
Ritual, Context, and Gender in Neolithic South-Eastern Italy
An attempt to demonstrate the importance of a contextual approach in the interpretation of pre-historic ritual is made through a critique of Ruth Whitehouse's recent work, Underground Religion. Cult and culture in prehistoric ltllly, and through a re-examination of the spatial, material, historical, and social context of the ritual use of caves in south-eastem Italy, with special reference to Grotta di Porto Badisco and other Neolithic and early-…
The Social Dynamics of Enclosure in the Neolithic of the Tavoliere, South-east Italy
The Neolithic ditched enclosures of the Tavoliere have been subject to various interpretations since their initial identification during the Second World War. The first part of this paper provides a critical review of these interpretations. The second part then sets out to re-write the history of the ditched enclosures, drawing upon a new radiocarbon chronology, the results of recent archaeological excavations, and developments in interpretative …
Towards an Archaeology of Everyday Aesthetics
The concept of aesthetics has long been marginalized in archaeology. It was originally formulated in the eighteenth century as part of an appreciation of Greek art and was fundamentally concerned with appreciating a quasi-universal idea of beauty; and as archaeologists and anthropologists recognized the distortion created by applying it to material from non-Western and pre-modern art, it fell into disfavour. An alternative anthropological approac…
Animate objects
This paper considers some of the relationships between people and things. It develops a broadly-based model of the later life-histories of prehistoric stone axes in the south-central Mediterranean region, taking account of their production, circulation, and consumption, and their cumulative transformation by physical and conceptual processes, of which the latter may have included personification, sacralisation, and animation. Attention is focused…
Neolithic Stamps
Decorated clay stamps carrying a culturally filtered range of abstract designs are one of the most visually striking but problematic categories of portable art found at Neolithic and Copper Age sites in western Asia and southern Europe. This article proposes a revised account of their production, consumption and changing values across space and time, by emphasizing their biographies, human relations and cultural embeddedness. They were sometimes …
Mobile elites at Frattesina
Triton's Trumpet
The distribution and uses of triton shells in Italy from the Neolithic to modern times are described in detail, along with a summary of examples from the Neolithic and Copper Age of Central Europe and the central and eastern Mediterranean. Attention is then focused upon the triton shell trumpet, which is interpreted both as a Neolithic visual symbol and an oral signal, and suggestions are offered concerning its changing meaning in historical and …
Caves, Senses, and Ritual Flows in the Iberian Iron Age
This article seeks to contribute to recent scholarship on ritual performances in caves, sensory archaeology and ritual journeys, and to stimulate fresh questions and debate about society, ritual, and mobility in the Iberian Iron Age. It uses an updated methodology for recording and interpreting – more contextually, holistically, and systematically – the multisensory affordances of caves and their landscapes on embodied human movements, experience…
Mobility and Place Making in Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene Italy
This paper offers a revised overview and model of Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene hunter-gatherers in Italy, one that questions and extends existing materialist, evolutionary and ecological perspectives through an emphasis on the socio-cultural dynamics of mobility and place making. Particular attention is paid to selected caves and rock shelters, which gained an anchoring power through the repeated performance of mundane and ritual practices…
The Cultural Life of Caves in Seulo, Central Sardinia
This paper seeks to refine understandings of the cultural life of caves—especially later prehistoric caves—in Sardinia, with particular reference to the themes of landscape and ritual performance. It also highlights significant local diversity within this category of archaeological site, drawing upon the results of archaeological research into an extraordinary group of over ten ritual caves in the territory of Seulo in central Sardinia, including…
Axe aesthetics
Highlighting a theme of visual culture, this paper examines the physical and conceptual transformation of ground‐stone axes in the Maltese islands between 5300 and 1500 cal BC: from tools and well‐travelled valuables into symbolically‐charged objects of social display, spiritual power and ritual sacrifice
Towards an absolute chronology for the Copper Age in central Italy
VERSO UNA CRONOLOGIA ASSOLUTA PER L'ETÀ DEL RAME IN ITALIA CENTRALE Con la recente pubblicazione di dodici nuove determinazioni radiocarboniche per Conelle d'Arcevia nella regione Marche, è ora possibile, da una parte, collocare la sequenza cronologica di questo importante sito dell'età del rame su una base più solida, e, dall'altra, cominciare a costruire una struttura cronologica assoluta per l'età del rame in Italia centrale. Per l'età del ram…
Words that Archaeologists Choose
Writing is the means by which archaeological knowledge is produced, shared and negotiated, which is why, as part of a wider reflexive archaeology, writing within the discipline has come under scrutiny. When writing, archaeologists make choices about what words to use to express their ideas about the past (even if these choices are sometimes subconscious). This study examines such choices via the application of methods from two linguistic subdisci…
Rethinking Collective Burial in Mediterranean Caves
Drawing on the results of new multi-method research in Grotta Regina Margherita-the largest known Middle Bronze Age mortuary cave in west-central Italy (ca. 1650-1450 b.c.)-this article helps to replace the generic idea of "collective burial" with a more precise understanding of how the bodies of the deceased were transformed into potent social, symbolic, and sensuous resources housed in caves. It contextualizes this process within a nuanced unde…
On the Noble Digger's Ode to the Trowel
"On the Noble Digger's Ode to the Trowel." Norwegian Archaeological Review, 45(1), pp. 102–103
Mediterranean Coral
Different types of Mediterranean coral are described, and the potential sources of prehistoric coral in the central Mediterranean are considered. Early examples of coral artefacts from in and around the alpine region, as well as their finds‐contexts, are then described and chronologically defined, and their value, use, and exchange is discussed
What Can the Annaliste Approach Offer the Archaeologist
Triton's Trumpet
The distribution and uses of triton shells in Italy from the Neolithic to modern times are described in detail, along with a summary of examples from the Neolithic and Copper Age of Central Europe and the central and eastern Mediterranean. Attention is then focused upon the triton shell trumpet, which is interpreted both as a Neolithic visual symbol and an oral signal, and suggestions are offered concerning its changing meaning in historical and …
Mediterranean Coral
Different types of Mediterranean coral are described, and the potential sources of prehistoric coral in the central Mediterranean are considered. Early examples of coral artefacts from in and around the alpine region, as well as their finds‐contexts, are then described and chronologically defined, and their value, use, and exchange is discussed
Ritual, Context, and Gender in Neolithic South-Eastern Italy
An attempt to demonstrate the importance of a contextual approach in the interpretation of pre-historic ritual is made through a critique of Ruth Whitehouse's recent work, Underground Religion. Cult and culture in prehistoric ltllly, and through a re-examination of the spatial, material, historical, and social context of the ritual use of caves in south-eastem Italy, with special reference to Grotta di Porto Badisco and other Neolithic and early-…
Animate objects
This paper considers some of the relationships between people and things. It develops a broadly-based model of the later life-histories of prehistoric stone axes in the south-central Mediterranean region, taking account of their production, circulation, and consumption, and their cumulative transformation by physical and conceptual processes, of which the latter may have included personification, sacralisation, and animation. Attention is focused…
Fieldwork Grants
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
Towards an absolute chronology for the Copper Age in central Italy
VERSO UNA CRONOLOGIA ASSOLUTA PER L'ETÀ DEL RAME IN ITALIA CENTRALE Con la recente pubblicazione di dodici nuove determinazioni radiocarboniche per Conelle d'Arcevia nella regione Marche, è ora possibile, da una parte, collocare la sequenza cronologica di questo importante sito dell'età del rame su una base più solida, e, dall'altra, cominciare a costruire una struttura cronologica assoluta per l'età del rame in Italia centrale. Per l'età del ram…
The Social Dynamics of Enclosure in the Neolithic of the Tavoliere, South-east Italy
The Neolithic ditched enclosures of the Tavoliere have been subject to various interpretations since their initial identification during the Second World War. The first part of this paper provides a critical review of these interpretations. The second part then sets out to re-write the history of the ditched enclosures, drawing upon a new radiocarbon chronology, the results of recent archaeological excavations, and developments in interpretative …
Speaking for the past in the present
This paper examines the development of debates surrounding the nature of curatorial authority and of public education in archaeology museums, with particular reference to texts accompanying exhibitions of prehistoric material in England and Scotland. Traditionally, such texts have been conceived of as authoritative aids to museum education and communication. However, since the late 1980s, they have been criticised, particularly on the grounds of …
Axe aesthetics
Highlighting a theme of visual culture, this paper examines the physical and conceptual transformation of ground‐stone axes in the Maltese islands between 5300 and 1500 cal BC: from tools and well‐travelled valuables into symbolically‐charged objects of social display, spiritual power and ritual sacrifice
Visual Culture in Prehistoric South-east Italy
Using the approach of visual culture, which highlights the embeddedness of art in dynamic human processes, this paper examines the prehistoric archaeology of the Lecce province in south-east Italy, in order to provide a history of successive visual cultures in that area, between the Middle Palaeolithic and the Bronze Age. It is argued that art may have helped human groups to deal with problems in subsistence and society, including environmental c…
Prehistoric chert exploitation in the Valle del Cesolone (Macerata)
LO SFRUTTAMENTO DELLA SELCE IN ETÀ PREISTORICA NELLA VALLE DEL CESOLONE (MACERATA): RELAZIONE PRELIMINARE Questo articolo descrive i risultati di un progetto diretto dall'autore tra il 1992 e il 1995, volto allo studio del procacciamento di selci in età preistorica, della produzione di utensili e dello scambio di attivita grave;esercitate nell'area dell'importante risorsa di pietra siliceà alia sommita della Valle del Cesolone, vicino Serrapetron…
Neolithic Stamps
Decorated clay stamps carrying a culturally filtered range of abstract designs are one of the most visually striking but problematic categories of portable art found at Neolithic and Copper Age sites in western Asia and southern Europe. This article proposes a revised account of their production, consumption and changing values across space and time, by emphasizing their biographies, human relations and cultural embeddedness. They were sometimes …
Making Sense of the Maltese Temple Period
This paper attempts to formulate a culturally specific sensory inventory of the Maltese islandscape during the distinctive Temple Period (c. 3400–2500 BC), with particular reference to the sensory stimuli and constraints of three dynamic types of place on the islands (houses, caves, and temples), in order to explore the islanders' full-bodied experiences and perceptions of their lived-in world, and to add to our understanding of their sensational…
Embodiment and visual reproduction in the Neolithic
This paper explores the cultural and conceptual dimensions of ceramic (and stone) stamps found at Neolithic and Copper Age sites in Western Asia and Southern Europe, dating to between the eighth and third millennia BC. Based upon a recent study of their archaeological deposition contexts, their surviving forms and regional variations in their style, they are discussed here in terms of their biographies, their reciprocal relations with people, and…
Making sense of world art
This article explores the methods through which the anthropology of the senses or sensual culture studies might be extended to world art studies. Reflexivity, inventory, experimentation, thick description and creative writing are all recommended. The potential contribution of these methods is illustrated with reference to recent archaelogical research on the sensual cultures of prehistoric Malta
On the Noble Digger's Ode to the Trowel
"On the Noble Digger's Ode to the Trowel." Norwegian Archaeological Review, 45(1), pp. 102–103
The Cultural Life of Caves in Seulo, Central Sardinia
This paper seeks to refine understandings of the cultural life of caves—especially later prehistoric caves—in Sardinia, with particular reference to the themes of landscape and ritual performance. It also highlights significant local diversity within this category of archaeological site, drawing upon the results of archaeological research into an extraordinary group of over ten ritual caves in the territory of Seulo in central Sardinia, including…
The Cultural Life of Caves in Seulo, Central Sardinia
This paper seeks to refine understandings of the cultural life of caves—especially later prehistoric caves—in Sardinia, with particular reference to the themes of landscape and ritual performance. It also highlights significant local diversity within this category of archaeological site, drawing upon the results of archaeological research into an extraordinary group of over ten ritual caves in the territory of Seulo in central Sardinia, including…
Fetishism and visual culture in Later Neolithic Southeast Italy
The term ‘fetish’ has been used since the sixteenth century to refer to indigenous ‘power objects’, perceived to embody positive supernatural energy. This concept is explored here with reference to the visual culture of the Later Neolithic in Southeast Italy (5800–4100 bc). During this period, many aspects of the material world were ascribed a greater visual significance, being modelled into more varied art-forms and highlighted by more innovativ…
Soundscapes of Temple Period Malta
During the later prehistoric Temple Period (c. 3400–2500 bc) we can begin to discriminate some of the diverse sounds and soundscapes that characterized the Maltese Islands. For example, we can imagine the sounds of the early farming communities, particularly in relation to the architecturally bounded spaces of their dwelling places. These combined the background noise of the subtly distinct island environment with the foreground noise familiar li…
Towards an Archaeology of Everyday Aesthetics
The concept of aesthetics has long been marginalized in archaeology. It was originally formulated in the eighteenth century as part of an appreciation of Greek art and was fundamentally concerned with appreciating a quasi-universal idea of beauty; and as archaeologists and anthropologists recognized the distortion created by applying it to material from non-Western and pre-modern art, it fell into disfavour. An alternative anthropological approac…
Mobility and Place Making in Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene Italy
This paper offers a revised overview and model of Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene hunter-gatherers in Italy, one that questions and extends existing materialist, evolutionary and ecological perspectives through an emphasis on the socio-cultural dynamics of mobility and place making. Particular attention is paid to selected caves and rock shelters, which gained an anchoring power through the repeated performance of mundane and ritual practices…
Mobile elites at Frattesina
Early Islamic North Africa
This volume proposes a new approach to the Arab conquests and the spread of Islam in North Africa. In recent years, those studying the Islamic world have shown that the coming of Islam was not marked by devastation or decline, but rather by considerable cultural and economic continuity. In North Africa, with continuity came significant change. Corisande Fenwick argues that the establishment of Muslim rule also coincided with a phase of intense ur…
History (23 obras) · Archaeology (21 obras) · Geography (16 obras) · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies (15 obras) · Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History (13 obras) · History (13 obras) · Art (12 obras) · Maritime and Coastal Archaeology (11 obras) · Ancient history (10 obras) · Prehistory (10 obras)