ANTH 003 Lecture Notes - Lecture 18: Moe Williams, Resource Distribution, Resource Depletion
29 Oct 2020
School
Department
Course
Professor
Anth 003
Msowae@go.pasadena.edu
Moe Williams
Intro to Archaeology
● Environment and Climate Reconstruction
○ Human and the Environment
○ Environment archaeology: a filed of interdisciplinary research—archaeology and
natural science—is directed at the reconstruction of human use of plants and
animals. And how past societies adapted to changing environmental conditions.
● Humans and the Environment
○ Environmental Variability
■ Temperature
■ Humidity
■ Resource distribution
● Plants
● Animals
● Raw materials
● Water
■ Terrain
■ Predictability
○ How do humans adapt to an environment?
■ Mobility and location on the landscape
■ Organization of resource exploitation
■ Hunting choice wild resource management domestication
■ Clothing
■ Buildings
■ Seasonal organization of tasks
■ Storage
● What kind of data tells us about adaptation to the environment?
○ No one data set is sufficient!
○ Food, clothing, settlement patterns, documents, human health, socioeconomic
roles, specialization
● Understanding Environment
○ People adapt to the environment
○ People change the environment to suit their needs
○ Only certain things are locally available
○ Trade, movement to get other things
● Mobility and location on the landscape
○ Pursue resources
○ Avoid harsh weather
○ Trade/exchange
○ Avoid local resource depletion
● Organization of resource exploitation
○ Planning when, where, how
○ Division of labor
Document Summary
Environment archaeology: a filed of interdisciplinary research archaeology and natural science is directed at the reconstruction of human use of plants and animals. And how past societies adapted to changing environmental conditions. Hunting choice wild resource management domestication. Food, clothing, settlement patterns, documents, human health, socioeconomic roles, specialization. People change the environment to suit their needs. Also an important medium for social expression. Procurement of resources when they are available. Changes in prey vs. changes in technology. Plants and environment in the archaeological record. Allow people to withstand weather and climate that would otherwise be extreme. Allow storage, organization of production, accumulation of wealth. We know that the earth"s climate has been radically different in the past than it is now. To understand the environmental context of past cultures. To study human impacts on the environment through time. Example: sahara about 100,000kya was tropical forest versus sahara desert today. Ecofacts: charcoal, pollen, animal bones, plant remains.
