Scott Maceachern, David A. Scott, Molly O'guinness Carlson & Jean
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IRON ARTEF A CTS FROM THE DGB-1 SI TE , NORTHERN CA MEROON : CONSERV A T I ON , MET A LLUR gi C A L AN A LYS I S A N D ETHNO A RCH A EOLO gi C A L AN A LO gi ES Scott MacEachern, David A. Scott, Molly O'Guinness Carlson & Jean-Marie Datouang Djoussou Abstract Résumé In 2008, a number of iron artefacts were recovered from En 2008, des objets en fer ont été mis au jour dans une an interior courtyard on the DGB-1 site during fieldwork cour intérieure de DGB-1, un très grand site multifon- in 2008. DGB-1 is a large multi-function site located in the ctionnel se trouvant dans le nord des monts Mandara northeastern Mandara Mountains of Cameroon, and dat- camerounais et datant du milieu du deuxième millénaire ing to the mid-second millennium AD. The iron artefacts après J-C. Ces objets comprenaient un ensemble de poin- recovered included a cache of spear/arrow points found tes de lance/flèche constituant un dépôt enterré sous un buried under a living floor, as well as a local hoe and a niveau d’occupation, ainsi qu’une chaîne à maillons et chain and a ‘barrette’ probably not of local provenance. une barrette, probablement allochtone ainsi qu’une houe This discovery has a number of points of interest: (1) de provenance locale. Cette découverte présente plu- ethnoarchaeological reenactments of iron smelts in the sieurs intérêts : (1) l’occasion rare de comparer, sur cinq 1980s in the same region provide a rare opportunity for siècles environ, des techniques sidérurgiques en Afrique comparison of iron-working techniques over about five sub-saharienne grâce aux réactivations de la réduction centuries in sub-Saharan Africa; (2) the variability in de fer réalisées en contexte ethnoarchéologique dans les different forms of iron (including eutectoid steel) used in années 1980 dans la même région, (2) la variabilité des these artefacts; and (3) the welding of different forms of différentes qualités de fer (y compris l’acier eutectoïde) iron to produce composite artefacts. utilisées dans ces objets, et (3) l’utilisation de la soudure de ces fers de différentes qualités pour produire des ob- jets composites. Downloaded by Scott MacEachern on January 30 2014 Downloaded by Scott MacEachern on January 30 2014 Keywords: Mandara Mountains, blacksmithing, iron technology, DGB sites, ethnoarchaeology Scott MacEachern 8 [email protected] * Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Bowdoin College, Brunswick, ME 04011, USA David A. Scott 8 [email protected] * Department of Art History, The Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA Molly O’Guinness Carlson 8 [email protected] * Head Tide Archaeological Conservation Laboratory, Wiscasset, ME 04578, USA Jean-Marie Datouang Djoussou 8 [email protected] * Pavillon Charles de Koninck, Université Laval, Québec, QC, G1V 0A6, Canada DOI 10.3213/2191-5784-10230 Published online May 14, 2013 © Africa Magna Verlag, Frankfurt M. Journal of African Archaeology Vol. 11 (1), 2013, pp. 39–54 39 S. MacEachern et al. Introduction some aspects of DGB material culture (especially cer- amics) and that of modern Mafa populations, and some During 2008 excavations, a number of iron artefacts domestic features excavated at DGB-1 in 2008 were were recovered from an interior sunken courtyard on interpretable in Mafa terms, according to Mafa men the DGB-1 site, located in the northeastern Mandara working as excavators there. This is of course not an Mountains of Cameroon. DGB-1, with the smaller, unusual situation: such claims of cultural affiliation or neighbouring DGB-2 site, forms a complex of dry- disaffiliation need to be thought of as social charters stone walls, terraces, platforms and associated archaeo- in the present as much as they are historical accounts logical features on the slopes of the northern Mandara of the past, and they will have played important social Mountains of Cameroon, in Central Africa. DGB-1 and roles through the whole period of coexistence between DGB-2 are only 100 m apart, and are partially contem- the DGB-1/-2 site complex and the humans for whom porary with an occupation spanning the period from the that complex would have formed an impressive feature 13th to the 17th centuries AD (see below). In total, six- of the mountain landscape. teen DGB sites have been identified to this point (Fig. 1), but the DGB-1/DGB-2 complex is significantly The question of potential cultural continuities be- larger than any of the other DGB sites (DA V id 2008; tween the builders and users of DGB-1/-2 and the Mafa MA C EA CHERN 2012b). DGB stands for ‘diy-geδ-bay’, people who live in the region today is significant for our or ‘ruins of chiefly residence’ in the Chadic language, interpretation of the iron artefacts found on DGB-1 in Mafa, spoken across this region. 2008. Two ethnoarchaeological reconstructions of trad- itional Mafa smelts, and one smelt associated with the The DGB-1/DGB-2 complex covers approxi- neighbouring Plata group in the northeastern Mandara mately four hectares (Figs. 2 and 3), and is perhaps Mountains, were undertaken by members of the Man- the largest example of indigenous stone architecture dara Archaeological Project in the late 1980s (DA V id & in Africa between Ethiopia and Great Zimbabwe. The LE BLÉ I S 1988; DA V id et al. 1989; KI LL I C K 1991; DA V id functioning of the site complex is at present unclear, 2012a). The results of those smelts (and especially or at least incompletely known: there is evidence for of the 1986 Mafa smelt [DA V id et al. 1989]) can be domestic occupation on DGB-1 and between the two compared with the characteristics of the iron artefacts sites, and ritual activities were carried out on the sum- recovered from DGB-1. mit of both and in different places on both sites. DGB- 1/-2 appears to have been utilised most intensively The examination of iron artefacts from DGB-1 in the mid-15th century AD, in a period of (probably thus allows researchers a very rare opportunity to com- interrelated) environmental and political crises south pare iron-working techniques in one narrowly delimited of Lake Chad (MA C EA CHERN 2012a). Chronologically, area of sub-Saharan Africa over a period of five centur- the site complex’s development dates to a period when ies. In this article, the iron artefacts recovered from the slave-raiding and the irruption of predatory states into DGB-1 site are therefore referred to as ‘DGB artefacts’, the southern Lake Chad Basin were transforming so- while the products of modern Mafa ethnoarchaeological Downloaded by Scott MacEachern on January 30 2014 cial and political relations between Mandara Mountain smelts are referred to as ‘Mafa artefacts’. We recognise, Downloaded by Scott MacEachern on January 30 2014 populations and the communities living on the plains of course, that comparison of the results of an ethno- around the mountains. Until recently, almost all of graphically known iron-smelting episode (bloom frag- the archaeological investigations in the region were ments) with finished tools recovered archaeologically is undertaken on sites in the plains around the Mandara not a straightforward issue. The latter can, for example, Mountains, because of a lack of well-preserved ar- shed no light upon processes of decarburization which chaeological sites known from the mountains them- would probably be different for the different types of selves. Excavations on the DGB sites by Nicholas furnaces ethnographically known from the area (DA V id David and colleagues began in 2002, and have con- 2012b). The spatial and cultural proximity in this case tinued from 2008 until 2011 under the direction of the nevertheless make the comparison worthwhile, if such first author (DA V id & MA C EA CHERN 1988; DA V id 2008; limitations are kept in mind. MacEachern et al. 2010; MA C EA CHERN 2012b). Communities of Chadic-speaking Mafa terrace Archaeological context farmers now occupy the area of the DGB sites. There is no explicit historical relationship between the builders During work on the DGB-1 site in June–July, 2008, of the DGB sites and the Mafa (STERNER 2008), whose researchers under the direction of Datouang Djous- oral histories of the region go back 200–300 years and sou excavated a sunken interior courtyard, the Cen- who profess ignorance of the history of these structures. tral Courtyard Area (CCA), on the summit of the site However, there are important continuities between (MA C EA CHERN et al. 2010) (Fig. 3). Although relatively 40 Journal of African Archaeology Vol. 11 (1), 2013 Iron Artefacts from the DGB-1 Site, Northern Cameroon Fig. 1. The DGB archaeological sites (purple stars) in the Mandara Mountains of Northern Cameroon, Africa, with other known archaeological sites in the area (red stars). Downloaded by Scott MacEachern on January 30 2014 Downloaded by Scott MacEachern on January 30 2014 Fig. 2. The DGB-1 site from the northeast. Journal of African Archaeology Vol. 11 (1), 2013 41 S. MacEachern et al. Fig. 3. Plan of the DGB-1/ DGB-2 site complex, with the DGB-1 CCA indicated. small (approximately 3x4x4.5 m deep), this trapez- ris) they were probably washed in from the platform oidal sunken courtyard was articulated with a number surfaces above the courtyard after abandonment of the of other significant architectural features, including CCA. Other materials found in primary context and two subsurface stone passageways on the western and associated with the occupation surfaces included iron northeastern sides and a staircase on the east side of artefacts, two artefacts made of copper alloy, stone and the CCA that was carefully built, used for some time, (probably) glass beads, and two very small fragments and then equally carefully blocked off behind a court- of what appears to be tin-glazed earthenware.