PART BACKGROUND TO I ARCHAEOLOGY My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair! Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away. —Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ozymandias, 1818 Why study archaeology? What is the importance of this popular and apparently romantic subject? We will begin by looking at the place of archae- ology in the twenty-first-century world. We will explain the subject’s roots, who we are, and what we do. Unfortunately, the discipline faces a crisis brought about by rapid destruction of important sites by industrial development and treasure hunt- ing. Furthermore, all kinds of pseudoarchaeologies purporting to tell the truth about lost worlds, an- cient astronauts, and sunken continents undermine archaeology’s credibility with a wider audience. As this chapter reveals, the reality of archaeology is What archaeology is and isn’t. Left: Archaeology Hollywood style: Harrison one of rigor and professionalism, but can be more Ford as Indiana Jones, the swashbuckling professor. Right: Archaeology the science: An Italian expedition excavates at Nisa, Turkmenistan, an early engaging than any invented Indiana Jones drama. Parthian settlement of the third century B.C. No one can fully understand archaeology with- out having some notion of its roots. The first descriptive discipline into a many-sided activity that archaeologists were little more than collectors and tries to understand how human cultures changed antiquarians who were searching for curiosities, bur- and evolved in the past. If there is one major lesson ied treasure, and intellectual enlightenment. These to be learned from the history of archaeology, it is treasure hunters were the predecessors of the early that no development in the field took place in isola- professionals, scholars who concentrated on site de- tion. Innovations in many other disciplines, includ- scription and believed that human society evolved ing geology, cultural anthropology, and computer through simple stages, the final stage being modern science, resulted in changes in the way archaeology civilization. Since World War II, archaeology has was carried out in the field and, more importantly, undergone a major transformation, from a basically how researchers thought about the past. 1 M01_FAGA6585_13_SE_C01.indd 1 8/31/13 11:26 AM 1 Introducing Archaeology MySearchLab Fagan icon colors CHAPTER OUTLINE The First Archaeologists Listen to the Chapter Audio on MySearchLab What Is Archaeology Today?C0 M100 C74 M36 C0 M75 C18 M50 C75 M0 C70 M25 C63 M28 C40 M90 Who Are the Archaeologists? Why Study Archaeology? Y100 K20 Y0 K65 Who Owns the Past? Y100 K30 Y32 K0 Y100 K0 Y60 K0 Y94 K15 Y44 K20 Is Archaeology in Crisis? What Are the Goals of Archaeology? FAGAN Color Palette C61 M64 Y73 K69 C46 M73 Y83 K63 C100 M58 Y49 K30 C70 M51 Y94 K57 C61 M64 Y73 K69 C46 M73 Y83 K63 C100 M58 Y49 K30 C70 M51 Y94 K57 The romantic past. Watercolor of the Pyramids of Giza, Egypt, by David Roberts, 1838. C56 M50 Y55 K29 C26 M85All Y100 was K22 mystery, dark,C45 impenetrable M15 Y18 K0 mystery, andC63 M28every Y94 circumstanceK10 increased C56 M50 Y55 K29 C26 M85it. Y100In Egypt,K22 the colossalC45 M15 skeletons Y18 K0 of giganticC63 temples M28 Y94 K1 stand0 in unwatered sands in all the nakedness of desolation; but here an immense forest shrouds the ruins . giving an intensity and almost wildness to the interest. —John Lloyd Stephens, 1841 C53 M55 Y60 K28 C18 M62 Y100 K4 C66 M23 Y38 K0 C35 M7 Y50 K0 C53 M55 Y60 K28 C18merican M62 Y100 K4 traveler JohnC66 LloydM23 Y38 K0Stephens wroteC35 M7the Y50 wordsK0 above as he explored the overgrown ruins of the great Maya city at Copán in Honduras in the mid- A nineteenth century. He called Copán the “Mecca or Jerusalem of an unknown people” and made the exploration of the past high drama. It is still a fascinating adventure. Archaeology is the stuff dreams are made of—buried treasure, gold-laden pharaohs, the C22 M22 Y81 K0 C41 M38 Y53 K5 romance of long-lost civilizations. Many people believe that archaeologists are romantic C41 M38 Y53 K5 heroes, C22like M22 the Y818 film K0 world’s Indiana Jones. Cartoonists depict them as elderly, eccentric schol- ars in sun helmets digging up inscribed tablets in the shadow of Egyptian temples. They are thought to be typical absentminded professors, so deeply absorbed in the details of ancient life that they care little for the pressures and frustrations of modern life. Archaeology is believed to open doorsC25 M90 to Y20a world K0 of adventure and excitement, to discoveries, such as the spectacular tomb of the EgyptianC25 M90 Y20 pharaoh K0 Tutankhamun, opened by English archaeologists Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon in 1922. But where does this romantic image come from? For answers we need only to look to the first archaeologists. The First Archaeologists The first archaeologists were indeed adventurers. The Maya civilization of Mexico and Guatemala was first described by American travel writer John Lloyd Stephens, who trav- eled in the forests of the Yucatán with artist Frederick Catherwood in 1839. Stephens was already a gifted travel writer, Catherwood an artist with a reputation for spectacular public exhibitions, when they traveled to Central America. 2 M01_FAGA6585_13_SE_C01.indd 2 8/31/13 11:26 AM CHAPTER 1 Introducing Archaeology 3 Some early archaeologists dug for profit, others out of intellectual curiosity. None was more single-minded than Heinrich Schliemann, a German businessman (Traill, 1995). In his early forties he gave up business, married a young Greek woman, and set out to find Homer’s legendary city of Troy in 1871. His hectic search ended at the mound of Hissarlik in northwestern Turkey, already identified as Troy by the local American consul, Frank Calvert. Schliemann recruited 150 men and moved 325,000 cubic yards of soil in his early seasons (Figure 1.1). He proved the Homeric legends had some basis in reality, but his archaeological methods were brutal; he destroyed almost as much as he discovered. Archaeology has come a long way since the days when one could find a lost civilization in a month. In this chapter, we define archaeology and explore its role in the modern world. We also discuss archaeology’s relationship to other academic disciplines, its goals, and the ethics of studying the past. What Is Archaeology Today? Many people still associate archaeology with all the adventure and glamour of the early archaeolo- gists, as mythologized in the Indiana Jones movies—swashbuckling deeds of daring-do, sinister villains, and mythic treasure. And, of course, Harrison Ford and the good people win in the end. Great, crackling Hollywood stuff, which bears absolutely no resemblance to what modern archae- ologists really do. There’s another popular misconception, too, that has archaeologists unearthing spectacular dinosaur fossils and all kinds of vicious creatures that flourished on earth long ago. Archaeologists study people, paleontologists research dinosaurs and other long-vanished animals. People never lived alongside dinosaurs, which became extinct about 66 million years ago. The first ancestral humans appeared a mere 4 to 5 million years before present. As witnessed earlier, a century ago, much of archaeology was a scramble for artifacts, spectacular and unspectacular, wrested from ancient cities and tombs. The old stereotype of a pith-helmeted professor digging in the shadow of a mighty pyramid had an element of truth in it. However, long gone are the days when an archaeologist would discover three royal palaces along the Tigris River in a week (this actually happened). Today, archaeology is a highly sophisticated, multidisciplinary science, which draws on a broad array of scientific methods. We used to be thought of as excavators in remote lands. Many archaeologists (including both authors of this book) do still work far from the beaten track, but some of today’s most spectacular discoveries come from air-conditioned labo- ratories. This, for example, is how we know that the Ancestral Pueblo people of Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, imported cacao from Mexico to make chocolate drinks. Microscopic residues on pot fragments revealed the exotic import (Washburn et al., 2011). Archaeology is the study of all aspects of past human experience primarily using the material (physical) remains of this behavior. These remains can include anything from prehistoric hand axes, to Egyptian mummies, to First World War trenches, and even more recent material. By rigorously studying these physical remains we aim to understand (or interpret) more about the past and the circumstances of the people who left them. FIGURE 1.1 Nineteenth-century excavation on a near-industrial scale. Heinrich Schliemann’s excavations at Hissarlik (Troy). M01_FAGA6585_13_SE_C01.indd 3 8/31/13 11:26 AM 4 PART I Background to Archaeology DISCOVERY CATHERWOOD AND STEPHENS AT COPÁN, HONDURAS, 1839 cottish-born artist Frederick Catherwood (1799–1854) and New York Everything was a mystery; they never knew what they would find next. “I leaned Sadventurer and lawyer John Lloyd Stephens (1805–1852) formed a over with breathless anxiety while the Indians worked, and an eye, an ear, a foot, remarkable archaeological team. Hearing persistent rumors of great cities in the or a hand was disentombed . when the machete rang against the chiseled rainforests of the Yucatán, they sailed for Belize and Guatemala in October 1839 stone, I pushed the Indian away and cleared out the loose soil with my hands” in search of lost civilizations. They set off inland with a small party and five mules. (Quotes from Stephens, 1841: 271–3). After a difficult journey through rough country, they arrived at the remote village Stephens wanted to buy Copán and ship it back to New York piece by piece.