An Interview with Edith Turner
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The Emergence of Pristine States
The Emergence of Pristine States Henri J. M. Claessen Leiden University ABSTRACT In this article the emergence of the Pristine State will be considered. First, I will present an overview of the applied method. Then seven cases of – probable – Pristine States are described. This makes a comparative research possible. As the case studies have been de- scribed with the help of the Complex Interaction Model, the com- parative part is also based upon this approach. From the compari- sons it appeared that all cases developed in a situation of relative wealth. They were not a consequence of hunger or population pres- sure. Nor could the often mentioned role of war be established as crucial in the formation of these states. War, as far as it occurred, was rather a consequence than a condition of state formation. 1. PRELIMINARY REMARKS In 1967, Morton H. Fried introduced the concept of the pristine state in The Evolution of Political Society, stating that ‘all contemporary states, even those that seem to be lineally descended from the states of high antiquity, like China, are really secondary states; the pristine states perished long ago’ (Fried 1967: 231). The pristine states were those that ‘emerged from stratified societies and experienced the slow, autochthonous growth of specialized formal instruments of social control out of their own needs for these institutions’ (Ibid.). The institutions grew and a leader – a priest, a warrior, a man- ager, or a charismatic person – came to the fore, and started to use his power. Gradually the organization of such a polity developed into an incipient early state (term in Claessen 1978, 2014). -
A Female Figurine from the Basal Aurignacian of Hohle Fels Cave in Southwestern Germany
Vol 459 | 14 May 2009 | doi:10.1038/nature07995 LETTERS A female figurine from the basal Aurignacian of Hohle Fels Cave in southwestern Germany Nicholas J. Conard1 Despite well over 100 years of research and debate, the origins of art dimensions. Four fragments were recovered in connection with water remain contentious1–3. In recent years, abstract depictions have screening and can be localized to a 10-l volume corresponding to a ,3- been documented at southern African sites dating to 75 kyr before cm-thick portion of a quarter metre.The pieces of the figurine lay about present (BP)4,5, and the earliest figurative art, which is often seen as 3 m below the current surface of the cave in an area about 20 m from the an important proxy for advanced symbolic communication, has cave’s entrance. All of the finds come from the southwest quadrant of a been documented in Europe as dating to between 30 and single square metre and were recovered from within 12 cm in the 40 kyr BP2. Here I report the discovery of a female mammoth-ivory vertical dimension (Fig. 2). Although, owing to their fragility and com- figurine in the basal Aurignacian deposit at Hohle Fels Cave in the plex depositional histories, many of the ivory artworks from the Swabian Jura of southwestern Germany during excavations in Swabian Jura are highly fragmentary, the Venus from Hohle Fels is 2008. This figurine was produced at least 35,000 calendar years nearly complete; only the left arm and shoulder are missing. The excel- ago, making it one of the oldest known examples of figurative art. -
Carneiro's Social Circumscription Theory: Necessary but Not Sufficient
Carneiro's Social Circumscription Theory: Necessary but not Sufficient D. Blair Gibson El Camino College Firstly, let me state what an honor and delight it is to be asked to revisit one of the seminal contributions by a towering thinker of modern anthropology. Robert Carneiro's 1970 paper succeeded in weaving many of the strands of the cultural ecology and neo- evolutionism of the 1950s and 60s into a succinct theory of state origins. This theory in turn influenced and inspired many treat- ments having to do with the growth of complex societies, espe- cially those of the New World. His ‘reformulation’ represents the author's effort to reaffirm the basic tenets of the theory and estab- lish its applicability on a global scale. Carneiro starts his treatment with a summary of the past and present thinking on the origins of the state whereby he categorizes theories of state origins as either voluntaristic or coercive. By dint of these categories it has proven possible to discern a dichotomy in the underlying attitudes of those who have developed theories of social complexity, but these categories are not comprehensive and the examples that he provides are not all apt. The voluntaristic theories of yore presented chiefdoms and states as emerging to re- solve some structural problem such as the prevention of food scar- city or the provision of access to unequally distributed resources. To characterize Wittfogel's hydraulic hypothesis as a voluntaristic theory of state evolution is certainly problematic on two counts: Wittfogel was not so much concerned with explaining state origins as he was with detailing the character of the ‘hydraulic/apparatus’ state, and secondly, Wittfogel states that his theory includes ele- ments of coercion (Wittfogel 1957: 26). -
Miriam N. Haidle Nicholas J. Conard Michael Bolus Editors Based on an Interdisciplinary Symposium
Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology Series Miriam N. Haidle Nicholas J. Conard Michael Bolus Editors The Nature of Culture Based on an Interdisciplinary Symposium ‘The Nature of Culture’, Tübingen, Germany The Nature of Culture Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology Series Edited by Eric Delson Vertebrate Paleontology, American Museum of Natural History New York, NY 10024, USA [email protected] Eric J. Sargis Anthropology, Yale University New Haven, CT 06520, USA [email protected] Focal topics for volumes in the series will include systematic paleontology of all vertebrates (from agnathans to humans), phylogeny reconstruction, functional morphology, Paleolithic archaeology, taphonomy, geochronology, historical biogeography, and bios- tratigraphy. Other fields (e.g., paleoclimatology, paleoecology, ancient DNA, total organismal community structure) may be con- sidered if the volume theme emphasizes paleobiology (or archaeology). Fields such as modeling of physical processes, genetic methodology, nonvertebrates or neontology are out of our scope. Volumes in the series may either be monographic treatments (including unpublished but fully revised dissertations) or edited col- lections, especially those focusing on problem-oriented issues, with multidisciplinary coverage where possible. Editorial Advisory Board Nicholas Conard (University of Tübingen), John G. Fleagle (Stony Brook University), Jean-Jacques Hublin (Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology), Ross D. E. MacPhee (American Museum of Natural History), Peter Makovicky (The Field Museum), Sally McBrearty (University of Connecticut), Jin Meng (American Museum of Natural History), Tom Plummer (Queens College/CUNY), Mary Silcox (University of Toronto). More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/6978 The Nature of Culture Based on an Interdisciplinary Symposium ‘The Nature of Culture’,Tübingen, Germany Edited by Miriam N. -
A New Hypothesis on the Creation of the Hohle Fels “Venus” Figurine
CLOTTES J. (dir.) 2012. — L’art pléistocène dans le monde / Pleistocene art of the world / Arte pleistoceno en el mundo Actes du Congrès IFRAO, Tarascon-sur-Ariège, septembre 2010 – Symposium « Art mobilier pléistocène » A new hypothesis on the creation of the Hohle Fels “Venus” figurine Gillian MORRISS-KAY* Female figurines, or “Venuses”, are well known from the Gravettian culture (Cohen 2003; Conard & Wolf 2010, and references therein). Their geographical spread extends from western France to Siberia, and their age from 24-29,000 years ago (kya). They are typically characterised by enlarged breasts and belly. If the face is depicted at all, it is purely stylised; in some examples, the head is not represented, or appears to have been broken off. The legs are usually fused in the midline and the feet absent. It seems likely that they are symbolically related to fertility and/or pregnancy, perhaps as amulets to protect against the dangers of childbirth; fingerprints on clay examples from Pavlovian sites indicate that they were made by women (Caldwell 2010, and references therein). They are commonly around 10cm in height. In 2008 a female figurine was excavated from Hohle Fels Cave in the Swabian Jura, Southwest Germany (Conard 2009). Excavations in this cave had already yielded three non-human figurative carvings (Conard 2003) and the oldest known musical instruments, bone and ivory flutes (Conard et al. 2009). Calibrated radiocarbon dating of the charcoal-rich material around the figurine yielded dates ranging from 36 to 40 kya. Given its position at the base of the Aurignacian deposit (28-40 kya), the older end of the range is thought to be more likely. -
World-System-. and Evolution an Appraisal Professor Thoma-. D. Hall
World-System-. and Evolution An Appraisal Professor Thoma-. D. Hall Department of Sociology & Anthropology DcPauw University Grccnca-.tlc, IN 46135-0037 317-658-4519 internet : [email protected] Revised version of paper presented at the American Anthropological A-.sociation meeting, Nov. 16-19, 1995. Wa-.hington, D.C. Copyright 1996 by Thoma-. D. Hall. v. 7/8/96 ABSTRACT This paper makes six arguments. First, socio-cultural evolution must be studied from a "world-system" or intcrsocictal interact ion perspective. A focus on change in individual "societies" or "groups" fails to attend adequately to the effects of intcrsoci ctal interact ion on social and cultural change. Second, in order to be useful, theories of the modern world-system must be modified extensively to deal with non-capitali st settings. In particular, changes in system boundaries marked by exchange networks (for information , luxury or prestige goods, political/military interactions, and bulk goods) seldom coincide, and follow different patterns of change. Third, all such system-. tend to pulsat e, that is, expand and contract, or at lea-.t expand rapidly and less rapidly. Fourth, once hi erarchi cal forms of social organization develop such systems typically have cycles of rise and fall in the relative positions of constituent politics. Fifth, expansion of world-s ystems forms and transforms social relations in newly incorporate d area-.. While complex in the modern world-system, these changes arc even more complex in prccapitalist settings. Sixth, th ese two cycles combine with demographic and epidemiological processes to shape long -term socio-cultural evolution. Intro duction I begin by indicating several problems, then review recent develop ments in world-sy stem work, and end with some ways to promote more fruitful interact ion. -
Incentive Compatible Extraction Under Environmental Circumscription
The Origin of the State: Incentive Compatible Extraction under Environmental Circumscription David Schönholzer∗ April 10, 2017 Abstract Theories of early state formation posit that the state enabled an emerging elite to extract resources in exchange for protection from outside groups. This paper formalizes and empirically evaluates these forces in a unified framework. The model shows that extraction is closely linked to the idea of environmental circumscription: only if outside options are sufficiently poor for potential ex- tractees, (a) they are willing to accept extraction, and (b) extractors consider extraction capacity a worthwhile investment. In a global dataset of archaeo- logical sites on a grid with 184,523 cells, we then show that circumscription is strongly associated with the location of early states, using the intersection of large rivers through arid regions as an instrument. Our estimates suggest that extraction was more important in the Old World civilizations of Egypt and China while other motives such as protection were more important in the New World. ∗Department of Economics, UC Berkeley, [email protected]. I thank Ernesto Dal Bó, Brad DeLong, Frederico Finan, Edward Miguel, Gerard Roland, Raúl Sánchez de la Sierra, Joachim Voth and Noam Yuchtman for useful discussions and continuous encouragement as well as seminar participants in the BEHL Economic History Lunch at Berkeley, the Stanford Economic History conference, the Archaeology Brownbag Seminar at Berkeley and the Society for Ameri- can Archaeology 81st Conference session “Theoretical Approaches in Archaeology”. I gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Swiss National Science Foundation, Fellowship number P1SKP1-158639. Word count: 10,044. -
Qt1sj9n878.Pdf
UC Riverside Cliodynamics Title Circumscription Theory of the Origins of the State: A Cross-Cultural Re- Analysis Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/1sj9n878 Journal Cliodynamics, 7(2) Authors Zinkina, Julia Korotayev, Andrey Andreev, Alexey Publication Date 2016 DOI 10.21237/C7clio7232817 License https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ 4.0 Peer reviewed eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California Cliodynamics: The Journal of Quantitative History and Cultural Evolution Circumscription Theory of the Origins of the State: A Cross-Cultural Re-analysis Julia Zinkina1, Andrey Korotayev2,3, Alexey Andreev4 1 The Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration 2 National Research University Higher School of Economics 3 Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences 4 Moscow State University Abstract In the paper, we express some doubts about one of the assumptions of Robert Carneiro’s model on state (and chiefdom) formation, namely the role of circumscription. In our opinion, the main flaw of Carneiro’s original theory of state formation is that it implicitly assumes that every community dreamt to conquer its neighboring communities. We test the presence of various types of warfare (such as conquest warfare, land acquisition warfare, and plunder warfare) in societies with different degrees of political centralization. Quantitative cross-cultural tests reveal a rather strong correlation between political complexity and the presence of conquest warfare suggesting that conquest warfare was virtually absent among independent communities. Newer works by Carneiro propose a model explaining how simple chiefdoms could appear in the absence of conquest warfare. This model also includes circumscription, but our analysis suggests that it is unnecessary. -
(Neanderthal) Men: the Small Mammal Record of the Middle to Upper Paleolithic Transition in the Swabian Jura, Germany
Of Mice and (Neanderthal) Men: The small mammal record of the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition in the Swabian Jura, Germany Dissertation der Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen zur Erlangung des Grades eines Doktors der Naturwissenschaften (Dr. rer. nat.) vorgelegt von Sara E. Rhodes, M.Sc. aus Toronto (Kanada) Tübingen 2019 Gedruckt mit Genehmigung der Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen. Tag der mündlichen Qualifikation: 8. Juli 2019 Dekan: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Rosenstiel 1. Berichterstatter: Prof. Nicholas J. Conard, PhD 2. Berichterstatter: PD Dr. Britt M. Starkovich Table of Contents I ABBREVIATIONS ................................................................................................................ III II ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................................................. IV III SUMMARY ......................................................................................................................... VI IV LIST OF PUBLICATIONS ............................................................................................... XIV V PERSONAL CONTRIBUTION .......................................................................................... XIV 1.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................... 1 1.1 NEANDERTHALS IN THE EUROPEAN CONTEXT .................................................................... -
Human Paleoecology During the Magdalenian in the Swabian Jura of Southwestern Germany
Human Paleoecology during the Magdalenian in the Swabian Jura of Southwestern Germany Dissertation der Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen zur Erlangung des Grades eines Doktors der Naturwissenschaften (Dr. rer. nat.) vorgelegt von Gillian L. Wong aus Fresno/USA Tübingen 2020 Gedruckt mit Genehmigung der Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen. Tag der mündlichen Qualifikation: 12.06.2020 Dekan: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Rosenstiel 1. Berichterstatter: Prof. Nicholas J. Conard, PhD 2. Berichterstatter: PD Dr. Britt M. Starkovich ii Table of Contents Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................ v Abbreviations ..................................................................................................................... viii Summary ............................................................................................................................... ix Zusammenfassung ................................................................................................................. xi List of Publications ............................................................................................................. xiii Personal Contribution .......................................................................................................... xiv Chapter 1: Introduction .......................................................................................................... -
Palaeolithic Ivory Sculptures from Southwestern Germany and The
letters to nature .............................................................. depict a mixture of felid and human traits. The preservation of the piece allows no conclusions to be drawn about the sexual attribution Palaeolithic ivory sculptures of the figurine. from southwestern Germany The horse head is slightly older than 30,000 years (30 kyr), the figurines from AH IV date to 31–33 kyr, and the deepest Aurigna- and the origins of figurative art cian deposit, AH Va, which immediately underlies AH IV, has yielded dates between 33 and 36 kyr (Table 2). Radiocarbon dates Nicholas J. Conard for the period before 30 kyr are likely to be underestimates of calendar ages4–7. Because there is no reliable, high-resolution radio- Abteilung fu¨rA¨ltere Urgeschichte und Quarta¨ro¨kologie, Institut fu¨r Ur-und carbon calibration for this period, the precise ages of the Swabian Fru¨hgeschichte und Archa¨ologie des Mittelalters, Universita¨tTu¨bingen, Schloss ivory artworks are not known. Hohentu¨bingen, 72070 Tu¨bingen, Germany Archaeological horizon IV is the richest of the Aurignacian ............................................................................................................................................................................. deposits at Hohle Fels and, although only 9 m2 have been excavated, Archaeologists have always viewed the origin of figurative art as a the deposit has provided a rich assemblage of lithic and organic 1,2 crucial threshold in human evolution . Here I report the artefacts, including diverse forms of finely carved ivory ornaments discovery of three figurines carved from mammoth ivory at and much ivory working debris. Whereas the setting of the dis- Hohle Fels Cave in the Swabian Jura of southwestern Germany, covery of the original Lo¨wenmensch deep in the cave of Hohlenstein- which provides new evidence for the appearance of figurative art Stadel has been argued to be a cache or cult site3,8, Vogelherd, more than 30,000 years ago. -
5 Cultural Theories and Proximate-Level Explanations of Primitive War
5 Cultural Theories and Proximate-Level Explanations of Primitive War 5.1 Introduction Evolutionary theories (in the Darwinian sense) and ultimate-level explanations of the origin of war in hominid/human evolution, as reviewed in Ch. 4, have been proliferating ever since Darwin and, after the introduction of socio- biology, expecially in the last decades. In anthropology and the social sciences, however, the conception of primitive war as a social theme and cultural invention, and cultural-evolution theories of the origin of war have prevailed at least since Spencer, Tylor, Lubbock and other contemporaries of Darwin. I shall use the term ’cultural theories’ in this chapter - which has no more pretense than to give a reasonably adequate and complete review of the pertinent literature - as a convenient shorthand for all theories presented by such disciplines as cultural anthropology, ethnology, sociology, psychology, psychoanalysis, etc. By their very nature, many of these theories tend to focus on proximate-level explanations of primitive war causation and motivational analyses, and sometimes (seem to) preclude an evolutionary approach (in the Darwinian sense) altogether. Sometimes these theories are regarded as the sane alternative for the ’biological determinism’ and alleged ’innateness’ ascribed to the evolutionary theories. Yet, every theory, even the most anti-nativist one, does make implicit assumptions about universal human nature. The most common implicit assumption in the cultural theories is that the human being, by virtue of being a cultural animal, has severed all ties with organic evolution, and that ’biology’ (including phylogeny) is therefore quite irrelevant as an explanatory category. Human nature, in this conception, is equivalent to neonatal infinite behavioral plasticity (a tabula rasa) and subsequent cultural moulding; all behavior, including warring behavior, is essentially learned and modulated by the values and requirements of the socio- cultural milieu.