Quantitative Archaeology and Archaeological Modelling Catalin Nicolae Popa Modelling Identities A Case Study from the Iron Age of South-East Europe Quantitative Archaeology and Archaeological Modelling Series Editors Andrew Bevan, University College London, London, United Kingdom Oliver Nakoinz, University of Kiel, Kiel, Germany More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/14342 Catalin Nicolae Popa Modelling Identities A Case Study from the Iron Age of South- East Europe Catalin Nicolae Popa Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands ISSN 2366-5998 ISSN 2366-6005 (electronic) Quantitative Archaeology and Archaeological Modelling ISBN 978-3-319-63265-0 ISBN 978-3-319-63267-4 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-63267-4 Library of Congress Control Number: 2017948646 © Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2018 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Printed on acid-free paper This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Science+Business Media, LLC part of Springer Nature. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland Preface Can we talk of large ethnic groups in South-East Europe during the Late Iron Age? Since ancient authors, such as Strabo, provide us with the names of numerous peo- ples, archaeologists have made great efforts to link them with particular material culture forms. But are these identity divisions indeed supported by archaeological finds? Did prehistoric people feel that they were part of these large ethnic entities? In this book I address such questions by investigating the funerary practices of Late Iron Age people with the aid of statistical modelling. This volume comes out of my Ph.D. research, conducted between 2009 and 2014 at the University of Cambridge. I became highly interested in the Late Iron Age of South-East Europe throughout my school years because this period is often regarded as inhabited by the ancestors of many modern European nations: Gauls, Celt- Iberians, Thracians, Illyrians etc. This point is particularly valid for my native coun- try, Romania, a nation that traces its roots back to the Late Iron Age people called Dacians or Geto-Dacians. However, as I delved into the identity literature through- out my university years, I started to question many of the ideas that I had read about “my” Dacian forefathers. What did it mean to be a Dacian? What made someone a Dacian rather than something else? And why were they “my” or anyone else’s fore- fathers in the first place? I was surprised to discover that such question had not been asked before. It became clearer and clearer that much of what we know about the Dacians was born out of the ambition of some Romanian scholars to populate the Late Iron Age past with their nations’ ancestors. Yet, if that is indeed the case, can one speak of Dacians, Getae or any other identity group when doing a critical analy- sis of the archaeological record? With these questions in mind, I embarked on the long and winding road of Ph.D. research. It may appear unusual that statistical modelling, of all things, was the method of choice for answering questions of group identity. Is it though? There is no doubt that, when looked at in detail, group identity involves a lot of personal, profoundly subjective choices. These choices can be led by the desire for personal gain, by a sense of pre-existing natural order, by previous personal experiences and many other factors. It thus seems logical that gaining a comprehensive understanding of such a complex process requires a highly meticulous, qualitative analysis. v vi Preface However, with the risk of being reductionist, in my research I was only interested in finding broad manifestations of group identity. When put in very simple terms, much of our current knowledge of group identity points to it being the result of people’s identification with or differentiation from the practices carried out by other individuals: identity comes out of some type of practice comparisons. And comparing is one thing that statistics excels at. Therefore, statistical modelling occupies a central role in this book. Extensive parts are dedicated to illustrating the modelling technique, which is employed to compare archaeological information. The method consists of a highly flexible simi- larity algorithm combined with clustering procedures. Through its flexibility, the algorithm can be adapted to incorporate and emphasise a large spectrum of elements that researchers may consider to be important. This feature also facilitates the trans- fer of the method to other contexts with relative ease. The book also aims to show the compatibility of archaeological theory and sta- tistical modelling. The discussions from archaeological theory rarely find method- ological implementations through statistical methods, since the former is seen as relating to qualitative issues, while the latter is perceived as being exclusively quan- titative in nature. In this volume theoretical issues form an integrative part of data preparation, method development and results interpretation. The steps of the analy- sis are grounded in theoretical concepts, which are discussed in varying degrees of detail. Finally, the volume takes the form of a narrative rather than a manual. The inten- tion is not to teach the workings of particular statistical methods, but rather to answer a complex archaeological question with the aid of statistical modelling. The reader is walked through each stage of the investigation procedure, from data preparation and method adaptation to evaluating and interpreting the results in their broader context. While some parts may be more difficult to comprehend, much of the analy- sis procedure and general argument should be relatively easy to follow with a mini- mum of prior knowledge. To facilitate text understanding, when describing data and statistical results, italics were used for the names of variables (e.g. object category 1) and underlining was employed for the value of variables (e.g. weapon). I hope that the book will prove useful to both statistics users and readers with an interest in the Late Iron Age of Europe or issues of prehistoric identity. Leiden, Netherlands Catalin Nicolae Popa August 2016 Acknowledgements This volume would not have been possible without the funding provided by the Arts and Humanities Research Council UK, the Cambridge European Trusts and the Raţiu Family Foundation, which allowed me to complete my Ph.D. research. I am also grateful for the support of my host institutions, the University of Cambridge, the Excellence Cluster Topoi, Freie Universität Berlin and Leiden University. I would like to express my thanks to the numerous people who have guided me or provided feedback throughout the writing of this volume: Simon Stoddart, Gelu Florea, Aurel Rustoiu, Mariana Egri, Oliver Nakoinz, Kerstin Hofmann, Martin Millet, Stephen Shennan, Kris Lockyear, John Robb and Sheila Kohring. My deepest gratitude goes to those who have been close to me throughout the years and have endured bravely my incessant ranting about archaeology and statis- tics: Barbara Hausmair, Maikel Kuijpers, Tiago Hermenegildo, Bela Dimova, Radmila Balaban and Marija Ljustina. vii Contents 1 Introduction ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 1 1.1 General Introduction of Research Area and Topic ���������������������������� 1 1.2 State of Research . 2 1.3 Justification of Study . 6 1.4 Structure of Volume �������������������������������������������������������������������������� 7 References �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 9 2 Final Resting Place: The Archaeological Data �������������������������������������� 15 2.1 Death and Burial . 15 2.1.1 Theoretical Concepts About Death: The Potential of Burials in Archaeology ������������������������������ 15 2.1.2 Practical Arguments for Using Burials . 19 2.2 Data Limits and Overview ���������������������������������������������������������������� 19 2.2.1 Spatial Limits ������������������������������������������������������������������������ 20 2.2.2 Chronological Limits ������������������������������������������������������������ 21 2.2.3 Void of Burials ����������������������������������������������������������������������