Castles and Coprolites

Two posts crossed my Twitter feed last week that got me thinking. Both are related to experimental archaeology and use of wetland resources. If you are a regular reader of my blog (or indeed my academic papers) you will have noticed that I talk a lot about the environment of Çatalhöyük, and how this may have influenced human activity in the Neolithic. You will also notice that I have criticised some of the early interpretations which, to me, present a simplistic interpretation of evidence that doesn’t consider the complexity of the environment, or people. Çatalhöyük was situated in a wetland environment, and there have been debates over the influence this had on agriculture. Where were people growing their crops if the local area was not suitable for agriculture?  One theory suggests people travelled to fields that were located many km away from the site, which in turn has implications for social organisation. This always bothered me, firstly because of the limitations of the ...

This weekend I went to my first AEA conference . As a student, then as a fixed term post-doc, it is difficult to fund conference attendance, and also to find the time when there are so many conferences to choose from. Having done a few years of the big conferences ( SAA and EAA ) to maximise audience and networking opportunities, I’ve decided to spend some time at the smaller ones, where I can focus on my specific interests. Overall it has been an enjoyable weekend, and it was great to be back in York and catch up with old friends and colleagues, including Matthew Collins , who I can’t thank enough for writing me many references over these past few years (I bet he’s relieved that I finally got a job so he can stop writing them!). There are three ‘themes’ that stood out for me at the conference. The first was the study of taphonomy, and how wildly different this is between different techniques in environmental archaeology. The second was the recognition of the advantages of inte...