An Analysis of Natural Factors Affecting the Dispersal and Establishment of Iron Age III (800-550 B.C)Settlements in the Western Zayandeh- Rud River Basin (West and Northwest of Isfahan)

Humans are always effect to their surroundings,which makes it possible to create habitable environments and create habitat patterns that fit the surrounding environment.The interaction between human being and environment either in the form of human effect on the environment or the environment effect on the human,cannot be considered out of the environment.According to this approach in archaeology,environmental factors have an important role in assessing settlements in each period.In addition to the recognition of the degree of environmental impact,this approach makes the degree of adaptation of the habitats with the dominant environmental conditions possible.As geospatial tools become more powerful,GIS archaeology has evolved as well,making it possible to visualize ancient settlements and analyze changes in the use of space over time.By incorporating historic map data,physical details of an area’s landscape and known information about past inhabitants,archaeologists can accurately predict the positions of sites with cultural,historical relevance.In this research Iron Age III(800-550 B.C)sites in the west and northwest of Isfahan were studied via GIS.The area studied is one of the most important but unknown areas of archaeological research due to its location in the center of the Iranian plateau and a link between the north-west and the south-west of the country.The environmental characteristics of the studied area have attracted the attention of humans since ancient times.Therefore,it was considered necessary to conduct archaeological excavations.To achieve this goal,the area was first studied archaeologically.As a result of this survey,approximately 50 ancient sites were identified which included the statistical population used for analysis.The effect of environmental variables including altitude,slope(percentage and direction),climate,geological structure,distances and proximity to water resources,land use and proximity to communication paths on the distribution of settlements in the study area was investigated.Through analytical-descriptive method,the factors affecting the formation and distribution of the establishment patterns of the period in question were examind.After analyzing the information and maps,the results indicated that among all the factors,three environmental factors were the most important in the formation of ancient settlements of the Iron Age III era in the west and northwest of Isfahan:factors relating to water resources,proximity to communication paths,and slope percentage and direction.

Traces of Metallurgy at the Site of Losino 15, Compared with Other Finds Related to Ancient Metallurgy

The eponymous site is located in the territory of Poland--the northern part of the central section of the Stupia river, about 30 km from the coast of the Baltic sea. The site of Losino 15 revealed some traces of a settlement of the Pomeranian and the Wielbark cultures. The most interesting features discovered at the study site are the remains of bloomery furnaces. The site of Losino 15 yielded 10 features interpreted as relics of the bloomery shaft furnace with a pit. They were characterized by a high degree of deterioration-due to the agronomic activities and slope processes, only the bottom part of the slag-pit have been preserved. These are the remains of shaft furnaces with a pit called slag-pit fumace, whose relics are slag-pits filled with slag. The site of Losino 15 yielded slag with a total weight of about 100 kg. Two alternative and temporarily equivalent hypotheses can be proposed here. According to the former one, the creators of the bloomery were representatives of the Pomeranian culture, and in the latter version--they represented the Wielbark culture.

Multi-frequency satellite radar imaging of cultural heritage:the case studies of the Yumen Frontier Pass and Niya ruins in the Western Regions of the Silk Road Corridor

Synthetic Aperture Radar(SAR)remote sensing is increasingly favoured in archaeological applications.However,the effectiveness of this technology for archaeological prospection has so far not been fully assessed.In this study,an integrated single-date and multi-temporal SAR data-processing chain was proposed to sharpen archaeological signs and hence their detection and monitoring.In total,14 scenes of X-band Cosmo-SkyMed,C-band Sentinel-1 and L-band PALSAR data covering the Western Regions of the Silk Road Corridor in China were employed for two important archaeological sites including the Yumen Frontier Pass with emerging archaeological traces and Niya ruins with subsurface remains.The results pointed out that single-date satellite radar data were useful for the identification of subsurface traces buried under desert in the landscape-scale,whereas for the identification of emerging monuments,Sentinel-1 was limited by its lower spatial resolution compared to TerraSAR and PALSAR data.Multi-date products,such as interferometric coherence,the averaged radar signatures and RGB multi-temporal composites,were effective to sharpen archaeological traces as well as for change detection in Yumen Frontier Pass.This study presents a pilot assessment of satellite SAR data for the analysis and monitoring of archaeological features in the predominantly arid-sandy environmental characteristic of investigated sites.

Dispersal of crop-livestock and geographical-temporal variation of subsistence along the Steppe and Silk Roads across Eurasia in prehistory

The innovations of agricultural production and their extensive dispersal promoted the transformation of human livelihoods and profoundly influenced the evolution of human-land relationships in late prehistoric Eurasia.The Steppe and Silk Roads(SSRs)played important roles in the transcontinental exchange and dispersal of cereal crops and livestock related to agricultural innovation across Eurasia before the Han Dynasty(202 BC to AD 220),while the geographical-temporal variations in prehistoric subsistence in relation to the spread and exchange of cereal crops and livestock originating from different areas of Eurasia still remain unclear.In this paper,we explore these issues based on the review and analysis of published archaeobotanical,zooarchaeological,and carbon-stable isotope data from human bones from Neolithic-Early Iron Age sites in areas along the SSRs,with a comparison to updated results based on radiocarbon dating and ancient DNA analyses.Our results suggest that humans engaged in hunting game,while foxtail/broomcorn millet cultivation gradually became the primary subsistence strategy in Eastern SSRs from 10,500 to 6000 a BP.In contemporaneous Western SSRs,humans mainly cultivated wheat/barley and raised sheep/goats,cattle,and pigs.Trans-Eurasian exchange,which is reflected by the mixed utilization of wheat/barley and millet,emerged in the south-central Steppe during 6000–4000 a BP,while millet cultivation and pig husbandry became the dominant livelihoods in most areas of Eastern SSRs.During 4000–2200 a BP,Silk Roads became the major passageway for trans-Eurasian exchange,the interactive development of oasis agriculture and pastoralism facilitated intensive human settlement in the Central Silk Roads,and subsistence strategies substantially changed with significant geographical differences in Eastern SSRs,while subsistence in some areas of Western SSRs was evidently affected by the introduction and adoption of millet crops after 3000 a BP.The geographical-temporal variations in subsistence in the SSRs from the Neolithic to Early Iron Age were primarily affected by the prehistoric dispersal of farming groups across Eurasia,which was accompanied by the spread of cereal crops/livestock,while the impacts of climate change still need to be further evaluated.