Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Identification of Pastoral Neolithic Sites in East Africa: A Geoarchaeological Approach

在菲奥娜马歇尔博士的指导下，露丝·沙哈克-格罗斯女士将为她的博士论文收集数据。她的研究目标是检测土壤模式，表明过去存在的家畜，并开发技术，这将有助于这一点。“新石器时代革命”，即从狩猎和采集到驯化以及随后对植物和动物的依赖的生存变化，导致了人类生活方式的根本变化，并为村庄，城市和国家组织的兴起提供了基础。因此，考古学家希望了解导致驯化的过程，并追踪其随时间的发展。虽然动物骨骼在某些考古环境中保存完好，但在其他情况下会迅速分解和消失，因此拥有牲畜存在的其他指标将非常有用。这将是特别有价值的驯化过程的早期阶段，当定居点经常移动，他们的景观明显的考古印记是轻微的。许多Maasi人仍然遵循传统的田园生活方式，放牧牛、绵羊和山羊。在她研究的第一部分，Shahack-Gross女士将研究Maasi的放牧实践和村庄的空间组织。她将从围栏区内外收集土壤样本，并检查被占用和被遗弃的营地。这些材料将在以色列和美国的实验室进行分析。据推测，从牲畜围栏土壤将有独特的矿物组成的蛋白石植硅体，含钙球粒，钙硅酸盐和磷酸盐矿物的形式。还假设微形态薄片分析将检测土壤空隙和颗粒的层压，并且质地改变也将指示在湿季与旱季的围栏。这项研究很重要，因为所开发的方法将适用于世界许多地区和许多时期。如果成功，这些技术将被广泛用于解决一系列问题。该项目还将协助培养一名有前途的青年科学家。

Under the direction of Dr. Fiona Marshall, MS Ruth Shahack-Gross will collect data for her doctoral dissertation. The goal of her research is to detect soil patterns which indicate the past presence of domestic animals and to develop techniques which will facilitate this. The "Neolithic Revolution", the change in subsistence from hunting and gathering to the domestication and subsequent dependence on plants and animals, resulted in a fundamental change in human lifestyle and provided the base for the rise of village, city and state levels of organization. Therefore archaeologists wish to understand the processes which led to domestication and trace its development over time. While animal bone is well preserved in some archaeological situations it rapidly disintegrates and disappears in others and therefore it would be extremely useful to have other indicators of livestock presence. This would be particularly valuable in earlier stages of the domestication process when settlements moved frequently and their visible archaeological imprint on the landscape is slight.MS Shahack-Gross will conduct fieldwork among Maasi speaking peoples in East Africa. Many Maasi still follow a traditional pastoral lifestyle and herd cattle, sheep and goats. In the first part of her study MS Shahack-Gross will examine Maasi herding practices and village spatial organization. She will collect soil samples from both within and outside penning areas and examine both occupied and abandoned campsites. These materials will be analyzed in laboratories in both Israel and the United States. It is hypothesized that soils from livestock enclosures will have distinctive mineralogy consisting of forms of opaline phytoliths, calcium-containing spherulites, calcium oxalates and phosphatic minerals. It is also hypothesized that micromorphological thin section analysis will detect lamination of soil voids and grains and that textural alterations will also indicate penning during wet vs. dry seasons. This research is important because the methods developed will be applicable in many parts of the world and for many time periods. If successful the techniques will be widely employed to address a range of questions. This project will also assist in training a promising young scientist.