US-Egypt Cooperative Research: Integrated Analysis of Organic and Inorganic Plant Remains from Hierakonpolis: A Contribution to the Palaeoethnobotany of Egypt

美国-埃及合作研究：希拉孔波利斯有机和无机植物遗骸的综合分析：对埃及古民族植物学的贡献

• 批准号: 0518688
• 负责人: Renee Friedman
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Alaska Fairbanks Campus
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2005
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2005-09-01 至 2009-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0518688&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: US; Egypt; Cooperative; Research; Integrated

0518688FriedmanProject Description: This project supports a collaborative research between Dr. Renee Friedman, Anthropology Department, University of Alaska at Fairbanks and Dr. Ahmed Fahmy, Department of Biology, University of Helwan, Helwan, Egypt. They plan to study organic and inorganic plant remains from Hierakonpolis in a contribution to palaeoethnobotany of Egypt. The project is to foster partnership with Egyptian scientific departments, provide research tools and training required to undertake macro and micro archaeobotanical research and integrate that with archaeological collection strategies in order to explore a range of information deriving from botanical material from the archaeological site of Hierakonpolis, Egypt. Egyptian regulations forbid the export of any archaeological materials. Intellectual merit: 1) Understanding of human interaction with plants in Ancient Egypt is based on inferential sources such as tooth wear, food offerings, and botanical remains retrieved from archaeological sediments. The recovery of a significant sample of well-preserved ingested food remains in the abdominal cavities of "working-class" human burials at the site of Hierakonpolis (c.3800-3400BC) allows a rare opportunity to test various assumptions on subsistence, environment and climate at this formative stage in Ancient Egyptian civilization with non-circumstantial evidence. The extraction of the full range of information from this material requires an integrated approach to the analysis, which includes the identification of organic macro-remains (e.g., fruits, seeds) as well as inorganic micro-remains, i.e., phytoliths. Fossil phytolith analysis is a new tool for palaeoethnobotanical research in Egypt. It holds great promise for recovering previously inaccessible information. 2) Phytolith studies can also reveal evidence captured in calculus on the teeth of humans and animals to provide information on longer-term diet. This in turn can be compared with observations derived from other dental dietary indicators and the evidence of consumed or offered foods. 3) The integrated archaeobotanical analysis of the working-class burials is further enhanced by the opportunity to analyze data from the contemporaneous burials of the elite and contrast both data sets with material from a domestic structure of the same time period. Together these analyses present an unprecedented body of evidence to assess human/plant interaction at the dawn of Egyptian civilization, a time of dynamic social and economic development that has been linked to climatic change. The project is designed to allow the collection of useful information while developing integrated collection strategies, expanding research facilities and training of students. Broader impact: 1) the development of a dedicated archaeobotanical research laboratory in Egypt of use to the international botanical, archaeological and geological communities; 2) train and provide hands-on experience for US and Egyptian senior scientists and students; 3) create guidelines for the collection of archaeobotanical remains to be distributed in English and Arabic, as the rise in water table due to increased land reclamation activities all over Egypt is making archaeological remains an endangered and even diminishing resource; 4) increase understanding for the scholarly and general public about the environment and climate change in the past and its effect on lifeways: how we learn about these aspects and how they are inter-related. The results will be published in peer reviewed archaeological and archaeobotanical journals, and updates and reports for the lay audience will be placed in the Hierakonpolis expedition's Nekhen News newsletter and on its website www.hierakonpolis.org and that of the American Institute of Archaeology www.archaeology.org. The archaeo-botanical material will be permanently curated in Egypt for further study. This project is being supported under the US-Egypt Joint Fund Program, which provides grants to scientists and engineers in both countries to carry out these cooperative activities.

0518688 Friedman项目描述：该项目支持费尔班克斯阿拉斯加大学人类学系Renee Friedman博士和埃及赫勒万大学生物系Ahmed Fahmy博士之间的合作研究。 他们计划研究希拉康波利斯的有机和无机植物遗迹，为埃及的古民族植物学做出贡献。 该项目将促进与埃及科学部门的伙伴关系，提供进行宏观和微观考古植物学研究所需的研究工具和培训，并将其与考古收集战略相结合，以探索来自埃及希拉康波利斯考古遗址植物材料的一系列信息。埃及法规禁止出口任何考古材料。 智力优点：1）对古埃及人类与植物相互作用的理解是基于推断来源，如牙齿磨损，食物供应，以及从考古沉积物中检索到的植物遗迹。在希拉康波利斯遗址（约公元前3800 - 3400年）的“工人阶级”人类墓葬的腹腔中发现了大量保存完好的食物样本，这为我们提供了一个难得的机会，可以用非间接证据来检验古埃及文明形成阶段对生存、环境和气候的各种假设。从这种材料中提取全部信息需要采用综合分析方法，其中包括鉴定有机宏观遗骸（例如，水果，种子）以及无机微残留物，即，植硅体化石植硅体分析是埃及古民族植物学研究的新工具。它为恢复以前无法访问的信息提供了很大的希望。2)植硅石研究还可以揭示人类和动物牙齿上的结石中捕获的证据，以提供长期饮食的信息。这反过来又可以与来自其他牙科饮食指标的观察结果以及消费或提供的食物的证据进行比较。3)工人阶级墓葬的综合考古植物学分析得到进一步加强，有机会分析精英阶层同时期墓葬的数据，并将两组数据与同一时期国内结构的材料进行对比。这些分析为评估埃及文明初期人类/植物的相互作用提供了前所未有的证据，这是一个与气候变化有关的动态社会和经济发展时期。 该项目旨在收集有用的信息，同时制定综合收集战略，扩大研究设施和培训学生。更广泛的影响：1）在埃及建立一个专门的考古植物学研究实验室，供国际植物学、考古学和地质学界使用; 2）为美国和埃及的高级科学家和学生提供培训和实践经验; 3）制定收集考古植物学遗迹的指导方针，以英语和阿拉伯语分发，由于埃及各地不断增加的土地开垦活动导致地下水位上升，使考古遗迹成为一种濒临灭绝甚至不断减少的资源; 4）增加学术界和公众对过去环境和气候变化及其对生活方式的影响的了解：我们如何了解这些方面以及它们是如何相互关联的。研究结果将发表在同行评审的考古学和考古植物学期刊上，面向外行读者的更新和报告将刊登在希拉孔波利斯探险队的Nekhen新闻通讯及其网站www.hierakonpolis.org和美国考古研究所的网站www.archaeology.org上。 该项目得到了美国-埃及联合基金方案的支持，该方案向两国的科学家和工程师提供赠款，以开展这些合作活动。