Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: The Socio-Political Organization of a Prehistoric West African Village, Kirikongo, Burkina Faso

在Augustin Holl博士的监督下，Stephen Dueppen将研究他的考古发掘材料，以重建布基纳法索西北部的Kirikongo晚期史前西非村庄的社会政治组织。Kirikongo位于Mouhoun弯曲，靠近Mouhoun河（黑沃尔特）流域的最北端。它是一个由一组土丘组成的聚集的村庄遗址，或者可以被认为是一个单一社区的大小不等的“告诉”。在公元五世纪到十五世纪之间有人居住，Kirikongo的特点是叠加保存的房屋与站立的泥砖建筑，抹灰地板，壁炉，原地材料遗骸和垃圾沉积物适合高分辨率考古研究。Dueppen将通过挖掘整个古村庄的单元来研究Kirikongo的布局，并比较居住在社区不同组成土丘的群体所进行的活动。村庄是实践和制度的物理表现，允许人们一起生活，而不是为了解决社会问题而迁移。这种定居类型的起源很重要，因为村庄是世界各地复杂社会发展轨迹的基本组成部分。然而，人们对早期的西非村庄知之甚少，也不知道那里发展起来的社会和政治制度如何促进了城镇等大型定居点的兴起。 Dueppen将评估三种村庄发展模式，每种模式都有不同的社会政治机制：（1）宗族模式-亲属关系是组织原则。集群中的每一个土丘都居住着一个独立的谱系或亚谱系，因为它们是从创始种群中萌芽出来的。(2)专家职业模式-每个土丘由不同的经济专家群体，如渔民，农民，猎人和钢铁工人，在互补系统中占据。(3)融合模式-创始人效应模式，其中创始人口首先定居，然后不同的新群体从其他地方来到村庄并定居其他土丘。为了评估Kirikongo的模型，将研究几个土丘挖掘单位的考古遗迹（陶器、铁器、建筑、坑、植物和动物遗迹），以确定和比较每个土丘的建立时间、居民的行为以及一个土丘上的居民与其他土丘上的居民的关系。其结果将是一个史前西非村庄组织的详细图片。 该项目将对布基纳法索考古学产生重大影响。由于普遍缺乏资金，布基纳法索的考古工作很少。这个项目对于新兴的布基纳法索研究界来说意义重大，因为村庄遗址是该国最常见的考古定居形式。考古实地培训也很少见，该项目将培训一名来自瓦加杜古大学的学生。研究结果将广泛传播给讲法语和英语的研究人员以及穆洪弯曲的当地居民。最后，Kirikongo的工作特别紧迫，因为布基纳法索10号公路直接穿过该地点的中部，每年有几个土丘的沉积物因道路维修而流失。

Under the supervision of Dr. Augustin Holl, Stephen Dueppen will study material remains from his archaeological excavations to reconstruct the socio-political organization of the Late Prehistoric West African village of Kirikongo in NW Burkina Faso. Kirikongo is located in the Mouhoun Bend, situated near the northernmost point of the Mouhoun River (Black Volta) drainage. It is a clustered village site composed of a group of mounds, or "tells" of varying sizes that can be considered a single community. Inhabited between the fifth and fifteenth centuries A.D., Kirikongo is characterized by superimposed preserved houses with standing mud-brick architecture, plastered floors, hearths, in-situ material remains and trash deposits appropriate for a high-resolution archaeological study. Dueppen will examine the layout of Kirikongo by excavating units throughout the ancient village, and comparing the activities performed by groups inhabiting the different component mounds of the community.The village is the physical manifestation of practices and institutions that allow people to live together rather than move to resolve social problems. The origins of this settlement type are important, because villages are the fundamental building blocks in the developmental trajectories towards complex societies around the world. However, very little is known about early West African villages, and how the social and political institutions that developed there contributed to the rise of larger settlements, such as towns and cities. Dueppen will evaluate three models for village development, each with a different socio-political mechanism: (1) The Lineage Model- Kinship is the organizing principle. Each mound in the cluster is inhabited by a separate lineage or sub-lineage as they bud off from the founding population. (2) The Specialist Occupation Model- Each mound is occupied by different economic specialist groups such as fishers, farmers, hunters, and iron- workers, in a system of complementarity. (3) The Fusion model- Founder effect model, in which a founding population settles first, then diverse new groups come to the village from elsewhere and settle the other mounds. To evaluate the models at Kirikongo, archaeological remains (pottery, iron artifacts, architecture, pits, plant and animal remains) from excavation units at several mounds will be studied to identify and compare when each was founded, what the inhabitants did, and how residents on one mound were related to those on other mounds. The result will be a detailed picture of the organization of a prehistoric West African village. This project will have a significant impact on Burkinabe archaeology. Archaeological work in Burkina Faso has been rare due to a general lack of funding. This project is significant and relevant for the emerging Burkinabe research community, since village sites are the most common form of archaeological settlement found in the nation. Archaeological field training is likewise rare, and this project will train one student from the University of Ouagadougou. Results will be broadly disseminated to French and English speaking researchers, as well as to the local residents of the Mouhoun Bend. Lastly, work at Kirikongo is particularly urgent since Burkina Road #10 runs directly through the middle of the site and deposits from several mounds are lost each year to road maintenance.