Collaborative Research: Investigating Ancient Nubian Identity and Interaction with Early African States in the Fourth Cataract Region of Sudan

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Interactions among ancient societies can yield insights into the dynamics of globalization and the ways that people create and develop social identities within increasingly complex worldwide interactions. With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Brenda J. Baker (Arizona State University) and Dr. Stuart Tyson Smith (University of California, Santa Barbara) will co-direct two seasons of archaeological fieldwork in the Fourth Cataract region of the Nile River valley in northern Sudan, situated in northeast Africa. This project investigates interactions of this rugged region's inhabitants with ancient Nubian and Egyptian states to determine the extent to which they were autonomous or integrated into them. The ways in which people identified themselves as members of these cultures or distinct from them are explored during the formation and fluorescence of the Kerman state (c. 4500-1500 BC) and during a period of perceived decline (c. 300-600 AD) after decentralization of the Meroitic state. Alternative hypotheses are evaluated through excavation and analysis of material culture and skeletal remains from both settlement and cemetery contexts. Because it contains Kerma period sites farther upstream than any previously recorded and the only substantial Kerma settlements in the Fourth Cataract region, our project area is uniquely suited to investigating questions concerning the extent of the Kerma state and its interactions with others. The substantial post-Meroitic occupation allows us to address similar questions about regional dynamics in a later period. This project will add to understanding of the rise and fall of state-level societies, provide a broader view of culture contact and center-periphery interaction from an African perspective, and contribute to documentation of a previously unstudied region of Nubia. The integrative archaeological and bioarchaeological research will encourage the application of anthropological approaches by Egyptological and Nubian specialists working elsewhere in this area. Construction of the Merowe dam at the Fourth Cataract will create a reservoir covering 170 kilometers of the Nile River valley, reaching a maximum width of 4 kilometers, and submerging our project area by 2009. This research fosters international collaboration with rescue teams from the US, UK, Poland, Germany, in cooperation with Sudan's National Corporation for Antiquities and Museums (NCAM). This project promotes a better relationship between the American and Sudanese people by involving community members near field sites and providing periodic tours to local school children and their teachers to explain our work and the information it provides about their ancestors. American graduate students will benefit from field experience, research and publication opportunities, and immersion in Nubian culture afforded by the project. Colleagues underrepresented in research will collaborate, specifically a Phoenix-area community college professor whose institution has high Hispanic enrollment. Results of this research will be broadly disseminated via public talks, course lectures, presentations at professional conferences, and publication in journals read by anthropologists, Egyptologists and Nubian archaeologists. Because Sudan permits export of archaeological materials, this project will provide well-documented, well-preserved skeletal and artifactual collections that will be a valuable resource for undergraduate and graduate education and an important comparative collection available to other scholars for research.