AHRC-NSF MOU: Metallurgical Practice, Technology and Social Organization during the Middle to Late Bronze Age in the Southern Urals, Russia

在国家科学基金会的支持下，布莱恩·汉克斯博士将进行考古实地考察和实验室分析，以调查铜器时代中期至晚期（公元前 2100 年至 1500 年）居住在俄罗斯南部草原的青铜时代社区所实践的铜冶金和社会经济组织的性质。该项目将重点关注两个青铜时代聚落，包括 1) 地球化学调查，2) 有针对性的小规模挖掘，3) 额外的场地流域研究，以及 4) 考古冶金材料和相关特征的比较分析。许多学者将铜生产与广泛的区域和区域间贸易以及社会冲突联系在一起，这反过来又使冶金学在试图解释社会不平等和区域等级制度出现的模型中占据了重要地位。本研究将探讨冶金发展在这一过程中发挥重要作用的命题。本研究既针对与区域社会经济发展、技术实践和社会组织之间的界面有关的持续人类学问题，也针对与欧亚大陆中北部青铜时代中晚期社会变迁相关的更具体的问题。金属生产和消费经常与史前晚期欧亚大陆的社会和经济发展模式联系在一起。然而，人们实际上对区域矿石的开采地点和方式、区域社会组织与冶金作为一个分段过程的关系如何变化，以及铜冶炼和金属生产技术的局部和区域差异发展到何种程度知之甚少。该项目的更广泛影响建立在美国、英国和俄罗斯的个人和机构之间非常成功且已经建立的合作研究计划的基础上。拟议研究的主要目标之一是对学生进行考古实地考察和实验室分析的整合和培训。

With support from the National Science Foundation Dr Bryan Hanks will conduct archaeological fieldwork and laboratory analysis to investigate the nature of copper metallurgy and socio-economic organization as practiced by Bronze Age communities who inhabited the Southern Russian steppe from the Middle to Late Bronze Age phases (2100 to 1500 BC). This project will focus on two Bronze Age settlements and include 1) geochemical survey, 2) targeted small-scale excavation, 3) additional site catchment study and 4) the comparative analysis of archaeometallurgical materials and associated features. Many scholars have tied copper production to both extensive regional and inter-regional trade and societal conflict, which in turn has afforded the role of metallurgy a powerful position in models that seek to explain the emergence of social inequality and regional hierarchies. This research will examine the proposition that the development of metallurgy plays a major role in this process.The research targets both persistent anthropological questions relating to the interface between regional socio-economic development, technological practice and social organization and more specific questions connected with social change during the Middle to Late Bronze Age in north central Eurasia. Metal production and consumption are frequently tied to models of social and economic development in Eurasia during the late prehistoric period. Yet, very little is actually known about where and how regional ores were being exploited, how regional social organization varied in connection with metallurgy as a segmented process, and to what degree local and regional variability in copper smelting and metal production technologies developed. The broader impacts of this project build on a highly successful and already established collaborative program of study between individuals and institutions in the United States, United Kingdom and Russia. The proposed research has as one of its principal aims the integration and training of students in both archaeological fieldwork and laboratory analysis.