Grave goods: objects and death in later prehistoric Britain

这个项目主要关注新石器时代、青铜时代和铁器时代英国(公元前4000年到公元43年)坟墓(和其他正式的殡仪馆)中的物质文化。许多史前英国最令人印象深刻的文物都来自坟墓--从Duggleby Howe的磨光的海狸门牙，到Bush Barrow丰富的黄金牌匾和大头针，进口的青铜匕首，化石石鱼和雕刻的骨柄装饰，再到Wetwang村覆盖着珊瑚的战车装备。对于英国新石器时代、青铜时代和铁器时代的大部分地区来说，重点放在埋葬上是必要的，因为从考古角度来看，定居点很难确定，这确保了停尸房证据往往是最好的，有时是唯一可用的信息。这也是埋葬成为社区谈判社会政治变革的关键舞台的时期。了解人和物品的生活是如何相互交织在一起的，将有助于我们调查材料和技术在塑造史前生命和死亡方面的动态作用。目前，英国史前学者对墓葬物品如何随着时间的变化只有大致的了解：在新石器时代，墓葬很少与物质文化联系在一起；青铜时代早期，墓葬物品的数量和重要性急剧上升；铁器时代见证了新的和更多样的物品类别的引入，但在考古学上看不到墓葬的重要空白。《坟墓商品》项目旨在改变我们对这一粗略顺序的理解，从印象派的理解转变为基于对记录的坚实的、经验性的理解。除了经常引起考古学关注的壮观物品外，该项目还试图评估和更充分地了解“日常”墓葬物品的特征和作用。为此，我们将建立一个数据库，其中包括新石器时代、青铜时代和铁器时代在英格兰、苏格兰和威尔士的六个关键案例研究区域内的正式停尸房中发现的所有物质文化(详情请参阅案例支持)。一旦使用地理信息系统绘制地图并进行分析，这些信息将使人们能够更好地理解墓葬习俗，以及那个时期物质文化变化的起伏。在数据库提供的大范围图景的基础上，我们将继续调查特定的分区域、遗址和坟墓作为案例研究。我们将为这份材料带来一种先进的新理论和方法，开创葬礼解释的黄金标准。我们研究的结果将是一本关于史前晚期英国物品和死亡的权威和详细的书，以及学术论文和两次会议。墓品数据库将是他人使用的无价、丰富的资源，在未来的学术研究项目中，也在商业遗产领域。我们的研究将对规划决策、区域政策文件和博物馆实践产生影响。我们将在未来几年将我们的发现传播给更广泛的公众，方法是利用我们的研究为大英博物馆后来的史前画廊的重大重新设计提供信息(通过公开会议启动)，并在英国各地的地区博物馆进行演讲。我们还将为六所学校制作有关史前埋葬的资料包。此外，一个迷你项目将由国际知名的儿童诗人迈克尔·罗森参与，他将创作三首受史前墓葬和墓葬物品启发的诗歌，以激发成年人和儿童的想象力。通过这些外展途径，我们还希望通过反思过去人类对待死亡的方式，开始打破英国公众对死亡的当代文化沉默。最终，墓地物品项目将彻底改变考古学和公众对物质文化在后来的史前英国生死中所起作用的理解。

This project focuses on material culture in graves (and other formal mortuary contexts) in Neolithic, Bronze Age and Iron Age Britain, c. 4000 BC to AD 43. Many of prehistoric Britain's most impressive artefacts have come from graves - from the polished beaver incisors at Duggleby Howe, to Bush Barrow's rich collection of gold plaques and pins, imported bronze daggers, fossil stone macehead and carved bone shaft-decorations, to the coral-encrusted chariot-gear of Wetwang Village. For large parts of the Neolithic, Bronze and Iron Ages in Britain, a focus on burial is a necessity, as settlements can be difficult to identify archaeologically, ensuring that mortuary evidence is often the best and sometimes only information available. It is also the period when burials became a key arena through which communities negotiated socio-political change. An understanding of how the lives of people and objects were intertwined will help us to investigate the dynamic role of materials and technologies that shaped prehistoric life and death.At present, British prehistorians have only an approximate idea of how grave goods changed through time: during the Neolithic burials were only rarely associated with material culture; the Early Bronze Age saw a dramatic rise in the quantity and significance of grave goods; the Iron Age witnessed the introduction of new and more varied classes of objects, but also significant blank spots where burial is invisible archaeologically. The Grave Goods project aims to shift our understanding of this broad-brush sequence from one that is impressionistic to one based on a solid, empirical understanding of the record. The project also seeks to evaluate and understand more fully the character and role of 'everyday' grave goods, in addition to the spectacular objects that so often capture archaeological attention. We will do this by constructing a database of all material culture found in formal mortuary contexts during the Neolithic, Bronze Age and Iron Age within six key case study regions across England, Scotland and Wales (see Case for Support for details). Once mapped and analysed using a GIS, this information will enable a new level of understanding of burial practice, and the ebbs and flows of material culture change, over that period. Building on the large-scale picture that the database provides, we will move on to investigate specific sub-regions, sites and graves as case studies. We will bring to this material a sophisticated new theoretical and methodological approach, pioneering a gold standard of funerary interpretation. The culmination of our research will be an authoritative and detailed book about objects and death in later prehistoric Britain, as well as academic papers and two conferences.The Grave Goods database will be an invaluable, rich resource for others to use, in future academic research projects but also in the commercial heritage sector. Our research will have an impact on planning decisions, regional policy documents and museum practice. We will disseminate our findings to the wider public for years to come by using our research to inform a major re-design of the British later prehistory gallery displays at the British Museum (launched with a public conference) and talks in regional museums across Britain. We will also produce six schools' information packs on prehistoric burial. In addition, a mini-project will involve internationally renowned children's poet Michael Rosen who will produce three poems inspired by prehistoric burial and grave goods to capture the imagination of both adults and children. Via these outreach pathways, we also hope to begin to breach the British public's contemporary cultural silence on mortality, by reflecting on past humanity's ways of coping with death.Ultimately, the Grave Goods project will revolutionise archaeological and public understandings of the role that material culture played in life and death in later prehistoric Britain.