OasCiv: Making Oasis Civilisation in the Moroccan Sahara

OasCiv：在摩洛哥撒哈拉打造绿洲文明

• 批准号: AH/T002409/1
• 负责人: David Mattingly
• 金额: $ 104.22万
• 依托单位: University of Leicester
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2020 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FT002409%2F1
• 关键词: OasCiv; Making; Oasis; Civilisation; Moroccan

Saharan prehistory and Neolithic rock art has attracted considerable archaeological attention in recent decades, but the Protohistoric and Medieval phases of settlement and activity are neglected by comparison. Knowledge of the ancient populations of the Sahara remains constrained by lack of archaeological investigation, the biased testimonies of the ancient sources and the uncritical assumptions of modern scholarship about Berber (Amazigh) peoples. Apart from the PI's work in S Libya on a people called the Garamantes, there has been an almost complete lack of field investigation of these societies, especially those of the W Sahara. Our recent demonstration of pre-Islamic origins of the earliest oasis agriculture and sedentary settlements in the Wadi Draa in the Moroccan W Sahara challenges a long-held model that has characterised the pre-Islamic populations of the W Sahara as essentially nomadic pastoralists and denied the evolution of oases there before the early Medieval 'Arab' conquest of N Morocco and Muslim investment in Saharan trade. This much earlier date for the establishment of first oases marks a major paradigm shift. Our proposed project seeks to investigate the character of the Protohistoric societies responsible for this transformation in the first millennium AD. The early Medieval story of the peoples of the Moroccan Sahara is also neglected, but of the highest significance to the emergence of the first Islamic states in N Africa (8th-10th centuries) and the great Medieval empires of the Almoravids and Almohads (11th-13th centuries). These began as revitalisation movements involving the oasis communities of S Morocco, but, for lack of robust archaeological data, the Saharan and Amazigh roots of Islamic civilisation have never been fully evaluated. This project thus seeks to re-evaluate the contribution of endogenous Amazigh groups to the emergence of sedentary farming and urbanised states in Morocco during the Roman/early Medieval eras.This project will identify how and why complex societies emerged in the W Sahara by conducting the first scientific excavations of Protohistoric and Medieval settlements, cemeteries and farming landscapes recently discovered in the Wadi Draa. We argue that the emergence of oasis societies is critical to understanding how Saharan trading networks and Islamic empires such as the 11th-century Almoravids were subsequently established. The research potential has been demonstrated by our pilot survey, revealing well-preserved landscapes and hundreds of sedentary sites linked to precocious oasis development in the Draa. The next phase of work will investigate exactly how and more precisely when this occurred. It will put 'flesh on the bones' of a new paradigm for understanding the ancient Saharan populations and provide a much needed counterbalance for the hitherto unique (and possibly exceptional) case study of the Garamantes as a precocious Saharan state-level society. By providing the first robust data-sets on the historic peoples of the Moroccan Sahara, this pioneering project will advance knowledge and understanding of both Protohistoric and Medieval phases, intersecting with wider debates about e.g. sedentarisation, urbanisation and state formation, migration, technologies, trade and connectivity in North Africa and well beyond. The work will draw out the Saharan particularities of these key societal developments.Using interdisciplinary methods, we shall investigate palaeoeconomy, technological capability, social organisation and religion and cultic practices of these desert populations. Four excavation seasons will target a series of different archaeological sites to illustrate the varied aspects of these societies, their economies and belief systems. The exploration of oasis civilisation existing alongside pastoral groups in the Sahara will mark both a fundamental scientific advance and a finding of considerable significance beyond academia.

近几十年来，撒哈拉史前时期和新石器时代的岩石艺术引起了考古界的广泛关注，但相比之下，原始历史和中世纪阶段的定居和活动却被忽视了。由于缺乏考古调查、古代资料的证词存在偏见以及现代学术界对柏柏尔人（阿马齐格人）不加批判的假设，对撒哈拉古代人口的了解仍然受到限制。除了PI在利比亚南部对一个名为加拉曼特人的民族所做的工作外，几乎完全缺乏对这些社会的实地调查，尤其是西撒哈拉的社会。我们最近展示了摩洛哥西撒哈拉干河中最早的绿洲农业和定居定居点的前伊斯兰起源，这对长期存在的模型提出了挑战，该模型将西撒哈拉的前伊斯兰人口本质上是游牧牧民，并否认在中世纪早期“阿拉伯”征服摩洛哥北部和穆斯林在撒哈拉投资之前那里绿洲的演变 贸易。第一个绿洲的建立日期早得多，标志着一个重大的范式转变。我们提出的项目旨在调查造成公元第一个千年这一转变的原始社会的特征。摩洛哥撒哈拉人民的中世纪早期故事也被忽视，但对北非第一个伊斯兰国家（8-10世纪）以及伟大的中世纪帝国阿尔摩拉维德和阿尔摩哈德（11-13世纪）的出现具有最高的意义。这些运动始于涉及摩洛哥南部绿洲社区的复兴运动，但由于缺乏可靠的考古数据，伊斯兰文明的撒哈拉和阿马齐格根源从未得到充分评估。因此，该项目旨在重新评估罗马/中世纪早期摩洛哥内生阿马齐格群体对定居农业和城市化国家出现的贡献。该项目将通过对最近在干河谷发现的原始历史和中世纪定居点、墓地和农业景观进行首次科学发掘，确定西撒哈拉复杂社会如何以及为何出现。 德拉啊。我们认为，绿洲社会的出现对于理解撒哈拉贸易网络和伊斯兰帝国（例如 11 世纪的阿尔摩拉维德王朝）随后如何建立至关重要。我们的试点调查已经证明了研究潜力，揭示了保存完好的景观和数百个与德拉阿早熟绿洲开发相关的定居点。下一阶段的工作将确切地调查这种情况是如何发生的以及何时发生的。它将为理解古代撒哈拉人口提供一个新范式的“骨肉”，并为迄今为止独特的（也可能是例外的）加拉曼特人作为一个早熟的撒哈拉国家级社会的案例研究提供急需的平衡。通过提供关于摩洛哥撒哈拉历史民族的第一个可靠数据集，这一开创性项目将增进对原始历史和中世纪阶段的知识和理解，并与有关诸如人类和人类的更广泛的辩论相交叉。北非及其他地区的定居化、城市化和国家形成、移民、技术、贸易和互联互通。这项工作将揭示撒哈拉这些关键社会发展的特殊性。我们将利用跨学科方法，调查这些沙漠人口的古经济、技术能力、社会组织以及宗教和崇拜习俗。四个挖掘季节将针对一系列不同的考古遗址，以展示这些社会、经济和信仰体系的不同方面。对与撒哈拉牧民群体共存的绿洲文明的探索将标志着一项根本性的科学进步，也是一项在学术界之外具有重大意义的发现。

项目成果

Horses and Habitations: Iron Age Rock Art from Fortified Hilltop Settlements in the Wadi Draa, Morocco

马匹和栖息地：摩洛哥瓦迪德拉山顶定居点的铁器时代岩石艺术

• DOI: 10.1163/21915784-bja10008
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: Journal of African Archaeology
• 影响因子: 1.4
• 作者: Bokbot Y