Feasting networks and Resilience at the end of the British Bronze Age

探索社区如何应对经济和气候危机是加强对过去和现在复原力理解的关键。这个项目将探索在青铜时代末期英国对日益恶化的气候和贸易崩溃的反应。一个主要焦点是发展起来的新的社会和经济网络，以及这些网络如何使社区在面对动荡时具有复原力。这将通过采用一套新的科学方法来分析非常丰富但尚未得到充分研究的被称为“丘”的遗址来实现。大约在公元前800年，由于气候恶化和经济崩溃，欧洲遭受了巨大的动荡，青铜突然失去了价值。就像21世纪的经济危机一样，公元前一千年的第一次繁荣和萧条造成了巨大的不稳定。在英国南部，社会的焦点并没有转向铁器，而是转向农业集约化和大规模的宴会；在铁器时代之前，有一个“盛宴时代”。这些盛宴的遗迹创造了一些有史以来最令人震惊的考古遗址。这些“墓穴”代表了英国史前时期最丰富的材料资源，其中一些覆盖了几个足球场大小的区域，并生产了数十万件文物。这些为理解这一阶段的社会经济变化提供了关键。尽管有丰富的考古资源和这一转变对几个世纪以来形成社会的重要性，我们仍然知之甚少。最根本的变化是青铜贸易网络的崩溃。几个世纪以来，青铜贸易网络一直控制着人员、思想和文物的流动。我们对以这些盛大宴会为中心的新的社会和经济网络知之甚少，这些网络使社会在不稳定时期具有弹性，并在罗马征服之前构建了权力关系和社区互动。它们不仅是了解这一过渡阶段的关键，也是更广泛地了解英国后来的史前时期的关键。新的研究进展意味着解决这些考古问题的时机已经成熟。最近的发掘为解决这些问题提供了丰富的材料。此外，科学的进步意味着我们现在可以比以前更精确地建立人类和动物的运动模式。最后，有大量的材料和一套科学方法可以重建英国南部不断变化的社会面貌，并研究它如何在经济和气候恶化的情况下保持弹性。该项目将重点关注位于威尔特郡和泰晤士河谷两个地区的六座可以追溯到青铜时代到铁器时代过渡时期（公元前800年至公元前400年）的墓穴。这些地区是这一阶段活动的中心，举办了大量的宴会活动，丰富的物质组合证明了这一点。这些宴会处于不断变化的社会动态的中心。它们为社区互动、锻造和巩固新联盟提供了一个焦点。它们也是新经济实践的焦点，代表着农产品集约化和贸易的中心。因此，使用一套生物考古技术，该项目将研究发展起来的新的社会和经济网络，并使用理论模型，研究它们如何使社区在逆境中保持弹性。多同位素分析（锶、硫、碳、氮和氧）将揭示动物和人类的起源，以及如何通过不同的畜牧业和景观利用来最大化农业生产。这将重建新的社区间网络以及经济和农业生产的组织，从而揭示使社区具有弹性的策略。它将为社会经济崩溃的反应提供一个关键的案例研究，并将改变对青铜时代末期变化如何影响英国南部几个世纪社会的理解。

Exploring how communities respond to economic and climatic crisis is key for enhancing understanding of resilience in the past and present. This project will explore responses to a deteriorating climate and trade collapse at the end of the Bronze Age in Britain. A major focus is the new social and economic networks that developed and how these made communities resilient in the face of turmoil. This will be achieved by employing a new suite of scientific methods to analyse the very rich, but understudied sites known as middens.Around 800BC Europe suffered great upheaval as the climate deteriorated and economies collapsed, with bronze abruptly losing value. Like the 21st century economic crisis, this first millennium BC boom and bust caused great instability. In southern Britain, society did not shift focus to iron, but rather to agricultural intensification and grand-scale feasting; there was a 'Feasting Age' prior to the Iron Age. The remains of these feasts created some of the most startling archaeological sites ever unearthed. These 'middens' represent the very richest resource of material from British prehistory, some covering an area the size of several football pitches and producing hundreds of thousands of artefacts. These provide the key to understanding socio-economic change during this phase.In spite of the rich archaeological resource and the importance of this transition in shaping society for centuries, we still know remarkably little. The most fundamental change was the breakdown in the bronze trade network, which had controlled the movement of people, ideas and artefacts for centuries. We know very little about the new social and economic networks that emerged and centred on these vast feasts, making society resilient at a time of instability and framing power relations and community interaction right up to the Roman conquest. They are key to understanding not only this transitional phase, but British later prehistory more broadly.New research developments mean that the time is right to address these archaeological problems. Recent excavations have provided a wealth of material to address these issues. In addition, scientific advances mean that we can now establish patterns of human and animal movement with greater precision than was previously possible. Finally, there is a large body of material and a suite of scientific methods that can reconstruct the changing face of society in southern Britain and examine how it remained resilient in the face of economic and climatic deterioration.The project will focus on six middens that date to the Bronze Age-Iron Age transition (c. 800BC-400BC) in two regions: Wiltshire and the Thames Valley. These areas were the epicentres of activity during this phase, hosting vast feasting events evidenced by rich material assemblages. These feasts were at the very centre of the dynamics of a changing society. They provide a focal point for community interaction, forging and consolidating new alliances. They are also the focus of new economic practices, representing hubs for the intensification and trade of agricultural produce. Therefore, using a suite of bioarchaeological techniques, the project will examine the new social and economic networks that developed and, using theoretical models, will examine how they made communities resilient in the face of adversity.Multi-isotope analysis (strontium, sulphur, carbon, nitrogen and oxygen) will reveal where animals and humans came from and how agricultural production was maximised through different husbandry practices and landscape use. This will reconstruct the new inter-community networks and the organisation of the economy and agricultural production, thus revealing the strategies that made communities resilient. It will provide a key case study into responses to socio-economic collapse and will transform understanding of how change at the end of the Bronze Age shaped society in southern Britain for centuries.