Doctoral Dissertation: Ceramic Vessel Circulation in Iron Age Moab (Jordan): A Regional Archaeometric Approach

在Bruce Routledge博士的指导下，Benjamin W. Porter将使用考古技术（岩石学和仪器中子活化分析（INAA））研究铁器时代（公元前1250 -500年）摩押（约旦中部）陶瓷容器的循环。目前，学术界一致认为，摩押没有证据表明其社会复杂程度符合古代国家的进化定义。然而，在做出这样的描述之前，需要对摩押的政治经济进行调查。目前，学者们认为，摩押的精英们仍然太弱，无法将当地的经济实践导向迪班（该国的行政首都）。相反，生产、分配和消费实践被认为是分散的，并在当地以小规模组织起来。然而，关于集约化农业生产、专业化陶瓷容器生产和明显的社会分化的考古证据，特别是在铁器II期的后半期，表明“摩阿比特人”的经济实践并不能很好地解释将分散和相对欠发达联系起来的假设。因此，通过调查不断变化的生产、交换和消费实践，该项目将对我们了解铁器时代摩押以及遥远过去复杂社会的经济和政治多样性做出重要贡献。本研究计划在社会变革的两个不稳定时期（铁器时代IIB和IIC时期）调查这些问题，使用物质文化循环模型，考虑生产来源和消费背景，以确定经济实践随时间的变化。美国国家科学基金会的资金将允许在摩押的首都古迪班进行为期四周的实地考察，在那里将挖掘摩押的精英居住地。接下来的数据将进行岩石学、INAA和放射性碳分析，以重建陶器的起源和生产方法，并确保它们在迪班沉积的绝对日期。这反过来又将允许重建当地的贸易和消费惯例及其随时间的变化。结论将在发表的文章、专著和学术报告中提出，鼓励在考古研究中进一步使用考古测量程序。该研究将生成区域岩石学和INAA数据集，并广泛分发给学者进行自己的研究。在约旦举行的几次公开讲座和报纸文章将向讲阿拉伯语的社区传播摩押和古代经济习俗的知识，鼓励当地参与现场解释和介绍。从广义上讲，这项研究解决了经济与社会之间的关系，而这种关系在全球范围内正在迅速变化。因此，考古学的长期视角是至关重要的；这不仅是为了说明人类是如何达到目前的高度互联状态的；但也要记住人类制造、使用和获得物品的许多不同方式，这是他们所处的历史和文化背景的产物。正是在这最后一点，调查历史上遥远的中东政体的摩押发现其最大的意义。

Under the supervision of Dr. Bruce Routledge, Benjamin W. Porter will investigate the circulation of ceramic vessels in Iron Age (1250 -500 BC) Moab (central Jordan) using archaeometric techniques (petrography and Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis (INAA)). Currently, a scholarly consensus assumes that Moab did not evidence levels of social complexity befitting evolutionary definitions of archaic states. Before any such characterization should be made, however, an investigation exploring Moab's political economy is required. At present, scholars argue that Moab's elites remained too weak to orient local economic practices towards Dhiban, the polity's administrative capital. Instead, production, distribution, and consumption practices are presumed to have been dispersed and locally organized on a small-scale. However, archaeological evidence for intensive agricultural production, specialized ceramic vessel production, and marked social differentiation, especially in the later half of the Iron II period, suggests that 'Moabite" economic practices are not well explained by assumptions linking decentralization and relative underdevelopment. Therefore, by investigating shifting production, exchange, and consumption practices this project will make an important contribution to our understanding of both Iron Age Moab and economic and political diversity in complex societies of the distant past. This research proposal investigates these issues during two volatile periods of social change (the Iron Age IIB and the IIC periods), using a model of material culture circulation that considers both production sources and consumption contexts in order to determine shifts in economic practices over time. NSF funding will permit a four-week field season at ancient Dhiban, Moab's capital, where the city's elite residency will be excavated. Forthcoming data will be subjected to petrographic, INAA, and Radiocarbon analysis in order to reconstruct the origin and production methods of pottery vessels, and to secure absolute dates for their deposition at Dhiban. This in turn will allow the reconstruction of local trading and consumption practices and their change over time.Conclusions will be presented in published articles, a monograph, and scholarly presentations, encouraging the further use of archaeometric procedures in archaeological research. A regional petrographic and INAA dataset will be generated from this research and broadly distributed to scholars for their own research. Several public lectures and newspaper articles in Jordan will circulate knowledge of Moab and ancient economic practices to Arabic-speaking communities, encouraging local involvement in site interpretation and presentation. Broadly considered, this research addresses the relationship between the economy and society at a time when this relationship is changing rapidly on a global scale. Archaeology's long-term perspective is, therefore, absolutely vital; not only to illustrate how humanity has arrived at its present hyper-connected condition; but also to remember the many different ways that humans have made, used, and acquired objects as a product of their situated historical and cultural context. It is in this final point that the investigation of the historically remote Middle Eastern polity of Moab finds its greatest significance.