Environmental and Cultural Dynamics in Central Lydia, Western Turkey

在国家科学基金会的支持下，克里斯托弗·H·罗斯福博士和克里斯蒂娜·卢克博士将领导一个为期三年的跨学科研究项目，调查土耳其西部曾被称为利迪亚的地区环境与社会政治变化之间的关系。中里迪亚是这个项目的焦点，在公元前7世纪和6世纪是利迪安王国和随后的帝国的中心地带。它的首都，也是唯一的城市中心，萨迪斯，坐落在宽阔的赫尔莫斯(现在的格迪兹)河谷的南部边界，自公元前2世纪青铜时代晚期以来一直被占领。与Sardis隔着Hermos河谷，资源丰富的吉盖湖(今Marmara Golu)从史前早期到现代一直是文化活动的磁石，其周围的景观见证了新石器时代农业和定居生活的到来，青铜时代社会政治的复杂性，以及铁器时代Sardis与国家和帝国形成相关的纪念碑坟墓的出现。虽然里迪亚中部的考古遗迹多年来一直得到认可，但这将是对该地区进行的第一次区域性全面和系统的调查。该项目将确定整个里迪亚中部景观的考古遗址的分布、性质和年代学，并对石头和粘土来源和文物进行化学表征，以更好地了解通过聚落特征的变化以及工艺品和奢侈品生产的集中化和控制程度的变化来更好地了解社会政治复杂性的变化。该项目专门关注里迪亚中部，以便通过景观考古学与古环境研究相结合来确定社会复杂性变化与环境和景观动态之间的相关性。吉盖湖目前被认为形成于公元前6000年至3000年之间，自那时以来，其水位的持续波动揭示了环境的动态，此外，该湖作为当地居民的关键资源也是脆弱的。调查将包括地貌调查、水深测量和沉积物取心，以确定吉盖恩湖的发育阶段并确定其日期，并为重建古地形、古环境条件(气候、植被等)和人类活动(农业、冶金等)提供关键数据。将使用全球定位系统(GPS)收集所有空间数据，并使用地理信息系统(GIS)对所有数据进行管理、可视化和分析。该项目将增进对环境和社会政治条件变化之间的关系的了解，以及文化反应如何在聚落和文物生产和消费模式中反映在当地景观中。除了为培训美国学生提供实地考察和研究机会外，该项目还将为土耳其学生提供学习测量和景观考古的高级实践的机会，这些都是田野考古的重要非破坏性分支。该项目还将与土耳其文化和旅游部的当地代表合作，提供目前缺乏的数据，用于长期保存文化资源和管理因抢劫和工业农业活动而不断遭到破坏的考古景观。

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Christopher H. Roosevelt and Dr. Christina Luke will lead a three-year interdisciplinary research project investigating the relationship between environmental and socio-political change in the part of western Turkey once known as Lydia. Central Lydia, the focus of this project, was the heartland of the Lydian kingdom and subsequent empire during the 7th and 6th centuries BCE. Its capital and only urban center, Sardis, sits on the southern border of the wide Hermos (modern Gediz) River valley and has been occupied since the Late Bronze Age of the 2nd millennium BCE. Across the Hermos River valley from Sardis, the resource-rich Gygaean Lake (modern Marmara Golu) has been a magnet for cultural activities from early prehistoric through modern times, and its surrounding landscapes witnessed the advent of agricultural and settled life in the Neolithic period, increasing socio-political complexity through the Bronze Age, and the appearance of monumental tombs associated with state and empire formation at Sardis in the Iron Age. While archaeological remains in central Lydia have been recognized for many years, this will be the first regionally comprehensive and systematic survey of the area. The project will establish the distribution, nature, and chronology of archaeological sites across central Lydian landscapes and chemically characterize stone and clay sources and artifacts to understand better changes in socio-political complexity through variations in settlement characteristics and degrees of centralization and control in the production of craft and luxury goods.The project focuses specifically on central Lydia in order to determine correlations between changes in social complexity and environmental and landscape dynamics through combining landscape archaeology with paleoenvironmental research. The Gygaean Lake is currently thought to have formed between 6000 and 3000 BCE, and continuous fluctuations in its levels since that time reveal environmental dynamics in addition to the vulnerability of the lake as a key resource for local populations. Investigations will include geomorphic survey, bathymetric survey, and sediment coring to establish and date developmental stages of the Gygaean Lake as well as provide critical data for reconstructions of paleotopography, paleoenvironmental conditions (climate, vegetation, etc.), and human activities (agriculture, metallurgy, etc.). All spatial data will be collected using a differential Global Positioning System (GPS), and all data will be managed, visualized, and analyzed using Geographic Information Systems (GIS).This project will increase understanding of relationships between shifts in environmental and socio-political conditions and how cultural responses are reflected across local landscapes in patterns of settlement and artifact production and consumption. In addition to providing fieldwork and research opportunities for training American students, the project will provide opportunities for Turkish students to learn advanced practices of survey and landscape archaeology, important non-destructive branches of field archaeology. In collaboration with local representatives of the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the project will also supply data currently lacking for long-term cultural resource preservation and for the management of archaeological landscapes that are suffering from continuing destruction due to looting and industrial agricultural activities.