Stepping Stones: Investigating Groundstone Economy at the Birth of Agriculture on the Central Anatolian Plateau

定居主义的出现--或者说定居点的永久占领--和农业的出现改变了我们这个物种。这种转变首先发生在西南亚的新石器时代（14，000 - 10，000年前），并在随后的数千年中慢慢蔓延到安纳托利亚，巴尔干半岛和欧洲。为什么移动的觅食者会放弃维持我们物种29万年的极其成功和低风险的策略，这仍然很难解释。生活方式的变化不仅彻底改变了生存模式，还引发了社会结构和经济行为的巨大变化。值得注意的是，大约在同一时间，社区大规模地扩展了他们的磨石工具包，这表明磨石可能与早期农业实践和久坐不动的生活方式密切相关。踏脚石项目通过观察安纳托利亚遗址Boncuklu Höyuk，Pinarbasi和Mendik Tepe的基石来调查技术在大规模社会和经济变革中的作用。新石器时代安纳托利亚的发展不仅是了解南方和东方新技术成功吸收的关键，也是新思想传播背后的过程。新的和改进的工具将允许利用更广泛的资源，促进支持久坐行为的广谱经济。此外，磨石可能允许在饮食中释放额外的营养和能量，并可能激发了烹饪实践的多样性，从而促进了sedentism和关键植物的种植。在轴线的情况下，它也可能使更大规模的景观清除成为可能，并在涉及定居主义的永久居住方面建造新形式的长期居住地。这些问题将使用以下研究方法进行调查：1）通过深入的类型学分析，我计划深入了解当代遗址序列采用的工具组合的相似性和差异，这些遗址序列具有不同的居住和生存策略，包括不同程度的定居和植物使用。2)对不同类型工具表面的微观磨损分析将用于了解工具的使用方式以及这些工具用于加工的材料，这对于了解它们在生存，食品加工和工艺中的作用非常重要。为此，将进行涉及使用磨损的实验考古学。3)调查用于制作地面石制品的原材料的采购将告知早期的交换网络以及能源投资对地面石制品的使用和管理的影响。4)最后，空间和时间分布分析将用于重建网站上的活动区域，并揭示家庭/公共活动的潜在划分以及这些文物的制造和使用随时间的变化。在Pinarbasi、Mendik和Boncuklu的发掘不仅关注建筑遗迹及其内容，还关注建筑之间的“空”空间。这种方法产生了大量关于整个定居活动的数据，并非常适合于研究定居点内的使用和废弃情况。所产生的数据将汇集在一个全面的研究中，为了解农业诞生之初社会与技术之间复杂的相互作用提供了一个独特的窗口。

The appearance of sedentism - or the permanent occupation of settlements - and agriculture has transformed our species. This transition first occurred in the Neolithic (14,000 - 10,000 years ago) in Southwest Asia, and slowly spread into Anatolia, the Balkans, and Europe in the millennia that followed. Why mobile foragers should abandon extremely successful and low-risk strategies that sustained our species over 290,000 years remains difficult to explain. Not only did the changes in lifestyle completely alter modes of subsistence, they also instigated massive changes in social configurations and economic behaviour. Remarkably, around this same time communities massively expanded their ground stone toolkits, suggesting ground stone may be closely linked to the onset of early agricultural practices and sedentary lifestyles. The Stepping Stones project investigates the role of technology in large-scale social and economic change by looking at the ground stone from the Anatolian sites of Boncuklu Höyuk, Pinarbasi, and Mendik Tepe. The developments that took place in Anatolia during the Neolithic are not only pivotal in gaining insight into the successful uptake of new technologies from the south and the east, but also into the processes behind the spread of new ideas. New and improved tools would have allowed utilisation of a broader range of resources, contributing to a Broad-Spectrum economy underpinning sedentary behaviours. Additionally, ground stone may have allowed the release of extra nutrition and energy within diets, and may have instigated diversity in culinary practices contributing to sedentism and cultivation of key plants. It also may have enabled larger-scale landscape clearance in the case of axes, and the construction of new forms of long-term habitations in terms of permanence of residence involved in sedentism. These matters will be investigated using the following research methods: 1) Through in-depth typological analysis I plan to gain insight into the similarities and differences in tool assemblages adopted by contemporary site sequences with differing residential and subsistence strategies, including variable degrees of sedentism and plant use. 2) Microscopic wear analysis on the surface of different tool types will be used to understand how the tools were used and what materials these were used to process, which is important for understanding their role in subsistence, food processing and crafts. To this end experimental archaeology involving use-wear will be undertaken. 3) Investigating the procurement of the raw materials used to make ground stone artifacts will inform on early exchange networks and the influence of energy investment on the use and curation of ground stone objects. 4) Lastly, spatial and chronological distribution analysis will be used to reconstruct zones of activity on the sites, and reveal potential divisions in domestic/public activities as well as changes through time in the manufacture and use of these artifacts. The excavations at Pinarbasi, Mendik, and Boncuklu not only focus on the architectural remains and their contents, but also on the "empty" spaces in between structures. This approach has resulted in a wealth of data concerning overall settlement activity, and lends itself excellently to studies on use and discard within the settlements. The generated data will be brought together in one comprehensive study, offering a unique window into the complex interplay between society and technology at the dawn of agriculture.