Lecture 5
Doing Archaeology

Goals
	Levels of understanding the past
		Culture History
		Past Lifeways
		Cultural Process
	Context is everything
	Measurement and statistics
	Research design
Archaeological terms
	Site, feature, artifact, ecofact
	Provenience, association, in situ
	Strata (bed, level, layer, spit) stratigraphy, superposition
	Assemblage, industry, culture, tradition, phase
	Three-age System
Finding sites
	Field survey
	Remote sensing
	Sampling 
	Test pits or trenches
Excavating sites
	Establishing position
	Laying out grid
	Removing overburden
	Digging
		By natural layers
		By arbitrary layers
	Mapping artifacts & features
	Removing & labeling artifacts
	Soil samples
	Sieving & flotation
Site formation
	Erosion & sedimentation
	Where are best places to find sites?
Dating (usually in years Before Present, BP, present being 1950)
	Relative
		Law of Superposition
		Faunal correlation (Biostratigraphy)
		Paleomagnatism- present to 160 million BP
		Seriation
	Absolute
		Historical Records
		Dendrochronology (Tree-ring Dating)
		Radiometric
			Radioactive isotopes & Half-life
			Limitations
				Calibration and Statistical certainty
				Materials measured
			Carbon 14- 300 to 50,000 BP; organic remains
			Potassium/argon- 100,000 to 4 billion BP; volcanic rocks
Artifact analysis
	Biological remains
		Botanical
			Flotation samples
			Palynology
		Faunal
			Faunal analyses; proportions of animals, proportions of elements
			Usage patterns; cutmarks, breakage, burning
	Classification
		Traditional
			By morphology
			Function usually assumed
		Newer methods: Function, Style and Technology
		Groups of artifacts
			By  single type artifacts
			By a collection of type artifacts
			By proportions of artifact type
	Wear patterns
	Ethnographic comparisons
	Experimental archaeology
		Manufacture
		Use
Site analysis
	Spatial patterns
		Functional areas
		Social group areas
	Site classification
		Living sites
		Kill sites
		Quarries
		Ceremonial sites
		Burial sites
	Settlement patterns