At the renovated Archaeological Museum of Nafplio the findings from Franchthi Cave, an important prehistoric [palaeolithic - mesolithic - neolithic] site in Greece, are displayed. Among them, the adornment artifacts are abundant: bone, stone and shell beads and pendants, the unique case of  documenting the whole technological process of making beads out of the Cerastoderma glaucum shell, and of course some ornaments made of Spondylus gaederopus. The ornament assemblage has been studied by Michele Ann Miller as part of her ground-breaking PhD on stone age jewellery in the Aegean [check the bibliography for all the related papers by Michele].

Following the Poros Spondylus of a previous post, a Spondylus gaederopus valve inside the wall of a beach bar in Chalkidiki, Greece.

The 15th annual meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists will take place at Riva del Garda (15-20/09/2009).

Roberto Micheli is the organiser of a session dedicated to the study of prehistoric adornment.

From natural shapes to abstract geometries: new data and current trends in the study of prehistoric personal ornaments

The recent discoveries and developments in the study of prehistoric personal ornaments have highlighted the antiquity, the complexity of employment and the relevance of such objects in prehistoric societies. Indeed, personal ornaments constitute a fascinating field of material culture having psychological, religious and sociological implications, since people used them to express their personality, to protect themselves from magic and illness, to indicate the! belonging of individuals to particular groups and to underline their social status. Therefore, ornaments are not only simple aesthetic artefacts or costume embellishments, but rather they are effective means to convey complex information and messages which cannot always be inferred from mere archaeological evidence. Nevertheless, personal ornaments do not often receive the attention they deserve during excavations and have not yet been given due relevance in prehistoric research. The aim of this session is to offer new data and an overview of current trends in the study of personal ornaments of prehistoric Europe. The session would allow scholars to present their latest research and discuss a number of issues, such as types and raw material variability, technological aspects, usewear and ornaments employment, circulation and trade, symbolic meaning, ancient costume. The session could be a unique opportunity to meet and debate, and could also be a starting point to establish a specific research branch on personal ornaments, with its own methodology and problems, within prehistoric studies. The session would be divided into two sections: one devoted to Palaeolithic and Mesolithic studies, the other to Neolithic studies.

PLEASE CONTACT: Roberto Micheli Via Pierluigi Da Palestrina, 1 34133 – Trieste Italy T: +39 328 4574853 E: michelir@tiscali.it

Alexander J. Martin (University of Pittsburg) has recently completed his PhD on the Spondylus industry of coastal Equador. His thesis (2009) and his MA (2001), the abstacts of which are posted below, are available through the Proquest digital dissertation database.

Francesco Carrer and Zsuzsanna Siklósi organize for the first time in the history of the EAA meetings a session dedicated to research by postgraduate students, entitled “Young scholars, high level: student research of upland landscapes and other important archaeological subjects”.

The first part of the session will concern the upland landscapes. Every kind of approach will be taken into account: from site analysis to the evaluation of territorial structure, from the application of new technologies to the digital rendering of landscape, from paleoenvironmental analysis to settlement strategy analysis… This will be the main part of the session. On the other hand, it has been decided to give a chance to other students that present high quality research not strictly within the main session theme; in fact, postgraduate research concerning any thematic, chronological, geographical or theoretical ambit can be presented in the second part of the session.

Supervisors of the session will be Francesco Carrer (francescocarrer@libero.it), PhD student at the Department of Philosophy, History and Cultural Heritage of Trento University and Zsuzsanna Siklósi (siklosizs@gmail.com), PhD student at Eötvös Loránd University, Institute of Archaeological Sciences, Budapest.

An abstract of the proposed paper has to be sent before the 31^st of May deadline to the e-mail address laboratoriodipreistoria@lett.unitn.it; the e-mail address of the participating student has to be indicated to enable contact after the selection. The abstract has to be written in English and should not exceed 3000 characters.

The abstracts will be read by a board of examiners that will judge them for their originality and academic merits. The members of this board will be: Prof. Annaluisa Pedrotti (Prehistoric Archaeology), Dr. Stefano Grimaldi (Paleolithic Archaeology), Dr. Diego Angelucci (Geoarchaeology), Dr. Elisa Possenti (Medieval Archaeology), Dr. Fabio Cavulli (Methodology of Research). A decision on the admission of papers will be made by the deadline of the 20^th of. All students who have sent an abstract will be informed of the result of the selection.

Some of the papers will be selected for presentation in the session, some will not. A few of the non-selected papers will be invited to join the poster session.

The Spondylidae in the historical collections of the Museum d’Histoire Naturelle, Geneva, with revision of the species described by Lamarck and by Chenu, and notes on nomenclature (Bivalvia : Pectinoidea : Spondylidae). Archiv für Molluskenkunde 137 (1) : 1-73

Article by Yves Finet and Kevin Lamprell.

A pdf version of the article is kindly provided by Yves Finet.

Environmental Archaeology in Greece is a blog-based site run by Dr. L. Karali under the auspices of the University of Athens, aiming to accumulate info, new publications, original articles and presentations related to the many faces of practicing environmental archaeology in Greece.

A rare case where a modified Spondylus gaederopus valve was used as an ear-imitation for a skull in a megalithic dolmen.

Text from

http://anthropologie-et-paleopathologie.univ-lyon1.fr/html/html/Les%20tr%C3%A9panations.htm

“La seconde trépanation est mégalithique, provenant du niveau moyen ( datable du début du bronze ) d’un petit dolmen situé à Roque d’Aille, dans le Var. L’intervention concerne la région fronto – pariéto – temporale gauche d’un crâne féminin, associé a une “oreille”gauche, sculptée dans un coquillage méditerranéen (un Spondylus gaedoropus L.). Crâne et coquillage avaient subi une crémation. La trépanation a été effectuée selon la technique classique du raclage puis du biseautage avec un instrument lithique. Une survie de quelques mois a pu être supposée d’après le début de cicatrisation osseuse.L’imitation auriculaire, pourt sa part, est un cas unique en Europe.Sa motivation n’est pas évidente : amulette, “prothèse”? Une certitude est qu’elle a été portée un temps assez long, comme le prouve l’usure relevée au niveau de la perforation qu’elle possède.”

Primary reference:
Perrot R., P. Morel & G. Bérard
1972 Un cas intéressant de trépanation mégalithique (dolmen de Roque – d’Aille, Lorgues, Var) associée à une imitation auriculaire. Cahiers méd. Lyonnais 48(26): 2871 – 2880.

Online, pdf-available journal Mediterranean Marine Science Journal published by the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research

The Mediterranean Marine Science Journal is published semi-annually by the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research (HCMR), replacing the previous journal entitled “Thalassographica”.

The journal welcomes original articles short notes and extended reviews in all fields of Oceanography (physical oceanography, operational oceanography, chemistry, biology, geology and geophysics), Limnology, Fisheries and Aquaculture in the Mediterranean area and the adjacent regions.

“A Social Archaeology of Households in Neolithic Greece: An Anthropological Approach” by Stella Souvatzi

The study of households and everyday life is increasingly recognized as fundamental in social archeological analysis. This volume is the first to address the household as a process and as a conceptual and analytical means through which we can interpret social organization from the bottom up. Using detailed case studies from Neolithic Greece, Stella Souvatzi examines how the household is defined socially, culturally, and historically; she discusses household and community, variability, production and reproduction, individual and collective agency, identity, change, complexity, and integration. Her study is enriched by an in-depth discussion of the framework for the household in the social sciences and the synthesis of many anthropological, historical, and sociological examples. It reverses the view of the household as passive, ahistorical, and stable, showing it instead to be active, dynamic, and continually shifting.

Stella Souvatzi in her book re-examines the Spondylus bracelets’ assemblage from Dimini, Thessaly.