Museum of Anthropological Archaeology
Editor at University of Michigan Museum of Anthropological Archaeology
In 1975, James B. Griffin retired as director of the University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology. During his three decades as director and professor, he had become one of the leading archaeologists in North America and had tremendous influence over the next generation of archaeological research. To honor the man and his work, nineteen scholars contributed essays to this volume.
In 1968 and 1969, Frank Hole directed the excavation of Chagha Sefid, a prehistoric site on the Deh Luran plain in Iran occupied from about 7000 to 3500 BC. This volume contains an analysis of the architecture, burials, and artifacts uncovered on the site. Contributions by M. J. Kirkby and Colin Renfrew.
In the early 1970s, Robert D. Drennan excavated the Middle Formative archaeological site Fábrica San José in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico. In this volume he presents the results of the excavations and provides a chronology of Middle Formative ceramics. Appendix on carbonized plant remains by Richard I. Ford.
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Karen Cowan Ford provides a guide to five extensive collections of medicinal plants from the Southwest U.S. and Mexico that are housed at the Ethnobotanical Laboratory (now part of the Archaeobiology Laboratories) at the University of Michigan Museum of Anthropological Archaeology. Includes information on the Spanish and botanical names of the plants, where they were collected, and their historical use.
The Effigy Mound tradition of Wisconsin dates to between roughly AD 100 and AD 1400. Its center is in central and southern Wisconsin, with a handful of sites also found in Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, and Michigan. During excavation at two major Effigy Mound sites—the Bigelow site and the Sanders site—William M. Hurley and his crew recorded 56 mounds, 91 features, 3 houses, and 10 prehistoric burials, and uncovered more than 55,000 artifacts.
The Yomut Turkmen of Central Asia are a nomadic people who migrate seasonally with their flocks. They live in the region where northern Iran, Afghanistan, and southern Turkmenistan meet, east of the Caspian Sea. In this monograph, William Irons describes the Yomut Turkmen’s political structure, kinship system, and social organization.
Bruce D. Smith reports on the faunal remains of seven Middle Mississippi sites in Tennessee, Arkansas, and Missouri, in the northern part of the Lower Mississippi River Valley. Remains recovered include those from white-tailed deer, raccoon, fish, turkey, rabbits, black bear, and more. The seven sites—the Banks site, the Chucalissa site, the Gooseneck site, the Lilbourn site, Powers Fort, the Snodgrass site, and the Turner site—date to between AD 1000 and 1550.
For this volume, archaeologist Jane W. Pires-Ferreira analyzed artifacts from the Valley of Oaxaca in order to understand more about prehistoric trade patterns in the region. Using her analyses, she was able to describe obsidian exchange networks, iron ore mirror exchange networks, and shell exchange networks in Early and Middle Formative Mesoamerica.
The Marksville site, which is believed to be contemporaneous with and connected to Hopewell sites in Ohio and Illinois, is in Avoyelles Parish in central Louisiana, in the Lower Mississippi Valley. In this volume, Alan Toth compiles information drawn from three early archaeological excavations at Marksville.
Carole L. Crumley draws on literary and archaeological sources to present a study of Celtic social structure during the period of about 500 BC to AD 1, prior to Roman conquest.
Niara Sudarkasa reports on Yoruba women and their role as traders in Nigeria’s marketing system. During Sudarkasa’s 15-month fieldwork in western Nigeria, she spoke with hundreds of traders, men and women, in order to understand the Yoruba markets, the division of labor, the difference between urban and rural communities in the region, residence and kinship, and other complexities of Yoruba society.
The Yörük of southeastern Turkey are both farmers and nomads. Every year, some of them migrate with their flocks into the mountains for summer pasture, and then back down to the plains for the winter. Others have chosen to remain settled. Anthropologist Daniel G. Bates lived in Turkey for two years in order to study the tribe. Here he describes the many aspects of tribal life: marriage and kidnapping, descent, residence and household patterns, pasture rights, domestic production and wealth, and settlement patterns.
In order to study canal irrigation in the Valley of Oaxaca, archaeologist Susan H. Lees visited more than 20 villages in the region. She interviewed residents and photographed local water systems. In this volume, Lees analyzes the relationship between water control and local and state government; compares Oaxacan irrigation with that in other regions; and assesses the role of organized labor in the establishment and maintenance of an irrigation system.
Gregory Alan Johnson uses the results of his archaeological survey of the Susiana plain of Iran to analyze settlement patterns in four Uruk occupational phases. Includes more than 100 maps, figures, tables, and photographs.
In the first volume of a series on Prehistory and Human Ecology of the Valley of Oaxaca, Anne V. T. Kirkby investigated the agricultural production in the valley. With land-use data gathered at the time of her study (the 1960s), she created population and distribution models to help archaeologists interpret prehistoric settlement patterns in the region.
The Late Prehistoric buffalo trap and meat-processing area known as the Wardell site is in Sublette County, in western Wyoming. In this volume, George C. Frison reports on the 1970–1971 excavation at the site. He describes the artifact assemblage and botanical materials and offers radiocarbon dates and an archaeological interpretation of the site. Contribution by Charles A. Reher.
Louise M. Robbins analyzes prehistoric human remains from sites in the central Ohio Valley. She organizes them into five groups and describes the varieties. She also sorts the remains by culture (Baum, Feurt, Anderson, Madisonville). Extensive appendices on metrical and morphological terminology, data, descriptions, drawings, and more.
Contributors in this volume are concerned with the role of exchange in maintaining social systems as diverse as aboriginal Australia, 1960s Madagascar, and prehistoric Mesopotamia. Contributions by Aram A. Yengoyan, George C. Frison, Richard I. Ford, Stuart Struever, Gail L. Houart, Peter Benedict, Henry T. Wright, Conrad P. Kottak, and Kent V. Flannery.
In this report, Robert Whallon provides a brief description of monothetic subdivisive classification, why it is useful in defining objective typologies in archaeology, and how it can be applied to an archaeological data set using a computer program.
In this volume, the authors collect data from various sources on the excavations of two groups of prehistoric burial mounds: the Knight Mound Group in Calhoun County, Illinois, and the Norton Mound Group in Kent County, Michigan. Includes more than 200 b&w maps, illustrations, and photographs.
Charles H. McNutt reports on excavations at the Tesuque By-Pass site in the northern Rio Grande Valley, north of Santa Fe, New Mexico. He found three Puebloan components and two pithouse occupations, spanning the period from about AD 900 to 1300. He includes detailed discussions of pottery and related ceramic complexes, as well as comparisons to other occupations in the area. Appendix on faunal remains by Arthur J. Jelinek.
Henry T. Wright offers a study of economy and production at two Mesopotamian sites dating to the Early Dynastic: Ur, a large town, and Sakheri Sughir, a small rural community. Includes appendices on artifacts, faunal remains, and two burials. Contributions by Sandor Bökönyi, Kent V. Flannery, and John Mayhall.
In this study of prehistoric trade in the Near East, Gary A. Wright uses obsidian—which comes from just a few sources in the region—to analyze long-distance distribution networks and local exchange.
In the early 1960s, archaeologists Frank Hole, Kent V. Flannery, and James A. Neely surveyed the prehistoric mounds in Deh Luran and then excavated at two sites: Ali Kosh and Tepe Sabz. The researchers found evidence that the sites dated to between 7500 and 3500 BC, during which time the residents domesticated plants and animals. This volume, published in 1969, was the first in the Museum’s Memoir series—designed for data-rich, heavily illustrated archaeological monographs.
Anta Montet-White analyzed chipped stone tools from more than 30 Woodland and Hopewell sites in the Illinois Valley, including Steuben, Weaver, Havana, Klunk, and Snyders. Contains more than 65 drawings and photographs of various tools, including preforms, projectile points, celts, and hoes.
