World Archaeology and Palaeoanthropology
Articles
Photos
- Tel Miqne - Ekron, Israel
I participated in the 13th and last session of excavation at the Biblical city of Tel Miqne - Ekron, in 1996.
"Tel Miqne, one of the largest Iron Age sites in Israel, is identified with biblical Ekron, one of the five capital cities of the Philistines. Tem miles inland from the Mediterranean seaport of Ashdod, Ekron is located on the border that separates the coastal plain from the hill country of Judah. In antiquity, it was a powerful, independant city-state which, in the beginning, threatened the existence of the indeginous Canaanites and the newly settled Israelites. Ekron was a major Philistine political and commercial center. In the 10th. c. B.C.E. it came under the shadow of the powerful kingdom of Judah, and by the 7th. c. was one of the vassal city-states of the Neo-Assyrian empire. In 603 B.C.E. Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, destroyed Ekron and with it the last vestiages of Philistine culture.
"Excavations have shed new light on four dramatic chapters in the history of Ekron. The first was the Canaanite settlement of the second millennium B.C.E.; the second, a large fortified city founded by the Sea Peoples/Philistines in the 12th and 11th c. B.C.E. which contained metal and other industries and a large palace and hearth sanctuaries with Aegean affinities. the third occurred in the 10th through 8th. c. B.C.E. when the city was reduced in size and conquered by the Neo-Assyrian King Sargon II in 712 B.C.E. The fourth took place when the city expanded and became one of the most important olive oil production centers in the ancient Near East. The city also produced a unique assemblage of four-horned altars, inscriptions to the goddess Aherah, and five caches of jewlry and silver ingots."
[The above is from the 1996 Tel Miqne - Ekron session information pamphlet]
- Peers Cave, South Africa
A detailed description of Peers Cave and its excavated contents is available by clicking this link.
- Cederberg Mountain Range, South Africa
Bushmen rock art in the Cederberg Mountain Range, Western Cape, South Africa. Dates range from c. 5 000 BC to the 19th century AD. These photos display both the rock art and the surrounding landscape of the Cederberg.
Books, journals and external resources
- Professor John Hawks' blog
- Dieneke's Anthropology blog
- Kevin Greene. Archaeology: An introduction - an electronic companion
- An 8 part video series consisting of introductory lectures and presentations of Australopithecus sediba. the accompanying press release can be accessed on the University of the Witwatersrand's website.
- Interactive presentation ("When the sea saved humanity")on Pinnacle Point, South Africa. Pinnacle Point, excavated by Professor Curtis Marean et al., has evidence for some of the earliest occurrences of cognitively modern human behaviour
- Professor Ralph Holloway's website
- C. David Kreger. A look at modern human origins
- An hour-long audio interview of Milford Wolpoff by Razib Khan on human evolution
- Ron Clarke video on Little Foot
- Freely availale key works by Michael Shanks
- Tony Baker. Paleoindian & other archaeological stuff
- A workshop on palaeoclimates and human evolution
- A comprehensive list of Milford Wolpoff's publications available online in pdf format
- Publications by Rob Boyd on evolutionary theory and cultural evolution
- Web book on how humans evolved
- A National Geographic video which recounts (in about than 10 minutes) the story of the discovery of the Dikika hominin child's skeleton
- Spanish Pleistocene site of the Atapuerca Foundation
- Journals: Journal of Human Evolution, African Archaeological Review, Current Anthropology, Journal of Archaeological Science, Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, American Journal of Physical Anthropology, PNAS, Evolutionary Anthropology, Antiquity, Cambridge Archaeological Journal, Oxford Journal of Archaeology, Quaternary International, Homo, Journal of World Prehistory
- A random snapshot of books on my shelves: Origins: Selected letters of Charles Darwin 1822-1859; Charles Darwin, The Beagle Letters; Axe Age: Acheulian toolmaking from Quarry to Discard; Ardipithecus kadabba: Late Miocene evidence from the Middle Awash, Ethiopia; The Human Career; The First Humans: Origin and Early Evolution of the Genus Homo; Human Osteology; The Human Lineage; Evolutionary Archaeology; The Fossil Trail; Quaternary Extinctions; From Lucy to Language. See Recommended Readings for a comprehensive bibliography.
Expeditions and fieldwork opportunities
Professional organisations
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