The Archaeology of Sustainability

The site of Engaruka in northern Tanzania has been the focus of decades of archaeological research regarding the development of terraced field systems in East Africa. Engaruka is a vast agricultural landscape, occupied from the 14th century and abandoned in 18th century. The abandonment of such a large and intensively cultivated area has been interpreted by some policy makers as a response to a failure of the agronomy, as has been argued elsewhere. This PhD research represents the archaeobotanical component of the AAREA (Archaeology of Agricultural Resilience in East Africa) Project, which was focused on establishing the efficacy of applying archaeological results that are in a dynamic state of development to policy decisions regarding agricultural resilience and sustainability. This study focuses on the identification of crops in cultivation at Engaruka during its occupation based on the analysis of archaeobotanical residues (e.g. charred plant remains), as well as historic and ethnographic observations of cultivation throughout the region. The results confirm the presence of sorghum and other millets as well as several pulses, disproving the argument that ancient Engarukans were practicing sorghum monoculture. These data have been queried to address questions about the presence and preservation of millets and pulses and non-crop taxa in both expected and unlikely contexts, providing information on a range of issues including cultivation strategy and practice, specifically relating to harvesting techniques, the role of wild and weedy taxa, and differential use of space. Discussion is based upon detailed investigations of plant cultivation, collection/harvest, and exploitation through quantification of charred plant macrofossils, gathered weeds/wild taxa, and interview data relating to farming practices, thus highlighting the strengths of a multidisciplinary approach for understanding resilience, sustainability, and, more generally, what it means to subsist in a challenging and dynamic agricultural landscape.

Author: Manolis I. Stefanakis. xii+192 pages; illustrated throughout in colour and black & white. Papers in English and Greek.. 52 2018. Available both in print and Open Access. Printed ISBN 9781784917685. Epublication ISBN 9781784917692.

Abstract
The area of Kymissala on the southwest coast of Rhodes is of great archaeological interest, as it conceals a large number of important archaeological sites belonging to the lesser known ancient deme of the Rhodian countryside, the deme of Kymissaleis. The region is also of exceptional environmental and ecological importance, as it has a particular biodiversity and is protected by the European ‘Natura 2000’ network of nature protection areas.
Kymissala has systematically been researched during the past 10 years by the Kymissala Archaeological Research Project (KARP) inaugurated by the Department of Mediterranean Studies and the Ephorate of Antiquities of the Dodecanese in 2006.
The research, escaping from its narrow academic and archaeological context and exploiting the comparative advantage of the region, may –and should– inter alia, intervene in a mild and sustainable manner in the promotion of the archaeological site of Kymissala. Its ultimate goal is to promote the antiquities of the area, its educational value and its historical and cultural continuity within a protected natural environment, in the context of an ecological-archaeological park.
Under the title Kymissala: Archaeology – Education – Sustainability, fourteen original studies have been published, constituting the first complete presentation of the area of Kymissala and the work in progress, after ten years of systematic research, in terms of Archaeology, Education and Sustainable Development.

Le preoccupazioni quotidiane sullo sviluppo sostenibile hanno certamente avuto un peso nel promuovere una serie di ricerche sulla sostenibilità e la resilienza delle comunità umane nel passato. Dobbiamo precisare, tuttavia, che esse non nascono all'interno del contenitore dell'archeologia europea, ma sono state sviluppate principalmente da ricercatori che si occupano di società precoloniali nelle Americhe, in Africa e Oceania.
Queste esperienze sono molto eterogenee, utilizzano strumenti e metodologie diversi, e, non meno importante, spesso il cuore della ricerca è altro, anche se possiamo estrarre dati sulla sostenibilità. Ma sarebbe ingeneroso affermare che gli archeologi europei non si siano mai posti la domanda se le scelte operate dalle comunità umane che stavano studiando erano o meno sostenibili. Quindi, in un panorama disciplinare già molto ricco, non si ritiene necessario proporre la fondazione di nuove discipline. Al contrario, appare più utile dotare di nuovi strumenti le discipline esistenti, che già dispongono di consolidati apparati ermeneutici, per porci nuove domande o, ancora meglio, per porci le stesse domande in modo nuovo, da una prospettiva nuova.

Archaeological investigations of the largest urban centers in southern Mesopotamia have excluded collection and detailed interpretation of faunal remains. This exclusion has resulted in a biased interpretation of urban dynamics based largely on architecture, site planning, artifact distribution, and textual evidence. The samples that do exist from these sites are often incomplete. Additionally, textual evidence pertaining to animal exploitation is essentially silent when it comes to pig husbandry and offers little information on the exploitation of fish and other wild resources. While addressing these biases with the analysis of faunal material from the late second millennium (BCE) urban site of Mashkan-shapir, this study also aims to shed light on the complex interplay between urban life and the natural diversity of the southern Mesopotamian wetlands. The site is presented as a model for heterarchical sociopolitical organization and sustainable agroecological approach to subsistence. A fundamental link is made between sustainability and heterarchical organization and consensus.

Results of the analysis of over 7000 specimens from excavation, as well as nearly 2900 specimens from systematic flotation, indicate that wetland resources were an integral part of the site economy. The data suggest pigs were a major dietary component, and suggest low intensity cultivation of free roaming "street pigs" as the likely pig rearing strategy. Ovicaprid remains indicate a strong bias towards sheep with the primary goal of wool production. The study attempts to describe and quantify the role of wetlands as a sustainable resource adding to the vitality and success of Mashkan-shapir. The data suggest an urban setting intimately linked to wetland ecosystems. This model of wetland exploitation is compared to both ancient and modern data including modern models of mixed species sustainable agroecosystems to illustrate the efficiency and sustainability of the proposed Mashkan-shapir model. The data from Mashkan-shapir suggest that a heretofore unexamined or hidden portion of the economy based on fishing, hunting, household level pig husbandry, and wetland resource exploitation, played a crucial role in the lives of Mesopotamian urbanites.

Cumulative cost surfaces have been the core of the least cost path analysis for decades. Recently, some researchers found cumulative
cost surfaces helpful in a broader evaluation process. In particular, they proved to raise many brand new questions
to challenge the archaeological and historical datasets in terms of environmental sustainability. The main goal of this paper
is to evaluate whether the territory controlled by towns and castles could sustain -i.e. to produce enough food - the people
that presumably used to live within it. I shall present some case studies from medieval Tuscany, and the procedures adopted.