What can we learn about the ancient landscapes of our world, and how can those lessons improve our future in the landscapes that we all inhabit? Those questions are addressed in this book, through a practical framework of concepts and methods, combined with detailed case studies around the world. The chapters explore the range of physical and social attributes that have shaped and re-shaped our landscapes through time. International authors contributed the latest results of investigating ancient landscapes (or "palaeolandscapes") in diverse settings of tropical forests, deserts, river deltas, remote islands, coastal zones, and continental interiors. The case studies embrace a liberal approach of combining archaeological evidence with other avenues of research in earth sciences, biology, and social relations. Individually and in concert, the chapters offer new perspectives on what the world’s palaeolandscapes looked like, how people lived in these places, and how communities have engaged with long-term change in their natural and cultural environments though successive centuries and millennia. The lessons are paramount for building responsible strategies and policies today and into the future, noting that many of these issues from the past have gained more urgency today. This book reaches across archaeology, ecology, geography, and broader studies of human-environment relations that will appeal to general readers. Specialists and students in these fields will find extra value in the primary datasets and in the new ideas and perspectives. Furthermore, this book provides unique examples from the past, toward understanding the workings of sustainable landscape systems.

This book focuses on issues of method and interpretation in studies of submerged landscapes, concentrating on illustrations and case studies from around Europe with additional examples from other parts of the world. Such landscapes were once exposed as dry land during the low sea levels that prevailed during the glacial periods that occupied most of the past million years and provided extensive new territories for human exploitation. Their study today involves underwater investigation, using techniques and strategies which are clearly set out in these chapters. The underwater landscape provides a rich source of information about the archaeology of human settlement and long-term changes in environment, climate and sea-level. This book highlights how such information can be revealed and interpreted. The examples presented here and the focus on techniques make this book of worldwide relevance. Chapters describe examples of underwater archaeological investigation as well as collaboration with offshore industries and legal, management and training issues relating to underwater cultural heritage. Such studies point to the significance of this drowned landscape, and readers are invited to consider its human impact in terms of past settlement and population dispersal through palaeolandscape reconstruction and interpretation in relation to broader themes in human prehistory. This volume is based on work from COST Action SPLASHCOS, a four-year multi-disciplinary and multi-national research program supported by COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) and has something to benefit all those with an interest in the sea floor of the continental shelf and the archaeological and social impact of sea-level change, including archaeologists, marine scientists, geographers, cultural-heritage managers, commercial and governmental organisations, policy makers and interested members of the public.

This open access volume provides for the first time a comprehensive description and scientific evaluation of underwater archaeological finds referring to human occupation of the continental shelf around the coastlines of Europe and the Mediterranean when sea levels were lower than present. These are the largest body of underwater finds worldwide, amounting to over 2500 find spots, ranging from individual stone tools to underwater villages with unique conditions of preservation. The material reviewed here ranges in date from the Lower Palaeolithic period to the Bronze Age and covers 20 countries bordering all the major marine basins from the Atlantic coasts of Ireland and Norway to the Black Sea, and from the western Baltic to the eastern Mediterranean. The finds from each country are presented in their archaeological context, with information on the history of discovery, conditions of preservation and visibility, their relationship to regional changes in sea-level and coastal geomorphology, and the institutional arrangements for their investigation and protection. Editorial introductions summarise the findings from each of the major marine basins. There is also a final section with extensive discussion of the historical background and the legal and regulatory frameworks that inform the management of the underwater cultural heritage and collaboration between offshore industries, archaeologists and government agencies. The volume is based on the work of COST Action TD0902 SPLASHCOS, a multi-disciplinary and multi-national research network supported by the EU-funded COST organisation (European Cooperation in Science and Technology). The primary readership is research and professional archaeologists, marine and Quaternary scientists, cultural-heritage managers, commercial and governmental organisations, policy makers, and all those with an interest in the sea floor of the continental shelf and the human impact of changes in climate, sea-level and coastal geomorphology.

This volume details how new theories and methods have recently advanced the archaeological study of initial human colonization of islands around the world, including in the southwest Pacific, the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, and Southeast Asia. This global perspective brings into comparison the wide variety of approaches used to study these early migrations and illuminates current debates in island archaeology. Evidence of island colonization is often difficult to find, especially in areas impacted by sea-level rise, and these essays demonstrate how researchers have tackled this and other issues. Contributors show the potential of computer simulations of voyaging in determining the range of timing and origin points that were possible in the past. They discuss how Bayesian modeling helps address uncertainties and controversies surrounding radiocarbon dating. Additionally, advances in biomolecular techniques such as ancient DNA (aDNA), paleoproteomics, analysis of human microbiota, and improved resolution in isotopic analyses are providing more refined information on the homelands of initial settlers, on individual life courses, and on population-level migrations. Islands offer rich opportunities to examine the exploratory nature of the human species, providing insights into the evolution of watercraft technologies and wayfinding, the impact of humans on their new environments, and the motivations for their journeys. The Archaeology of Island Colonization represents the innovative ways today’s archaeologists are reconstructing these unique paleolandscapes. Contributors: Nasullah Aziz | David Ball | Todd J. Braje | Richard Callaghan | John F. Cherry | Ethan Cochrane | Robert J. DiNapoli | Andrew Dugmore | Jon M. Erlandson | Scott M. Fitzpatrick | Amy E. Gusick | Derek Hamilton | Terry L. Hunt | Thomas P. Leppard | Carl P. Lipo | Jillian Maloney | Matthew F. Napolitano | Anthony Newton | Maria A. Nieves-Colón | Rintaro Ono | Adhi Agus Oktaviana | Timothy Rieth | Curtis Runnels | Magdalena M.E. Schmid | Alexander J. Smith | Harry Octavianus Sofian | Sriwigati | Jessica H. Stone | Orri Vésteinsson A volume in the series Society and Ecology in Island and Coastal Archaeology, edited by Victor D. Thompson

Vast coastal plains that vanished below the waves thousands of years ago were highways to new territories and a cornucopia of natural riches for early humankind. Oceans of Archaeology presents these virtually unexplored areas of the archaeological world map. It scrutinises the submerged early prehistory of Europe and reveals a richness and diversity unmatched around the globe. Specialists from ten countries join forces to tell of flooded settlements, enigmatic sacred places, amazing art and skillful navigation. Multifarious traces of food preparation, flintworking, hunting and fishing vividly illustrate Stone Age daily life. While children's footprints lead the way to new investigations of early prehistoric life in these now inundated landscapes.

Europe’s Lost Frontiers was the largest directed archaeological research project in Europe, investigating the inundated landscapes of the Early Holocene North Sea – often referred to as ‘Doggerland’. The first in a series of monographs presenting the results of the project, this book provides the context of the study and method statements.

Over the past three decades, “landscape” has become an umbrella term to describe many different strands of archaeology. From the processualist study of settlement patterns to the phenomenologist’s experience of the natural world, from human impact on past environments to the environment’s impact on human thought, action, and interaction, the term has been used. In this volume, for the first time, over 80 archaeologists from three continents attempt a comprehensive definition of the ideas and practices of landscape archaeology, covering the theoretical and the practical, the research and conservation, and encasing the term in a global framework. As a basic reference volume for landscape archaeology, this volume will be the benchmark for decades to come. All royalties on this Handbook are donated to the World Archaeological Congress.

The Till-Tweed river catchment areas in Northumberland contain outstanding archaeological and palaeoenvironmental remains which have been in general only poorly understood. This study has assembled detailed data that will provide a platform for future landscape-based research and site-based investigation. Written from a landscape, or geoarchaeological perspective, this study develops a methodology and management tool that will allow planners, curators and developers working in the region to to easily access information across sectors, and provide a transparent and easily comprehended record of sensitive archaeological and palaeoenvironmental sites.

It is difficult to capture one’s life in a few words, a few photographs or even a book. The papers in the present volume will hopefully reflect a part of Clive Bonsall’s scientific interests during a career that has started some 45 years ago. Their diversity is impressive: from radiocarbon dating, environmental changes, human-environment interactions, funerary behaviour, to paleogenetics and stable isotopes, reconstruction of ancient diets and obsidian sourcing, most of them in close connection to the hunter-gatherer and first farmer communities of Europe. His studies stretched over a large geographical area, focusing recently mainly around the Balkans and the neighbouring regions. He has conducted fieldwork in Britain, Scotland, Romania and Slovenia, edited 9 books and published over 160 papers, book-chapters, notes, as well as book and paper reviews. His main publications include: “The Mesolithic in Europe” (1989), “The Human Use of Caves” (1997), “The Iron Gates in Prehistory” (2008), “Submerged Prehistory” (2011) and “Not Just for Show: The Archaeology of Beads, Beadwork and Personal Ornaments” (2017). His substantial work in southeastern Europe is reflected by his long-standing collaboration and friendship with many Romanian and Bulgarian archaeologists, and has received due recognition: Clive Bonsall is an Honorary Member of both the “Vasile Pârvan” Institute of Archaeology in Bucharest and the National Institute of Archaeology with Museum in Sofia. His contribution to the archaeology of the Iron Gates has earned him the recognition of the Serbian archaeologists working in the area. His many other research interests and personal collaborations are also reflected in the present volume. We are grateful to all our contributors: colleagues and friends, new and old, former students and collaborators whose archaeological interests met Clive’s if only briefly. We were happy to see that so many of us were able to mobilize in such a short time. We would like to thank all those who answered our call and at a time when every minute of our professional lives is carefully planned in advance, helped us put together this volume in less than a year. They have endured and complied with our constant deadline reminders and requests, checked and re-checked their manuscripts in record times, gracefully complying with the comments and suggestions from the reviewers, and were most patient with our editorial work. Each paper was submitted to a double reviewing. We would like to also thank our colleagues from various disciplines who accepted to anonymously review the contributions. Their hard and serious work significantly improved the overall content of the volume. The outcome has exceeded our most optimistic expectation: a volume that geographically covers almost the entire European continent, from Britain to Russia and Greece and touches on most important issues of hunter-gather adaptions through time. A volume brought together by chronological landmarks (the end of the Pleistocene and the beginning of the Holocene) and geographical areas but also by common approaches to issues such as human-animal interactions, exploitation and use of raw materials, and subsistence strategies. We chose to organize the papers on three main sections, while within the respective theme they follow in chronological succession. The archaeology of the Iron Gates opens the volume, given Clive Bonsall’s substantial contribution to the local early prehistory. The eight contributions cover a large range of subjects, from physical anthropology (Andrei Soficaru), re-interpretation of earlier excavations and the subsequent collections (Adina Boroneanț), stone artefacts (Dragana Antonović, Vidan Dimić, Andrej Starović and Dušan Borić) to the study of faunal remains and subsequent paleo-dietary issues (Adrian Bălășescu, Adina Boroneanț and Valentin Radu; Dragana Filipović, Jelena Jovanović and Dragana Rančić; Ivana Živaljević, Vesna Dimitrijević and Sofija Stefanović), and osseous industries (Monica Mărgărit and Adina Boroneanț; Selena Vitezović). These studies illustrate the still immense research potential of the Iron Gates region despite the fact that most of the sites have been flooded many decades ago. During the editing of the volume it became obvious that while some of the contributions focused on the evidence from a certain site, others were more of a regional synthesis. This latter section begins with a most interesting paper bringing together world history and underwater archaeology (Jonathan Benjamin and Geoff Bailey). The following nine articles deal with subjects such as social inequalities seen through the study of burial practices (Judith M. Grünberg), lifeways, adaptations and subsistence strategies of the early prehistoric communities (Agathe Reingruber; Mihael Budja; Annie Brown and Haskel Greenfield; Kenneth Ritchie), raw materials acquisition and exploitation (Tomasz Płonka, Maria Gurova, Eva David), exploitation, management and trade of “exotic” goods (Vassil Nikolov). The nine papers focusing on individual sites present case studies that illustrate the nature of the current research, the rich opportunities offered by the growing range of scientific techniques and their applications to existing collections. This series of papers starts at Zemunica Cave on the coast of the Eastern Adriatic (Siniša Radović and Ankica Oros Sršen), explores the Mesolithic occupations at Malga Rondenetto (Paolo Biagi, Elisabetta Starnini and Renato Nisbet) and Grotta dell’Edera (Barbara Voytek) in Italy, the Mesolithic ornamented weapons of Motala in Sweden (Lars Larsson and Fredrik Molin), ending this Mesolithic journey among the shell middens on the western coast of Scotland (Catriona Pickard). The transition to the Neolithic happens among the beaver tools at Zamojste 2 in Russia (Olga Lozovskaya, Charlotte Leduc and Louis Chaix). The Neolithic Age finds us further south into Bulgaria, exploring the pitfields of Sarnevo (Krum Bacvarov and John Gorczyk) and the gold of Varna (Tanya Dzhanfezova), while during the Bronze Age roe deer hunting is resurrected at Paks-Gyapa in Hungary (László Bartosiewicz and Erika Gál). The volume presents altogether new results in recent research and new information resulted from the study of old collections. We also hope it points out directions for future research. It is with great joy that we present Clive Bonsall this volume, as a token of both our appreciation and friendship, for his contributions to the Early Prehistory of Europe in general, and of Southeastern Europe in special. The Editors