Children and Questions in the Jarama Valley (Almela et al, 2015)

This is a chapter from the book "Children, Spaces and Identity" entitled "Infant Burials During the Copper and Bronze Ages in the Iberian Jarmama River Valley".

A young Madrid woman, child behind her.

The authors take a chunk of time in the Jarama valley of Iberia, 3,000 B.C. to 1,500 B.C., and look at how children were treated in death over time.  This is in the center of the Iberian Peninsula.

Period 1: The Early Chalcolithic before the Beakers.

We have a Early Chalcolithic phase that is basically community tombs.  Bunch of people piled in a cave or in a barrow.  Children over a year of age are buried with everyone else and become community ancestors.

Period 2: Beginning of the Beaker Age.  We have two types of people that are contemporary and live close to one another...

a)  Children/Adults buried without Bell Beaker pottery.

The skeletons of these people suggest they worked hard, died young.  Adults are single burial in pits with little worldly goods.  No children under six months old are ever found, all other children are grouped together and no single burial of a child is found, and certainly without worldly goods.

b)  Children buried with adults and Beaker pottery is present.

These people are often buried in small, nuclear collectives, something along the line of mom, dad and children or otherwise closely related people.  Men outnumber women like everywhere in Beakerworld.

They appear to have been wealthier in burial having exotic, costly or rare items.  They also occupy spaces that took a lot of effort to construct.  Isotopes show their diet was high in meat and dairy and the mortality numbers suggest they lived longer than people buried without beakers.  People buried with Beaker pottery don't exhibit the kind of repetitive physical stress markers that the people buried without exhibit.  Beaker children above the age of 6 months are buried, but always buried with an adult.

I suspect that graves were reopened for children so they could be buried with an adult.  At a later time I'll expand on some evidence for the 'Beaker underworld' and the kinds of tests and trickery found in a Bronze Age Hades.

Period 3:  The Bronze Age

Basically this is now our modern situation.  All children of any age from their first breath are buried completely and fully as an individual person.  A strange caveat is that these children are buried with a dog.  That's right.  The authors suggest the dog was a protector for the afterlife, and again I'll pitch my sometime-in-the-future-canoeing-through-purgatory comments.

Lastly, the authors note that the Beaker children were not achievers and did not earn or merit a higher status by our understanding.  Again, I think this has the marks of ethnicity, but only a few hundred miles up the Tagus and Douro Rivers!  What!?

That's why I love this.  Bang head here.

A Folk Who Will Never Speak (Falileyev, 2015)

Continuing with "The Bell Beaker Transition in Europe" by Salanova and Preito-Martinez, we'll now look at a chapter written by Alexander Falileyev concerning problems of Bell Beaker language.

This is a very short read, but very condensed and well-written.  There's two topics examined closely, one is that Beakers spread Old European (or the Alteuropaisch) of Krahe's hydronymy.  The other is the possibility that some Beaker communities spoke something ancestral to Celtic, being more or less a proxy.

Beakers have been variously implicated in the origin of the old European hydronymy because after all, what other archaeological horizon has unified such a vast region?  But there are problems with this possibility as Falileyev lays out, the least of which is the old naming system is theoretically larger that the effective area Beakers are thought to have inhabited, assuming 1) any unity existed among Beakers 2) or that they were sufficiently present for enough time to change an existing hydronymy.

I think Falileyev really channels us into one conclusion: the sporadically settled Beaker phenomenon has no plausible role in creating the European hydronymy.  In a paradoxical sense, the stability of the hydronyms over the last 2,500 years really questions their vulnerability to begin with, so it's hard to seriously accept the possibility that an ethnic minority changed all naming conventions, then after crystallizing, those names remaining stable through all the turmoil over the last 4,000 years.

I'll also throw this out there, that Beakers post-date putative IE speakers in much of the zone in which the area this hydronymy exists.  Really, the smart money is implicating the earliest Near Eastern farmers of Europe.

The next option is a little more dicey.  That is the chronological age of Celtic and whatever linguistic evidence we have for European languages in the prehistoric West.  So this is where the real food-fight starts. 

First, let's accept that the Celtic question really is not about the Celtic family in the regular sense.  Here we are using it as a proxy for a language that no longer exists.  Celtic itself, as Falileyev explains, is also a developing story and it may have no relation whatsoever with the West and certainly not the Beaker people.  Or it could.

The Beakerfolk don't exactly help with this question either.  If Bell Beaker had drove in from the Pontic Steppe and left a neat trail of breadcrumbs across Eastern Europe, then maybe this question would be less difficult.  Instead Beakers come from the other direction, at least in their immediate history.  It also doesn't help that many archaeologists reject questions of ethnicity, especially as it relates to cultural and linguistic transmission.

From a glottochronogical standpoint, in many schemes of mainstream linguistics IE-speaking Beakers is still doable.  Celtic and/or Italic are sufficiently old enough to have been seeded by early Martime Beakers and rising to the top of the primordial foam by the Urnfield period.  Many of the phylogenetic trees place them and Tocharian at the base, or the most diverged after Anatolian. 

Aside from the favorable clockwork, it's also noteworthy that Tocharian and I-C are physically the most distant of the recorded European languages.  In this sense, although the Beaker story is strange, it offers a framework that other archaeological periods fail to demonstrate.

Falileyev criticizes the 'Celtic from the West' as argued by Koch and Cunliffe, seeing a number of weak points that can't be reconciled.  He does however give a preview of a work by Gibson and Wodtko that he thinks is more promising in which a linguistic mosaic was formed by pockets of Beaker settlements over the continent and this theoretical language possibly becoming ancestral to Celtic (or not exluding Celtic).  In this scenario there is no nucleus or geographic origin of Celtic, or whatever, just pockets of communities that speak a similar language.

I'll look for the Gibson and Wodtko work.  It looks interesting [link].

Children as Potters (Garrido-Pena, Herrero-Corral 2015)

I just changed my mind on ten things.  Seriously, this paper approaches Beaker pottery production through the lens of modern ethnography and then looks at the archaeological record in a way that makes greater sense.

Tiny Beaker (Thanet Arch?)

One item discovered throughout the ceramic-making parts of the planet are miniatures like the one above.  In the Late Neolithic of Europe, items like this found their way into graves which gives us a rare opportunity for some prehistoric insight.  Miniature grave items, whether they are tiny pots, battle axes or arrowheads, have sociological dimensions in the Late Neolithic as relates to idealism and the afterlife (Turek), but really there is another dimension too.

What Garrido and Herrero demonstrate is clear signals of prehistoric childhood apprenticeship using Bell Beaker as an example.  They extrapolate the ethnographic data from pre-modern cultures to show that tiny, medium-sized, and poorly-made Beaker pottery follow the natural trajectory of apprenticeship and learning by growing children.

Throughout the world, girls sat with their mothers at an early age, watching, playing and finally pinching tiny play pots.  Given the standardization of the Beaker pots, I previously believed before reading this paper that Beaker pottery was a specialized craft, executed by certain individuals.

There is now a more appealing explanation for the production of Beaker ceramics, that it was always made by ordinary women, and that all Beaker women participated in its production.  These women, every woman, began learning this craft and other crafts in early childhood.  That has profound implications for the miscegenation of regional pottery styles and the begleitkeramik itself, and I will absolutely go out on a limb and suggest that the genetic data (right now) can already complement this view.

To put it another way, we know that ethnic Bell Beakers intermarried frequently with local folks and, unsurprisingly, local character makes its way into the local Beaker pottery (or the other way around).  The only way to fully appreciate Irish food vessels or Dutch Zone Corded beakers or Artenac culture beakers, is to quite literally accept these material items as one product of actual ethnic miscegenation, largely between men of an Iberian Maritime Beaker ancestry and women of Carrowkeel Neolithic, Single Grave Culture and Artenac I culture, etc.  Blended families, blended pottery.

Another question is the poorly-made pygmy pottery that sometimes appears in the graves of adults.  In other respects there appears to be (IMO) at times evidence of sentimental grave offerings, such as single beads or an extra cup or equipment, and in the case of pottery appears likely that child pottery was sometimes deposited by those mourners in attendance of the funeral.

Really, I think the implications of this subject are more important that the many analyses of pottery and decoration.  This cuts right down to the important question of 'who' and the topic of 'cultural learning'.

Allow me to now put a slice of pizza in the punchbowl.  If all Beaker girls are learning how to make Beaker pottery at a young age, this would more likely be the result of "Unbiased Cultural Transmission".  It is the 'infinite alleles' model in which there is a tenancy for natural drift, but no explicit bias for prestige or non-conformity.

Most of the late models for the spread, adoption, imitation or trade of beaker pottery has been a preference for the later, that it was 'prestigious' or was part of some weirdo bonding ritual.  But I'll put this to brass tacks and get to the point:  Unbiased Cultural Transmission through childhood learning involves a stable and mature culture transmitting itself through the vehicle of ethnicity.

Papers can be found here.  Published 2015 [Link]

*Footnote for a paper involving lots of math and cultural transmission in archaeology assemblages:
"Neutral Cultural Transmission in Time Averaged Archaeological Assemblages" Mark E. Madsen Journal of Anthropological Archaeology (2012)  [here]

Wrist-Guards as Symbolic Male Ornament (Turek)

I'll begin this year with a new book "The Bell Beaker Transition in Europe" and a chapter written by Jan Turek concerning the unusual arm guards of the archers. [Preview here]

I won't rehash this topic since chances are you already know a little about the arm-guards.  Instead, I'll condense this down to basic arguments and questions:

Figure 4.  Bohemian Wrist-Guards

A problem raised by Harry Folkens was that the stone wrist-guards are functionally overkill for the assumed job of string slap, whereas a simple piece of hardened leather would sufficiently protect the skin. 

The decoration of Central European boar's tusks may suggest that a dominant bow used at this time (in Bohemia) was similar to the Meare Heath bow [here].  Reconstructions put it in the ball park of a 55-90 lb draw weight to the cheek for a 27-28 reach.  So again, no need for a titanium wrist-guard.

As Turek outlines here and as previous authors have done, there is a reordering of functional requirements of its design, moving aspects such as appearance or significance higher in the design criteria than as a safety device.  This is illustrated in the title "Symbolic Male Ornament"

Folkens makes this case as well by showing that 66% appear on the outside of the arm in burials, and this could be reinforced by the gold sheet bosses that appear in the tie-down holes of a few bracers.  Turek they are more likely to have been worn in the interior of the arm but was simply rotated when not in use.

Amesbury Archer (Jane Brayne)

The facts do support the stone, or some stones, being attached to leather as some exhibit tannin etching.  The stones show evidence of being worn, repaired, repaired again.  The color of the stone as Turek mentions here, appears to have been very important and it would seem reasonable that the stone would be at least visible instead of a mere insert.  And in the same way the bow is slung over the shoulder when not in use, the bracer may be rotated in a comfortable position as well.

But as we may or may not see in the upcoming paper by Ryan [here], shock injuries may have the real culprit, not skin irritation.  In this case the stones could have been functional by adding dead weight to the forearm.  The focus on the stone itself may be an artifact of the reality that it is only one component of a larger assembly that has disintegrated.  So while we were at the earliest time correct to assume this item has something to do with being an archer bracer, we may be incorrect to assume that it is in fact an archery bracer.

Finally, the chronology and evolution of the stone-wrist guard is discussed.  Here Turek suggests they originate in Central Europe then spread elsewhere and he gives evidence for this by their absence in early All Over Ornamented Bell Beaker graves.  I'm assuming that the stone wrist-guard lacks a forerunner in a preceding culture and originates within the Beaker culture.

Interestingly, he sees the earliest stone wrist-guard as an elongated river pebble with perforations on either end.  This simple and primitive design might be the best explanation for their origin.  The link is at the top.

Controversies and Discoveries for 2016

2016 will be a watershed year for the study of the Bell Beaker Phenomenon.  A rapid data metamorphosis is radically changing the resolution of prehistory.  I don't think we need to be worried about get stuck in a rut or being bored.

This year we'll see a lot of Atlantic genomes, possibly soon.  I don't have any special gouge, however the ripples are what you'd expect [here] and [here]. In addition to the shaking bushes, there's always one study that jumps out of nowhere with a big surprise.

Here's some papers and posts ahead:

- A sufficient amount of "The Bell Beaker Transition in Europe" by Prieto-Martinez and Salanova is now preview-able that I can begin posting and commenting.  Each topic covers some very interesting questions, timely as the genomic question has moved to the forefront of discussion.  From linguistics to ethnicity, there's plenty 'cage match' worthy material. 

- "Children as Potters" is an interesting subject discussed by Garrido-Pena and Herrero-Corral in a chapter of a recent book "Children, Spaces and Identity"

- Another chapter by Aliaga-Almela, Liesau, Rios, Blasco and Galindo look at Beaker babies in "Infant Burials During the Copper and Bronze Ages in the Iberian Jarama River Valley"

- There's a paper in Quaternary that was presented at a conference this last Spring about a horse butcher site at Portalon.  Young foals appear to have been selectively butchered (I commented on this before and the context is pre-Beaker or non-Beaker).  This sounds simple, people eating horse chili, but it becomes increasingly problematic, especially because of the effective population size. 

It's likely that the Atapuerca horses were genetically similar to the Sorraia and Lusitano.  In fact, H.P. Uerpmann (page 70, Olsen) theorized that the smaller Bell Beaker horse around Europe was essentially something akin to the Portuguese Lusitano, and then boom, the same menage that happened between Beakers and the Corded Ware people also happened with Beaker and Corded Ware horses (Warmuth et al, 2011)

What! What!  (Fig.1, Warmuth et al, 2011)

So aside from the genetics of migrating people, the genetics of migrating animals offer the second biggest artifact of Beaker history.  I've previously commented on the brachyceros/longifrons [here].


- There's a coming thesis examining the biometrics of Beakerfolk by Jos Kleijne, Kiel University (I'm not sure of the date of this paper)

- There's a thesis (Jessica Ryan) looking at musculoskeletal stress indications of Bell Beaker archers.  There have been various examinations and comments on the bodies of Neolithic or Medieval archers, however this will be the first study that examines this specific phenomenon, and certainly that of the Beaker time-frame.

- I believe there will be sequel coming out on Beaker pottery from Moroccan rock shelters.

- Google Earth and zebra mussels are cranking out Neolithic and Bronze Age discoveries on a daily basis.  A gigantic and previously unknown circle anomaly was discovered in Britain last week by amateur mousing around the terrain. This year will rock for discoveries.

Dr. Tibor Bader (Sudwest Presse Photo Initiative)

- In 2015, I had hoped to see a study on vegetarianism in a certain portion Bronze Age and/or Neolithic people.  The issue was mentioned by Garrido-Pena (?) in an abstract from Burgos and I looked further into an earlier isotope study and found what look like a small but visible portion of isotopic vegans.

I find this interesting because vegetarianism is most often engendered by people with a certain metaphysical worldview, although a minority in practice.  Given what we know about Bronze Age religions, which gave us the majority of modern religions, we may be able to extrapolate how they may have viewed the nature of man and the material world.

And finally, I have a long list of quacky, heuristic, loose-on-the-facts, but free blog posts.  This year is going to be for me suckingly busy, but I will not relent.  Long live the Beakers!