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Cannibalism in Palaeolithic Britain - Talk by Silvia Bello in Norwich (16 Feb 2012)
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End date: 2012-02-16Cannibalism in Palaeolithic Britain Dr Silvia Bello (Palaeontology Department, The Natural History Museum) Venue: Music Room, Assembly House, Theatre Street, Norwich, NR2 1RQ Thursday 16 February 2012, 7.30 pm Abstract: Cannibalism (the act of eating any type of tissue from another individual of its own kind) amongst sapiens and pre-sapiens humans has been suggested, rejected, accepted and criticised since the nineteenth century. Whilst cut-marks on faunal remains are usually seen as a direct manifestation of butchery activities, those on human remains are not considered an unequivocal evidence of cannibalism. This is mainly because cannibalism among humans has always been a taboo topic, and because cut-marks on human remains can be the product of ritual practices (such as defleshing) without consumption of the body. The identification of nutritional cannibalism is hard to prove through osteological analyses. One often-used criterion to demonstrate cannibalism is the similarity of butchery traces (frequency and location) on human and animal remains from the same archaeological context. In this talk, I will present cases of cannibalism around the world and how it has been recognised. In particular, I will provide details of the Upper Palaeolithic site at Gough's Cave (Somerset, England) which has revealed interesting human behaviour associated with cannibalism. Here, not only humans bodies were cannibalised, but the skulls of some individuals fashioned into drinking cups. The use of human braincases as drinking cups and containers has extensive historic and ethnographic documentation, but archaeological examples are extremely rare. In the Upper Palaeolithic of western Europe, cut-marked and broken human bones are widespread in the Magdalenian (~15 to 12 ka BP) and skull-cup preparation seems to be an element of this tradition. The combination of cannibalism and skull-cup production at Gough's Cave is so far unique in the European Upper Palaeolithic. Direct age determinations on two of the vaults (~14,700 cal BP) make these the oldest dated examples of skull-cups in the archaeological record.Chris Stringer awarded the 2012 James Croll Medal
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End date: 2012-03-05Chris Stringer has been awarded the James Croll Medal for 2012. This is the highest award of the Quaternary Research Association and is named in honour of James Croll (1821-1890). Croll is most closely associated with fundamental work on the astronomical theory of the ice ages, but he also made seminal contributions on the glacial geology of Scotland, on the mechanisms that drive ocean circulation and the impact of that circulation on recent climate, on tidal theory and the rotation of the Earth. These are all major issues that occupy Quaternary scientists to this day. Croll was effectively self-taught. His work and example demonstrate that any individuals from all backgrounds can rise to national eminence and generate science of lasting and major international impact, that it is not who you are or where you come from but what you do that is important. These are the qualities that the QRA seeks to celebrate in the award of the James Croll Medal.Russell Coope (1930-2011)
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End date: 2012-03-27Russell Coope the distinguished palaeoentomologist and AHOB Associate Member died at his home in Scotland last weekend. He was actively working on new material from AHOB-related excavations right up to his death, and everyone in AHOB and the field of Quaternary Research will miss him and his tremendous contributions to knowledge very much.New chronology for British Quaternary published in Nature
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End date: 2012-10-15Penkman, Parfitt, Preece and others published in Nature an aminostratigraphy for 74 British sites based on opercula from the genus Bithynia, a freshwater snail.Where The Wild Things Are: Recent Advances in Palaeolithic and Mesolithic Research - 24-25 March 2012, Durham University
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End date: 2012-03-24A conference Where The Wild Things Are: Recent Advances in Palaeolithic and Mesolithic Research will be held on the 24th and 25th March 2012 at Durham University. The call for papers is now open and the deadline for abstract submission is 17th December 2011. Registration costs are students/unwaged 15 pounds and Staff/Waged 20 pounds, and the deadline is 2nd March 2012.Further information, including details of registration, session themes and conference schedule can be found at http://www.wildthingsconference.com/. Alternatively you can email at: wildthingsconference@gmail.com, or find us on facebook.Palaeolithic Populations: Coping with the Environmental Challenges of the Pleistocene, 31 March - 1 April, Oxford
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End date: 2012-03-31Palaeolithic Populations: Coping with the Environmental Challenges of the Pleistocene The Pleistocene epoch (c. 2.6 million to 10,000 years ago) saw great changes in climate as the world's ice sheets expanded and contracted many times. Against this background of global climate change, the first members of our own genus, Homo, emerged and evolved into several different forms, including, ultimately, our own species. New work continues to contribute to our understanding of the ebb and flow of Palaeolithic populations as climatic and environmental changes took place. Recent investigations at Happisburgh in Norfolk, for example, not only push back the presence of humans in Britain to somewhere between 850,000 and 950,000 years ago, but also show that some early Palaeolithic populations could survive cooler conditions than previously thought, although there is growing evidence to suggest that the Neanderthals were not as cold-tolerant as has been widely supposed. This weekend school brings together a number of researchers to explore how different human populations, particularly in Europe and Africa, coped with the varied environmental challenges that they faced.
(c) 2009, Ancient Human Occupation of Britain Project
Questions: e-mail
pdpolly@indiana.edu
