Theme:
1. Networks, networking, communication: archaeology of interactions
Session format:
Regular session
Title:
CANCELLED Being Sarmatian. Approaching “Sarmatian Archaeological Cultures” as a Networking System
Content:
A presupposition that cultures are clearly defined, essentially self-contained entities has cast serious doubt in the modern world archaeology mirroring also in the Sarmatian archaeology. The concept “Sarmatians”, “Sarmatian period” and “Sarmatian archaeological culture(s)” are widely used in the archaeological literature. However, the monuments of the different macro-regions connected usually to the various Sarmatian communities and political formations of the written sources have significant cultural distinctions. The nature of these differences and similarities has not yet been reliably clarified. This leads to contradictions in the interpretation of the same culture groups by representatives of different schools of archaeology. It is necessary to develop common approaches to the interpretation of the archaeological material.
A promising approach in this regard is the network model. Using such models, culture groups may be described as a stable set of features, objects and phenomena of the material world, reflecting the network connections formed and operated in a certain area in a particular period of time. The interpretation of the material remains depends on the various concepts of the “archaeological culture” and the goals that a researcher, consciously or unconsciously, puts by its singling out.
The transformation of the main characteristics of the archaeological material both in space and time, expressed in the change of the set of features, obviously follows the change or termination in functioning of the network connections. Analysing these changes, it is possible to reconstruct their reasons (social, ideological, economic, and political) with a sufficient share of probability.
The session proposes the following topics for discussion:
- Location of the Sarmatians according to the written sources.
- Specificity of regional archaeological sites correlated with the Sarmatians.
- Network relations according to the materials from regional archaeological sites correlated with the Sarmatians.
- Network relations usually associated with the cultural and chronological boundaries of the “Sarmatian archaeological cultures“.
Keywords:
cultural transformation, networking model, culture-defining features, extra-cultural intra-cultural and cross-cultural elements, self-identity, Sarmatians
Session associated with MERC:
no
Session associated with CIfA:
no
Session associated with SAfA:
no
Session associated with CAA:
no
Session associated with DGUF:
no
Session associated with other:
Main organiser:
Zsófia Masek (Hungary) 1
Co-organisers:
Valentina Mordvintseva (Russia) 2
Affiliations:
1. Institute of Archaeology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
2. Centre for Classical and Oriental archaeology, National Research University «Higher School of economics», Moscow, Russia
THIS SESSION CAN NOT BE SELECTED AT THIS MOMENT