Download or read book Landscapes and Landforms of Belgium and Luxembourg written by Alain Demoulin and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-08-25 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides an informative and intriguing overview of the most scenic landscapes of Belgium and Luxembourg. Geodiversity is emphasized, for example the periglacial features in the Hautes Fagnes area, the planation surfaces in the Ardennes and Oesling, and the famous caves of Han/Lesse and Remouchamps. The book’s chief goals are to provide the reader with enjoyable and informative descriptions of the selected sites within their regional geographical and geological settings; to offer an up-to-date survey of the evolution of Belgium’s and Luxembourg’s landscape; and to share additional information on the cultural value of the respective sites wherever appropriate. The book is a richly illustrated reference work that makes accessible for the first time a wealth of information currently scattered among many national and regional journals. It will benefit earth scientists, environmental scientists, tourism geographers and conservationists alike.

Download or read book UNESCO General History of Africa Vol I Abridged Edition written by Jacqueline Ki-Zerbo and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1990 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This volume covers the period from the end of the Neolithic era to the beginning of the seventh century of our era. This lengthy period includes the civilization of Ancient Egypt, the history of Nubia, Ethiopia, North Africa and the Sahara, as well as of the other regions of the continent and its islands."--Publisher's description

Download or read book Sourcebook of Paleolithic Transitions written by Marta Camps and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2009-09-01 with total page 575 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the study of Palaeolithic technologies moves towards a more analytical approach, it is necessary to determine a consistent procedural framework. The contributions to this timely and comprehensive volume do just that. This volume incorporates a broad chronological and geographical range of Palaeolithic material from the Lower to Upper Palaeolithic. The focus of this volume is to provide an analysis of Palaeolithic technologies from a quantitative, empirical perspective. As new techniques, particularly quantitative methods, for analyzing Palaeolithic technologies gain popularity, this work provides case studies particularly showcasing these new techniques. Employing diverse case studies, and utilizing multivariate approaches, morphometrics, model-based approaches, phylogenetics, cultural transmission studies, and experimentation, this volume provides insights from international contributors at the forefront of recent methodological advances.

Download or read book Multidisciplinary Approaches to the Study of Stone Age Weaponry written by Radu Iovita and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-05-28 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The objective of this volume is to showcase the contemporary state of research on recognizing and evaluating the performance of stone age weapons from a variety of viewpoints, including investigating their cognitive and evolutionary significance. New archaeological finds and experimental studies have helped to bring this subject back to the forefront of human origins research. In the last few years, investigations have expanded beyond examining the tools themselves to include studies of damage caused by projectile weapons on animal and hominin bones and skeletal asymmetries in ancient hominin populations. Only recently has there been a growing interest in controlled and replicative experiments. Through this book readers will be updated in the state of knowledge through a multidisciplinary scientific reconstruction of prehistoric weapon use and its implications. Contributions from expert authors are organized into three themed parts: recognizing weapon use (experimental and archaeological studies of impact traces), performance of weapon systems (factors influencing penetration depth etc.), and behavioral and evolutionary ramifications (cognitive and ecological effects of using different weapons).

Download or read book The Ancient Human Occupation of Britain written by Nick Ashton and published by Elsevier. This book was released on 2010-11-12 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Ancient Human Occupation of Britain Project (AHOB) funded by the Leverhulme Trust began in 2001 and brought together researchers from a range of disciplines with the aim of investigating the record of human presence in Britain from the earliest occupation until the end of the last Ice Age, about 12,000 years ago. Study of changes in climate, landscape and biota over the last million years provides the environmental backdrop to understanding human presence and absence together with the development of new technologies. This book brings together the multidisciplinary work of the project. The chapters present the results of new fieldwork and research on old sites from museum collections using an array of new analytical techniques. - Features an up-to-date treatment of the record of human presence in the British Isles during the Palaeolithic period (700,000 - 10,000 years before present) - Takes multidisciplinary approach that includes archaeology, geochemistry, geochronology, stratigraphy and sedimentology - Coincides with the culmination of the AHOB project in 2010, providing a benchmark statement on the record of human occupation in Britain that can be utilized and tested by future research

Download or read book The British Palaeolithic written by Paul Pettitt and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012 with total page 616 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The British Palaeolithic provides the first academic synthesis of the entire British Palaeolithic, from the earliest occupation to the end of the Ice Age. It fills a major gap in teaching resources as well in research by providing a current synthesis of the latest research on the period.

Download or read book A Companion to the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East written by D. T. Potts and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2012-08-15 with total page 1509 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A COMPANION TO THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST A Companion to the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East is a comprehensive and authoritative overview of ancient material culture from the late Pleistocene to Late Antiquity. This expansive two-volume work includes 58 new essays from an international community of ancient Near East scholars. With coverage extending from Asia Minor, the eastern Mediterranean, and Egypt to the Caucasus, Central Asia, and the Indo-Iranian borderlands, the book highlights the enormous variation in cultural developments across roughly 11,000 years of human endeavor. In addition to chapters devoted to specific regions and particular periods, many contributors concentrate on individual industries and major themes in ancient Near Eastern archaeology, ranging from metallurgy and agriculture to irrigation and fishing. Controversial issues, including the nature and significance of the antiquities market, ethical considerations in archaeological praxis, the history of the foundation of departments of antiquities, and ancient attitudes towards the past, make this a unique collection of studies that will be of interest to scholars, students, and interested readers alike.

Download or read book Formal Variation in Australian Spear and Spearthrower Technology written by B. J. Cundy and published by BAR International Series. This book was released on 1989 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Published version of MA thesis; investigation of the variation in Australian spear and spearthrower technology through the analysis of the mechanical and material factors controlling form; includes performance comparison of hand thrown and spearthrown spears, spear aerodynamics, wound ballistics and models of spearthrower operation; application of models to spear and spearthrower forms from the Northern Territory; brief discussion of implications for understanding technological variation.

Download or read book Background to Beakers written by European Association of Archaeologists. Annual Meeting and published by Sidestone Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Background to Beakers is the result of an inspiring session at the yearly conference of European Association of Archaeologists in The Hague in September 2010. The conference brought together thirteen speakers on the subject Beakers in Transition. Together we explored the background to the Bell beaker complex in different regions, departing from the idea that migration is not the comprehensive solution to the adoption of bell Beakers. Therefore we asked the participants to discuss how in their region Beakers were incorporated in existing cultural complexes, as one of the manners to understand the processes of innovation that were undoubtedly part of the Beaker complex. In this book eight of the speakers have contributed papers, resulting in a diverse and interesting approach to Beakers. We can see how scholars in Scandinavia, the Low Countries, Poland, Switzerland, France, Morocco even, struggle with the same problems, but have different solutions everywhere. The book reads as an inspiration for new approaches and for a discussion of cultural backgrounds in stead of searching for the oldest Beaker. The authors are all established scholars in the field of Bronze Age research.

Download or read book The Lithic Assemblages of Qafzeh Cave written by Erella Hovers and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2009-06-09 with total page 379 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book presents the first comprehensive description of the lithic assemblages from Qafzeh Cave, one of only two Middle Paleolithic sites in the Levant that has yielded multiple burials of early anatomically modern Homo sapiens (AMHs). The record from this region raises the question of possible long-term temporal overlap between early AMHs and Neanderthals. For this reason, Qafzeh has long been one of the pivotal sites in debates on the origins of AMHs and in attempts to compare and contrast the two species' adaptations and behavior. Although the hominin fossils from the site were published years ago, until now the associated archaeological assemblages were incompletely described, often leading to conflicting interpretations. This monograph includes a thorough technological analysis of the lithic assemblages, incorporated in their geological and sedimentological contexts. This description serves as a springboard for regional comparisons as well as a more general discussion about Middle Paleolithic behavior, which is relevant to important and as yet unresolved questions on the origins of "modern" behavior patterns. The volume includes a wide-ranging and up-to-date bibliography that provides the middle-range for discussing the ecological context and behavioral complexity of the Middle Paleolithic period, and ends with some thought-provoking conclusions about the dynamic human interactions that existed in the region during this time.

Download or read book Meat Eating and Human Evolution written by Craig B. Stanford and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2001-06-14 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When, why, and how early humans began to eat meat are three of the most fundamental unresolved questions in the study of human origins. Before 2.5 million years ago the presence and importance of meat in the hominid diet is unknown. After stone tools appear in the fossil record it seems clear that meat was eaten in increasing quantities, but whether it was obtained through hunting or scavenging remains a topic of intense debate. This book takes a novel and strongly interdisciplinary approach to the role of meat in the early hominid diet, inviting well-known researchers who study the human fossil record, modern hunter-gatherers, and nonhuman primates to contribute chapters to a volume that integrates these three perspectives. Stanford's research has been on the ecology of hunting by wild chimpanzees. Bunn is an archaeologist who has worked on both the fossil record and modern foraging people. This will be a reconsideration of the role of hunting, scavenging, and the uses of meat in light of recent data and modern evolutionary theory. There is currently no other book, nor has there ever been, that occupies the niche this book will create for itself.

Download or read book Genes Language Culture History in the Southwest Pacific written by Jonathan S. Friedlaender and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007-04-19 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The broad arc of islands north of Australia that extends from Indonesia east towards the central Pacific is home to a set of human populations whose concentration of diversity is unequaled elsewhere. Approximately 20% of the worlds languages are spoken here, and the biological and genetic heterogeneity among the groups is extraordinary. Anthropologist W.W. Howells once declared diversity in the region so Protean as to defy analysis. However, this book can now claim considerable success in describing and understanding the origins of the genetic and linguistic variation there.In order to cut through this biological knot, the authors have applied a comprehensive battery of genetic analyses to an intensively sampled set of populations, and have subjected these and complementary linguistic data to a variety of phylogenetic analyses. This has revealed a number of heretofore unknown ancient Pleistocene genetic variants that are only found in these island populations, and has also identified the genetic footprints of more recent migrants from Southeast Asia who were the ancestors of the Polynesians. The book lays out the very complex structure of the variation within and among the islands in this relatively small region, and a number of explanatory models are tested to see which best account for the observed pattern of genetic variation here. The results suggest that a number of commonly used models of evolutionary divergence are overly simple in their assumptions, and that often human diversity has accumulated in very complex ways.

Download or read book Spatial Archaeology written by David L. Clarke and published by . This book was released on 1977 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Early Modern Human Evolution in Central Europe written by Erik Trinkaus and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 506 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is primary descriptive volume on the most important paleontological site for research into the emergence of humans, the development of a modern pattern of hunting and gathering societies in the Middle Upper Paleolithic Era. Erik Trinkhaus is among the most distinguished paleoanthropologists and a member of the National Academy. Svoboda is the project leader on the Pavlovian site.

Download or read book Evolution of the Human Diet written by Peter S. Ungar and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007 with total page 428 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We are interested in the evolution of hominin diets for several reasons. One is the fundamental concern over our present-day eating habits and the consequences of our societal choices, such as obesity prevalent in some cultures and starvation in others. Another is that humans have learned to feed themselves in extremely varied environments, and these adaptations, which are fundamentally different from those of our closest biological relatives, have to have had historical roots of varying depth. The third, and the reason why most paleoanthropologists are interested in this question, is that a species' trophic level and feeding adaptations can have a strong effect on body size, locomotion, "life history strategies", geographic range, habitat choice, and social behavior. Diet is key to understanding the ecology and evolution of our distant ancestors and their kin, the early hominins. A study of the range of foods eaten by our progenitors underscores just how unhealthy many of our diets are today. This volume brings together authorities from disparate fields to offer new insights into the diets of our ancestors. Paleontologists, archaeologists, primatologists, nutritionists and other researchers all contribute pieces to the puzzle. This volume has at its core four main sections: · Reconstructed diets based on hominin fossils--tooth size, shape, structure, wear, and chemistry, mandibular biomechanics · Archaeological evidence of subsistence--stone tools and modified bones · Models of early hominin diets based on the diets of living primates--both human and non-human, paleoecology, and energetics · Nutritional analyses and their implications for evolutionary medicine New techniques for gleaning information from fossil teeth, bones, and stone tools, new theories stemming from studies of paleoecology, and new models coming from analogy with modern humans and other primates all contribute to our understanding. When these approaches are brought together, they offer an impressive glimpse into the lives of our distant ancestors. The contributions in this volume explore the frontiers of our knowledge in each of these disciplines as they address the knowns, the unknowns, and the unknowables of the evolution of hominin diets.

Download or read book Mousterian Lithic Technology written by Steven L. Kuhn and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2014-07-14 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Human beings depend more on technology than any other animal--the use of tools and weapons is vital to the survival of our species. What processes of biocultural evolution led to this unique dependence? Steven Kuhn turns to the Middle Paleolithic (Mousterian) and to artifacts associated with Neanderthals, the most recent human predecessors. His study examines the ecological, economic, and strategic factors that shaped the behavior of Mousterian tool makers, revealing how these hominids brought technological knowledge to bear on the basic problems of survival. Kuhn's main database consists of assemblages of stone artifacts from four caves and a series of open-air localities situated on the western coast of the Italian peninsula. Variations in the ways stone tools were produced, maintained, and discarded demonstrate how Mousterian hominids coped with the problems of keeping mobile groups supplied with the artifacts and raw materials they used on a daily basis. Changes through time in lithic technology were closely tied to shifting strategies for hunting and collecting food. Some of the most provocative findings of this study stem from observations about the behavioral flexibility of Mousterian populations and the role of planning in foraging and technology. Originally published in 1995. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Download or read book African Biogeography Climate Change and Human Evolution written by Timothy G. Bromage and published by OUP USA. This book was released on 2000-01-27 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bringing an ecological and biogeographic perspective to recent fossil finds, this book provides a new synthesis of ideas on hominid evolution and will be a valuable resource for a variety of researchers.