商品簡介
To some, the Chalcolithic (4700/4500-3700/3600 BC cal.), as the first period with metallurgy, large sprawling villages, rich mortuary offerings, and cult centres, represents a developmental stage on the road to the urban Bronze Age, the `dawn of history'. Others have called it `the end of prehistory'. More recent scholarship focuses upon the diversification of the subsistence economy, elaborated craft production, and expanded networks for resource acquisition. Many of today's Chalcolithic specialists were taught by biblical archaeologists, such that the culture history paradigm remains deeply embedded.
This volume grew out of a workshop held in Madrid in 2006 and aims to kick start a dialogue about how to move beyond culture history and chronology in order to re-engage with larger theoretical discourses. A vast swathe of research in the region ignores these issues and considers theory to be irrelevant. One has the impression that the political realities of the region (including a predilection for biblical archaeology) has left a large proportion of archaeologists in the region, including prehistorians, lost without a map.
Contributors to this volume recognize that culture history is the platform upon which current archaeological research is discussed but differ in the degree ofemphasis placed on previously defined entities or phases. Delineating levels of difference and similarity between temporal boundaries is critical in this process. The two themes of this volume - culture and chronology - combine the need for theoretical engagement with the establishment of broader, more precise empirical data using explicit classificatory schemes. This is, essentially, the rock and the hard place where much archaeological debate is wedged, and as such the volume will have resonance for scholars of other periods and regions.
The Council for British Research in the Levant (CBRL) is the British Academy sponsored society for research into the humanities and social sciences in the modern countries of the Levant, closely related to the former Bilad el-Sham. It is a membership based learned society, with its headquarters in London and research centres in the region. The regional centres provide research facilities for members, with libraries, accommodation and equipment, and serve as contact points with local universities, museums, other research institutions and government agencies.
The CBRL currently sponsors a large number of British-based research projects in the Levant, in topics ranging from Palaeolithic archaeology to contemporary social science, fostering collaborative research with scholars in the region. Members receive the CBRL's journal, Levant, as well as the annualCBRL Bulletin which reports on current research and activities.
The CBRL also sponsors regular lectures in London and elsewhere in the UK, as well as in the Levant, and publishes academic monographs in the `Levant Supplementary Series'.
