In the debate about the demise of the Neandertal, several scholars have claimed that humanity’s nearest relatives were indistinguishable archaeologically, and thus behaviorally and cognitively, from contemporaneous Homo sapiens. They suggest that to hold otherwise is to characterize Neandertals as inferior to H. sapiens, a false dichotomy that excludes the possibility that the two human types s...

The role of starchy plants in early hominin diets and when the culinary processing of starches began have been difficult to track archaeologically. Seed collecting is conventionally perceived to have been an irrelevant activity among the Pleistocene foragers of southern Africa, on the grounds of both technological difficulty in the processing of grains and the belief that roots, fruits, and nut...

Whereas shrines in Africa, and to a lesser extent their links with medicine and healing, have been extensively studied by historians and anthropologists, they have been largely neglected by archaeologists. Focus has been placed upon palaeopathology when medicine is considered in archaeological contexts. Difficulties certainly exist in defining medicine shrines, substances and practices archaeol...

In this study, I develop a theory of landscape archaeology that incorporates the concept of “animism” as a cognitive approach. Current trends in anthropology are placing greater emphasis on indigenous perspectives, and in recent decades animism has seen a resurgence in anthropological theory. As a means of relating in (not to) one's world, animism is a mode of thought that has direct bearing on...

In 2019, the Iberian Peninsula suffered worst drought in recent decades. The lack of rain and water shedding to feed rivers meant a clear reduction levels at Spanish reservoirs. This situation allowed previously flooded lands re-emerge on surface, many cases, they were accessible foot, as happened Valdecañas reservoir (Cáceres). Dolmen Guadalperal, due its spectacular nature aroused great expec...

Meaningful collaborations between archaeologists and descendant communities nations is a necessary component of archaeological practice in the 2020s beyond. While calls for decolonising social sciences humanities have become common refrain, practical methodologies supplanting settler-colonial research been less apparent. We detail how development independent radiocarbon-based chronologies archa...

archaeological excavations on the western part of the central iranian plateau, known as the qazvin plain provides invaluable information about the sedentary communities from early occupation to the later prehistoric era. despite the past archeological data, chronological studies mostly rely on the relative use of the bayesian modeling for stratigraphically-related radiocarbon dates. the current...