Anthropology.net

“The tattooed man stopped at the edge of the meadow and sat on a rock for a moment as he shook the old grass from his bearskin soled boots. After replacing with fresh grass and ensuring that it was evenly distributed around his feet, the man stood, gathering his bow, quiver, and snow shoes, which slung over his shoulders, and continued his trek. He needed to reach the village by nightfall. The grass would keep his feet warm and the new grass was needed since the deep snow covered any chance of grass in the highlands.Arriving at the village just as the sun dipped behind the mountain, no one dared approach to greet the man. Indeed, the village’s people -his friends, his family, people he new for many years, literally turned their backs on him and went inside the warm thatch of their homes. Forgiveness would not come easy. If at all. The man reached his own home, now empty and desolate without a woman’s attention.

He cooked and served his own meal and intended to sleep through the night before speaking with the village elders in the morning. But morning wouldn’t wait. The shout from village center saw to that. More shouts. Demands that he come out. Knowing this wouldn’t go the way he’d hoped, the man gathered the things he entered with in haste and kicked out the back wall of the house. His intent was to steal off in the night yet again, this time not to return with the hope of a forgiveness that now seems impossible.

But the night wasn’t as black as he’d hoped and the firelight from the village center must have revealed him to the men waiting for him there. After making it only a few steps from the his house, the tattooed man felt the sharp pain and jolt of the impact by what could only be an arrow striking him in the back of the left shoulder. Had he slung his gear over that shoulder instead… Falling to his knees but for a second, the tattooed man was again up and ran as hard and as fast as he could for the darkest shadows, knowing that once there he would be back in his element and able to make for the highlands once again. This time, there would be no return. “

The above is pure speculation with regard to many things, but some of the details about the tattooed man we now refer to as Ötzi are being confirmed. New research, soon to be published in the Journal of Archaeological Sciences and Quaternary Sciences Review are confirming the so-called “disaster theory ” of the last days of Ötzi, the Iceman. Ötzi was found in 1991 by two German tourists hiking in Austria, his remains naturally frozen and mummified by a glacier and dating to ca. 3300 BCE. The two different research teams, one in Bolzano, Italy and the other in Innsbruck, Austria have confirmed a few things relating to Ötzi’s death:

1. that it was a projectile point that lacerated the left subclavian artery, and that the attempted removal of the arrow at the time of death may have caused Ötzi to bleed to death. The projectile has long been known about, but, until now, the actual cause of death has been speculative.
2. Ötzi’s movements in the last day or two of his life are confirmed by analysis of ingesta and pollen samples. He, apparently ate two different meals since he had two different kinds of meat in his digestive system that were at different stages of digestion and pollen samples could be forensically traced to specific regions near the site of his death.

Specifically, Ötzi was in a subalpine region some distance above the Schnals and/or Etsch valleys where he walked to and was present about 9-12 hours before his death. Seven to four hours later, Ötzi was again in a subalpine coniferous forest where he consumed his last meal and then he climbed to the Tisen Pass where he died. Basically, he was in the highlands, went down to the valley, and then back up to the highlands again in a matter of hours. His last hours were both hectic and violent.

Where he was, what he ate, and the shot in the back of the shoulder with an arrow are all things that can be forensically revealed. Why he was where he was and why he was shot, to those questions we can only speculate. But sometimes, as long as we don’t attempt to establish them as truths, speculations can be the fun parts of archaeology.

Further Reading (keep an eye out for them):

• Oeggl, K., et al (2007). The reconstruction of the last itinerary of “Ötzi “, the Neolithic Iceman, by pollen analyses from sequentially sampled gut extracts. Quaternary Sciences Review, article in press.
• Pernter, P. et al (2007). Radiologic proof for the Iceman’s cause of death (ca. 5,300 BP), Journal of Archaeological Sciences, article in press.

This morning, I stumbled upon a not so much anthropology centered piece of information, but it is interesting none-the-less.

The image to your right is a map of relationships among scientific papers published in certain set of natural and physcial sciences. It documents the intricacies and correlations between disciplines, and what you see is pretty remarkable…. it kinda reminds me of a phylogenetic map with the bushes and what not.

“This map was constructed by sorting roughly 800,000 published papers into 776 different scientific paradigms (shown as pale circular nodes) based on how often the papers were cited together by authors of other papers. Links (curved black lines) were made between the paradigms that shared papers, then treated as rubber bands, holding similar paradigms nearer one another when a physical simulation forced every paradigm to repel every other; thus the layout derives directly from the data. Larger paradigms have more papers; node proximity and darker links indicate how many papers are shared between two paradigms. Flowing labels list common words unique to each paradigm, large labels general areas of scientific inquiry.”

Often, anthropology is sold as the discipline that intersects the natural sciences to the social ones. It would be interesting to see a similar image that shows this bridge between these two worlds in academia. I wonder if anyone has made one, or plans to make one? Anyways, if you want a free print of this image, as in a free 25″ x 24″ poster, you can order on here.

I just got news from an anthropology professor of mine that Francis Clark Howell has passed away this weekend. According to him, Clark Howell was recently diagnosed with lung cancer and died on Saturday.

Clark Howell was a professor of anthropology at UC Berkeley and known, in my book, for criticizing the multiregional hypothesis and Piltdown. If you want a more desciptive biography of him, here’s one and here is a list of books he wrote.

I really can’t confirm this 110%, but I know my anthropology professor is trustworthy. He knew Dr. Howell, visits UCB every week, and was in touch with Dr. Howell as recently as two weeks ago. As of now, no press release has been issued by the University of California, Berkeley nor have other news sources covered this yet.

In my opinion, F. Clark Howell was one of the best physical/paleoanthropologists around and he will be missed.

So if you live in the United States, or know anything about our politics, you may get an awkward chuckle out of this.

Next week, President Bush will be visiting a sacred Mayan archaeological site. He’s actually gonna be visiting Iximche on the high western plateau in a region of Guatemala which is currently populated mostly by Mayans. Iximche is about 30 miles west of the capital of Guatemala City. It was founded as the capital of the Kaqchiqueles kingdom before the Spanish conquest in 1524.

After his visit, according to the director of a Mayan nongovernmental organization, Juan Tiney, with close ties to Mayan religious and political leaders,

“the “spirit guides of the Mayan community ” decided it would be necessary to cleanse the sacred site of “bad spirits ” after Bush’s visit so that their ancestors could rest in peace. He also said the rites — which entail chanting and burning incense, herbs and candle. “

They’ll be doing something similar to what you see in the image to the right.

And, he will be followed by protests, of course. This is very embarrassing but also interesting news because it documents the intersection of politics, archaeology, and cultural issues. I find it particularly interesting that a ritual that has been used for thousands of years is being used in a modern socio-poltiical context.

Have you ever been in mid-kiss and wondered, “Why the hell am I doing this?” If not, well firstly, I hope you have kissed someone. If you have kissed someone but haven’t asked why, then I guess you just don’t see the amusement in such a strange habit we, as humans, have picked up.

The origins of kissing have been hypothesized to stem from learned feeding behaviors of our prehistorical ancestors… Of which, have become instinctual down the generations. Gauging from the morphology of early hominid mothers teeth, they weren’t eating mash potatoes. Try rock hard tubers, and so they

“may have chewed food and passed it from their mouths into those of their toothless infants. Even after babies cut their teeth, mothers would continue to press their lips against their toddlers’ cheeks to comfort them.”

This claim is further supported by primatology. The behaviors of Bonobos, who are known for their promiscuity and affection show that,

“They do [kiss] to make up after fights, to comfort each other, to develop social bonds, and sometimes for no clear reason at all – just like us.”

But there is some data that negates the claim to instinct. See kissing is not as uniform across all cultures, as we like to think. Approximately, 10% of the human population does not kiss. That leans the hypothesis to one that supports it is a learned behavior rather than instinctual since not all humans kiss. In fact cultural anthropologists report that “Certain tribes around the world just don’t make out” and have no idea what it is all about!

Philematologists, the select few of the scientific community that specialize in the science of kissing say,

“humans do it because it helps us sniff out a quality mate. When our faces are close together, our pheromones ‘talk’ – exchanging biological information about whether or not two people will make strong offspring. Women, for example, subconsciously prefer the scent of men whose genes for certain immune system proteins are different from their own. This kind of match could yield offspring with stronger immune systems, and better chances for survival.Still, most people are satisfied with the explanation that humans kiss because it feels good. Our lips and tongues are packed with nerve endings, which help intensify all those dizzying sensations of being in love when we press our mouths to someone else’s. Experiencing such feelings doesn’t usually make us think too hard about why we kiss – instead, it drives us to find ways to do it more often.”

I think kissing is a unique phenomenon in our behavioral repertoire, don’t you? What’s your hypothesis on why we kiss?

Thanks to Scienceline’s Roberto Morabito on “Why do humans kiss?“