More than a House; A chaîne opératoire-based approach for the analysis of prehistoric house-building

In Dutch archaeology prehistoric houses are frequently used as sources of information on past societies. There hasn’t been much research on the construction of these houses, however. Even though anthropological studies show that the construction of a house vital is in understanding the links between house and society. This thesis develops a chaîne opératoire-based methodology for studying prehistoric house-construction and applies this methodology to develop an analogy for prehistoric house-construction. The latter goal is achieved by studying the reconstruction of a Late Neolithic house that was built during the Horsterwold-project. This project is an archaeological experiment that aimed to gain insights in prehistoric house-building and tool use by building a reconstruction of a Late Neolithic house with replicas of Neolithic and Mesolithic tools. All the use of tools and building-processes were monitored during the project. The results of this analysis consist of a chaîne...Show moreIn Dutch archaeology prehistoric houses are frequently used as sources of information on past societies. There hasn’t been much research on the construction of these houses, however. Even though anthropological studies show that the construction of a house vital is in understanding the links between house and society. This thesis develops a chaîne opératoire-based methodology for studying prehistoric house-construction and applies this methodology to develop an analogy for prehistoric house-construction. The latter goal is achieved by studying the reconstruction of a Late Neolithic house that was built during the Horsterwold-project. This project is an archaeological experiment that aimed to gain insights in prehistoric house-building and tool use by building a reconstruction of a Late Neolithic house with replicas of Neolithic and Mesolithic tools. All the use of tools and building-processes were monitored during the project. The results of this analysis consist of a chaîne opératoire for the Horsterwold House; an overview of traces from production processes which can serve to diagnose these; and quantifications for several of the building-processes. These results can be used as parallels for understanding the construction of the original house, but also as a starting-point for the analysis of prehistoric house-construction. Since the methodology was an essential element of the thesis, it was tested by analysing an Iron Age house from Ezinge, Groningen. This test demonstrated the broad applicability of the model when studying prehistoric house-construction. The most important result of this study is that we should understand prehistoric houses as the end product of a dynamic interaction between a large number of factors in a complex entanglement of processes. This complexity offers opportunities to study the connections between a large number of factors through an analysis of prehistoric house-construction.Show less

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More than a House; A chaîne opératoire-based approach for the analysis of prehistoric house-building