Proper prehistory, from the Eocene to the Iron Age! Archaeology, anthropology, & palaeontology 🦕🦍🗿🏹 MA Public Archaeology @UCLArchaeology #PubArch #SciComm
Oct 17, 2019 • 15 tweets • 7 min read
Struggling to find the motivation to do my reading for tomorrow, so I have decided to live tweet it & see how that goes. The chapter is about animal domestication in the Americas...how, where & why did it happen? What animals were involved? Join me to find out...
1/??
Source is "Handbook of South American Archaeology" by H. Silverman & W.H. Isbell.
Chapter: "Animal domestication in South America" by P.W. Stahl.
Imaginitive titles, I know.
2/?
Sep 28, 2019 • 13 tweets • 6 min read
1/ Following on from our thread about amber fossils yday, I thought we'd take a look at how prehistoric people used amber today!
This spectacular bear carving from Słupsk, Poland, dates back to the Neolithic, somewhere between 4000-7000 BP.
(Source: muzeum.szczecin.pl/en/collections…) 2/ Early evidence for human use of amber comes from the famous Altamira Cave in Spain. In a Solutrean layer, dated 17-22kya, several pieces of unworked amber were found.
This may have been intended for jewelry, or for medicine - amber has antibiotic properties.
(D.Descouens)
Sep 12, 2019 • 9 tweets • 4 min read
1/ Nawarla Gabarnmung is one of the largest & most impressive #PrehistoricArt sites in Australia. The entire rock shelter is man-made. The Jawoyn, who created it, quarried out loose stone from the cliff-face, leaving behind supporting pillars. Some of the ceiling #art is 28kya+
^^Photo by John Gollings
Sep 5, 2019 • 14 tweets • 6 min read
1/ Tadrart Akakus is a mountain range in Libya, known for its prehistoric art. The images were created btw 12,000 BCE & 100 CE. They reveal the shifting ecology of the region & its inhabitants changing lifestyles. The earliest art depicts giant animals, like elephants. (Thread) 2/ Hippos have also been immortalised. Art from this period (12,000 BCE - 6,000 BCE) is known as the Large Wild Fauna or 'Bubalus' Period.
(All petroglyphs photographed by Lucas Galuzzi unless otherwise stated)
Sep 5, 2019 • 6 tweets • 4 min read
1/ The runic script, the 1st to be adopted by Germanic speakers, was rarely used for everyday writing. The symbols represented both letters & cosmic forces, giving runes an added spiritual significance. But what's myth behind the script? #FolkloreThursday
(Ovre Stabu Spearhead) 2/ Rune means both 'letter' & 'secret' in many Germanic languages - hinting at their supposed magical origins. The Norns, 3 powerful female Jotun, were the 1st to use the runes. They'd carve them into the world tree Yggdrasil to control the fates of gods & men. #FolkloreThursday