On the occasion of a short research trip to Japan, I had the opportunity to sit down with Professor Koji Mizoguchi in Kyushu University, Fukuoka, to discuss several topics, which you will find transcribed below. I was curious as to his thoughts that he – as the President of the World Archaeological Congress, a non-governmental and non-profit organization that promotes the exchange of archaeological results, training at a global scale and the empowerment of Indigenous and minority groups, a Professor of Social Archaeology, and one of the few archaeologists writing archaeological theory in the far East – had on the state of the art of archaeology today. Furthermore, since I grew up in Europe but nevertheless feel a deep connection with my own Asian ancestry, I was very interested in Mizoguchi’s own experience and contributions to archaeology in Japan and the world.

La Porta Borgiana di Civita Castellana (Viterbo, Italia), eretta alla fine del XV secolo in onore del cardinale Rodrigo Borgia, venne costruita grazie allo smantellamento di un monumento funerario romano, dal quale venne estratto un insieme di materiali marmorei per decorare l'arco. L'iscrizione sulla porta chiarisce l'origine di tali pezzi, i quali appartenevano alla tomba di Publius Glitius, uno dei protagonisti della congiura di Pisone. Sulla base dello studio dei materiali, spoliati e riutilizzati nella Porta Borgiana e in altri siti del comune di Civita Castellana, nei pressi della città di Falerii Novi, presentiamo un approccio al monumento funerario in questione, fornendo nuovi dati sull'identificazione del personaggio e sulla possibile ubicazione della tomba. Allo stesso tempo, l'analisi della costruzione della Porta Borgiana ha permesso di metterla in relazione con la propaganda politico-ideologica di Rodrigo Borgia, basata, in parte, sull'uso dell'antichità classica, quale strumento di legittimazione dinastica e territoriale.

This article presents differences and similarities in dietary practices of fisher-gatherer groups excavated from two sambaquis (shell-mound archaeological sites) in Saquarema, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil. We analyzed the buccal apparatus of 35 individuals excavated from Sambaqui da Beirada, dated from 5437 to 3440 years cal BP, and Sambaqui do Moa, dated from 4770 to 3199 years cal BP. Our oral health analysis of 852 alveoli and 704 teeth assessed the frequency and degree of teeth wear and the prevalence and frequency of caries, linear enamel hypoplasia, calculus, periapical cavities, and antemortem teeth loss. We applied the chi-square test and Fisher exact test to test statistical significance. Severe tooth wear, the absence of caries, a high frequency and prevalence of dental calculus, and a low prevalence of linear enamel hypoplasia were found in both sites, although periapical cavities and antemortem teeth loss indexes varied greatly. Despite a superficial homogeneity, the results point to variation in the physiopathological processes that occurred at both sites, including differences related to age and sex. These oral health-related results, together with other archaeological data from both sambaquis, showcase the expected cultural differences stemming from dietary practices.

This article presents an example of ceramic circulation and exchange networks in the southern Andean region during the first centuries AD, derived from the study of the production, circulation, and consumption of the pottery assemblages found in the villages of Cardonal and Bordo Marcial, located in the Cajón Valley in Catamarca, Argentina. Our analysis of the technical, morphological, and design aspects of the ceramics suggested six morphological groups using three representation techniques and 16 paste recipes; we also found that locally manufactured vessels were used together with ceramics of nonlocal origin in similar domestic contexts. In addition, the foreign ceramic materials suggest that there were networks of interaction between Cardonal and Bordo Marcial and other regions, such as the southern Puna, the Hualfín Valley, the Rosario-Lerma Basin, and the San Francisco Valley in northwestern Argentina.

What legitimizes archaeological work in an age of global climate change, socio-political crises and economic recession? On what topics should archaeology focus its research questions, and what forms of archaeological engagement are not merely justifiable but able to make a difference in light of such challenges? Today, there is a tendency, we argue, that archaeological responses to current challenges are expected to align with a specific mode of conduct, political stance and genre, where, for example, a very particular notion of activism, responsibility and ethics is dominating. There is no denial that current challenges call for immediate instrumental reactions, but we contend that valuable reactions can – or even must – vary, and that more fundamental and slow ontological and epistemological change should also be nested within these responses. In this article, we explore what it means to care – what it means to be concerned – in the Anthropocene through archaeological practice and aesthetic engagement. By highlighting the relations between ethics and aesthetics, we explore ways in which we get in touch with the objects of concern, placing undecidability and speculation as dispositions equally important to urgency and impact.

Sequential thermal analysis allows for deconvoluting the refractory nature and complexity of carbon mixtures embedded in mineral matrices for subsequent offline stable carbon and radiocarbon (14C) isotope analyses. Originally developed to separate Holocene from more ancient sedimentary organic matter to improve dating of marine sediments, the Ramped Pyrolysis and Oxidation (RPO) apparatus, or informally, the “dirt burner” is now used to address pressing questions in the broad field of biogeochemistry. The growing interest in the community now necessitates improved handling and procedures for routine analyses of difficult sample types. Here we report on advances in CO2 purification during sample processing, modifications to the instrumentation at the National Ocean Sciences Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (NOSAMS) facility, and introduce sodium bicarbonate procedural standards with differing natural abundance 14C signatures for blank assessment. Measurements from different environmental samples are used to compare the procedure to the different generations of sequential thermal analyses. With this study, we aim to improve the standardization of the procedures and prepare this instrumentation for innovations in online stable carbon isotopes and direct AMS-interface measurements in the future.

Shipping radiocarbon samples from the scientist to the laboratories involves packaging and wrapping them with all sorts of bags and materials to make sure the samples arrive safely. Over the years a variety of possible and impossible package materials have arrived at our laboratory, causing problems occasionally but often being the highlight of the day cheering up the people involved. The reality of excavating important, occasionally unexpected, samples during field work sometimes includes taking samples when time is short or package materials could not be prepared. At this point, any kind of package becomes useful. Things like cigarette packets, reused office packets, tissue boxes, or medical packaging can become handy. But sometimes samples are taken, wrapped in aluminum foil, and forgotten in the desks. This article celebrates creativity, giving an overview of the many ways samples can be packed. However, using some of the less-than-ideal choices, drawbacks will be shown and possible problems explained.

Radiocarbon (14C) measurements undertaken by the NERC Radiocarbon Laboratory using accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) are now freely available on a new online database. The data presented covers measurement of the wide range of sample types that are processed for research projects in the fields of Earth and environmental science, supported by the United Kingdom’s Natural Environment Research Council. Sample types within the database include organic remains, soils, sediments, carbonates, dissolved organic and inorganic carbon, and carbon dioxide. Currently, the database contains 14C data for over 2400 individual samples that were measured and reported between 2005 and 2013, but it is envisaged that this will expand considerably as more data are made available. Contextual information such as sampling location and associated publications are provided where available, and searches can be performed on sample location, sample type, project number, and publication code. This new database compliments an existing, publicly available database of measurements performed using radiometric methods by the laboratory which has recently been expanded to present over 2000 measurements. It is hoped that this archive will prove useful to workers in the community who would benefit from greater availability of measurements for particular locations or sample types, and for the purposes of performing meta-analyses, and/or synthesis of larger datasets.

This study focuses on the chronology of King Den’s reign, the fifth ruler of the 1st Egyptian dynasty. A series of radiocarbon (14C) dates were established on archaeological material from several tombs at the Abu Rawash site, near Cairo, which comprises a complex of 12 monumental mud-brick mastabas. Modeling the 14C results enables us to estimate the date of King’s accession and to link this to the beginning of the 3rd Dynasty, i.e., to Egyptian state’s structuration. Through the application of OxCal software, sets of 14C results obtained from the same archaeological context have been summarized and compared with the precise state of our knowledge on the historical duration of this reign. These results place King Den’s accession between 3104 and 2913 BCE (2σ), with the more likely date being 3011–2921 BCE (1σ). The modeled temporal density thus obtained is based both on new contextualized 14C dates and on an updated reading of the historical information on his reign. This is a dynamic result, which can be refined as soon as we have more data to integrate into the model. Above all, this resulting model becomes a crucial chronological point to better determine the beginning of the Egyptian Old Kingdom.