Abstract
This chapter critiques the use of archaeological evidence in the preceding case study of bushcraft in Iron Age Zambia. Commentary focuses on issues of data quality from published sources and the use of chronological estimates from radiocarbon dating. The discussion highlights the difficulty of working with published faunal assemblages, especially when attempting to address questions and issues that differ from the original research. Additionally, suggestions for other ways of deploying archaeological data are offered, exploring the use of individual deposits as well as house and village assemblages. The use of particular household deposits guides the revised narrative at the end of the chapter, which reveals a remarkable nexus between archaeological deposits and historical linguistic reconstructions.
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Notes
- 1.
There are, of course, challenges in distinguishing between wild and domesticated animals based on faunal remains. This can be exacerbated by fragments not identified to species, which are often reported in a broader taxonomic category (eg, bovids), which can be remains of both wild and domestic animals.
- 2.
Compare to Rosemary Joyce’s (2008) use of the concept ‘citation’ as a means of performing connectivity across time in practices that resulted in structured deposits. Joyce’s evidence, however, is far richer; therefore, the interations of practice she studies can be read as citations to the past.
- 3.
In an earlier draft of this supplemental reading of the linguistic and archaeological evidence of the Batoka Plateau, Fleisher observed a ‘paired contrast’ and suggested a reference to Hodder’s (2006) research on Çatalköyük on the basis of parallel processes of bringing wild animals skulls into the house in order to manage transitions in household composition and new balances between wild and domesticated foods.
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de Luna, K.M., Fleisher, J.B. (2019). Comments, Dialogue and Supplemental Reading: South Central Africa. In: Speaking with Substance. SpringerBriefs in Archaeology(). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-91036-9_3
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