 |
 |
 |
|
|
|||
|
 |
Department of Archaeology | |
|
||
|
||
| University of Cambridge > Department of Archaeology > Marsha Ann Levine |
Marsha Levine has, since 1985, been working on a project concerned with the exploitation of the horse in central Eurasia from the Late Palaeolithic to the Iron Age. Its objective is to investigate the change from horse hunting to horse herding, the evolution of horse husbandry and equine pastoral nomadism, and their human social, demographic and ecological implications. She has therefore been studying the taphonomy, palaeopathology and population structure of relevant assemblages and interpreting the patterns she finds with reference to ethological, ethnoarchaeological, artifactual and contextual data. As part of this research project, between 1988 and 1999 she made ten trips to the former Soviet Union---to Kiev (Institute of Zoology and Institute of Archaeology, Ukraine), Yerevan (Institute of Zoology, Armenia), St. Petersburg (Hermitage Museum), Moscow (State Historical Museum), Ekaterinburg (Ural A M Gorky State University and Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology), Petropavlovsk (A. Kh. Margulana Institute of Archaeology, Kazakhstan), Almaty (Institute of Archaeology, Kazakhstan), Novosibirsk (Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography), Cheliabinsk (Department of Archaeology, Cheliabinsk State University and Arkaim Centre). She carried out ethnoarchaeological research with Mongol and Kazakh herders 1989--1995. She visited China in 2003 and 2004 in collaboration with Prof. Li Shuicheng (Department of Archaeology, Peking University). She is collaborating with Dr. Linas Daugnora (Lithuanian Veterinary Academy) on the study of both modern draught horses and Medieval riding horses.
From 1996--1998 Dr Levine was the Research Associate for a 3 year project funded by NERC, entitled ‘Palaeopathology of animal bone and the origin and consequences of horse husbandry’. This work was carried out at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research. The principal investigators were Prof. G. N. Bailey (Department of Archaeology, Newcastle) and Prof. L. B. Jeffcott (Department of Clinical Veterinary Medicine, Cambridge). Katherine Whitwell, FRCVS (equine pathologist, Newmarket), was also collaborating with us as a consultant. In 2003 Prof. Leo Jeffcott (as Principal Investigator) and Dr. Levine (as Senior Research Associate) received funding from the Isaac Newton Trust and the AHRB to carry out the next step (3 years) on this project. In 2004 Prof. Graeme Barker took over as Principal Investigator when Prof. Jeffcott moved to a new post in Australia (Veterinary School, University of Sidney, Australia). Prof. Jeffcott will continue to collaborate on the project. Katherine Whitwell is the project consultant in Equine veterinary pathology and Maša Amatt the project technician.
The specific objective of the current project has been to investigate the use of palaeopathology as a means of informing us about the relationship between people and horses from ancient times to the present. There is some evidence that the kinds and, particularly, the incidences of abnormalities that we can expect to find in bones of wild horses differ from those of domesticated ones. The main reason for this is that the stresses associated with riding and traction differ from one another and from those related to more natural activities. In this project we have been comparing bones of contemporary horses, whose history we know, and those of archaeological horses, whose history we can infer from their context, with the bones of animals whose history we would like to understand. The material included in this project has come from both modern and ancient sources.
Modern material includes 12 skeletons from free-living Exmoor ponies, around 12 Lithuanian draught horses, and around 5-7 modern British riding ponies. In the case of horses from burials, it is often possible both to make a detailed examination of the bones and also to determine how the animal was used in life, for example, for riding (Early Iron Age Scytho-Siberian horses and Lithuanian and Altai Medieval horses) or chariotry (Bronze Age Chinese horses). The comparison of ancient and modern, riding and traction horse skeletons is the focus of this project.
1988-91 Horse bones and teeth from the Ukraine (the Chalcolithic site of Dereivka) and Armenia (Lchashen, 2nd millennium BC; Mochrablur, early 4th millennium BC; Tzamakabert and Hairivan, end of 4th or beginning of 3rd millennium BC). 1989
An ethnoarchaeological interview with Mr. B. Damdin (Department of Foreign Languages, Ulan Bator University, Mongolia).
1990 An ethnoarchaeological interview with G. Jambalsuren (Institute of Language, Ulan Bator University, Mongolia).
1991 Two Scytho-Siberian horse skeletons from the tombs at Bashadar (6th c. BC, Altai); horse teeth from the Iron Age (VII-III c. BC) settlement site, Malii Vishnevii I and the Bronze Age (XV-X c. BC) settlement site, Alabuga I, (West Siberian Transurals); horse bones and teeth from the Eneolithic (circa 3500 BC) settlement site, Botai (northern Kazakhstan).
1992 Continued study of the horse bones from Botai. Study of the horse bones from the Early Bronze Age settlement site, Sergeevka (northern Kazakhstan). Ethnoarchaeological research at Botai.
1993-96 Continued study of the horse bones and teeth from Botai.Ethnoarchaeological research in northern Kazakhstan.
1996 Horse bones and teeth from 4 Ukrainian sites: Desyatiny (Early Bronze Age), Molyukhov Bugor (Neolithic and Eneolithic), Semyonovka (Neolithic and Eneolithic) and Lisovichi (Scythian, Iron Age).
1997 3 Scytho-Siberian horse skeletons from Ak-Alakha (Altai).
1998 2 Turkic and 1 Scytho-Siberian horse skeleton from Ak-Alakha (Altai).
2000 One horse skeleton from Icklingham, Suffolk.
2003 4 (out of 12) modern Exmoor ponies.
2004 3 (out of 9 so far) modern Lithuanian draught horses.
2004 12 horse skeletons from the Spring and Autumn period site, Sun Jia Nan Tou, (Fengxiang, Shaanxi, China).
|
|
|
|