The 97th Annual Meeting of the New York State Archaeological Association - April 26-28, 2013

The Finger Lakes and Thousand Islands Chapters are proud to host the 97th annual Meeting of the New York State Archaeological Association and the annual spring meeting of the New York Archaeological Council April 26-28 in historic Watertown, New York.

NYAC will meet Friday, April 26.  The NYSAA annual business meeting will be Friday evening with paper presentations all day Saturday, April 27, and on Sunday morning, April 28.  The annual banquet and awards ceremony will be held Saturday evening.  This year's guest speaker will be Dr. Claude Chapdelaine, discussing the search for Paleo-Indians in the far Northeast.

All events will be held at the Ramada Inn in Watertown, New York.  Register for the event now by clicking here.

A full program list is available here.

This year's conference has a fantastic lineup.  We hope that if you are in the area, you'll be able to make your way to the conference.

An Archaeologist Reviews Tomb Raider

This past week I purchased the Tomb Raider reboot.  Reboots are all the rage now: Batman, Superman, Ninja Turtles, Star Trek, James Bond; half the stuff I grew up liking as a kid is being modernized.  Lara Croft was one character who desperately needed an overhaul.  The campy, one dimensional heroine of 1996’s original Tomb Raider left much to be desired.  Originally, Lara was a stoic, crack shot, capable of outrageous gymnastic maneuvers despite her cartoonishly plump mammaries.  She was shallow and uninteresting; more an object of male fantasy than of female empowerment.  But her adventures were fun.  And even while the past three games (Legend, Underworld, and Anniversary) have taken steps to add breadth and depth to her being, it still felt as though pieces were missing.  Enter the reboot.

Here is the gist: Recent college grad Lara Croft is a part of a team of archaeologists searching for a long lost island off the coast of Japan.  When a debilitating storm leaves them shipwrecked on the mysterious island, Lara, unknown to adventure, is thrust into countless scenarios where she must fight to survive.  As far as I know, this is the first game that specifically references Lara’s formal training in archaeology.  While the game focuses more on combat and survival, a key aspect involves the search for relics modeled after actual historical treasures.  These artifacts include Noh masks, WWII dog tags, various jade creations, and enough coins to make a numismatist’s mouth water.  With each artifact discovered, players are rewarded with a quick blurb on the form and function as well as the ability to explore it from 360 degrees.

I was pleased to find Lara embodies positive qualities which any archaeologist would find flattering: resourcefulness, determination, and a continuously burgeoning sense of confidence in herself and her abilities.  Meanwhile, her male counterpart, Dr. James Whitman, personifies the haughty snobbishness a dual PhD holder obsessed with success may exude.  We’ve all met a James Whitman before; someone who believes knowledge is an entitlement to leadership.  A know it all with an axe to grind.  CRM firms are rife with them.  As archaeologists, he and Lara are opposite sides of the same drachma.  Whitman’s motivations are geared towards personal reward; fame and gain.  On the other hand, Lara sees knowledge as a tool for understanding her situation.  Lara's awareness of history, culture, and ancient languages helps propel the heroine through the game and for the player, helps weave a fascinating narrative.

Tomb Raider incorporates more archaeology than other archaeo-themed adventure games, including the previous Tomb Raider games, the Uncharted series, and whatever digital incarnation of Indiana Jones has graced platforms recently.   And honestly, the new Lara Croft is a far more likable character than either Indiana Jones or Nathan Drake.  In fact I despise Drake who is driven solely by the pursuit of treasure and wealth in his series as much as those nitwits with metal detectors over on Spike TV.

Overall, Tomb Raider is gritty, brutal romp through fiction.  It is not so much a story of archaeology as with archaeology.  There are a half dozen job titles Croft could hold that wouldn’t change the narrative, but it is good the game’s creators crowned Lara as a shovel bum.  If I had to choose a representative for the field of archaeology in interactive entertainment, I'd vote Lara all the way.

Tomb Raider is available now for PC, XBOX 360, and Playstation 3.

Call for Papers: New York State Archaeological Association 97th Annual Meeting

The New York State Archaeological Association's 97th Annual Meeting

Watertown, New York

April 26-28th, 2013

The Finger Lakes and Thousand Islands Chapters are proud to host the 97th annual Meeting of the New York State Archaeological Association and the annual spring meeting of the New York Archaeological Council.  NYAC will meet Friday, April 26.  The NYSAA annual business meeting will be Friday evening with paper presentations all day Saturday, April 27, and on Sunday morning, April 28.  The annual banquet and awards ceremony will be held Saturday evening.  This year's guest speaker will be Dr. Claude Chapdelaine, discussing the search for Paleo-Indians in the far Northeast.  All events will be held at the Ramada Inn in Watertown, New York.

This is an open call for papers on the archaeology of New York and the adjoining regions.  Presentations should not exceed 20 minutes in length.  Time will be allowed for questions following the presentation.

Abstracts (one paragraph, 150 words) and A/V preferences must be received by March 1, 2013 for consideration.  Please send your abstracts to Wendy Bacon, 2013 NYSAA Program Co-Chair.  You will be notified by March 10 if your paper is accepted.  Meeting registration for paper presenters must be pre-paid by March 20, 2013 or your paper will be dropped from the program.  Each speaker may present only one paper although individuals may co-author multiple papers.  All speakers must register for the conference.

Registration information will be available at the New York State Archaeological Association website.

From the Editor - 2012: The year nothing will happen

I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges nearer, pseudo-science and superstition will seem year by year more tempting, the siren song of unreason more sonorous and attractive. Where have we heard it before? Whenever our ethnic and national prejudices are aroused, in times of scarcity, during challenges to national self-esteem or nerve, when we agonize about our diminished cosmic place and purpose, or when fanaticism is bubbling up around us—then, habits of thought familiar from ages past reach for the controls. The candle flame gutters. Its little pool of light trembles. Darkness gathers. The demons begin to stir." - Carl Sagan

______________________________________________

I, along with several other websites, received an email this week with details on a new series being developed for the History Channel called Seekers 2012.  Here’s what the email said:

Mr. Hunt,

I am working on a documentary series for the History Channel focusing on the Mayan prediction that 2012 will be the END OF DAYS.  We will be taking an academic approach to the mysterious prophecies set out by the Mayans and other cultures.  We are looking for two investigators/researchers to host the series.  Ideally our investigative team will be comprised of a man and a woman between the ages of 26 and 55, who are scientists, investigators and adventurers.

We are looking for people with advanced degrees (Anthropology, Ethnology, Mesoamerican studies etc. with an interest in 2012) who are open, curious and rigorous. Because this is a television series these investigators must also be articulate, passionate, knowledgeable and comfortable in front of an audience and a camera.

In each episode our Hosts will scour the globe investigating these “End of Days” prophesies and other unexplained phenomena from history and the world.  These Hosts will share their questions, investigative techniques, knowledge and gut instincts with the audience, as they seek answers to some of the world’s oldest and most ominous predictions.

If you or anybody you know may be interested, please feel free to pass this email along or contact me directly.  More information as well as an application can be found at our website: Seekers 2012

Thanks so much and I look forward to hearing from you.

I groaned; deep and guttural, my head hit the desk.  I hadn’t groaned as hard in months; not since I’d received an offer to host a series called Aliens Did It.  Once again, pseudoscientific beliefs were attempting to get their foot in the door of public entertainment under the guise of “scientific investigation”.  I raised my head and cracked my knuckles.  This time it was personal.  This time it was trying to slip its slimy paws around archaeology.  Well I wasn’t about to stand for it.

I explored the Seekers 2012 website where the show’s creators claim:

“There are predictions in nearly every culture that the world will end in 2012.”

Stop the bus.  Nearly every culture?  Care to name them?  The truth is you would be hard pressed to find ANY reference to a 2012 apocalypse outside New Age beliefs.  My question is: how can you create an investigative series when the very core concept of your show is false?

Er, um…

Wow, I could stop right here.  But, while we're on the topic, I’d like to go in to a bit more detail on two aspects of this subject; The Maya Calendar and the idea of an apocalypse; two completely unrelated things that have become bed buddies thanks to New Age nut jobs.  I think a large part of the problem is the public's misunderstanding of information, so here is the Cliff’s notes version of what one should know.

The 2012 date itself comes from the Maya, a Pre-Columbian civilization who occupied portions of Mesoamerica from 2000 BC to the 16th century AD.  The Long Count Calendar is just one of several methods the Maya used to count time.   The calendar marks time in (roughly) 394 year periods known as b'ak'tuns. Thirteen was a sacred number for the Maya and the thirteenth b'ak'tun ends around December 21, 2012.  But the Maya don’t see this as THE end, conversely they saw this as a time of celebration.  We have similar events in our own culture; namely New Years.  Yes, the thirteenth b'ak'tun is the final one in the Long Count Calendar, so what happens after that?  Easy, the cycle resets and the Long Count begins again.  Hardly cause to worry.

Next up is the idea of an apocalypse.  The end of everything; it’s pretty scary, isn’t it?  That’s probably why it’s been picked by Hollywood and exploited to no end.  What better antagonist than the complete destruction ofeverything?  What most people fail to understand is that the idea of the apocalypse is an inherently Western idea, with its origins chiefly tied to Abrahamic religions.  The Maya didn't hold the belief of an apocalypse or an end to everything.  In this case, the idea has been swapped cross culturally (and rather unfairly) from the West and ascribed to the Maya.

It is important to consider who is presenting the argument for 2012.  Certainly not scientists, scholars, historians or anyone with half a brain.  No instead you get people like this website proprietor who gladly lists all the celebrity believers of the 2012 nonsense.  Celebrities: always a source of solid scientific information.  New Age mystics have predicted apocalypses before.  Off of the top of my head, I recall three: Comets Kohoutek in 1973 and Hale-Bopp in 1997 and more recently Y2K.  Those events have come and gone and the world is still here, why should 2012 be any different?  This time, it isn't worldwide computer failure threatening mankind.  Proponents of the 2012 nonsense like to point to earthquakes, floods and cosmic occurrences such as solar flares, sunspots, planetary collisions, and switching poles as having ties to this date.  The real truth?  Sure, some of these could happen.  Some of them will happen, just like your gold fish will die someday. Given enough time (thousands to millions of year), there is the potential that all of these could happen.  But there is no evidence that the Maya predicted any of them, or even had the slightest interest in such events.

The Maya possessed some pretty stellar knowledge, especially when it came to astronomy and timekeeping.  But their science, in no way shape or form could ever rival what we’ve established as a whole over the last hundred years.  Do you really think they could accurately predict any of these with a higher degree of accuracy than we can today?

To summarize, 2012 is a fine example of misrepresenting archaeology to suit an agenda, namely that of New Age charlatans.   Taking the Maya Long Count Calendar, removing its meaning and affixing to it that of an entirely different culture is not only a misrepresentation of Maya history, it is essentially a gross perversion of beliefs.  It’d be the equivalent of saying the pyramids were built to predict that Wal Mart will build a new store in San Antonio in 2046.  We should be happy that archaeology has brought us the discovery of the Maya Long Count calender.  We should be awestruck that the Maya were such keen observers of time to create such a thing as the Long Count Calendar.  But we should not be so quick to demean the Maya and the calendar's creation by ascribing it with bogus meaning.

Shows like Seekers 2012 are damaging to public understanding.  The widespread popularity of the 2012 nonsense has proven that we live in a time when people will believe anything without question.  Is the best response to this to feed them more pseudoscience?  Or would we do better to show them a guiding hand; to teach them to think critically and ask questions rather than believe without question?  To encourage people to say, “where is the evidence?”

Do me a favor producers of Seekers 2012,  stop peddling pseudoscience.  Stop trying to make a dime off of people's paranoia.  Stop promoting that misunderstanding.  Stop misconstruing history and stop fucking with archaeology.

Sincerely disgusted,

Kurt Thomas Hunt
SexyArchaeology.org

Petroglyph thefts near Bishop stun federal authorities, Paiutes

 

Ancient hunters and gatherers etched vivid petroglyphs on cliffs in the Eastern Sierra that withstood winds, flash floods and earthquakes for more than 3,500 years. Thieves needed only a few hours to cut them down and haul them away.

Federal authorities say at least four petroglyphs have been taken from the site. A fifth was defaced with deep saw cuts on three sides. A sixth had been removed and broken during the theft, then propped against a boulder near a visitor parking lot.

Dozens of other petroglyphs were scarred by hammer strikes and saw cuts.

"The individuals who did this were not surgeons, they were smashing and grabbing," U.S. Bureau of Land Management archaeologist Greg Haverstock said last week as he examined the damage. "This was the worst act of vandalism ever seen" on the 750,000 acres of public land managed by the BLM field office in Bishop.

The theft required extraordinary effort: Ladders, electric generators and power saws had to be driven into the remote and arid high desert site near Bishop. Thieves gouged holes in the rock and sheared off slabs that were up to 15 feet above ground and 2 feet high and wide.

Visitors discovered the theft and reported it to the BLM on Oct. 31. BLM field office manager Bernadette Lovato delivered the bad news to Paiute-Shoshone tribal leaders in Bishop.

"It was the toughest telephone call I ever had to make," Lovato said. "Their culture and spiritual beliefs had been horribly violated. We will do everything in our power to bring those pieces back."

The region is known as Volcanic Tableland. It is held sacred by Native Americans whose ancestors adorned hundreds of lava boulders with spiritual renderings: concentric circles, deer, rattlesnakes, bighorn sheep, and hunters with bows and arrows.

For generations, Paiute-Shoshone tribal members and whites have lived side by side but not together in Bishop. But desecration of the site, which Native Americans still use in spiritual ceremonies, has forced reservation officials and U.S. authorities to come together and ask a tough question: Can further vandalism be prevented?

"How do we manage fragile resources that have survived as much as 10,000 years but can be destroyed in an instant?" asked archaeologist David Whitley, who in 2000 wrote the nomination that succeeded in getting the site listed on the National Register of Historic Places. "Do we keep them secret in hopes that no one vandalizes them? Or, do we open them to the public so that visitors can serve as stewards of the resources?"

The easy answer is to police the site and others listed under the Archaeological Resources Protection Act. But that's not possible given the condition of cash-strapped federal lands agencies, authorities said.

Authorities said the petroglyphs aren't worth a great deal on the illicit market, probably $500 to $1,500 each. But they are priceless to Native Americans, who regard the massive tableaux as a window into the souls of their ancestors.

The site is one of dozens of such locations managed by the BLM office in Bishop. A small army of volunteers has stepped up surveillance of the area.

For archaeologists, the images carved into a half-mile-long volcanic escarpment depict the culture and spiritual notions of the ancient tribes that once populated the sage flats and river valleys of the Eastern Sierra.

Paiute tribal historic preservation officer Raymond Andrews observed sacred law by quietly chanting a traditional prayer when he approached the site earlier this month.

Standing beneath a panel of geometric renderings believed to have been carved by shamans, Andrews took a slow, deep breath and said, "We still use this sacred place as a kind of church to educate tribal members and children about our historical and spiritual connections. So, our tribal elders are appalled by what happened here."

Federal authorities and Native American leaders plan to mark each defaced petroglyph with a small sign pointing out that, as archaeologist Haverstock put it, "this damage was done by malicious, selfish individuals."

The BLM is offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the thieves. Damaging or removing the petroglyphs is a felony. First-time offenders can be imprisoned for up to one year and fined as much as $20,000, authorities said. Second-time offenders can be fined up to $100,000 and imprisoned up to five years.