[Bonetools] Re : Re : Worked Astraguli from Turkmenistan

Thu Aug 25 09:58:44 CEST 2011

Dear Alice, dear Kate

I agree with you, we have to multiply the experiments to benefit of the widest possible sample. Another important metallurgy experiment session is planned for the month of october, I will inform the list about the results ! and thank you for your article, Kate.

Best

Marquebielle Benjamin
PhD student TRACES laboratory - UMR 5608
5, rue du pont Guilheméry
31000 Toulouse
tel : 06 71 33 61 52
e-mail : benjamin.marquebielle at yahoo.fr

________________________________
De : Alice Choyke <h13017cho at iif.hu>
À : MARQUEBIELLE Benjamin <benjamin.marquebielle at yahoo.fr>; "Mailing list for archaeologists of the research group for the study of object and waste of bone, antler. ivory and horn." <bonetools at listserv.niif.hu>
Envoyé le : Mercredi 24 Août 2011 8h22
Objet : Re: [Bonetools] Re : Worked Astraguli from Turkmenistan

Dear Benjamin,
     As I was telling someone or other I was just in Armenia where I met a potter. He was telling me that the older potters traditonally used 'deer bone' for burnishers. He said he would be willing to try to use bone as well. I tried to encourge him to use phalanges and astragalus from domestic as well as wild animals. The animals there are kept in very extensive conditons  so I am absolutely sure there is little difference in bone density between deer and cattle/caprine bone. I have sent all the articles (including Jackie's PDF of her poster - thank you Jackie) to him through his wife but there has been no response yet. If I hear anything I will inform the list. The more people who use these objects in practice the better off we will be. It would be important though that you continue with your metallurgy experiments because as we all know form does not always accurately reflect function.

Cheers!
Alice

On Tue, Aug 23, 2011 at 11:50 PM, MARQUEBIELLE Benjamin <benjamin.marquebielle at yahoo.fr> wrote:

Dear Kate
>
>
>Thank you for this information and, as Alice, I would like to have a pdf of the article !
>We had to try some experiment with a potter who work with protohistoric techniques and he was very enthusiast about the idea.
>We made first experiments with phalanges used as metal polisher (or burnisher, I'm not sure about the right word in english...) and the smith who work with us confirm it could be an efficient tool to finish and bring shine to metal pieces as fibulas. We had to make other experiments and to analyse this results more precisely, of course.
> 
>Best 
>Benjamin
>
>
>Marquebielle Benjamin
>PhD TRACES laboratory - UMR 5608
>5, rue du pont
 Guilheméry
>31000 Toulouse
>tel : 06 71 33 61 52
>e-mail : benjamin.marquebielle at yahoo.fr
>
>
>
>________________________________
>De : Alice Choyke <h13017cho at iif.hu>
>À : "Mailing list for archaeologists of the research group for the study of  object and waste of bone,  antler. ivory and horn." <bonetools at listserv.niif.hu>
>Envoyé le : Lundi 22 Août 2011 18h45
>Objet : Re: [Bonetools] Worked Astraguli from Turkmenistan
>
>
>
>Dear Kate,
>       I would LOVE a PDF of this article. I just met a potter in southern Armenia who swears that traditonally potters in the region prefered bone as a burnisher and beyond that red deer bone. I personally doubt there is much difference between the density phalange/astrag from domestic animals kept extensively and those of red deer but clearly the insistence on the better qualities of red deer bone as burnishers is related to ideas about the nature of wild animals and red deer in particular. The potter actually says he would be willing to start using bone again if we send him enough examples from prehistoric contexts. Your article is about material right in the neighborhood as it were...
> 
> 
>Cheers!
>Alice
>
>
>On Mon, Aug 22, 2011 at 5:38 PM, Katherine M. Moore <kmmoore at sas.upenn.edu> wrote:
>
>Dear colleagues:
>>
>>A few weeks ago we shared an exchange about astraguli (and phalanges) that had been worked on one or both edges, and I commented that I was familiar with this from work in Bronze Age Turkmenistan. This was older work! and it took me a moment to dig out those records. At this point, there is no pdf, and I can't even find a computer file for the report in which this material appears:
>>
>>1993  Bone tool technology at Gonur Depe. Information Bulletin (Moscow),  vol.19: 218-227
>>
>>If there is interest, I could produce a pdf using a hard copy. I am attaching a drawing of two representative pieces. My manuscript notes a cache of 8 and a cache of 17 from room fill contexts at the southern, later, massive room block at this site. Single examples were also found. Worked and unworked bones were packed together, and sheep bones occurred together with those of the less common (probably wild) pig. Up to 4mm of bone material had been removed from individual faces of these bones. I speculated that they had been used on a softer but still abrasive material, but I regret that I am not sure if these pieces now are in Turkmenistan or in Moscow, and I have no good photographs of the pieces after they had been cleaned.
>>
>>for context on the American excavations at Gonur:
>>
>>Moore, K.M., N. Miller, F. Hiebert and R. Meadow 1994  Agriculture and herding in the early oasis settlements of  the Oxus Civilization.  Antiquity 68: 418-427.
>>
>>Hope this provides a further clue to the variability in these pieces.
>>
>>best wishes,
>>
>>Kate Moore
>>
>>Zooarchaeology Laboratory
>>University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology
>>3260 South Street
>>Philadelphia, PA 19104 USA
>>
>>
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>>Bonetools at listserv.niif.hu
>>https://listserv.niif.hu/mailman/listinfo/bonetools
>>
>>
>
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