12 days of Archaeology! A Christmas Sing Song

We are feeling very Christmassy at CUDI, so what better way to spread festive cheer than to have a little festive sing along, so all together now…

On the first day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Fortune's portrait collection of Chinese trees

On the second day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Two neolithic ditch enclosures in Bohemia

On the third day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Three ancient Jewish reliefs

On the fourth day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Four middle Holocene pillar sites in West Turkana, Kenya

On the fifth day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Five notes on Jerusalem in the first and second Temple Periods

On the sixth day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Six apostle spoons from Finland

On the seventh day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Seven years of preserving damaged stone 

On the eighth day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Eight seventeenth-century decorative paintings

On the ninth day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Nine engraved sites in the Hong Kong

On the tenth day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Ten Commandments for effective anthropological exhibits

On the eleventh day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Eleven post-medieval corpses

On the twelfth day of Christmas CUDI gave to me,
Twelve dirt-walled structures in Mesa Verde National Park

'One of my cherished remembrances of the Holy Land': Lord Kitchener and Christmas at Bethlehem

It might be all last minute shopping, frantic gift wrapping and over done turkey these days but have you ever wondered what Christmas was like in the Holy Land in the nineteenth century? Well you're in luck as I am celebrating this blog's first Christmas with a detailed account by Lord Horatio Herbert Kitchener, a British Field Marshal and colonial administartor who died during the First World War, of 'Christmas at Bethlehem'. This article, together with another, was found among reports and other papers of the late Lord Kitchener, in his handwriting and over his signature after his death. It was published in the January 1917 issue of Palestine Exploration Quarterly.

'On Christmas Eve of 1875 we rode from Jerusalem to Bethlehem to be present at the ceremonies of the Roman Catholic Church. The road, so well known to all travellers in the Holy Land, passes the Well of the Magi, where tradition relates that the three kings from the East again beheld the guiding star.

"A little farther on is a still more ancient site, the Tomb of Rachel, now an ordinary Mahommedan tomb without any appearance of remote antiquity; yet this spot has been venerated by Christians, Mahommedans, and Jews from the earliest times as the burial-place of the mother of Benjamin. It agrees so well with the Bible narrative of the death and burial of Rachel on the way to Bethlehem, that it seems hard to find objection to the genuineness of its position, and yet there are many difficulties to be reconciled before it can be accepted without any doubts. On our, arrival at Bethlehem we found the inhabitants returning from Beit Jala, where they had been to meet and bring the Latin Patriarch to their town. Any honoured person is thus met in Palestine by the inhabitants before arriving at the town, and conducted the rest of the way with great rejoicings, the mounted portion of the escort performing fantasia in front, galloping wildly about, shouting, and firing their' rusty old flintlocks into the air. On returning from Beit Jala they had started on the Jerusalem road in order to meet the French Consul, who arrives in great state as the representative of the Roman Catholic Church.

The Bethlehemites are well-to-do people, earning a good deal from their speciality of carving religious subjects in mother-of-pearl which they sell to pilgrims and travellers; they are mostly Christians, and their women have a well-deserved reputation for good looks which is enhanced by their rather peculiar costume. It consists of a dress of red and blue woollen stuff, open at the throat, and with long hanging sleeves, a mantle of the same hangs down behind, and a long white veil, sometimes embroidered, and held up by a high cylindrical bonnet, forms their headdress; this resembles the ancient oriental headdress worn by female figures representing Syrian towns seen on coins. The lower part of the bonnet is ornamented sometimes by strings of coins closely packed together, and necklaces of silver coins are worn with full dress. A Bethlehem woman might almost start a money-changer's shop with the amount of coins she wears; some are old family heirlooms, and it is their great ambition to put on as many coins as possible. This desire is fraught with some danger, as several of these women were murdered for their ornaments in the short time we were at Jerusalem. Nothing is prettier than a crowd of these women in their long white veils, bright dresses, and sparkling jewellery. The men delight in very rich and full turbans of all colours, and very bright oriental dresses."

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Rudolph, how did you get your nose so bright? PhD opportunities in reindeer archaeology

So it's a tenuous link, but Christmas is just around the corner, I wanted to write a festive blog post and this is as close as I could get. 

Fully-Funded PhD Research Project (UK/EU students only) Department of Archaeology, School of Geosciences, University of Aberdeen

Title: Caribou and the precontact Yup'ik: the isotope ecology and biogeography of a key subsistence species

Supervisors: Dr. Kate Britton, Dr. Rick Knecht, Dr. Vaughan Grimes (external, MUN)

Application deadline: Friday 6th December 2013

Start date: Flexible, but should be between February 1st and August 1st 2014 (a later start date in Autumn 2014 may be negotiable)

Details: This studentship is part of a new, large international AHRC-funded research project at the University of Aberdeen, Department of Archaeology, led by Dr. Rick Knecht – Understanding Cultural Resilience and Climate Change on the Bering Sea through Yup'ik Ecological Knowledge, Lifeways, Learning and Archaeology (ELLA). Focusing on the precontact village site of Nunnalleq (AD 1350- 1700) in the Yukon-Kuskokwim (Y-K) Delta, this community-based archaeology project aims to use both the products and processes of archaeological research to understand how Yup'ik Eskimos in coastal Western Alaska adapted to rapid climate change in the late prehistoric past, in order to inform and empower descendant Yup'ik communities struggling with contemporary global warming. 

This PhD studentship will focus on the isotope ecology and biogeography of caribou in late Holocene Western Alaska, a key subsistence species for the precontact Yup’ik. Caribou continue to play an important role in the seasonal subsistence menu today, but recent climatic shifts have influenced the seasonality, distribution and migrations of herds, impacting subsistence activities. The impact of larger scale climatic change on this species, such as that experienced during the Little Ice Age (a pre-modern global temperature excursion event), is not known, but may provide vital clues about future variability. 

Through the sequential-sampling and subsequent strontium and oxygen isotope analysis of archaeological caribou teeth, this project will reconstruct migratory behaviour of this species in different phases of the Nunalleq site, mapping variations in the behaviour of this prey species during the Little Ice Age. Archaeological data will be compared to the behaviour of modern herds in the region, in order to establish any broad-scale diachronic trends, providing insights into the long-term effects climate change may have on caribou in the Y-K Delta. Data will be compared with isotope data from on-going palaeodietary studies and procurement technologies at the site, relating possible changes in the ecology of this species to subsistence choices and technology. The importance of caribou to modern and archaeological groups in the Y-K Delta will be explored, with reference to their subsistence, technological and ideological roles. 

Analytical work will take place in laboratories at the University of Aberdeen, and at Memorial University, Newfoundland. 

We are looking for talented and ambitious researchers in the relevant discipline.

Your qualifications should include: 
• an undergraduate degree in Archaeology (or related discipline) with first class honours or upper second class honours (or equivalent) 
• a master's degree in Archaeology (or related discipline) with an excellent academic record 
• excellent command of English and good academic writing skills 
• experience of archaeological laboratory work is essential, experience with stable isotope analysis, zooarchaeology, and/or Arctic archaeology is highly desirable 
• student must be prepared (and eligible) to travel to the USA and Canada, and is expected to participate in archaeological fieldwork in Alaska  

In addition to the online form, applications should include the following: 
1) A personal statement introducing yourself, describing your motivation to conduct the research, and placing your interests/experience within the context of the project and the range of work conducted by the Department of Archaeology, University of Aberdeen, and the ELLA project. 
2) A full CV demonstrating academic excellence, including publications and presentations (if applicable)  

The third supervisor on this project is Dr. Vaughan Grimes (external advisor, Memorial University, Newfoundland)  

The start date for this project is flexible, but should be between February 1st and August 1st 2014 (a later start date in Autumn 2014 may be negotiable.

Funding notes:

Available to UK nationals who have been normally resident in the UK for the three years prior to nomination for funding. If a student is a national of a Member State of the EU other than the UK, they are eligible for a full studentship award if they can establish a relevant connection with the UK and Islands, i.e. if they have been ordinarily resident in the UK throughout the three year period immediately preceding the start of their course. EU students who cannot establish a relevant connection may be eligible for fees-only award. For full details please visit this website.

 

Application Procedure 

Formal applications can be completed online

You should apply for Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Archaeology, to ensure that your application is passed to the correct College for processing. Please ensure that you quote the project title and supervisor on the application form. You should also indicate that you are self-funded.

Informal enquiries can be made to, Dr Kate Britton (k.britton@abdn.ac.uk) or Dr Rick Knecht (r.knecht@abdn.ac.uk), University of Aberdeen. All general enquiries should be directed to the Graduate School Admissions Unit (cpsgrad@abdn.ac.uk).