Deck 8: Taphonomy Experimental Archaeology And Ethnoarchaeology

Question 1

Taphonomy is useful to archaeology because it:

A) shows that modern human behavior can be extended into the past, strengthening interpretations of the archaeological record.
B) helps archaeologists separate the effects of natural processes and human behavior on site formation.
C) can determine the most efficient method of tool manufacture, which was most likely the method employed in the prehistoric past.
D) reminds ethnoarchaeologists of their responsibility to the living people that they study.

Answer 1

helps archaeologists separate the effects of natural processes and human behavior on site formation.

Question 2

When discussing projectile points, a "flute" refers to:

A) a distinctive characteristic of Clovis and Folsom projectile points.
B) a wide, shallow, longitudinal groove on the face of a projectile point.
C) the feature that is created by the removal of a channel flake.
D) All of the answers are correct.

Answer 2

All of the answers are correct.

Question 3

A thin, sharp sliver of stone removed from a larger piece of rock during the flintknapping process is a:

A) projectile point.
B) core.
C) flake.
D) biface.

Answer 3

flake.

Question 4

A geologist observes glacial moraines and striations in an area that is today not glaciated. The geologist interprets those features as evidence of past glacial activity. He or she is utilizing:

A) middle level theory.
B) the principle of uniformitarianism.
C) a relational analogy.
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 5

Inferring that prehistoric kivas had the same function as kivas used by Puebloan societies today is an example of:

A) a formal analogy.
B) a relational analogy.
C) low level theory interpretation.
D) both formal and relational analogies.

Question 6

Don Crabtree's experimental flintknapping research:

A) failed to discover any successful ways in which Folsom projectile points could be fluted in spite of decades of research; flintknappers today still don't understand how to produce a flute.
B) discovered successful ways in which Folsom projectile points could be fluted, and stimulated additional research resulting in the discovery of more successful fluting methods.
C) discovered the purpose of the flute in Folsom projectile points; fluting was part of a pre-hunting ritual designed to ensure hunting success.
D) showed that the fluting of Folsom projectile points was actually a simple process that any minimally skilled flintknapper (by today's standards) could accomplish with relative ease.

Question 7

The purpose of heat-treating stone tool raw material was to:

A) create stone tools by subjecting the raw material to heat, which would cause the material to fracture into usable pieces.
B) make it more difficult for the raw material to be flaked and shaped.
C) improve the flintknapping properties of the raw material.
D) have hot stones that could be used for cooking (e.g., dropped into ceramic vessels).

Question 8

Taphonomic research at the Hudson-Meng bison bonebed in northwest Nebraska showed that:

A) the ancestors of modern Plains Indians purposely broke open bison skulls to remove the brains for use in tanning hides.
B) natural processes such as incomplete burial and subsequent exposure to sunlight could have caused the tops of the bison skulls to decompose.
C) the bonebed was a result of the ancestors of modern Plains Indians running a herd of 500 bison off of a low cliff and subsequently dragging them to a processing area.
D) the bonebed was a result of both natural bone accumulation and human hunting practices.

Question 9

What happened to the remains of Ishi, the Yahi Indian who lived at the University of California's museum in San Francisco and demonstrated traditional arrow-making and fire-starting for museum visitors?

A) His body was autopsied by the university's medical center after his death in spite of his wishes that no autopsy be performed.
B) His brain was sent to the Smithsonian Institution so that it could be put "to scientific use," where it sat for nearly 85 years.
C) His remains were returned to California's Pit River tribe in 2000, and buried in a secret location.
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 10

Analogies justified on the basis of close cultural continuity between the archaeological and ethnographic cases or similarity in general cultural form are known as:

A) formal analogies.
B) relational analogies.
C) middle-range analogies.
D) uniformitarian analogies.

Question 11

Which of the following is true of the Hudson-Meng site in northwest Nebraska?

A) Taphonomic research suggests that humans played little, if any, role in the deaths of the 500 bison at the site.
B) The presence of hundreds of projectile points among the bison bone strongly suggests the bison were dispatched by human hunters.
C) The presence of unequivocal cutmarks on many of the bison bone provides strong evidence of butchery by humans.
D) The fact that most of the bison bones were highly disarticulated and scattered provides evidence of butchering by humans.

Question 12

A sipapu is:

A) a small pit in a kiva located along the wall opposite the ventilator shaft.
B) the place where the Hopis are said to have emerged into this world from the underworld.
C) the place through which Hopi communication with the supernatural world takes place.
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 13

Formal analogies are strengthened if:

A) many ethnographic cases demonstrate the same pattern, and the archaeological and ethnographic cases have many attributes in common.
B) they can be drawn between cultures with drastically different settlement systems, subsistence practices, or economies.
C) close cultural continuity cannot be demonstrated between archaeological and ethnographic cases.
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 14

Exploring the possible ways to make a projectile point is an example of , while observing the way a living group of people make projectile points is an example of .

A) experimental archaeology/ethnoarchaeology
B) middle range research/general theory
C) ethnoarchaeology/experimental archaeology
D) general theory/middle range research

Question 15

Experimental archaeology provides archaeologists with bridging arguments, ways to make inferences about past behavior from material remains. Which of the following is not an example of experimental archaeology?

A) Using British schoolboys to see if they could move stones similar to those used to build Stonehenge.
B) Using a stone tool to scrape hide and then examining microwear present on the tool's edge to determine the type of wear caused by hide-scraping.
C) Using seriation to construct a way to date archaeological sites based on painted pottery styles.
D) Throwing hafted spearpoints into elephant carcasses to determine their capacity for penetration.

Question 16

Analogies justified by similarities in the formal attributes of archaeological and ethnographic objects and features are known as:

A) formal analogies.
B) relational analogies.
C) middle-range analogies.
D) uniformitarian analogies.

Question 17

The goal of middle level theory is to:

A) determine whether modern cultures accurately reflect prehistoric cultures.
B) identify gender through stone tool analysis.
C) help build secure inferences from archaeological remains.
D) identify the role of the individual in archaeological research.

Question 18

In geology, the principle of uniformitarianism asserts that:

A) the processes that modified the earth's surface in the past are unknowable because they cannot be directly observed.
B) the processes now operating to modify the earth's surface are the same as those of the geologic past.
C) the processes now operating to modify the earth's surface cannot simply be assumed to be the same as those of the geologic past, but must be demonstrated to be the same.
D) geologic processes are distinct from archaeological processes and that uniformitarianism only applies to geologic processes.

Question 19

Which of the following is an example of reasoning through uniformitarian principles, rather then simple analogy?

A) Ethnographic data on the hunting and gathering Shoshone in Nevada suggest that in the 19th century the Shoshone lived in groups of about 25 people; therefore prehistoric people who lived in the same area with the same economy also lived in groups of about 25.
B) Ethnographic data from all over the world show that hunter-gatherers live in groups of about 25 people; therefore prehistoric hunter-gatherers in the deserts of Nevada also lived in groups of about 25 people.
C) It has been demonstrated using ethnographic data that in a variety of different kinds of environments a group of hunter-gatherers of about 25 people contains about 7 active hunters and this number is sufficient to ensure that someone comes home with game each day; increasing the number of hunters beyond 7 increases the amount of food needed for the group but does not appreciably increase the chance that some hunter will come home with game; thus we argue that prehistoric hunter-gatherers also lived in groups of about 25 people.
D) Ethnographic data on highly nomadic hunter-gatherers in desert environments who depend heavily on plants for food rather than on animals show that they live in groups of about 25 people; since prehistoric foragers in the Great Basin deserts were highly nomadic and heavily dependent on plant foods we argue that prehistoric peoples there lived in groups of 25 people.

Question 20

Studying how a large animal carcass decomposes on an African savannah to determine how long it takes the carcass to disarticulate in different seasons and which bones are carried away by carnivores is an example of:

A) ethnoarchaeology.
B) taphonomy.
C) experimental archaeology.
D) geoarchaeology.

Question 21

To create relevant bridging arguments, archaeologists must

A) contact several other archaeologists for their interpretations.
B) observe the workings of a culture in its systemic context.
C) research the literature.
D) consult with a geologist.

Question 22

Microwear traces on stone tools can be difficult to identify due to which of the following?

A) Prehistoric resharpening of stone tools
B) Multiple uses of stone tools prehistorically
C) Brief tool use that did not permit formation of distinctive wear traces
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 23

Newcomer designed blind experiments to test the accuracy of Keeley's high-power microscopy method of identifying stone tool microwear. These experiments:

A) established the validity of Keeley's high-power microscopic method; Keeley was able to correctly identify the microwear on many of the experimental stone tools.
B) determined that while high-power microscopic identifications could always be correctly made on the type of material worked, identifying the area of the tool actually used was much more difficult.
C) showed that while high-power microscopic analysis can be useful, it is not as effective as low-power analysis in determining microwear.
D) showed that high-power microscopic analysis is useless in determining microwear.

Question 24

The "schlep effect" caused Perkins and Daly to explain that throwing away the bones was why upper limb bones were not found at the Neolithic village, Suberde. R.E. Chaplin interpreted the shortage of upper limb bones on a late-ninth century Saxon farm as the result of butchering and dressing the carcasses for market. Upper limb bones missing at American Plains Indian sites were argued by T. White to have been pulverized and boiled to render the grease to make pemmican. These examples exemplify the following:

A) the difficulty of archaeologists to agree on interpretations.
B) the lack of validity in archaeological interpretations made from animal bone.
C) several competing hypotheses account for the same body of facts.
D) you cannot hypothesize from an absence of data.

Question 25

Binford's ethnoarchaeological work with the Nunamiut Eskimo of Alaska demonstrated:

A) that it was safe for archaeologists to assume that a difference in artifacts reflects a difference in culture.
B) that different artifact assemblages could result from different activities conducted by the same culture.
C) the likelihood that different Mousterian tool assemblages were a result of different Neandertal tribes.
D) that the same people leave the same kinds of tools at different locations across the landscape.

Question 26

If you are observing microwear, or minute, often microscopic evidence of use damage on the surface and working edge of an artifact, you are probably observing:

A) striations.
B) microflaking.
C) polish.
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 27

Unlike detectives, archaeologists

A) want to know what happened in the past.
B) make inferences about the past based on material remains.
C) work on sites that are quickly discovered and immediately protected.
D) commonly recover objects with unknown functions and meanings.

Question 28

Experimental archaeology has been used to determine how stone tools were used in the past. This research has shown that:

A) different kinds of use produce different kinds of microflakes on different parts of the tools.
B) stone tool edge damage varied with the type of material being worked (soft materials versus hard materials).
C) different kinds of use result in different kinds of stone tool polish.
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 29

Trying to move stones weighing several tons using only the tools and materials that the ancient Egyptians had available to them, with the goal of determining whether or not Egyptian technology was sufficiently sophisticated to produce monuments like the pyramids, is an example of:

A) experimental archaeology.
B) ethnoarchaeology.
C) analogy.
D) uniformitarianism.

Question 30

Faunal remains in archaeological sites are composed of

A) plant remains.
B) animal bones.
C) pottery artifacts.
D) soil samples.

Question 31

Analogies justified on the basis of close cultural continuity between the archaeological and ethnographic cases or similarity in general cultural form are known as

A) formal analogies.
B) bridging arguments.
C) incorrect science.
D) relational analogies.

Question 32

Flutes, or wide, shallow, longitudinal grooves on each face of a point, are made by

A) chipping away the unwanted materials.
B) removing channel flakes on both sides of the point's base.
C) burning the original core.
D) carving the grooves with a sharp instrument.

Question 33

The word taphonomy refers to

A) the fossil record.
B) faunal remains in the archaeological record.
C) how organisms become part of the fossil record.
D) fossil organisms.

Question 34

Kelly conducted ethnoarchaeological research among the Mikea of Madagascar to answer which of the following questions?

A) Are different lengths of stay in different types of settlements reflected in the material remains left behind at Mikea sites?
B) What are the long-term effects of Mikea slash-and-burn horticulture on soil nutrients?
C) Are different subsistence practices reflected in the material remains left behind at Mikea sites?
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 35

If you are conducting archaeological excavation in an area where houses were made in a way similar to that inhabited by Madagascar's Mikea, and you find a house structure that has very consistent post diameters (as determined by the post holes left behind, now filled with decayed wood), what could you infer about the house based on ethnoarchaeological research?

A) Wood resources were sparse.
B) It was used as a temporary foraging structure.
C) It was likely a permanent house.
D) It was a seasonal habitation.

Question 36

The principle asserting that the processes now operating to modify the earth's surface are the same processes that operated long ago in the geological past is known as

A) analogy.
B) principle of uniformitarianism.
C) evolution.
D) stratigraphy.

Question 37

Which of the following is the final stage that Hill and Behrensmeyer found to be the process of how large animal skeletons fall apart?

A) A decomposing animal carcass will collapse into a flat pile of bones.
B) The scapula detaches from the vertebral column, allowing the entire front limb to drop away.
C) The vertebrae disarticulate.
D) The sun causes the exposed skull to flake away.

Question 38

Ethnoarchaeological research among the Mikea suggests that the more permanent a settlement is the:

A) greater range of features it will contain.
B) closer trash dumps will be to habitations structures.
C) more variable posthole diameters will be.
D) All of the answers are correct.

Question 39

The purpose of Binford's ethnoarchaeological research among the Nunamiut Eskimo of Alaska was to:

A) document Nunamiut subsistence strategies in order to determine what prehistoric adaptations in other arctic environments may have entailed.
B) determine how the kinship system of the Nunamiut differed from the kinship systems of cultures in non- marginal environments.
C) observe living people and see what remains their activities left behind in an attempt to strengthen inferences from archaeological data.
D) determine the effect of seasonality on Nunamiut hunting practices.

Question 40

If stone is chert or quartzite, you might improve the raw materials for stone tool making by

A) burying the flakes or cores.
B) burning a fire on top of the stones.
C) soaking the stones in water.
D) burying the flakes or cores and burning a fire on top of the stones.

Question 41

In archaeology, plant remains from archaeological sites are known as faunal remains.

Question 42

Low power (40X to 60X) microscopic analysis is much more useful in determining stone tool microwear than high power microscopy (up to 400X).

Question 43

Ethnographic analysis makes it clear that it is safe to assume that women in the past always made the pottery, and men always made the stone tools.

Question 44

The purpose of middle range theory is to create arguments that link human behavior to material remains so that archaeologists can make reliable behavioral inferences from archaeological material.

Question 45

One way to make relevant bridging arguments is to observe the workings of a culture in its systemic context.

Question 46

Obsidian blades are much sharper than steel scalpels, leaving smaller cuts with clearer edges that heal more quickly and are less likely to scar than steel blades; because of this, obsidian blades have been used in many surgical procedures.

Question 47

The goal of taphonomic studies is to infer the function of prehistoric objects and features based on the similarity of those objects and features to those used by related cultures today.

Question 48

Experimental archaeology is necessary when archaeologists want to know the material effects of behaviors that no longer exist.

Question 49

Analogies must be used cautiously because there is no guarantee that the analogy will accurately describe the prehistoric culture.

Question 50

Ethnoarchaeological research suggests that the longer a site was occupied in the past, the farther the distance between habitation structures and trash dumps.

Question 51

Archaeologists have tried to replicate, through trial and error with flintknapping, the way in which Folsom points were fluted. This research is an example of experimental archaeology.