Archaeology and Apprenticeship: Body Knowledge, Identity, and Communities of Practice 9780816507672, 2012014653

Table of contents :
cover
title page
Contents
1. Archaeology and Apprenticeship: Body Knowledge, Identity, and Communities of Practice
2. Apprenticeship and the Confirmation of Social Boundaries
3. Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Performance
4. Knowledge Transfer: The Craftmen’s Abstraction
5. Placing Ideas in the Land: Practical and Ritual Training among the Australian Aborigines
6. Apprentice to the Environment: Hunter-Gatherers and Landscape Learning
7. Lithic Raw Material Availability and Palaeo-Eskimo Novice Flintknapping
8. Apprenticeship and Figured Ostraca from the Ancient Egyptian Village of Deir el-Medina
9. Craft Apprenticeship in Ancient Greece: Reaching beyond the Masters
10. Apprenticeship and Learning from the Ancestors: The Case of Ancient Urkesh
11. Types of Learning in Apprenticeship
12. Writing Craftsmanship? Vocabularies and Notation Systems in the Transmission of Craft Knowledge
13. Recognizing Knowledge Transfer in the Archaeological Record
About the Contributors
Index

Citation preview

Archaeology and Apprenticeship

Archaeology and Apprenticeship Body Knowledge, Identity, and Communities of Practice EDITED BY WILLEKE WENDRICH

Tucson

© 2012 The Arizona Board of Regents All rights reserved www.uapress.arizona.edu Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Archaeology and apprenticeship : body knowledge, identity, and communities of practice / edited by Willeke Wendrich. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8165-0767-2 (cloth : acid-free paper) 1. Ethnoarchaeology. 2. Social archaeology. 3. Apprenticeship programs— Sociological aspects. 4. Material culture. 5. Crafts. 6. Knowledge management. 7. Communities of practice. I. Wendrich, Willeke. CC79.E85A7484 2012 930.1–dc23 2012014653

Manufactured in the United States of America on acid-free, archival-quality paper containing a minimum of 30% postconsumer waste and processed chlorine free.

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CONTENTS

1 Archaeology and Apprenticeship: Body Knowledge, Identity, and Communities of Practice Willeke Wendrich 2 Apprenticeship and the Confirmation of Social Boundaries Hélène Wallaert 3 Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Per formance John L. Creese 4 Knowledge Transfer: The Craftmen’s Abstraction Harald Bentz Høgseth

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5 Placing Ideas in the Land: Practical and Ritual Training among the Australian Aborigines Simon Holdaway and Harry Allen

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6 Apprentice to the Environment: Hunter-Gatherers and Landscape Learning Marcy Rockman

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7 Lithic Raw Material Availability and Palaeo-Eskimo Novice Flintknapping S. Brooke Milne

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8 Apprenticeship and Figured Ostraca from the Ancient Egyptian Village of Deir el-Medina Kathlyn M. Cooney

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9 Craft Apprenticeship in Ancient Greece: Reaching beyond the Masters Eleni Hasaki

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10 Apprenticeship and Learning from the Ancestors: The Case of Ancient Urkesh Marilyn Kelly-Buccellati 11 Types of Learning in Apprenticeship Heather M.-L. Miller

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12 Writing Craftsmanship? Vocabularies and Notation Systems in the Transmission of Craft Knowledge Lise Bender Jørgensen

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13 Recognizing Knowledge Transfer in the Archaeological Record Willeke Wendrich

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About the Contributors

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Index

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Archaeology and Apprenticeship

CHA P TER ONE

Archaeology and Apprenticeship Body Knowledge, Identity, and Communities of Practice Willeke Wendrich

As archaeologists, we study material remains to pronounce upon a wide range of immaterial aspects, from cultural identity to the internal and external dynamics of sociocultural groups. The profession has developed from a simplistic equation of material culture with “a” culture (“a pot is a people”) to understanding cultural and individual identity as a fluid and context-dependent human trait. Explicating how and why material culture has a close relation with identity in the broadest sense of the word brings us to study the sharing of characteristic material features based on a shared understanding, a tradition, born from a degree of stability that results in recognizable material patterns (Costin 1998). The relative stability of these patterns is dependent on the transfer of knowledge from one person to the other, and from one generation to the next. Defining how and why this knowledge transfer occurs, and how we can recognize it in our archaeological material, is a definite aid in developing a deeper understanding not only of the types of and motives for knowledge transfer but also of the relation between material traces and what they tell us about individuals, groups, and generations.

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Very limited explicit attention has been paid to the transfer of knowledge in archaeology. An excellent contribution was the special edition of the Journal of Anthropological Research (2001), edited by Jill Minar and Patricia Crown, dedicated to learning. Many of their contributors’ articles are cited by authors contributing to this volume. A resurgence of interest in the subject is exemplified by a recent volume on cultural transmission (Stark et al. 2008). Anthropological and sociological interest in the subject of learning and apprenticeship is more ubiquitous, sometimes involving a lengthy apprenticeship of the researcher (Keller and Dixon Keller 1996; Marchand 2001, 2008) and descriptions of theory and method (Coy 1989), and recently has been explicitly related to present-day educational practices or concerns (Blackmore 2010; Brown et al. 1989; Hara 2009; Lave 1988; Lave and Wenger 1991; Wenger 1998; Wenger et al. 2009). Archaeology and Apprenticeship considers various aspects of knowledge transfer: from the types and functions of knowledge to the methods of acquiring skill, experience, and the right attitude. The volume brings together authors who study knowledge transfer in a variety of cultures, ancient and modern, with the purpose to understand the domains that are directly or indirectly influencing and influenced by learning. Whether an approach to understanding teaching and learning is mostly psychological, sociological, economic, or symbolic, the transfer of knowledge implies change, and this enables us to observe the processes and relations involved. A session at the meeting of the Society of American Archaeologists in 2005 brought most of the authors together. When it was decided to bundle the contributions in a publication, interest in contributing was expressed by several scholars who could not participate in the meeting but whose research is directly relevant to the subject and provides augmenting angles (chapters 4 and 5). The volume is organized according to five broad and overlapping themes. Chapters 2– 4 emphasize the social context of learning and the agency of the producers, mostly based on French traditions in social theory. Chapters 5 and 6 focus on landscape, the natural environment, and aspects of learning. Chapters 7–10 and 13 discuss the identification of traces of apprenticeship in the archaeological record. Chapter 11 outlines types of learning, while chapter 12 explores types of practical learning and the language used in apprenticeship from a perspective prevalent in Scandinavian scholarship. Chapter 13 provides concluding remarks.

Some Basic Concepts and Questions Apprenticeship is broadly defined as the transmission of culture through a formal or informal teacher–pupil relation, as individuals or groups. The

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major purposes are the development of dexterity, skill, endurance, memory, consideration, and properness, while gaining knowledge, inspiration, and/or motivation. Dexterity is defined as the physical ability to perform a required action. Skill, then, is the ability to perform the proper action in the proper sequence at the proper time, following an internalized set of rules of “how things are done.” Skill involves the right conduct of movements, timing, and organization. Endurance is the capability to perform a particular action for the required length of time, or the number of repetitions needed to finish a product or a workday. Part of mastering endurance is simply a matter of building muscle, but it also involves learning the correct body position, physical attitudes, and movements (Wendrich 2006). Memory involves not just the recollection of the production process but also the collective memory of the craftsmanship and the products that are the result, while consideration requires the full attentive focus on the work and the social context. Properness involves learning the appropriate behavior, the enculturation of the apprentice in the world of the group or the master, and is often characterized as “becoming a human being” within society. This is a tacit, informal function of learning that is not only part, but in many cases the most important purpose, of apprenticeship. Lastly, inspiration and motivation are the driving forces in the relation between master and pupil. Theoretical approaches to learning range from focusing on the development of the individual (psychology, cognitive science) to the role of knowledge transfer within group or in a par ticular environment (social theory). The French anthropological research tradition has long emphasized the importance of the body in expressing cultural aspects, going back to Marcel Mauss’s Les techniques du corps (1936). Developed by Pierre Bourdieu, the term habitus (Latin for the French concept of déportement, the manner of carry ing or conducting oneself) denotes the embodied culture, which includes such aspects as skills, habits, style, and taste, as well as one’s history and experiences. This is communicated through hexis (the Greek term for déportement), which is the manifestation of habitus and enables communication through very subtle body language and almost involuntary movements, expressing reactions and communicative behavior, such as mimicking the other. Habitus is the basis for social differentiation, where the personal and cultural dispositions are combined (Bourdieu 1977). The material aspect of Bourdieu’s social theory is also anchored in earlier French anthropology. His distinction between opus operatum, the created work, and modus operandi, the method of creating, reflects André Leroi-Gourhan’s (1964) consideration of material objects as the result of a chaîne opératoire, a sequence of operations from collecting and preparing raw materials to fi nishing the product.

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Archaeology and Apprenticeship The essential part of the modus operandi which defines practical mastery is transmitted in practice, in its practical state, without attaining the level of discourse. The child imitates not “models” but other people’s actions. Body hexis speaks directly to the motor function, in the form of a pattern of postures that is both individual and systematic, because linked to a whole system of techniques involving the body and tools, and charged with a host of social meanings and values. (Bourdieu 1977, 87)

The emphasis on postures, gestures, and movements bears comparison to Leroi-Gourhan’s interest in body position and tool use but has been expanded to encompass all social interaction, including sometimes almost imperceptible nonverbal communication. Likewise, Pierre Lemonnier has pointed to the importance of studying movement: “A social theory of material culture should deal with technologies in their most physical aspects, that is to say, with the way they are made and used for some action on the material world” (1992, 3). The movements and operational sequences exist within mental models of the end product, which guide the technological choices that are made throughout the process (81; see also chapter 4 this volume). Transfer of knowledge, then, encompasses the entirety of operational sequences, mental models, appropriate behavior, and involuntary gestures, within a social context. Knowledge is conveyed and acquired through play, observation, imitation, repetition, and experiment, but the emphasis on any of these is determined by cultural direction and circumscription, as well as the agency of both master and apprentice. The transfer of knowledge takes place not only directly from person to person, master to pupil, parent to child, and experienced group member to novice but also through oral traditions and narratives (see chapter 5) and examples in heirloom material culture (see chapter 10). In the latter situations, knowledge transfer is initiated by the learners, who may be experienced producers. They develop practical approaches from generalized principles, see examples of alternative methods, and find inspiration to adopt a new style or adapt their own based on ideas that might come to them through a variety of channels and are incorporated in their daily routine, adding to their experience. Apprenticeship is for the most part extremely hard and repetitive work, focused on gaining body knowledge, a physical memory embedded in muscle and the central ner vous system, so that in many phases of the work the body simply seems to “know” what to do. A successful apprentice masters design and planning, having the ability to visualize the result before even starting to collect the raw materials (see chapter 4). Apprenticeship, knowledge transfer that conveys traditions and enculturation, is also closely related to the definition of style, not as a diagnostic

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tag of a culture as a whole but as an information carrier of social and cultural identity (Lemonnier 1992, 89). Style reflects instances of choice in a technological process, determined by the agency of a group or individual (van der Leeuw 1993). In descriptions of present-day apprenticeship, there is much emphasis on the rules one has to abide by, described as a “web of rules” (Gamst 1989) or “strict set of rules” (Aronson 1989), which seems to deny agency of both apprentice and teacher. A valuable approach to the relations between group and individual, which reflect and are reflected by the production process, is the concept of communities of practice, as introduced by Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger (1991) and expanded by Wenger (1998). They focus not only on the learning of the individual but also on the activities of the group, which integrates individuals to participate through legitimate peripheral learning (observation, performing limited tasks, and imitation). The learning in a community of practice is ongoing, often informal, and is based on the sharing of knowledge and experience within a social group. It can be contrasted with formal learning but is not its opposite; rather, it is a complementary way of learning in practice (Wenger 1998, 63–71). Communities of practice share knowledge for a variety of reasons and in many different ways. Interests in contemporary applications of the concept focus on dispersed individuals forming communities of practice and sharing knowledge through the Internet (Hara 2009; Wenger et al. 2009), but mostly communities of practice have a locational center, such as a workshop, building site, or even an entire landscape (Ingold 2010; Marchand 2010; see also chapters 5 and 6 this volume). The notion of communities of practice allows for agency of all members of the group. This concept of agency is quite different from that defined by Bourdieu and especially Jean-Pierre Warnier, who argues that we should also recognize that technologies are embedded in systems of agency, which act on objects and directly influence the (bodies of) persons involved. Warnier calls this system of agency the “praxis value” of material culture, which exists next to the sign value used to communicate (Warnier 2007, 1– 40). Scholarly endeavors, even ancient ones, such as becoming a scribe (see chapter 8), have strong elements of apprenticeship. In our own training we are confronted with a general Western attitude toward learning that ranks academic (explicit) knowledge higher than practical (tacit) knowledge, a preference that is expressed in the social position and salaries of white- versus blue-collar workers (see chapter 12). Knowledge that is not or is poorly verbalized, termed procedural knowledge by Warnier (1999, 2007), is not given the same appreciation as discursive knowledge. This pervasive attitude may form the greatest obstacle to a proper understanding of what learning in the past encompassed. Archaeologists are among the academics that are most familiar with learning practical skills, in the form of methods for fieldwork (see

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chapter 11). Archaeological field schools are, in a very literal sense, apprenticeships, in which students learn how to excavate, record, set up, and execute a survey, as well as clean and do first-aid conservation on finds. There still is a dichotomy between academic work and practical work, however, because a theoretical account is generally given a higher status than practical fieldwork. This seems to be less so for scientists, who are also heavily involved in hands-on work as part of method development and analysis (see chapter 12). Following the GIGA rule (“garbage in, garbage out”), good practice is the foundation of good science; good data are the result of well-designed and well-executed practical work. Apprenticeship in archaeology is therefore an integral part of the training at both the undergraduate and graduate level. Graduate students are supposed to “do their chores”—pay their dues by performing repetitive or uninteresting tasks for their masters. Similar to ancient workshop owners, some academics abuse their position of power. Depending on the academic culture, a student’s innovation and criticism are stimulated or discouraged. Similarly, ancient apprentices were tightly bound to the culture of their masters and either passed this on or rebelled against and transformed it. As academics, we are to a great extent the product of a process in which learning is on one level explicit, highly structured, and abstract yet on another level is hidden, implied, and sometimes flat-out denied. Knowledge transfer is done through a curriculum, with defi ned goals, while at the same time academic learning has many aspects of apprenticeship, in which the goal is not just imbibing and reproducing information but also doing the chores (“as we all did in our time”), learning the correct attitude—ranging from reverent to independently critical, depending on the academic (sub)culture— displaying the correct behavior, and wearing appropriate clothing. The first type of learning is acknowledged; the second usually is not. These implicit social values that are part of the academic community of practice are at the heart of apprenticeship, ancient and modern. To understand ancient apprenticeship, we need to take many aspects into consideration, ranging from cognitive skills to social and personal relations and objectives of learning. This leads to the definition of five key questions: 1. What can a person master—what is the human potential for learning? 2. How does a person learn—what is the apprenticeship process? 3. Who is teaching—what is the apprentice-tutor relation? 4. What is the result of learning—what types of knowledge can we discern?

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5. Why does a person learn—what is the objective of the apprenticeship? These five questions feature in one form or another in all chapters in this volume. They illustrate the variation of approaches to apprenticeship, emphasizing the psychological, economical, or social aspects, but also the many common features.

The Human Potential for Learning It has long been recognized that there are different types of learning (Gardner 1983, 1999; Guilford 1967; Guilford and Hoepfner 1971; Lave and Wenger 1991; Sternberg 1997). Developmental psychology has considered the potential of children to learn, either related to age and development stage (e.g., Piaget 1970, 1972; Wadsworth 1996) or to personality and talent (Gardner 1983, 1999; Guilford 1967; Sternberg 1997). Jean Piaget developed four distinctive stages of cognitive development, linked to specific age groups, and argued that children’s learning should be adapted to these (table 1.1). The development progresses from the sensorimotor stage, in which children develop motor skills but are not capable of forming mental images, through a stage in which children develop “true thought,” the preoperational stage. When children are approximately eight years old, they start to develop the capability of deductive reasoning and discerning different perspectives, the concrete operations stage. The last stage is the formal operations stage, in which children develop abstract thinking.

Table 1.1. Four stages of cognitive development (Piaget 1972) Stage

Function

Approximate Age (years)

Sensorimotor

Development of sensory perceptions and motor skills

0–2

Preoperational

Language development

3– 6

Concrete operational

Logical thinking

7–11

Formal operational

Logical and abstract thinking, deductive reasoning, systematic planning

12 to adult

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Criticism of this cognitive approach was twofold. The main revision of Piaget’s work was that more attention should be given to the social and cultural context of the child, which, as Lev Vygotsky argued, was of great influence on a child’s development and potential (Veer and Valsiner 1991). Furthermore, cognition was defined mostly as a development of linguistic or logical abilities, while only the very first stage was important for the development of sensory perception and motor skills. A more holistic approach should take these other types of continuing development into account as well. Howard Gardner’s nine types of intelligence—linguistic, logical-mathematical, bodily-kinesthetic, spatial, musical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalistic, and existential (Gardner 1983, 1999)— recognized human variation in capabilities and has been important for the development of a balanced appreciation of personal potential, even though society tends to value some types of intelligence over others. It would not be surprising if individuals with a strong bodily-kinesthetic or spatial intelligence, provided they had a free choice of career, would gravitate toward working as craftspersons. For archaeologists who work with cultures that are removed from theirs in space and time, it is important to move away from a definition of knowledge and understanding centered on academic and Western culture, to redefine the definition of capabilities, and to recognize that they are multifaceted. Apart from Gardner’s, several other systems have been devised to express or analyze the differences in human capacity. Joy Paul Guilford discerns 150 components of intelligence, which consist of the intersections of five contents, six products, and five operations. In this way, he enables a refined definition of human potential by cross-referring the various possible approaches, the types of talents, and the scale and focus on relationships with which a person primarily tends to approach a problem or activity (Guilford 1967; Guilford and Hoepfner 1971). Thus, decisionmaking skills (the evaluative operation), for instance, can be subdivided into 30 types of aptitude: the cross-references of the five types of content and the six products. Less detailed, but perhaps more accessible, is Robert J. Sternberg’s triarchic theory of intelligence, an approach that provides insights from developmental psychology. It is particularly helpful for archaeologists to understand the principles underlying apprenticeship constructs and how to recognize them. Sternberg is quoted more often than Guilford in this context, because his approach seems less rigid than Guilford’s system and more geared toward the influence society has on all elements of human behavior and cognition (Sternberg 1997). His division of the theory of intelligence into componential (metacognitive, performance, knowledge acquisition), experiential (referencing to previous experience on a scale from novel to familiar), and contextual theories (specifying the circumstances in which certain behavior is or is not intel-

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ligent) forms a useful basis for understanding the variation of defining intelligence across (sub)cultures. Particularly relevant is that he recognizes the existence of implicit theories of intelligence between and within cultures and subgroups (Sternberg 1983). Cognitive psychology and cognitive science have developed a more thorough recognition that the human ability for learning is not a passive, unchanging, and individual trait. Psychology has been known to apply to various other cultures theories that have been developed in a Western cultural population, without accounting for the specific context, and without adaptation. More recent approaches strive to be aware of ethnocentrism and reductionism (Miller 1997; Sinha 1997).

The Apprenticeship Process In many present-day societies, apprenticeship involves a number of stages, often, but not always, linked to the age and to the talent, skill, and social position of the apprentice and the length of the total apprenticeship (see chapters 2, 4, and 9 this volume). Piaget discerned the capabilities of children according to age groups and stressed that children had to be taught at the appropriate level of the knowledge acquisition they were capable of (see table 1.1), but the apprenticeship stages do not mimic development stages and are more complex than these. Different types of knowledge and skills are incorporated at every stage, ranging from motor skills to abstract thinking (chapters 3 and 4). In many cases apprenticeship is geared toward learning the properties of the raw materials, the use of tools, the type of products that are supposed to be the end result, and decorative patterns, which typically carry complicated meaning and are means of communication. Wallaert (chapter 2) demonstrates convincingly that apprenticeship is much more than learning certain actions or understanding particular materials. The stages of apprenticeship can be defined by the type of involvement or the type of activities, and the apprenticeship can be structured to a greater or lesser extent. If the apprenticeship starts very early, the level of involvement is to a certain extent linked to the child’s development stages. Typical approaches are learning by play, observation, imitation, per formance of menial tasks, initiation, copying, repetitive practice, and increased responsibility, freedom, and experimentation. There is, however, also a strong relation between the apprenticeship and the production process (chaîne opératoire). Pupils start with cleaning up and helping with preparations, a stage that may take several years (see chapter 9). Preparation of the raw materials (e.g., selection and preparation of reeds for matting, clay for pottery, and trees for carpentry) often takes more

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than half of the total production time and is of extreme importance to ensure the quality of the end product. That part of the work is where most apprentices start. Learning the production of the actual object often is another multiyear stage, in which the apprentice fi rst assists, for instance, in building a wooden structure or starts handling the raw materials as part of the process, such as adding handles or adding slip to half-finished pots. Then the student progresses to a period of increasingly difficult tasks, for instance, making increasingly larger pots, thoroughly practiced at each stage through numerous repetitions and characterized by increasing dexterity and speed. The fi nal stage sees the apprentice finishing a product from beginning to end, including the application of decoration. These apprenticeship stages can be part of a highly structured curriculum, or an almost off hand “instruction by example.” Educational theory defines a complex relation between aptitude and instructional treatment. Even though the talent of the apprentice, the tasks, and the learning situations vary greatly, in general low-ability students or pupils who are dependent or anxious perform better in highly structured instructional environments, while the opposite is true for high-ability, independent apprentices (Cronbach and Snow 1977; Snow et al. 1980). The examples outlined in this volume represent both ends of the scale. Holdaway and Allen (chapter 5) explicitly address the constant interplay between informal action-based learning and formal ritual training, represented by specific stages that are reached through gradual initiation, among Australian aboriginals. Rockman (chapter 6) demonstrates the seeming lack of structure of learning among the !Kung, even though the abilities of being a skilled hunter are clearly defined as four types: knowledge, sense, cleverness, and alertness. Only the first can be taken from others, but even that is not a given: knowledge should actually be gained by experiencing the environment. In this case, the transfer of knowledge is therefore mostly through observation, imitation, and practice. The case studies of Wallaert (chapter 2), on the other hand, demonstrate tightly structured systems among the Dowayo in Cameroon, as well as the Pueblo potters in New Mexico. From the writings of the Greek philosophers, we may deduce that in ancient Greece apprenticeship was highly structured as well, with clearly defined stages. Plato seems to quote an existing axiom when he says, “Is not this, as they say to learn the potter’s craft by undertaking a pithos (large storage jar) . . . and does not this seem to you a foolish thing to do?” (Plato, Gorgias, 514E, qtd. in chapter 9 this volume). In other words, there is a very specific order in which to learn things. Almost all apprenticeships, ancient and modern, have in common that they last a long period, ranging from several months to decades. There

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is, however, enormous variation in the apprentice-tutor relationships and the purposes of the learning period.

Apprentice-Tutor Relation The word apprentice often calls up the formal relation between a master and a pupil, an image derived from the medieval and renaissance guild systems. This is a very specific, highly structured, and regulated type of apprenticeship that was particularly dominant in urban environments. In such a system, “apprentice” is a specific stage between “learners” and “journeymen” that involves working with a master who can only accept a limited guild-regulated number of apprentices (Montias 1977). From the contributions in this volume, it is clear, however, that many of the craft apprenticeships in rural areas of the ancient and the present-day world are much more informal and in many cases part of a long-standing family tradition and divided by gender: father teaches son or mother teaches daughter a craft that has been taught for generations, and a specific form of familial apprenticeship is that of a new bride with her mother-inlaw (Wallaert 2008; see also chapter 2 this volume). In many cases, the social structure of teaching expands to encompass the extended family or an entire village that specializes in a par ticular craft (Wallaert 1999; Wendrich 1999), or part of a community that develops its specific technological or decoration signature (Lave and Wenger 1991; Wenger 1998). The study of communities of practice is particularly apt for understanding knowledge transfer and apprenticeship from the archaeological record, because it enables us to understand shared principles, without necessarily knowing the exact apprenticeship relations (see chapter 2). Such a community of practice demonstratively existed in ancient Egyptian Deir elMedina (chapter 8). The few glimpses that we get from apprenticeship among potters in ancient Greece can also be characterized as a “community of practice,” even though the organization seems to have been more formalized than that in Egypt. Learning among several hunter-gatherer groups is usually characterized as “informal learning,” a term that exists only in the context of a society in which “formal learning” has a place as well (Schugurensky 2000). Much of the ancient apprenticeship structure can be characterized as such because, aside from a formal position as apprentice, the socialization, which is such a prominent part of most apprenticeships, usually is not formulated in explicit terms of learning, while the stages of craftsmanship, related to the chaîne opératoire, commonly are. The training of huntergatherer youths seems to be instigated by the student rather than by an instructor or the group. This type of informal learning is not exclusively

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family related but expands to the broader group. Younger group members can develop their skills by observing and imitating their elders, but mostly skills are honed by practice. Specialization is based on talent and zeal of the individual (see chapters 5 and 6). Chapters 2, 3, and 10 highlight yet another form of learning that is based not on the one-to-one relation with a living crafts specialist who serves as an example or is actively engaged in the teaching process but on products from previous generations of craftsmen. Copying the style and reinventing a long-lost procedure of the ancestors can be a strong impetus for innovation and learning. It is more than inspiration because the physical products are at hand and can be analyzed, copied, and used as a check for the results. This also highlights the fact that skilled, practiced, and creative craftsmen are never finished learning, as Cooney points out in chapter 8 for the community of artists in Deir el-Medina. To our Western minds, learning from the ancestors may not be a valid educational principle, but the participants who are involved take the lessons as seriously as other forms of teaching. The relation between student and master is, on the one hand, firmly embedded in the social context around and beyond craftsmanship, as defined by status, gender, age, and other factors of identity. On the other hand, it also has its own rules that at times can change the established social hierarchy. In my own work I have used the position of apprentice as a means of ethnoarchaeological research into basketry production in Egypt (Wendrich 1999). Bridging the gap between a Western-trained, urban, foreign, female academic and an Egyptian, rural, male basketmaker was made possible by my request to learn the trade. I was accepted as an informal apprentice, even though I was in Middle Egypt for only three months rather than a number of years. My interest and regular visits elevated the social status of the basketmaker, and at the same time, my position as his pupil opened up many opportunities for learning other, mostly female, village activities such as cheese making and the baking of bread. Nevertheless, this “shortened” apprenticeship had many shortcomings in understanding the usual apprenticeship procedure. The basketmaker did not have a formal or informal apprentice and was actually hesitant to teach his young sons because he wanted them to go to school and improve their economic situation.

Types of Knowledge The range of knowledge gained in apprenticeship is very broad, from motor skills through organizational skills to design and abstract thinking. Students have to handle the materials, understand the production pro-

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cess and timing, and be trained in using the tools, gestures, and processes of creating the objects. In addition, they need to learn the vocabulary of the craft and the abstract dimensions, the vision of what the final project should be (see chapter 4). Knowledge of materials and their properties is a first requirement. Properties should be taken in the widest sense and includes knowledge ranging from the physical characteristics (e.g., tension strength, flexibility) to the source of the materials (e.g., quarry, natural habitat, trade network). Endless repetition is a major element in all forms of apprenticeship, to enhance kinesthetic skills and also to build endurance, create habits, and engrain the movements, actions, and work order in the body. The result is what I have called body knowledge: the mastery of dexterity, skill, and endurance (Wendrich 2006). To grow from an apprentice to a master, however, body knowledge is not sufficient; self-motivation, creativity, and organizational and communication skills are equally important (Marchand 2001). Only rarely is repetition not the key element of learning, namely, when the knowledge transfer targets skills to deal with novel circumstances, as in landscape learning of mobile peoples (see chapters 5–7). This type of knowledge transfer is characterized by a high degree of abstraction and generalization, to enable pupils to extrapolate from earlier experiences. Memorizing the knowledge therefore happens on a number of different levels. One could see apprenticeship as a result of personal, cognitive, and habit memory, as discerned by Connerton (1989), in which the importance of the latter is often underrecognized. Cognitive memory, as one of the universal mental faculties, is important in the basic classification of the world, while habit memory introduces the social factor, the conventions that a community abides by. Both of these types of memory are often an unconscious part in the learning process, but from several examples in this volume it is very clear that enculturation and socialization are key factors and, in some instances, the main driving force for apprenticeship. Each craft has its own specialized vocabulary, a refi nement and adaptation of daily language that enables the distinction of par ticular materials, techniques, products, and faults. Learning the jargon without learning the physical aspects is of no use, however, and explaining the exact activities is impossible by using words alone. Even adding visual means of knowledge transfer (e.g., drawings, photographs, video), although helpful, ultimately does not bring across the tactile and social elements that are essential in apprenticeship. If a master says “let me show you how to do this,” then in fact what he says is “let me make you feel how to do this,” a fact beautifully illustrated by an Egyptian tomb relief from approximately 1450 BCE, where the official Min trains the young king in shooting his bow by adjusting his position (figure 1.1).

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Figure 1.1. The official Min gives archery lessons to the prince (later King Amenhotep II), ca. 1425 BCE: relief from Theban Tomb 109. Line drawing by H. Barnard, based on the drawing by N. de G. Davies (1935, 52).

The use of language is often geared toward the theory of craftsmanship, a very particular type of literacy that covers only part of the process. The most satisfying combination of movement, rhythm, applied strength, creativity, and time investment is often impossible to express in words. A written tradition on crafts may exist but may be geared not toward the practitioner but to other groups, such as the financers (see chapter 9). When academics write about crafts, we also find that language falls short (see chapter 12). When trying to describe aural, visual, or tactile aspects of craft production, we need to revert to quite clumsy, often numerical ways of expressing patterns such as working rhythm or properties such as tensile strength (Wendrich 2006). It is a way of theorizing practical knowledge and is linked intrinsically to status: in our literate society, knowledge that is not transferred through the written word is considered of lesser social value than theoretical knowledge (Marchand 2008). Several philosophers of science and sociologists have reflected on the different types of knowledge and the language of crafts knowledge transfer (chapters 4 and 12). Bloch (1977) calls it “learning what” and “learning how,” Polanyi (1966) refers to “verbalized knowledge” and “tacit knowledge,” adapted by Harré (2002) to “explicit knowledge” versus “tacit knowledge,” while Warnier uses the terms “discursive” and “procedural” knowledge. In a field where theory and practice are thoroughly interwoven, recognizing that the status difference is a by-product of a singularly focused society in which certain types of literacy are considered primary is the start of putting into practice the realization that there are different

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types of intellect, as discussed above. In the Scandinavian countries, a number of quite recent initiatives stress the value of practical intellect. Several professional schools have obtained university status, and the application and study of crafts practices are considered valid thesis subjects (see chapter 12). Such an approach has been accepted to a certain extent in the United States, where professional schools such as architecture, conservation, dance, music, and arts are part of regular universities, although even there the assessment of faculty for promotion and tenure regularly turns out to be problematic.

The Objective of Learning On the surface, the educational objective of apprenticeship is learning a craft, with a very practical, economic purpose: making a living. The purpose of the training can be to make perfectly standardized pot sizes, gorgeously decorated vessels, sturdy boats, or intricate baskets. As hinted to above, this is usually the explicit objective; all forms of apprenticeship also aim, often implicitly, for some degree of enculturation. This is expressed by several contributors to this volume, for instance, Milne (chapter 7), who describes that learning how to make stone tools involves not only “learning how to do” but also “learning how to act.” The learning process facilitates enculturation by exposing novices to the norms that structure the technological, social, and economic environment. In her work on craft specialization, Costin (1991, 1998, 2001) has given ample attention to the social aspect of craft production. The often considerable length of apprenticeship is related not only to engraining body knowledge but also to the investment and period that a person dedicates to becoming a full member of (a segment of) society. In chapter 2, Wallaert describes a situation in which the transfer of technical skills is almost negligible; virtually all of the apprenticeship is dedicated to becoming part of a new group. Highly skilled potters are obliged to restart at the very beginning of apprenticeship if they move from their own household to that of their husband’s family. Guided by the mother-in-law, their abilities are humbled, their attitude is criticized, and they are treated as children, even though they are full-grown well-trained women. The point of the apprenticeship is becoming a potter, but this means a thorough enculturation in the new group rather than learning new skills. Apprenticeship has the characteristics of an initiation in other ways, too, not only in a very literal sense (see, e.g., chapter 5) but also in the sharing of knowledge that is meant for and guarded by a limited group of people (Dilley 1989). The family lineage that forms the core of the most common informal apprentice-tutor relations is a powerful stimulant for

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keeping the knowledge within and limited to the group. Restricted knowledge can be a par ticular building style, an ingredient, or a recipe for a clay mixture or colorant. The strong social factor of apprenticeship has no set consequences for whether a new member of the group is stimulated to dutifully copy or generally adhere to the group style or whether he or she is allowed to experiment and innovate. A community of practice can have a tradition of innovation, for instance, among the master vase painters in ancient Greece (see chapter 9), and it is the group culture that determines whether change is considered a positive or negative feature of recently graduated apprentices. Similarly, new forms can be resocialized and become the standard, based on the personality of the producer—just one example of the importance of agency in understanding craft traditions (Dobres 2000; Dobres and Hoffman 1999; Warnier 1999, 2007). Considering the above, it is not far-fetched to state that apprenticeship provides an important contribution to identity construction, whether or not this is a conscious course of action (Gosselain 2000; see also chapter 3 this volume). To grasp such developments as aspects of growth and change requires that we perceive apprenticeship as a process rather than a fi xed situation, goal, or end product. Acknowledgments

I want to recognize the persons that have been most influential throughout the years of my apprenticeship: Mohamed Abd el-Na’im, John Baines, Joris Borghouts, Nicholas David, Barry Kemp, Gerrit van der Kooij, Dirk Nijhuis, Piet van de Velde, Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood, and Karin Willemse. I also thank Hans Barnard, who always reads my heart and over my shoulder. References Aronson, L. 1989. To Weave or Not to Weave: Apprenticeship Rules among the Akwete Igbo of Nigeria and the Baule of the Ivory Coast. In Apprenticeship. From Theory to Method and Back Again. M.W. Coy, ed. Pp. 149–162. Albany: State University of New York Press. Blackmore, C., ed. 2010. Social Learning Systems and Communities of Practice. London: Springer. Bloch, M. 1977. The Past and the Present in the Present. Man (n.s.) 12:278–291. Bourdieu, P. 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Brown, J.S., A. Collins, and P. Duguid. 1989. Situated Cognition and the Culture of Learning. Educational Researcher 18(1):32– 42.

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Connerton, P. 1989. How Societies Remember. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Costin, C.L. 1991. Craft Specialization: Issues in Defining, Documenting, and Explaining the Organization of Production. In Archaeological Method and Theory. M.B. Schiffer, ed. Pp. 1–56. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Costin, C.L. 1998. Introduction: Craft and Social Identity. In Craft and Social Identity. C.L. Costin and R.P. Wright, eds. Pp. 3–16, Archaeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association, Vol. 8, issue 1. Washington, DC: American Anthropological Association. Costin, C.L. 2001. Craft Production Systems. In Archaeology at the Millennium. G.M. Feinman and T.D. Price, eds. Pp. 273–327. New York: Kluwer. Coy, M.W., ed. 1989. Apprenticeship. From Theory to Method and Back Again. Albany: State University of New York Press. Cronbach, L., and R. Snow. 1977. Aptitudes and Instructional Methods: A Handbook for Research on Interactions. New York: Irvington. Davies, N.d.G. 1935. The Work of the Graphic Branch of the Expedition. In The Egyptian Expedition 1934–1935. Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Vol. 30, no.11, pp. 46–57. Dilley, R.M. 1989. Secrets and Skills: Apprenticeship among Tukolor Weavers. In Apprenticeship: From Theory to Method and Back Again. M.W. Coy, ed. Pp. 181–198. Albany: State University of New York Press. Dobres, M.-A. 2000. Technology and Social Agency: Outlining a Practice Framework for Archaeology. Malden, MA: Blackwell. Dobres, M.-A., and C.R. Hoffman. 1999. The Social Dynamics of Technology. Practice, Politics and World View. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institute Press. Gamst, F. 1989. The Railroad Apprentice and the “Rules”: Historic Roots and Contemporary Practices. In Apprenticeship. From Theory to Method and Back Again. M.W. Coy, ed. Pp. 65– 86. Albany: State University of New York Press. Gardner, H. 1983. Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences. New York: Basic. Gardner, H. 1999. Intelligence Reframed: Multiple Intelligences for the 21st Century. New York: Basic. Gosselain, O.P. 2000. Materializing Identities: An African Perspective. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 7:187–217. Guilford, J.P. 1967. The Nature of Human Intelligence. New York: McGraw-Hill. Guilford, J.P., and R. Hoepfner. 1971. The Analysis of Intelligence. New York: McGraw-Hill. Hara, N. 2009. Communities of Practice: Fostering Peer-to-Peer Learning and Informal Knowledge Sharing in the Work Place. Information Science and Knowledge Management, Vol. 13. Berlin: Springer. Harré, R. 2002. Cognitive Science: A Philosophical Introduction: From Meaning to Molecules. London: Sage.

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Ingold, T. 2010. Footprints through the Weather-World: Walking, Breathing, Knowing. In Making Knowledge: Explorations of the Indissoluble Relation between Mind, Body and Environment. T.H.J. Marchand, ed. Pp. 115–132. (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/book/10.1002/9781444391473) Oxford: WileyBlackwell. Keller, C.M., and J. Dixon Keller. 1996. Cognition and Tool Use. The Blacksmith at Work. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lave, J. 1988. Cognition in Practice: Mind, Mathematics, and Culture in Everyday Life. New York: Cambridge University Press. Lave, J., and E. Wenger. 1991. Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lemonnier, P. 1992. Elements for an Anthropology of Technology. Ann Arbor, MI: Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan. Leroi-Gourhan, A. 1964. Le geste et la parole I, Technique et language. 2 vols. Paris: Albin Michel. Marchand, T.H.J. 2001. Minaret Building and Apprenticeship in Yemen. Richmond, UK: Curzon Press. Marchand, T.H.J. 2008. Muscles, Morals and Mind: Craft Apprenticeship and  the Formation of Person. British Journal of Educational Studies 56: 245–271. Marchand, T.H.J. 2010. Introduction: Making Knowledge: Explorations of the Indissoluble Relation between Mind, Body and Environment. In Making Knowledge: Explorations of the Indissoluble Relation between Mind, Body and Environment. T.H.J. Marchand, ed. Pp. 1–20. Malden, MA, Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Mauss, M. 1936. Les techniques du corps. Journal de Psychologie 32(3– 4): 271–293. Miller, J.G. 1997. Theoretical Issues in Cultural Psychology. In Handbook of Cross-Cultural Psychology, Vol. 1, Theoretical Issues in Cultural Psychology. J.W. Berry, Y.H. Poortinga, and J. Pandey, eds. Pp. 129–170. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. Minar, C.J., and P.L. Crown. 2001. Learning and Craft Production, an Introduction. Journal of Anthropological Research 57(4):369–380. Montias, J.M. 1977. The Guild of St. Luke in 17th-Century Delft and the Economic Status of Artists and Artisans. Simiolus: Netherlands Quarterly for the History of Art 9(2):93–105. Piaget, J. 1970. Genetic Epistemology. New York: Norton. Piaget, J. 1972. The Psychology of the Child. New York: Basic. Polanyi, M. 1966. The Tacit Dimension. Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith. Schugurensky, D. 2000. The Forms of Informal Learning: Towards a Conceptualization of the Field. New Approaches to Lifelong Learning, Working Paper 19. Toronto: Centre for the Study of Education and Work.

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Sinha, D. 1997. Indigenizing Psychology. In Handbook of Cross-Cultural Psychology, Vol. 1, Theoretical Issues in Cultural Psychology. J.W. Berry, Y.H. Poortinga, and J. Pandey, eds. Pp. 129–170. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. Snow, R., P. Federico, and W. Montague. 1980. Aptitude, Learning, and Instruction, Vols. 1 and 2. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. Stark, M.T., B.J. Bowser, L. Horne, and C. Kramer. 2008. Cultural Transmission and Material Culture: Breaking Down Boundaries. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Sternberg, R.J. 1983. Criteria for Intellectual Skills Training. Educational Researcher 12:6–12. Sternberg, R.J. 1997. Thinking Styles. New York: Cambridge University Press. van der Leeuw, S.E. 1993. Giving the Potter a Choice: Conceptual Aspects of Pottery Techniques. In Technological Choices: Transformation in Material Cultures since the Neolithic. P. Lemonnier, ed. Pp. 238–288. London: Routledge. Veer, R.v.d., and J. Valsiner. 1991. Understanding Vygotsky: A Quest for Synthesis. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell. Wadsworth, B.J. 1996. Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive and Affective Development: Foundations of Constructivism. White Plains, NY: Longman. Wallaert, H. 1999. Potières et apprenties Vere du Cameroun: Styles techniques et processus d’apprentissage. Techniques et Culture 33:89–116. Wallaert, H. 2008. The Way of the Potter’s Mother: Apprenticeship Strategies among Dii Potters from Cameroon, West Africa. In Cultural Transmission and Material Culture. M.T. Stark, B.J. Bowser, and L. Horne, eds. Pp. 178– 198. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Warnier, J.-P. 1999. Construire la culture matérielle. L’homme qui pensait avec ses doigts. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. Warnier, J.-P. 2007. The Pot-King. The Body and Technologies of Power. Leiden: Brill. Wendrich, W. 1999. The World According to Basketry. An Ethno-archaeological Interpretation of Basketry Production in Egypt. Leiden: Research School for Asian, African and Amerindian Studies. Wendrich, W. 2006. Body Knowledge. Ethnoarchaeological Learning and the Interpretation of Ancient Technology. In L’apport de l’Égypte à l’histoire des techniques. B. Mathieu, D. Meeks, and M. Wissa, eds. Pp. 267–275. Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale. Wenger, E. 1998. Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity. New York: Cambridge University Press. Wenger, E., N. White, and J.D. Smith. 2009. Digital Habitats: Stewarding Technology for Communities. Portland, OR: CPsquare.

CHA P TER T WO

Apprenticeship and the Confirmation of Social Boundaries Hélène Wallaert

Many paths can be followed to reach a full understanding of the complexity of craft production looking at apprenticeship procedures. To clarify the role of teaching and learning in the shaping of cultural identity and the reproduction of styles, a double case study explores apprenticeship through pottery making in New Mexico pueblos and in northern Cameroon villages. In the archaeological literature of the past fifty years, a large number of research projects have investigated the mechanisms responsible for the elaboration and duplication of technological styles. The initiators of Ceramic Ecology were among the first to focus on the contexts of craft production, pointing out the relationship between environmental constraints and cultural imperatives and their impact on the development of ceramic styles. Each action taken by a craftsman, at every step of the chaîne opératoire, was seen as reflecting his social position conditioned by his natural habitat (Arnold 1975). Apprenticeship was reduced to a set of simple duplicated rules largely dependent on that habitat. This theory did not explain why groups of craftsmen sharing a same habitat might develop different techniques and technological behaviors. Numbers of ethnological observations showed that pressure from the habitat does not always determine educative choices (Herbich and Dietler 1991).

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Ceramic Sociology went a step further and centered its researches on the persistence and diffusion of ornamental styles as a reflection of social interactions among members of a craft production group (Longacre 1970). The study of ceramic styles focused on designs and surface treatments, while technological aspects of the products and production process were considered secondary. The stability of material styles of a given community, either a residency unit or a group of individuals, was considered to be increasing when relationships during apprenticeship were stable and the geographical or social distance of the protagonists limited. Style would thus allow the determination of interethnic limits. This theoretical concept was observed in the field by several researchers (Pryor and Carr 1995; Deboer 1990; Wiessner 1983) who pointed out the importance of mother– child relationships in the shaping of style. This approach showed to be too restrictive, however, because it reduced apprenticeship to a process of impregnation without any active part played by the apprentice. New Archaeology developed another approach by looking for universal mechanisms responsible for the variations of style. This implies a study on a linguistic level: decorative motives were seen as decodable phonemes (McGovern 1986; Schiffer and Skibo 1987). Stylistic variations would be studied only through decoration and surface treatments that reflect the will of the producers to communicate to others and spread their culture. However, numerous ethnological studies have shown that stylistic variations were not always meant to consciously communicate. The multiple roles of styles are debated, but the necessity to fully appreciate their contribution to the creation of social boundaries is emphasized in many studies related to anthropological archaeology. This research is largely inspired by the work of the late Carol Kramer and other colleagues, including Nicholas David, Scott MacEachern, and Marcia-Anne Dobres. It follows the path of others involved in projects employing ethnographical studies of material culture production in living contexts (David and Kramer 2001; Dobres and Hoffman 1999; Kramer 1985; MacEachern 1996). Even while the debate around the nature of style continues, we can agree that technical knowledge is expressed partly through recognizable traditions that are passed on, from one generation to the next, through conscious and unconscious processes (Dietler and Herbich 1994; Wiessner 1983). Technological studies have shown that each step of the chaîne opératoire, and every technical behavior participates in the elaboration of the habitus, as described by Bourdieu (1980), and thus to style. Traditions, as expressions of culture, serve largely as vectors for cultural transmission. Furthermore, the messages that styles are said to carry not only may signal identity to outsiders but also may strengthen a sense of membership within the group of producers itself (David et al.

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1988; Hodder 1988; MacEachern 1998). In that case, styles establish the existence and recognition of producers as a specific social and/or technical unit. Keeping in mind the complexity of these processes, we recognize that, within a given society, many facets of the multiple aspects of styles can be expressed simultaneously and on different levels. We should also integrate the concept that some elements of style can be developed through unconscious or subconscious phenomena that contribute to the elaboration of stylistic values, the development of technologies, and the production of artefacts (Goulet 1998).

Research Background One of the main breakthroughs in the cultural technology approach has been a focus on the study of technical diversity, meaning the manufacturing processes necessary to produce objects (Lemonnier 1992). Descriptions of chaînes opératoires allowed a clearer appreciation of the impact of social, cultural, economic, and educative contexts on technical behaviors, which are considered to be styles. Scholars have investigated how to expose the mechanisms underlying the habitus as described by Bourdieu (Bailey 2003; Bourdieu 1980; Bril et al. 2000; Childs and Greenfield 1980; Crown 1999; Dietler and Herbich 1994). The learning period appeared to be a key moment in the lives of producers, since the choices available to them are guided by cultural conventions, transmitted socially through apprenticeship. The term apprenticeship is used here to define a complex cognitive process in which memory, attention, and motivation interact. It does not necessarily imply a scholastic context. Thus, the actors in the learning processes will be referred to as apprentice and instructor even if the people involved are bound, for example, by a mother– daughter relationship and learning is done as part of an everyday activity within the household. We should not forget, however, that makers keep on learning during their entire lives; some start their apprenticeship during childhood, whereas others begin during adulthood. Stylistic behaviors might be shaped during the primary apprenticeship, but they can still be influenced later on by internal and external influences (direct or indirect) at the individual, familial, or community level. It is only through a clear understanding of the contexts of teaching and learning processes related to craft production that we will be able to determine the range of choices available to the producers and the level of freedom they have in their practice, knowing that the extent of alternatives is

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influenced by universal cognition rules, cultural contexts, and, to a lesser extent, environmental or technical constraints (Mahias 1993). This body of information will condition the nature of possible innovations. Even though technological studies have created interest in the analysis of apprenticeship, research in that field often remains too general to allow us to identify the constitutive components influencing the reproduction of techniques (David et al. 1988; Dietler and Herbich 1994; Dobres and Hoffman 1999; Gosselain 1998; Roe 1995; Sackett 1990; Sillar 1994; Sterner 1989). Most of these studies focus on identifying the actors, determining the duration of processes, establishing places and times of apprenticeship, and analyzing the relationship between the apprentice and the instructor. All this information is vital but does not allow us to identify the cognitive parameters guiding apprenticeship or their impact on technological behaviors and social identity construction patterns (Martinelli 1996). Furthermore, what is considered “traditional” apprenticeship, based mainly on an observation and imitation of conducts, is still too regularly reduced to the conclusion that it is an informal procedure. The duality that is introduced by the researchers between observation–imitation and trial and error should be overcome, because the reality of craft making involves, as we will see, combinations of many pedagogic tools (Childs and Greenfield 1980; Goody 1993; Hosler 1996; Palsson and Helgason 1999; Pelissier 1991; Strauss 1984). For this study, I have used a multidisciplinary approach (including methods related to cognitive and experimental psychology) that allows the identification of microscale patterns of cultural transmission within given societies.

Studying Apprenticeship Procedures Apprenticeship is considered through the study of pottery making, in an attempt to identify the people who act as style transmitters. Numerous works deal with the question of cognition and transfer of knowledge and abilities (Ames 1992; Fraisse and Piaget 1963), but few contemplate these matters within the scope of a technical activity learned in a nonscholastic environment (Goody 1993; Lave 1991; Palsson and Helgason 1999). The following study could not be accomplished without taking into account the work of scholars such as Mead (1928) who very early on investigated child development (in our study in Cameroon, apprentices are mostly children), social apprenticeship, and its influence on adult behaviors. Because these studies usually do not deal with technical apprenticeship, they have been little used in the study of technological styles.

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The innovative and pertinent work of Michael Dietler and Ingrid Herbich (1994) demonstrates the importance of the study of the production process, the chaîne opératoire, and of the learning processes in my approach of the question of style. Among the Luo of Kenya, Dietler and Herbich have clearly identified a set of microstyles directly linked to specific apprenticeship procedures. The Luo of eastern Kenya produce a great variety of utilitarian pottery made by only a small percentage of the female population regrouped into “communities of potters.” Women learn pottery making after their marriage from their mother-in-law, or co-wives in the husband’s homestead. When they were children, these girls helped their mothers with clay processing or other chores related to pottery making, but they were not taught to form a pot. As teenagers, they would be actively discouraged through social pressure from becoming potters. In this exogamous, polygamous, patrilineal, and patrilocal group, it is through “outsiders” integrated into the family by marriage that microstyles are developed and perpetuated. Pottery apprenticeship is organized as part of a domestic routine that involves social interaction with the mother-in-law. Thus, young wives adapt their habitus through practice under several years of guidance from their husband’s mother, learning pottery making but also their social role as new members of the family. By this resocialization process, the young wife learns to conform to the authority of her mother-in-law and the rules of her new homestead. One of the roles of the mother-in-law is to ensure the conformity of the newcomer to a set of social and technical behaviors, as well as a set of stylistic messages, often incomprehensible to outsiders of the potters’ community. The processes described by Dietler and Herbich (1994) largely challenges the assumption that mother– daughter learning of ceramic production is the norm in traditional societies. It also questions the concept that microstyles are propagated only by women, who learn during childhood and move about after their marriage, following a matrilocal postmarital residence pattern. Another challenge is to determine if marriage alliances are static over generations, and if so, over how many. Our difficulty in working with societies without script is to deal with our ambition to draw general longterm patterns while not being certain whether we witness merely a snapshot of conduct, even if the interviewees claim to respect traditions going back to the “beginning of times.” One way to overcome this problem might be to identify stylistic patterns geographically and check whether the spatial distribution is always linked to similar marital patterns. In order to understand teaching and learning procedures, it is necessary to identify a set of parameters that condition the acquisition of knowledge and competences. In my study, I focus on analyzing the role

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of attention, motivation, repetition, language use, and hand lateralization in the development of apprenticeship procedures.

Pottery Making and Apprenticeship among the Dowayo Extensive fieldwork was carried out among nine different ethnolinguistic groups of potters living in northern Cameroon (figure 2.1), providing a total of 218 potters. During the first season of fieldwork (November 1995 through April 1996), I and my colleagues from the Céramiques et Sociétés project, Guy William Ewé, Olivier P. Gosselain, Alexandre L. Smith, and Marc Vander Linden, collected information under the aegis of the Université Libre de Bruxelles. During the second season (December 1996 through April 1997), all information was collected by me (Wallaert 1999, 2008). Here, I focus on apprenticeship procedures in eight Dowayo villages, where 22 potters (18 fully trained potters and 4 apprentices) represent all the producers living in Dowayo country between 1996 and 1999 (figure 2.2). The Dowayo represents a group of about 18,000 people in the Poli mountainous area, west of the town of Poli. The population is generally animist. Their language belongs to the Niger-Congo-Kordofanian phylum and the Adamawa group. The Dowayo share many characteristics with the neighboring groups of the Dii, Duupa, Longto, and Vere, which are associated to the same linguistic family and present very similar economic or ritual contexts (Grimes 1996; Lembezat 1961; Olson 1996; Seignobos 1982). The typical homestead regroups series of extended families’ compounds. The economy relies on small-scale agriculture and a minimum of hunting or cattle holding. The Dowayo are patrilineal, exogamous, and polygamous. They follow a patrilocal residence pattern, and each village represents a hereditary chiefdom from which “big men” emerge. Among the Dowayo, potters represent a small percentage of the female population, and all belong to the endogamous group of the potter-blacksmith that can be seen as a community within the community, bounded by technical abilities but also by specific activities (e.g., traditional healing, organization of rituals, or handling of burials) and symbolic powers. Potters tend to describe themselves as members of their craft community before referring to their ethnolinguistic affiliation (Muller 1993). In the Dowayo region (figure 2.2), potters and blacksmiths live in distinct areas of the villages, separated from the rest of the population. This physical separation from the other members of the group reflects

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Figure 2.1. Map of the research area in northern Cameroon, near the borders of Nigeria and Tchad. The map shows zones of study: 1, Dii; 2, Duupa, Longto, Dowayo; 3, Samba, Vere, Koma; 4, Fali; 5, Kapsiki. Drawing by Yvette Paquay for Helene Wallaert, Africa Museum, Tervuren, Belgium.

the dual social status of the potters. They are widely respected for their skills but also feared because of their relationship to the blacksmith, and their participation in rituals is considered dangerous. Marriage often binds people from different villages, but intermarriage with people belonging to other non-Dowayo groups is rare. Potters make a wide set of mainly utilitarian vessels, and production is largely confined to the dry season, from October through the end of March. The average potter

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Figure 2.2. Map showing the areas of the potters from Dowayo, Duupa, and Longto villages. Number of potters in Dowayo villages: Toupté, 4; Boulko, 8; Déta, 1; Koumsdongo, 2; Boumbsé, 2. Drawing by Yvette Paquay, Africa Museum, Tervuren, Belgium.

produces a hundred pots a year. Potters from the village of Boulko are recognized as specially gifted, and their products are sold in all neighboring villages. Production also includes ritual pottery used during weddings, funerals, and initiation rites or to contain the bones of a deceased after the second funeral. The clay is gathered on traditional and often symbolic sites that are family owned and symbolically opened each year by the Master of Rain, on the day when the young circumcised boys return from the bush. The clay is cleaned and mixed with water before it is kneaded by hand. The building of the pot starts with a pancake of clay, placed on a pottery sherd or old plate, that forms the base of the vessel while the walls are drawn up by adding coils of clay. After smoothing the surface, the pot is left to dry; it is then covered entirely or partly with a red ocher slip and burnished. Dowayo potters have limited painted decoration, but they use wooden roulettes to impress designs. The pots are fired in an open fire, and most of the product is sold at the firing place, while the surplus is sold at nearby markets. Pottery production is ruled by a series of interdictions. A pregnant woman is forbidden to collect clay or to fire pots. During her monthly period or on the day after sexual intercourse, the potter cannot fashion

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pots. It is also forbidden to eat sesame or eggs while producing pottery. The nonobservance of these regulations is thought to result in the destruction of the pots during firing or can have worse consequences: it can even bring disease or death into the potter’s family. Among all Dowayo, a girl learns primarily from her mother; she starts when she is approximately six years old, and her apprenticeship lasts for an average of seven to nine years (figure 2.3). Teaching and learning the

Figure 2.3. Edwa, Apprentice of Toupté, Dowayo country, Cameroon

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craft are obligations for every wife and daughter of the blacksmiths’ and potters’ families, who describe themselves as being part of the “potter race.” The learning period ends when the child reaches the ideal marital age. By then, each of these girls is a well-accomplished potter. The learning period is organized in five different stages, each characterized by specific tasks. The technical knowledge is gradually conveyed by the mother through small units of activity. That system allows the teacher to have better control over the technical acts performed by the apprentice and to prevent any inappropriate behavior. Pottery apprenticeship among the Dowayo is perceived as a way to acquire a technical activity and also a way to learn respect for the authority of the elder women and to integrate social values proper to the group. During the first stage, which lasts almost two years, the child is mainly a helping hand. She collects clay and fetches water and wood but does not fashion pots. The instructor seems to ignore her, and the student is not allowed to ask questions about the practice. This stage basically serves to forge the tenacity and motivation of the future potter (Ocholla-Ayayo 1980). All the taboos related to the activity are made known even if they are not explained. The second stage lasts one year and symbolizes the birth of the apprentice. She is now excused from the load of menial work and focuses on pottery making. The apprentice is asked to produce small versions of the usual array of pots. These miniatures are fired but are rarely decorated. The child must learn by herself while watching her instructor work and is not allowed to ask questions. Apprenticeship is based on active observation and not just copying: the child must adapt every step of the production process to fit a reduced-size pot, which requires an understanding of her instructor’s actions that she observes. The child usually sits next to her mother and watches her work, while the mother does not seem to pay any attention to what the apprentice is doing as long as she seems to work on her projects. She will intervene only to redirect the attention of the child and make such comments as “Pay attention to what you do,” “Don’t be so lazy,” “Don’t waste the clay,” “Watch what I do.” The third stage lasts almost two years and results in the production of full-size pots, which are fired but still undecorated. There is, at this stage, a real change of behavior from the instructor. Hours are spent explaining the different techniques; the instructor agrees to lose time on her own production to show details to the apprentice. Individual initiative is strictly forbidden: every gesture has to follow the mother’s pattern. Corporal punishments (spanking, forced eating of clay) are used to ensure that the rules are respected, and verbal humiliations are very common. Mothers interpret technical mistakes as proof of social disorder, defects in morality, and a challenge to their authority. Good behavior is rarely noticed, but

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errors are always pointed out in public. This treatment puts a lot of pressure on the apprentices, who tend to be quite ner vous when working in their mothers’ company. Social disorder has many faces, and obviously, in our case study, mothers associate bad practice in pottery making as a sign of a social perturbation. In fact, it seems that what mothers consider unbearable is to be challenged in their authority. Not being able to copy exactly the gestures of the mother is seen as an act of weakness and/or rebellion that cannot be tolerated. The fourth stage lasts another year, during which the apprentice learns to decorate pots and focuses on producing a bottle, which is considered the most difficult piece to create. The apprentice is now capable of executing and describing every stage of the production process, but she still does not handle the firing by herself. The apprenticeship, at this stage, continues to be oriented mainly around observation and imitation and shows very little use of language as an educational incentive. The mother intervenes only to correct major mistakes. From this time onward, the apprentice is selling her product, but the income is still handled by the instructor. The last and fifth stage lasts only a few weeks, during which the apprentice learns to apply decorative patterns, is allowed to organize a firing on her own, and learns to master postfi ring treatments. Among the Dowayo, the teaching and learning processes aim at strict respect for traditions, while innovations are not promoted and are even actively discouraged. Still, some divergence from the rules can be observed, mainly occurring in the layout of the decoration as small differences that can be recognized as microstyles. The end of apprenticeship is marked by a ceremony conducted by the blacksmith. The instructor sets the appropriate date for this event, determined by the moment at which the apprentice is declared capable of making every model of pot produced in her village. Furthermore, she must be sexually mature and engaged to a future husband. A large meal is prepared and shared by all the guests (the extended family and the other potters from the group); strangely, this meal includes sesame seeds and goat meat, which are ordinary banned to potters. During the ceremony, the newly born potter receives a set of tools from her instructor; she is fed by hand like a child and sprayed by millet beer spat on her by the blacksmith. This remarkable custom is also performed by the blacksmith on the firing pit before the actual firing begins, as well as during funerals, when corpses are sprayed with beer in the same way. Thus, by the time they get married, young Dowayo girls are fully trained potters who learned to produce pots in a way that suits their mothers, seen as guardians of the tradition and the technological habitus typical of the Dowayo’s way or style.

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Boulko differentiates itself from the other Dowayo villages by the fact that the mother-in-law imposes a “second apprenticeship” after marriage, no matter if the young wife comes from Boulko or another Dowayo village. As soon as they enter their new homestead, the young wives are retrograded and become apprentices again for a period of three years. They are allowed to produce only reduced-size vessels without decoration. The “new” apprentices are asked to work with clay gathered and prepared by the mother-in-law, who shows her own technique step by step. This period is difficult for the incoming wives, who express their distress at being considered children again, especially since the mother-in-law criticizes their first apprenticeship (the young women’s own mothers) endlessly. The critical remarks do not address technical flaws, because the young wives are, after all, well-trained potters, but focus mainly on behavioral faults: “You are a bad wife,” “You do not listen to what I say,” “You have been raised as a sloppy girl.” Far more than teaching technical skills to the young wives, who often originate from Boulko and were taught the Boulko way by their mothers, this second apprenticeship aims at testing the social qualities and the submission of the wives to the authority of the new household. As long as the newcomer does not conform, she will not be allowed to sell her products. In this particular process, the husband does not seem to play any part. As was observed among the Luo of Kenya (Herbich and Dietler 1991), the mother-in-law plays a very important role as an agent responsible for the elaboration and duplication of ceramic microstyles. But in the case of the Dowayo of Boulko village, it seems that her part is directed toward control of social behaviors and the construction of social boundaries that can be seen as a constitutive part of style making. This double apprenticeship results in the strengthening of social ties between members of the potters’ community, even if the “outsiders” who are integrated in the Boulko household by marriage are usually Dowayo people, and often people born in that specific village. Apprenticeship among potters of Boulko, therefore, ensures that specific microstyles typical of the village are perpetuated through a very strict teaching and learning method, while the resocialization after marriage strengthens this mechanism even more.

Pottery Making and Apprenticeship in San Idelfonso Pueblo, New Mexico San Idelfonso Pueblo is located in the Rio Grande Valley, close by the Pajarito Plateau and the Jemez Mountains. The north side of the village is marked by the presence of the Black Mesa, where many potters go to gather their clay (figure 2.4). The San Idelfonso people belong to a Tewa-speaking

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Figure 2.4. Locations of New Mexico’s pueblos. Courtesy Jemez Pueblo.org.

group. They originate from southwestern Colorado in the area of Mesa Verde National Park. Today, the reservation counts a little more than 1,500 people. The present village dates back to the 1300s. Presence of the Spanish is reported since the end of the sixteenth century. After the 1694 attack by the Spanish general Don Diego De Vargas, the residents retreated to the top of Black Mesa, where they repelled repeated attacks. After two years of combat, the tribe surrendered and resettled just north of the previous village. The Spanish flu that spread after World War I reduced the pueblo population to a handful of people. Since then, the pueblo has experienced a slow but continual revival, mostly through pottery. Since the late 1800s, potters of San Idelfonso had been well known for their polychrome pottery production. This changed in the early twentieth century: in 1908, one of the potters, Maria Povenka Martinez, received some potsherds from her husband, Julian, who was working with an archaeologist, Edgar Lee Hewett, the fi rst director at what is now the

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School of American Research and the Museum of New Mexico, on an excavation of pueblo ruins in the Pajarito canyons (Hewett et al. 1913). Up until that time, Maria made utilitarian polychrome pottery, but by reproducing the style of the archaeological pieces (under the guidance of Hewett), she became the leader of a revival process that led to the development of a blackware with alternating lustrous and matte finish obtained by smothering red clay pots during bonfiring. This new production process became the trademark of San Idelfonso (Batkin 1999; Berger and Schiffer 2000; Bunzel 1929; Dillingham 1994; Kramer 1996; Marriott 1963; Peckham 1990; Peterson 1984, 1987; Trimble 2007). Today, many male and female residents of the pueblo make their living creating various arts and crafts. It seems, however, that in the past only women were allowed to be involved in this activity. Recently, the potters redeveloped the production of highly carved and polished redware and polychrome vessels. The most recognized design is the water serpent, whose rippling spine and forked tongue represent roiling summer rain and lightning. Many families of potters open their homes or run shops to sell their products (Ditter and Plog 1999). Data presented here were collected while I was leading an eight-month fieldwork project among different pueblos, which gave me the opportunity to interview many potters and gather information on different families from San Idelfonso. It appeared that this pueblo, where the rule is for the bride to move into the compound of her husband’s parents, develops a specific apprenticeship process that for female potters involves strict guidance by the mother-in-law. Especially young brides from other pueblos, who enter San Idelfonso after marriage, are subjected to this. However, we have no cross-generational studies to fully understand why this rigid system came into being and how far back in time it can be traced. In San Idelfonso, clay is being picked from the foot of the Black Mesa from family plots, the location of which is kept secret to outsiders. Clay is seen as a gift from Mother Earth, who is thanked for the richness she provides. As in Cameroon, potters say prayers on the clay pit to express their gratitude to the earth and sometimes leave gifts in the shape of figurines of clay or cornmeal. Once the clay is collected, it is brought back to the house, broken up or ground if needed, and left to soak in water before it can be processed by hand in a way that is very similar to that in Cameroon. Adding a temper of sand, potsherds, or kaolin allows for more efficient drying. The building techniques can vary from one family to the next, but many potters share a chaîne opératoire that is very similar to the one in Cameroon. A slab of clay is used to fashion the base, and the walls are elevated by adding coils of clay. Many potters speak of taboos or rules

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that need to be observed while making the pots: shaping while having a menstrual period is not acceptable, and shaping while experiencing bitter feelings will lead to the destruction of the vessels during firing. One is to refrain from having sexual intercourse during the production period as well. While the potters are incorporated into modern American society, they respect traditional rules and rituals while producing their pottery. Every step of production is a ritual statement. Pottery can be fi red outside into an open fire or can be kiln fired. In San Idelfonso, polishing is a vital stage because the products are well known for their high level of polish (figure 2.5). Apprenticeship procedures are more diverse within the pueblo than among, for example, the Dowayo. Still, many potters learned the craft during their childhood from a family member (a woman, man, or both). Maria Martinez (c. 1880–1980), for instance, learned how to produce the pots from her aunt Nicolasa. She was an accomplished potter by the age of thirteen. When comparing the organization of apprenticeship among the five pueblos where I carried out fieldwork (Taos, San Idelfonso, Santo Domingo, Pojoaque, and Isleta), we can recognize a similar pattern. It seems that in general pottery apprenticeship was a long process (from five to eight years), organized within the familial context, starting with the han-

Figure 2.5. Dora Tse Pe, San Idelfonso Pueblo, 2005. Photograph by Hélène Wallaert.

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dling of chores related to pottery making (fetching clay, water, and combustibles) before the apprentice was allowed to shape animal figures, then small size pots with no or little design, and finally complete vessels with painted or carved designs. In the last few decades, more and more people received part of their technical background in school (mostly the College of Santa Fe), but it is still far from being a general rule, and it usually comes as a complement to an initial apprenticeship within the family unit. The apprenticeship of Santana Martinez (1909–2002) illustrates the San Idelfonso way. She began learning with her grandmother Dominguinta and her aunt Tonita Royal but she perfected Maria Martinez’s technique after she married Maria’s eldest son and moved into her household. She had to adapt and integrate Maria’s recipes for working the clay and her husband Julian’s method of painting. Being the mother-in-law conferred to Maria a status of elder and holder of knowledge (especially because she was recognized as the leader of the revival) that the incoming bride must respect not only by making pots the same way but also by taking care of many other domestic chores for her mother-in-law. For many years, Santana made pots or decorated them in a group effort with Maria and Julian. Dora Tse Pe is another striking example of this resocialization process after marriage. She was born in Zia Pueblo in 1939 and learned to make pottery from her mother, Candelaria Gachupin, a well-known artist in Zia. After a nine-year process under the very directive guidance of her instructor, she mastered every detail of the Zia technique and produced a very typical polychrome ware with painted zoomorphic or floral designs. Her apprenticeship consisted of four distinctive stages. During the first stage, which started at the age of six, she was allowed only to help fetch clay and water and grind the clay. This was a period of harsh labor, during which she only followed her mother, who was performing all the tasks, without having the time or opportunity to work with the clay. During the second stage, when she reached ten years old, she was allowed to use small quantities of clay to model plain miniature pots. She was not allowed to prepare the clay (because the material would be ruined if an apprentice made mistakes) or to apply designs on her little pots. Next, she worked side by side with her mother producing larger-size pots and applying the designs she was taught by her mother. During this process, she was not supposed to question too much what her mother said or to show a lack of attention and motivation. Finally, around the age of 15, she was trusted to make pots on her own and to apply designs with more freedom, even creating designs of her own. Once Dora married Tse Pe (Juan Gonzales), she moved to San Idelfonso, next door to her mother-in-law, Rose Gonzales. Her testimony

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regarding that period gave no doubt that she had to adopt the style of Rose, who originated from San Juan Pueblo. In her youth, Rose had produced polished black pottery typical of San Juan, and she had continued to make mainly blackware at San Idelfonso, but under supervision of her mother-in-law, Rose had adapted her designs to what was recognized as being “from San Idelfonso.” She made very little polychrome ware or redware, but she developed the deep carving with a preference for the water serpent design. Dora, for her part, had to give up making painted floral designs and zoomorphic figures, and she remembered having a very hard time learning to produce the water serpent, a motif that would have been forbidden to use in Zia. The resocialization process implied, in this case, the integration of new symbolic images and a radical change in what the appropriate symbolic and ritual behavior should be. As a young bride, Dora found herself an apprentice again and worked for ten years after her marriage under close supervision of Rose. Even after she divorced from Tse Pe, she continued to follow the steps of her mother-in-law, completely giving up her previously acquired knowledge, perhaps because after Tse Pe’s death she remained in San Idelfonso, where these designs were in favor. It is interesting to see that during that second apprenticeship in the hands of the mother-in-law, the “apprentice” is considered as a beginner who has to learn everything from the start. The mother-in-law develops a teaching technique based on an observation and imitation process. The mother-in-law will supervise every technical gesture to ensure it is done her way. Thus, we are far from the process witnessed in Dowayo country, where potters share basically the same technique and decorative designs and where the second apprenticeship leans more toward learning to respect the mother-in-law within a shared technological frame. Nevertheless, the two situations have in common that the apprenticeship is a reeducation: many remarks made by the mother-in-law in San Idelfonso clearly challenge the previous education of the incoming bride and criticize the way the bride’s mother had raised her. Here, too, the mother-inlaw plays the role of stylistic transmitter once we consider that every step of the production processes and appropriate social behaviors ultimately results in a specific style. A different pattern is seen in the story of Blue Corn, who was born in San Idelfonso. She started learning pottery with her mother but was soon enrolled in a Santa Fe school, where she remained until her parents died. She was then sent to relatives in Southern California. At the age of twenty, she married a silversmith, Santiago Calabaza, from Santo Domingo Pueblo, but they settled in San Idelfonso, where her children were born and where she produced pottery. Thus, she did not encounter the

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guidance of the mother-in-law, who was living in Santo Domingo, and was free to develop her own technique and decoration, largely inspired by prehistoric models. Her products are mostly polychrome and are differentiated from the classic San Idelfonso style by the composition of her designs and the use of strong-colored clay. This evolving family microstyle is carried on by her daughter Diane Calabaza-Jenkins. Today in San Idelfonso, we can observe a decrease of the role of the mother-in-law as guardian of knowledge and tradition, even toward outsiders of the community, who could be considered as a potential source of disorder or lack of respect for tradition. The young generation’s products show a greater variety of technical conducts and decorative designs. The specific role of the mother-in-law in San Idelfonso seems to be survival of the traditional apprenticeship process in which pottery making was passed on within the family, not only through the women but probably also through the men, who may have played an important part as instructors for decoration. Men are often influenced to a great extent by the products of their wives. For example, Russell Sanchez, one of the most active male potters of the pueblo, learned his technique with Rose Gonzales, his great-aunt, and with Dora Tse Pe. It appears from these different examples that the role of the motherin-law as a vector of style must be appreciated differently, depending on the production context and the market value of the pots that are sold. Comprehending how stylistic behaviors are acquired, transformed, and perpetuated within a same community of producers or on an intercultural level requires a thorough analysis of the production and economic context.

Conclusions Apprenticeship in traditional communities irrespective of the economic and use context (production for household and ritual use among the Dowayo; for the collectors’ market and ritual use among the Pueblo people) is very complex and involves many different pedagogic tools over long periods of time. Even if the Dowayo people seem to have little in common with Pueblo societies of New Mexico, they share some interesting values regarding apprenticeship in craft production. All craft makers share a complex social status: they are either part of an endogamic group (as for the pottersblacksmiths) or recognized as ritualists as for Pueblo potters, who are producers of highly symbolic vessels fashioned for religious ceremonies held in the privacy of the Kivas (ceremonial chambers very distinctive in

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a pueblo). Pottery learning entitles them to a specific social status in the community. Among the Pueblo people, this social status is also bonded to the fact that potters are highly regarded, some being “stars” among their community for the success of the sales of their products in the collectors’ world. This is not always linked to economic success but rather to an iconic status. Apprenticeship procedures, as illustrated here, develop great complexity and some common features. The period dedicated to teaching and learning is long and follows a very strict organizational pattern and a hierarchy in the actions. It implies the use of many different pedagogic tools, each of them specific to a given stage in the teaching process. Apprenticeship is highly conditioned by symbolic and social conventions, more than by technological demands imposed by, for example, the habitat. Observation–imitation is often used, as is a reconstructive observation pattern, such as the production of miniatures. Trial-and-error processes also exist at specific moments with or without the use of language and questioning as pedagogic tools. Craft apprenticeship is thus part of a larger educational purpose in which technological knowledge integrates moral and social values as part of building cultural identity. It is difficult to determine how far back this system goes and how long it will perpetuate in its present (original or modified) form. Teaching and learning procedures, as we observe them today, need to be fully described in the largest corpus possible and compared with past and future observations in order to enlarge our study and be able to apprehend how stable these procedures are in time and space. We lack information in the longue durée. In both study cases, a secondary apprenticeship is undertaken right after marriage. Among the Dowayos, it aims at a social integration of the young wife and does not create new technological microstyles but rather a specific social habitus that is clearly part of the style of the village of Boulko. For the Pueblo people, this second apprenticeship is a way for the mother-in-law to integrate the young wife into her family, to impose her domination on the younger woman, and is also a way of forcing the newcomer to produce forms and designs conforming to what is established in her new household. It is a way to maintain a certain uniformity of production, a microstyle, within the community of residence and to follow a local tradition searched for by the collectors’ market and seen as being authentic. The mother-in-law insists on guiding the young wife in specific steps of production— choice of the shapes, decoration, and surface treatments—while the actual building technique is left free. These two case studies are a snapshot of practices, and much more work is needed to fully evaluate the complexity of the processes and their stability or change in time and space. Nevertheless, they demonstrate

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Roe, P.G. 1995. Style, Society, Myth, and Structure. In Style, Society and Person, Archaeological and Ethnological Perspectives. C. Carr and J.E. Neitzel, eds. Pp. 27–76. New York: Plenum Press. Sackett, James R. 1990. Style and Ethnicity in Archaeology: The Case for Isochretism. In The Uses of style in Archaeology. M. Conkey and C. Hastorf, eds. Pp. 32– 43. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schiffer, Michael B., and James M. Skibo. 1987. Theory and experiment in the study of technological change. Current Anthropology 25(5):595– 622. Seignobos, C. 1982. Montagnes et Hautes Terres du Nord-Cameroun. Paris: Editions Parenthèses. Sillar, B. 1994. Playing with God: Cultural Perceptions of Children, Play and Miniatures in the Andes. Archaeological Review From Cambridge 13(2):47– 63. Sterner, J. 1989. Who Is Signalling Whom? Ceramic Style, Ethnicity and Taphonomy among the Sirak Bulahay (Cameroon). Antiquity 63:451– 459. Strauss, C. 1984. Beyond “Formal” versus “Informal” Education: Uses of Psychological Theory in Anthropological Research. Ethos 12(3):195–222. Trimble, S. 2007. Talking with Clay. The Art of Pueblo Pottery in the 21st Century. Santa Fe, NM: School for Advanced Research. Wallaert, Hélène. 1999. Potières et apprenties Vere du Cameroun: Styles techniques et processus d’apprentissage. Techniques et Culture 33:89–116. Wallaert, Hélène. 2008. The Way of the Potter’s Mother: Apprenticeship Strategies among Dii Potters from Cameroon, West Africa. In Cultural Transmission and Material Culture. M.T. Stark, B.J. Bowser, and L. Horne, eds. Pp. 178–198. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Wiessner, P. 1983. Style and Social Information in Kalahari San Projectile Points. American Antiquity 48(2):253–276.

CHA P TER THREE

Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Performance John L. Creese

Motor habit can be analyzed through “microvariables,” an archaeological method used to identify the work of individual prehistoric potters. Based on an experiment designed to test the premises on which this method is based, I argue, contra Hill (1977), that motor-performance–related attributes are quite sensitive to their social contexts of learning and change over time. Individuals in two groups, a “social pressure” and an “individualist” group, completed an incised design on wet clay plaques on two occasions. Principal components analysis and discriminant analysis provide strong support for the proposition that individual patterns of motor performance are directly influenced by the social environment of their acquisition. There is widespread recognition among anthropologists that continuity and change in material culture, as the product of socially and technically engaged craftspeople, are in large part a function of processes of knowledge and skill acquisition and transmission. It is surprising, therefore, that the nature of these processes has often been tacitly accepted by archaeologists instead of forming the basis of a critical line of inquiry. This may relate in part to the tendency of Western academics to privilege analytical over embodied knowledge, art over craft, and science over skill (see also chapter 12 this volume). Even within the subfield of the anthropology of education, apprenticeship has been neglected as a subject of explicit inquiry (Pelissier 1991). This general outlook has made it

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possible for style to be divorced from function/technology (e.g., Hurt and Rakita 2001), and bodily motor per formance from meaningful social practice (Hill 1977; Pryor and Carr 1995). In what might be termed a body-as-machine perspective, the body is assumed to produce craft products in accordance with the designs of an independent intellect and, like all machines, simultaneously to imprint its unique production mark as a by-product. Craft items derived from any par ticular body will exhibit a unique level of homogeneity since no two bodies are mechanically identical (Hill 1977). Motor per formance becomes independent of learning and social engagement. Learning remains the active pursuit of minds; production, the passive disposition of idiosyncratic bodies. The results of the experiment detailed here turn this paradigm on its head and suggest that we should ask of the material record not only how the body shapes the craft but also how the craft shapes the body. The allure of the view that motor skills are largely individually unique, unlearned, and unchanging goes beyond its concordance with the ontology described above, however. My own interest in the subject began with the recognition that the identification of individual prehistoric craftspeople via motor-performance attributes could significantly advance understanding of how other elements of style were being deployed in past contexts. The use of style in archaeological interpretation has traditionally concentrated on the formation of analytical groups that exhibit maximum similarity within the group and maximum difference from other groups. These groupings are then interpreted as reflectors of social affiliation or ethnic boundaries. This application of style can be criticized for being static and deterministic. Alternatively, style can be seen as reflexive and discursive (though not necessarily conscious), saying as much about the individual as it does about social groups (Wobst 1999). H. Martin Wobst has commented that “style always talks loudly about individuals. How loudly, in which contexts, with which objects and attributes, and by whom are important inter- and intracultural variables. Archaeologists should be well positioned to address this variability and have not done so” (1999, 121) A major impediment to a more individual-oriented approach to style in archaeological reasoning has been, Wobst argues, the insensitive use of internally homogeneous stylistic groupings, or what he calls “islands of similitude”: “Where talk is not allowed to vary within groups, and where values that logically link forms between groups are suppressed, group formation, and group process are hard to make visible” (127). The treatment of internal, often individual-related variation as “noise” within stylistically homogeneous groupings seems to parallel a trend in archaeology that ignores cultural uniqueness, historical particularity, and individual agency in a search for generalizations of human behavior (Hodder 1982).

Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Per formance 45 By developing a method to identify the work of individual artisans, I reasoned that one could potentially deconstruct such “islands of similitude” and come to understand the dynamics of style as it mediates between agents and their social structures. While perhaps couched in new jargon, motivations for identifying the work of individuals in prehistory are not new. Culture historians and ethnographers have long taken note of the ability of potters to distinguish the work of other potters within their communities, often when the researchers themselves were unable to do so (e.g., Bunzel 1929). Ethnoarchaeological studies have also recorded the phenomenon. William A. Longacre’s study of sources of variability among the ceramics of the Kalinga reported the ability of the potters (usually women) to identify each other’s work but the men’s ignorance of this ability (Longacre 1991). Perhaps because of the apparent difficulty of such a task, even for members of the society not directly involved in ceramic production, few archaeologists have attempted to apply these findings. In his seminal paper on the issue, however, James N. Hill (1977, 57–59) noted the potential usefulness of a methodology for identifying the work of individual potters in investigating such perennial archaeological topics as craft specialization, exchange, residence units, burial relationships, sodality affiliation, and patterns of community endogamy/exogamy. In essence, knowing the number and identity of potters responsible for a ceramic assemblage would introduce a much-needed element of control in comparisons of other attributes. For instance, studies of standardization (as an index of specialization), although supported by ethnoarchaeological work (e.g., Longacre 1999), may be difficult to apply archaeologically since interassemblage variability is in part a function of interpotter variability. If the approximate number of potters responsible for an assemblage could be directly controlled for, these comparisons could be placed on a much firmer foundation. Despite these motivations and Hill’s claims to success, few archaeologists followed his lead until recently. In the field of Iroquoian archaeology, Holly A. Martelle (2002) recently employed a method inspired by Hill to identify the work of individual Huron potters at several sites in southern Ontario, Canada. Like Hill, she used the measurement of supposedly motor-performance–related microvariables regarding Huron incised-line rim motifs, including the depth, direction of motion, plan shape, direction, and degree of lean of incised parallel oblique lines (a ubiquitous design element in late prehistoric/early historic Iroquoian contexts), and used multivariate statistical techniques (principal components analysis) to attempt to “discover” the work of individual Huron potters. The rationale for the use of such microvariables is derived from Hill’s experimental work in which he found it possible to cluster sherds by

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known individual potters using metric microvariables such as the mean width of painted lines, spaces between parallel painted lines, and shape of the line (Hill 1977, 69). Because two of the potters in a sample of five were brothers who had been taught by their father, and their work was easily distinguished, Hill concluded that the social context of learning had little effect on motor-performance microvariables. He suggested that these were subconscious and could not be easily shared or taught, making them ideal for distinguishing the work of different individual potters. The problem here is that we know nothing of the nature of the social context in which the brothers learned from their father. Highly standardized work might or might not have been strictly enforced. The boys might simply have copied the finished work of their father or actively instructed as to the proper way to hold the paintbrush. Without such information, we cannot be sure to what degree these microvariables are indeed individually unique and immune from their social contexts of learning or development through time. If, in fact, they are significantly affected by change over time, their social contexts of learning and practice, or both, their utility for identifying individual potters in an archaeological context might be severely hampered. Also of concern is that several archaeologists have been using similar motor-performance attributes to address other archaeological questions. In fact, their findings are based on the assumption, contra Hill, that with increased age and experience come increased motor coordination and important changes in motor-habit per formance, such as increased skill and standardization (e.g., Crown 1999; Longacre 1999). Such a development over time might preclude the identification of one individual’s work over the period of learning. Some investigators have even suggested that motor-performance variables will be more sensitive to the socioeconomic conditions of their production (and therefore, e.g., useful measures of craft specialization) than are more macrolevel attributes (Costin 1991, 34–35; Roux 1989). Cognitive psychological studies of learning patterns of motor-habit per formance demonstrate that motor skills are acquired through procedural learning and involve stages of memory consolidation during sleep, followed by periods of waking “reactivation” that can take a previously consolidated body memory back into a flexible state (Walker et al. 2003, 616). Significantly, these studies suggest that the social and technical contexts of learning may have an important impact on the development of personal motor skills, particularly depending upon the frequency and duration of periods of activity and inactivity in practice. In short, we should expect that the degree of variability and change over time within the work of an individual will be contingent upon the processes in which those habits were acquired, practiced, consolidated, and reconsolidated.

Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Per formance 47 The following experiment was designed to address the pressing need to investigate the potential significance of (1) social contexts of learning and (2) change over time, to the study of individual-related variability in prehistoric incised ceramic design.

Purpose of the Experiment The goal of this program of research was to test a variation of the general methodology proposed by Hill (1977) and adapted for the Iroquoian case by Martelle (2002) using the measurement of apparently motorperformance–related microvariables and the application of multivariate statistical methods to these data to identify the presence or absence of individual-related clusters of cases. More specifically, the intention was to test Hill’s assertions that microstyles are individually unique, are relatively insensitive to their social contexts of learning and practice, and lack significant (confounding) change over time. I hypothesized that motor-performance attributes are sensitive to their social contexts of learning and practice and change over time. Specifically, they are expected to become more standardized through procedural repetition and memory consolidation (Walker et al. 2003). Such an increasing level of skill and standardization should allow numerous replicates of individuals’ incised designs on clay plaques to be more tightly clustered by a principal components analysis and therefore be more easily identified as the work of a single individual. Furthermore, I predicted that increasing skill and motor-habit control would allow the members of the social pressure treatment group to produce work that is more similar to that of other members of the learning group, causing these individuals’ work to be more frequently confused with that of other members of their group than with members of an individualist treatment group. I likewise expected the work of the members of an individualist treatment group to be less frequently confused with that of other members of this treatment because of social isolation during the learning period. Social contexts of learning can affect the development of motor performance attributes in a variety of ways. As several of the other chapters in this volume demonstrate, the cross-cultural range of pedagogic practices that affect the development of body knowledge (from casual imitation to strict physical correction) is vast (see, e.g., chapter 2). Moreover, the pace, timing, and duration of learning vis-à-vis childhood development may serve to condition the acquisition of specific motor habits (see chapter 1). However, beyond specific aspects of the apprenticeship process designed to either instill or efface specific bodily tendencies, social pressure in the form of a desire to conform or resist par ticular social values that are

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associated with an existing aesthetic can be a powerful motivator. Social values about what is seemly, tasteful, appropriate, or pleasant are frequently associated with aesthetic properties of the finished craft such as neatness and texture that in turn are influenced by motor-performance attributes.

Method In an effort to make the results of this experiment useful to the evaluation of recent archaeological studies, I have attempted to use many of the same microvariables and statistical methods they employ (Hill 1977; Martelle 2002). The method can be broken into three components: experiment, microvariable measurement, and data analysis. Each is described below.

The Experiment The experiment was to involve the work of eight undergraduate students at the University of Toronto, although in the end only seven participated. These students were assigned to two groups. None of the students were told the purpose of the experiment. All participants were instructed to use the hand they write with to incise. This was done in order to prevent anomalous disparities owing to differences in skill related to some individuals using their practiced writing hand and others using an unpracticed hand. Treatment group A, the social pressure group, consisted of three students. These students were seated in a semicircle at a small table and were provided with a series of fifteen rectangular, moist, unfired clay plaques measur ing approximately 3 × 4 cm in size. In some cases, the spacing of incised lines might have been affected by a slight variability in the size of the plaques, although the variability in dimensions was approximately evenly distributed among the individuals, precluding any major bias. Each student was provided with an identical bamboo stylus and a recording sheet. They recorded their names, their level of experience incising clay, their handedness, and the time they took to incise all fifteen plaques. They also labeled the plaques to indicate the edge that was “up” while they worked and the sequential number of the plaque, ordered from fi rst to last (numbers 1–15). The students in group A were provided with a demonstration plaque incised earlier by the investigator. This plaque consisted of a simple motif, involving a number of roughly parallel incised oblique lines oriented to the left. The investigator took the role of the instructor of this group. The students were told that the demonstration plaque was an “ideal example of

Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Per formance 49 what they should be striving to produce.” As they worked, students were corrected when it appeared that their work was too different from the ideal and praised when their work was close to the ideal. The students were encouraged to compare work and share ideas. Throughout the process, the students had the demonstration plaque to hold, inspect, and pass around. The instructor did not, however, tell the students exactly how to hold the stylus, the angle at which to work, the depth or pressure to use, the direction of motion, or other more directive instructions. While the latter type of instruction is certainly found in cases of strong social pressure, it seemed a foregone conclusion that intensive physical modeling would result in conformity. I wished instead to test a scenario in which individuals would need to creatively adapt their practices when motivated to conform. During the experiment, the students themselves shared ideas about these factors as they attempted to reproduce the ideal plaque. Treatment group B, the individualist group, consisted of four students. These students were not privy to the instructions given to group A. Each was (independently) shown the same demonstration plaque and instructed that “this is an example of the type of decoration you should complete, called ‘incised obliques.’ ” Next these students were provided with fifteen plaques each, according to the same specifications as for group A, and were instructed to take their plaques to complete them where they could not see or talk to any other members of the group. These students were given no corrections or approval for their work, nor could they refer back to the demonstration plaque during the experiment. Although these individuals sat on the floor, rather than at a table, both groups were provided with a tray to hold the plaques and were observed to hold the plaques in one hand while they incised with the other, limiting any potential bias resulting from group A members using the tabletop as a means to steady the plaque as they worked. The same experiment was held in two separate sessions (referred to below as experiment sessions 1 and 2), exactly three weeks apart to the hour, to make a total of thirty plaques per individual, or a total sample size of 210 plaques.

Microvariable Measurement Attribute states for twelve microvariables related to motor-habit per formance (Hill 1977; Martelle 2002) were recorded for each plaque and entered into an excel spreadsheet (see Table 3.1).

Data Analysis SPSS for Windows (version 12.0) software was used to run a number of statistical analyses. First, the ratio scale variables (width and interval,

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Table 3.1. Microvariable Attribute Coding Format Attribute

Scale

Coding

1. Incision depth

Ordinal scale 1–7

1 = very shallow to 7 = very deep

2. Direction of stylus motion

Nominal scale

1 = down, 2 = up

3. Incision plan shape

Nominal scale

1 = S-profile 2 = reverse S-profile 3 = convex 4 = concave 5 = straight

4. Stylus direction of lean

Nominal scale

1 = down, 2 = up, 3 = no lean

5. Stylus angle

Ordinal scale 1–13

1 = perpendicular to 13 = extremely acute

6. Extrusion side

Nominal scale 1– 6

1 = down, 2 = up, 3 = both equally, 4 = both bottomheavy, 5 = both top-heavy, 6 = none

7. Extrusion level

Ordinal scale 1–13

1 = none to 13 = extremely heavy

8. Incision direction

Nominal scale

1 = right, 2 = left

9. Mean spacing width

Ratio scale

Average width of spaces between incised lines at approximate longitudinal midpoint

10. Mean spacing interval

Ratio scale

Average width of space from outer edge of one incised line to outer edge of the next

11. Standard deviation of spacing width

Ratio scale

12. Standard deviation of spacing interval

Ratio scale

Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Per formance

51

and their standard deviations) were reduced to ordinal scale data by discretization into 0.05-mm intervals (a number approximately equivalent to the standard error of the recorder’s self-test measurements, to eliminate false distinction due to intrarecorder variability). Next, the sample data from experiment session 1, experiment session 2, and the combined sample from both experimental sessions were each submitted to a principal components analysis (PCA) for categorical data. PCA is a multivariate statistical method for extracting a set of uncorrelated variables, or components, from the data to explain most of the variance (Dunteman 1989). PCA was used to produce object scores for each plaque. Eight principal components (essentially, uncorrelated dimensions of variability) were extracted to explain >97% of the variance for each sample. Each plaque was assigned an object score for each dimension. Next, K-means cluster analysis was applied to the PCA object scores for each plaque, to evaluate the degree to which the dimensions of variability produced by the PCA could be used to cluster the plaques according to their individual makers. Finally, discriminant analysis (DA) was used as an analytical tool to evaluate hypotheses regarding effects of social context and change over time. Unlike PCA, the purpose of DA is classificatory and predictive. It aims to build an optimal model of group membership based on known cases belonging to known groups. This model allows future cases to be predictably assigned to one of the known groups (Jolliffe 1986, 157). It must make certain assumptions about the clusters of objects in multidimensional space, especially that the covariance matrix is the same for all groups (Jolliffe 1986, 158). As Baxter (1994, 197, 200) points out, often this condition is not met in archaeological assemblages, because it requires that groups have different means but are of similar shape and size in multivariate space. The PCA scatter plots described below suggest that this assumption is not met in this sample. It is therefore critical to note that DA is used in a strictly analytical, rather than in an inferential, manner in this study. The purpose is not to demonstrate the utility of this technique in archaeological contexts, as Hill (1977, 71) problematically does, but to take advantage of its explicit assumptions such that relative comparisons of the degree of clustering within and between samples may be evaluated using a standard mathematical rule. Because DA has self-evaluation procedures, it was particularly useful in this regard. The success of DA in building a model based on these assumptions was evaluated for the different samples, which provided important information about the shape of the clusters and their relationships to each other in multivariate space. The principal components produced by PCA were treated as variables describing the plaques by the DA. This PCA-DA combined analysis was quite fruitful, and similar combined methods have been described in

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more detail elsewhere (Jolliffe 1986, 157–162). Because DA requires its variables to be numeric in scale, it could not have been run on the original microvariables, many of which were categorical. The PCA allowed reduction and conversion of the original variables into a form intelligible to the DA. Two statistics produced by this method were of principal importance: (1) reported classification of objects by treatment group against actual treatment group membership, or classification:misclassification proportions, and (2) squared distance between group centroids. Hill (1977) used reported classification rates of the DA as a straightforward reflection of the utility of his microvariable measurements in classifying ceramic vessel sherds by their respective potters. This assumption was problematic for several reasons. In order to simulate an archaeological situation in which the investigator did not know how many clusters existed in the sample, Hill first produced clusters via neighborhood limited classification, and these clusters were submitted to the DA. As Baxter (1994) points out, the use of DA to validate a cluster analysis is problematic since both cluster analysis and DA will tend to impose structure on an unstructured data set.

Results The experimental results support the hypothesized patterns. The results of the PCAs are visually represented by the six scatter plots described below (figures 3.1–3.6).

Figure 3.1. Scatter plot of PCA results, experiment session 1. Data points (representing incised plaques) are labeled according to the individual who decorated them. Here and in the figures that follow, PC1–PC3 are principal components 1–3.

Figure 3.2. Scatter plot of PCA results, experiment session 1. Data points (representing incised plaques) are labeled according to treatment group: A, social pressure group; B, individualist group.

Figure 3.3. Scatter plot of PCA results, experiment session 2. Data points (representing incised plaques) are labeled according to individual.

Figure 3.4. Scatter plot of PCA results, experiment session 2. Data points (representing incised plaques) are labeled according to treatment group: A, social pressure group; B, individualist group.

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Figure 3.5. PCA scatter plot of results, experiment session 2. Data points (representing incised plaques) are labeled according to cluster membership (1–7) as derived from K-means analysis.

Figure 3.6. Scatter plot of PCA results representing the combined data from experiment sessions 1 and 2. Data points (representing incised plaques) are labeled according to individual.

Bearing in mind that each of these plots illustrates a maximum of three of the eight dimensions associated with each plaque, they nevertheless provide a helpful visualization of the trends. It is evident that the work of individuals is clustered together (figures 3.1 and 3.3), and that the tightness of these clusters varies widely across individuals, causing the cluster analysis to cluster some individuals at a lower level of tolerance for within-group variance than for others (figure 3.5). It is also evident that plaque clustering was affected by social group affi liation (figures 3.2 and 3.4). The work of individuals is most clearly clustered separately in the second session (compare figure 3.1 for session 1 with figure 3.3 for

Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Per formance 55 session 2). Also, the predicted trend for group A members to be tightly clustered with each other and group B members to be diffusely scattered is very evident in the session 2 plot (figure 3.4). Finally, figure 3.6, which illustrates a combined sample of plaques from both experimental sessions, demonstrates that some individuals changed their habits significantly from session 1 to session 2, sometimes creating two quite distinct clusters for a single individual. Fittingly, individuals md, dg, and tp, who exhibit the greatest continuity across the two sessions, are members of the social pressure treatment group. In general, the temporal diversity exhibited by the individualist group members suggests that, perhaps because these individuals were new to the set of motor habits, individual-related patterns were not fi xed but could change from session 1 to session 2. This, in turn, suggests that at least at this early stage in learning, temporally related intraindividual variability can form a highly confounding variable in the search for individual potters. K-means cluster analysis was conducted to produce seven clusters (one per individual). The PCA scatter plot for experiment session 2 showing plaques according to cluster membership is illustrated in figure 3.5. It is noteworthy that plaques produced by members of group A are conflated into a single group, while plaques produced by individuals in group B are split among several different groups. Thus, individuals within the social pressure group had learned by session 2 to conform so closely to a group norm that the variability they exhibit is within the range of variability exhibited by single individuals in the individualist group. The DA produced very strong results (table 3.2). First, for classification according to both learning group and individual, the trend is for the number of correctly classified plaques to increase over time, from 73% and 75% correct classification in session 1 to 99% and 93% correct classification in session 2, respectively. This suggests an overall increase in the standardization of motor performance over time. Also, because learning group is very well discriminated in session 2, there is an indication that motor habits are increasingly controlled through time. The mean squared distance between individuals in group A (the social pressure group) decreases slightly from 29 to 26.5 in session 2. At the same time, the mean squared distance between individuals in group B goes from 43.2 in session 1 to 920.9 in session 2. Moreover, the mean squared distance between groups A and B goes from a mere 32.8 in session 1 to 1076.7 in session 2. Thus, the work of individualist group members is more internally consistent and externally distinct from the work of other individualist group members than is the work of social pressure group members. Over time, the normative tendencies of the social pressure group and the individually unique tendencies of the individualist group were both accentuated.

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Table 3.2. Discriminant analysis classification results from experiment sessions 1 and 2

Measure

Session 1

Session 2

Summary of discrimination by learning group (i.e., group A or B) N N correctly classified Proportion correctly classified Squared distance between groups

105 77 0.73 2.39

105 104 0.99 25.8234

Summary of discrimination by individual N N correctly classified Proportion correctly classified

105 79 0.75

105 98 0.933

Mean squared distance Between individuals in group A Between individuals in group B Between groups A and B

29.46 43.23 32.83

26.52 920.88 1057.67

Before discussing the implications of this study, two important caveats relating to its scale should be kept in mind. First, social group size has been shown to affect how individuals behave in group settings (e.g., Brewer and Kramer 1986; Cummings et al. 1974). Thus, the experimental results cannot necessarily be generalized to larger social groups. Second, more replicates of the same experiment would be needed to confirm the generality of the effects, since the par ticular social dynamics of the student volunteers could have played a role in the observed outcome. Nonetheless, social-psychological studies of individual learning in group settings have documented group effects very similar to those observed here (e.g., Olivera and Straus 2004).

Discussion and Conclusions The results of the PCA, the cluster analysis, and the DA all correspond to suggest a number of interesting conclusions. The hypotheses that motor-performance–related microvariables are affected by their contexts of learning and practice and change over time are both supported. More specifically, it appears that over just two learning sessions, individuals developed relatively distinct but internally consistent microstyles that allowed their work to be more easily distinguished from that of others. On the other hand, increasing skill and control allowed members of the

Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Per formance 57 social pressure group to more consistently conform to their group norm. These results have important implications for identifying the work of individual potters. Because the number of individual potters in an archaeological collection is unknown, and the number of clusters produced by cluster analysis ranges from one to the total sample size, the number of clusters one chooses to represent individuals is arbitrary. In attempting to address this conundrum, Hill (1977, 83) suggests that archaeologists “examine at each stage the spatial distributions of the clusters in the archaeological site or context being studied to see if they make sense.” This might work quite well if nonrandom variability in the sample is essentially attributable to the individual alone. But as the results above show, in a seven-group cluster analysis produced by the K-means method for session 2, some clusters corresponded to a social group related to apprenticeship rather than to the individual. While this doubtless confounds the simplicity of identifying the work of individual potters, it is also an exciting corroboration of the notions of Costin (1991) and Crown (1999) that motorperformance microvariables relate to social contexts of learning and practice and changes in skill through time. The coextensive relationship of individual and social-group–related patterns of variability in evidence here supports a recent turn in the theory of style that is critical of the traditional position that only relatively visible stylistic elements are involved in the creation and negotiation of social boundaries. Gosselain (2000) has pointed to a growing literature suggesting that less conspicuous aspects of style (e.g., design structure; see Hardin 1970) are involved in identity construction and that this need not be a conscious process (Gosselain 2000, 189). The results presented here support this argument by demonstrating the sensitivity of lowvisibility motor-performance attributes to social learning contexts. Although the unified theory of artefact design presented by Carr and Neitzel (1995) is commendable in its efforts to synthesize the formidably divergent perspectives on style in current archaeological method and theory, it continues to propagate the assumption that attributes related to motor performance stand apart from learned behavior (e.g., Pryor and Carr 1995, 273). Pryor and Carr (1995) assume that, to the extent that these traits can be transmitted, the process will be passive and reflective rather than active and socially negotiated. This view considerably underestimates the faculties of observation and control here evident even among inexperienced college students (let alone master craftspeople). All this suggests the need for archaeologists to begin exploring the sociological implications of varying levels of bodily control in craft production. Although efficiency and the demand for recognizable products may be factors (e.g., Longacre 1999), studies suggest that degree of craft standardization, for example, is also influenced by differing social contexts of production

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(e.g., Berg 2004). The notion that crafting and related technical and productive processes are embedded in meaningful social relations is not new (e.g., Costin and Wright 1998; Lechtman 1977; Pfaffenberger 1999), but the pervasiveness and depth of the recursive influences of society, craft, and body have been underestimated. We might do well to start by considering Foucault’s encompassing treatment of the role of “discipline” in sociopolitical change in the seventeenth century, where he observes the penetration of discipline to the intimate level of a “hold over the body” (Foucault 1984). Recently, even the cross-cultural constitution of individuality or personhood in the sense given by Western methodological individualism has been challenged (Knapp and van Dommelen 2008; Strathern 1988; Thomas 2004). The analysis of motor performance variability may be one of the few ways that archaeologists can begin to address questions about how “the individual” is crafted through learning contexts and styles. This research demonstrates the great potential of experimental approaches to answering archaeological questions. Remaining questions linger, however. To what degree would individuals’ work become increasingly standardized through time? How would larger social group sizes affect the learning experience? To what degree would the social context of learning and practice have a lasting impact on motor-habit performance? These questions can only be answered through longer-term actualistic and ethnoarchaeological studies. Acknowledgments

I thank the University of Toronto undergraduate students who participated in this experiment, and Christine Czerniak for her diligent assistance with data collection and analysis. Heather M.-L. Miller, Brenda Bowser, Willeke Wendrich, and four anonymous reviewers provided many helpful comments on an earlier version of this chapter, for which I am very grateful. References Baxter, Michael J. 1994. Exploratory Multivariate Analysis in Archaeology. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Berg, Ina. 2004. The Meanings of Standardisation: Conical Cups in the Late Bronze Age Aegean. Antiquity 78:74– 85. Brewer, M.B., and R.M. Kramer. 1986. Choice Behavior in Social Dilemmas: Effects of Social Identity, Group Size, and Decision Framing. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 50:543–549.

Social Contexts of Learning and Individual Motor Per formance 59 Bunzel, Ruth L. 1929. The Pueblo Potter: A Study of Creative Imagination in Primitive Art. New York: Columbia University Press. Carr, Christopher, and Jill E. Neitzel, eds. 1995. Style, Society, and Person: Archaeological and Ethnological Perspectives. New York: Plenum. Costin, Cathy L. 1991. Craft Specialization: Issues in Defining, Documenting, and Explaining the Organization of Production. In Archaeological Method and Theory. M.B. Schiffer, ed. Pp. 1–56. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Costin, Cathy L., and Rita P. Wright, eds. 1998. Craft and Social Identity. Washington, DC: American Anthropological Association. Crown, Patricia L. 1999. Socialization in American Southwest Pottery Decoration. In Pottery and People: A Dynamic Interaction. J.M. Skibo and G.M. Feinman, eds. Pp. 25– 43. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Cummings, L.L., G.P. Huber, and E. Arendt. 1974. Effects of Size and Spatial Arrangements on Group Decision Making. Academy of Management Journal 17:460– 475. Dunteman, George H. 1989. Principal Component Analysis. London: Sage. Foucault, Michel. 1984. The Means of Correct Training. In The Foucault Reader. P. Rabinow, ed. Pp. 76–100. New York: Pantheon. Gosselain, Olivier P. 2000. Materializing Identities: An African Perspective. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 7:187–217. Hardin, Margaret A. 1970. Design Structure and Social Interaction: Archaeological Implications of an Ethnographic Analysis. American Antiquity 35:332 –343. Hill, James N. 1977. Individual Variability in Ceramics and the Study of Prehistoric Social Organization. In The Individual in Prehistory: Studies of Variability in Prehistoric Technologies. J.N. Hill and J. Gunn, eds. Pp. 55–105. New York: Academic Press. Hodder, Ian. 1982. Theoretical Archaeology: A Reactionary View. In Symbolic and Structural Archaeology. I. Hodder, ed. Pp. 1–16. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hurt, Teresa D., and George F.M. Rakita, eds. 2001. Style and Function: Conceptual Issues in Evolutionary Archaeology. Westport, CT: Bergin and Garvey. Jolliffe, I.T. 1986. Principal Components Analysis. Berlin: Springer. Knapp, A.B., and P. van Dommelen. 2008. Past Practices: Rethinking Individuals and Agents in Archaeology. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 18:15–34. Lechtman, Heather. 1977. Style in Technology: Some Early Thoughts. In Material Culture: Style, Organization, and Dynamics of Technology. H. Lechtman and R.S. Merrill, eds. Pp. 3–20. New York: West. Longacre, William A. 1991. Sources of Ceramic Variability among the Kalinga of northern Luzon. In Ceramic Ethnoarchaeology. W.A. Longacre, ed. Pp. 95–111. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

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Longacre, William A. 1999. Standardization and Specialization: What’s the Link? In Pottery and People: A Dynamic Interaction. J.M. Skibo and G.M. Feinman, eds. Pp. 44–58. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Martelle, Holly A. 2002. Huron Potters and Archaeological Constructs: Researching Ceramic Microstylistics. Ph.D. Dissertation. Toronto: University of Toronto, Department of Anthropology. Olivera, F., and S.G. Straus. 2004. Group-to-Individual Transfer of Learning: Cognitive and Social Factors. Small Group Research 35(440– 465). Pelissier, Catherine. 1991. The Anthropology of Teaching and Learning. Annual Review of Anthropology 20:75–95. Pfaffenberger, Bryan. 1999. Worlds in the Making. In The Social Dynamics of Technology: Practice, Politics and World Views. M.-A. Dobres and C.R. Hoffman, eds. Pp. 147–164. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press. Pryor, John, and Christopher Carr. 1995. Basketry of Northern California Indians: Interpreting Style Hierarchies. In Style, Society, and Person: Archaeological and Ethnological Perspectives. C. Carr and J.E. Neitzel, eds. Pp. 259–296. New York: Plenum. Roux, Valentine. 1989. The Potter’s Wheel: Craft Specialization and Technical Competence. New Delhi: Oxford and IBH. Strathern, M. 1988. The Gender of the Gift: Problems with Women and Problems with Society in Melanesia. Berkeley: University of California Press. Thomas, Julian. 2004. Archaeology and Modernity. London: Routledge. Walker, Matthew P., Tiffany Breakfield, J. Allen Hobson, and Robert Stickgold. 2003. Dissociable Stages of Human Memory Consolidation and Reconsolidation. Nature 425:616– 620. Wobst, H. Martin. 1999. Style in Archaeology, or Archaeologists in Style. In Material Meanings: Critical Approaches to the Interpretation of Material Culture. E.S. Chilton, ed. Pp. 118–132. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.

CHA P TER FOUR

Knowledge Transfer The Craftmen’s Abstraction Harald Bentz Høgseth

The tacit knowledge of craftsmen is communicated not only by example but also through language. Carpenters in the past developed specialized terms for timber qualities, features of tools, and specific designs. It is possible to gain an understanding of the language of craftsmen by combining the study of archaeological timber remains with that of the living tradition of craftsmen today. The carpenter’s perception and expression are closely connected to the performance of practice, a knowledge that has existed outside of books and formal education. The transmission of know-how through the generations can be traced by studying tool marks and the selection of timber qualities in wooden buildings in Norway. An ongoing cooperation of the last fourteen years between several craftsmen working with traditional methods, tools, and materials in wood constructions and myself, a carpenter and archaeologist, has resulted in a research project with a focus on the perception of tacit knowledge and knowledge through action and how this has been transmitted from one generation of craftsmen to the next. Different projects have been based on the comparison of archaeological wooden building remains and living craft traditions among carpenters in Norway. A common misunderstanding among noncraftsmen, based on a lack of information and knowledge about the craft process, is that craft production is manual labor, without a high level of abstraction. Before starting a project, the craftsman has to decide what the end product is going to look

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like and how the production process is going to develop. This is a process based on his insights and experience in a range of features, such as the properties and possibilities of materials and tools. It requires a long procedure based on a series of activities, many of which are not physical or manual but cognitive. The craftsman deals with a whole series of considerations and decisions that are part of a creative process (Høgseth 2007). In my previous work, I have discussed the relationship between “knowing how” and “knowing what” based on archaeological wooden building remains. The term knowing how refers to the craftsman’s movements through his body, his technical skill (see chapter 1 this volume). The term knowing what refers to reflections and knowledge describing such movements and techniques and is traditionally understood as a more intellectual process. The craftsman’s knowledge is a combination of both these forms. In practice, they function as closely interwoven integrated parts. Archaeological timbers unmask stories about the craftsman’s knowing how and knowing what. The selection of timbers for a specific purpose is based on cognitive skills. The experience, understanding, and knowledge range from the selection of the raw materials to the use of tools, the sense of form, and choice of techniques. The craftsman depends on his perception: “finger feeling,” visual estimates, hearing, and smell. He depends on this knowledge gained through practice and experience concerning the product’s purpose, the creation process, and the embodied knowledge of tools when he decides what types and qualities of timber the construction needs. When a craftsman uses tools to work timbers, he leaves traces in the surface consisting of particular patterns that characterize the individual tool, almost like a signature. This enables us to explore in the archaeological material the kinds of tools the ancient craftsman probably used and to transcribe the procedures and techniques behind them. Tool marks represent definitive parts of this knowledge and give some perspectives about the connections among the craftsman, materials, tools, and working processes— and the relationship between the sequences of tool marks and their dynamics, rhythm, and movement pattern. The craftsman’s rhythm is built on his know-how and know-what; his body movement and perception are essential for his praxis (Høgseth 2007). The craft tradition is an ongoing chain of knowledge transfer, perception, and expression, based on the abstractions that craftsmen make. My empirical data that this chapter is built on are derived from reconstruction and restoration projects in which two very experienced craftsmen, Jon Bojer Godal and Roald Renmælmo, have been involved. They have both studied and experimented with old carpentry traditions in Norway. This chapter focuses on the transmission of know-how along the generations by studying the selection of timber qualities and tool marks in

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wooden buildings in Norway. The subject is therefore craft and pedagogy, in the sense of both transmission of knowledge between generations (the learning of proper ways) and how we can trace this in an ethnographic and archaeological context. I particularly focus on the premise for pedagogy in craft. Before a craftsman knows what he shall communicate, he has to know how. My primary goal is therefore to bring into focus important conditions for knowledge transfer by craftsmen. Knowledge is transferred through the craftsman’s abstractions, the concepts relating to the inanimate object. Words are abstract by nature, removed from the context they are informing us about, and each single word has diverse meanings. In mathematics, the derivative function is more abstract than the function itself. Similarly, words are more abstract than the objects they represent, and common words describing a group of phenomena are of a more abstract level than specified terms that are closer to what can be sensed. The concept “tool” is more abstract than the word axe, while the latter is in turn more abstract than specific axes, such as carve axe or carpenter’s axe. It is a similar in principle to the way abstract art attempts to translate the inner experience not through direct depictions but through associations of music, colors, and shapes with familiar things. Abstraction moves away from what is perceptible. All forms of knowledge are to a great extent connected to and dependent on abstractions. Not only mathematics but also descriptions of craftsmanship in words and concepts necessarily make use of abstract terms. A way to make the abstract more concrete is by using symbols. In mathematics, the question “how many?” is answered by quoting a number, which is represented by a symbol, for example, 7. Thus, we can not only talk about but also manipulate amounts, dimensions, and distance and convey more complex information by replacing or surrounding the numbers with mathematical symbols. The same holds true for abstractions in craftsmanship, but abstractions work only if we communicate them between people who hold them in common. They are part of our enculturation, which assures that words, terms, and numbers are a meaningful mode of communication within a particular cultural group.

Transmission of Knowledge through Action To create a right angle, carpenters will measure three and four meters from the corner of a house and then automatically know that the length between the endpoints measures five meters, provided the corner is rectangular (32 + 42 = 52), but they apply this without using the theorem of Pythagoras or considering more precisely how or why it works. Their

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solutions are practical: to check, they will measure the diagonals, and when both are equal, the house has a rectangular base. The craftsmen have their own way of expressing properties of materials, based on what they have experienced through practice. Hardness, stiffness, flexibility, and twisting—there are specific terms for all of these properties, including the character of the fiber and the type of heartwood of timbers. Such characterizations are often extremely nuanced. The precision of the terms and the concepts is closely linked to a common experience: terms are understood properly only when they are built on common practice. Without having experienced the properties of materials with your own hands, it is difficult to understand the depth of knowledge or even have a fruitful conversation. Scientific or scholarly researchers likewise have their own terms that enable precise speaking with each other, using a technical language developed inside the scientific environment. For people not working inside the “cultural community” that are not familiar with the experience or language, the conversation is not understandable. The craftsmen often make reference to spatial relations, in which their body is the central component, which interacts with the physical form of objects. The “words” are tools, materials, and movements, element they make use of in the building process. The “thoughts” are the methods, sequence of actions, and the final product that exists as an abstraction in their minds and that they try to express and create as a physical form through the building process. Their movements are not random but are based on a technique of actions, knowledge of which is transmitted through attention in action. The total experience is built on the concepts of “knowing how” and “knowing what.” The fi rst refers to the physical knowledge of the craftsman, how he moves with his hands and entire body, the technical skills, and knowledge of the procedures. The term knowing what refers to a level of reflection and knowledge describing the techniques. The craftsman needs both of these forms of knowledge, and in practice they function as integrated parts, closely woven together. The church father Augustine has expressed his insights in how children learn, understand, and communicate. The learning process described by Augustine reminds me about several aspects of how craftsmen learn: [I observed that] my elders would make some par ticular sound, and as they made it would point at or move towards some par ticular thing; and from this I came to realise that the thing was called by the sound they made when they wished to draw my attention to it. That they intended this was clear from the motions of their body, by a kind of natural language common to all races which consists in facial expressions, glances of the eye, gestures and the tones by which the voice expresses

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the mind’s state—for example whether things are to be sought, kept, thrown away, or avoided. So, as I heard the same words again and again properly used in different phrases, I came gradually to grasp what things they signified; and forcing my mouth to the same sounds, I began to use them to express my own wishes. Thus I learnt to convey what I meant to those about me; and so took another long step along the stormy way of human life in society, while I was still subject to the authority of my parents and at the beck and call of my elders. (Augustine, Confessions, Book 1, paragraph 8, translated in Sheed 2006, 10)

Language and body communicate a chain of abstractions that in turn expresses experience and practice. We have linguistic freedom when we manage to know and pronounce the words after a long period of training. It is the same way with craftsmanship, which is dependent on experience and know-how: dexterity, knowing the methods and order of operations, and understanding the forms that are transmitted from one generation to the next in a knowledge-based working community. By transmission of knowledge through action, the fundamental learning is imitating and copying, just like the process we pass through when we learn to use words.

Tacit Knowledge A great deal of knowledge that the craftsmen use includes unarticulated knowledge transmitted through action, or tacit knowledge (Godal 1994, 1996a, 1996b, 1998, 1999, 2006a, 2006b; Godal and Moldal 1992; Merleau-Ponty 1945, 1994; Molander 1996; Polanyi 1958; Polanyi and Prosch 1975; Ryle 1949; Schön 1983). Michael Polanyi has explained how he understands tacit knowledge. He describes the knowledge needed to be able to identify or recognize a situation or a face or how to use tools. This knowledge increases and builds up an understanding from single parts to an entire complex situation. Our body language helps us to capture a situation, be understood, and understand others. To Polanyi it is important to make “tacit” knowledge visible exactly because the science and education institutions have neglected the importance of the bodily phenomena in our everyday life, despite the fact that the “tacit dimension” is also performed in science. Polanyi is interested in the circumstances, processes, and properties that enable us to learn. He shows how we gradually, in a learning process, become more aware of how the use of tools affects us and how they gradually become an integrated part of our self. In the beginning of the learning process, tools are experienced as a foreign body, something outside the physical body, foreign from ourselves. From his awareness of how the tool

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becomes an integrated part of his body, his control of the tool, and the essential skill he develops, the craftsman is able to focus on the situation as a whole rather than just the interaction with the tool. Through the practice of his skill, he gains experience, and the sensation of wielding becomes more secure, or as Polanyi describes it, the sensation becomes “tacit knowing.” According to Polanyi, all personal knowledge is connected to the body (Gadamer 1991; translation: Gadamer 2000, 136–144; Meland and Petersen in press; Polanyi 1958, 22– 45, 52, 1966; Polanyi and Prosch 1975). Knowledge is set in motion through actions and always has a tacit dimension, while the transmission of knowledge through actions is how an apprentice learns. At the same time, Polanyi states that tacit knowledge is something personal: the cultural and social working environment, community, and surroundings influence the apprentice’s knowledge (Polanyi 1966; Weber 1985, 1999, 26–33). Transmission of knowledge takes place through interaction within the cultural community. Not only do apprentices learn the proper movements, tools and treatments, and the procedures of the trade, but also the learning process shapes their character, and thus is true enculturation. Polanyi asserts that the working environment, surroundings, the tradition, and the collective always contribute as a foundation for regenerated knowledge. The apprentice must gain confidence in his tradition and cultural practice and be fully involved in the customs and cultural heritage to further develop his skills and knowledge. To achieve skill and competence through learning processes, the apprentice must submit to the master, expert, or authority. Knowledge is established through the interaction of apprentice and master student and professor, in other words at the interface between individual and tradition. Tacit knowledge is the foundation for knowledge through action and enables us to learn, know, or perceive something. Knowledge through action involves what we can sense and communicate through action.

Some Thoughts regarding Apprentice and Habitus In the past, work and free time and professional and private life were not strictly divided. To work was an obvious part of living. The partition between leisure and working hours was fluid and different from that of Western society today (Cornell 1986). Nevertheless, it is reasonable to assume that people then, as now, developed in the same way through the social community/fellowship. Archaeologists often borrow the sociological concept of habitus to explain and understand the interaction between individuals and collectives and the process of exchanging knowledge and

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experience in a dynamic process where knowledge is learned, unfolds, and develops in a social space (Bourdieu 1977, 1987). Through our habitus we recognize aspects of daily life through experiences that connect us with other people. In such a way, we recognize fear, pain, and happiness in others by reading their body language and the situation, context, and surroundings we participate in. We recognize, distinguish, and understand through experience, moving not only from part to totality but also from totality to parts (Polanyi 1966; Polanyi and Prosch 1975, 22– 45, 52). Similar to an academic who recognizes and has the ability to read and understand “strokes” or pencil lines forming a sentence, a craftsman can distinguish “strokes” or “marks” of a tool forming a product or construction. It is the habitus that enables them to recognize and understand the specialized language, symbols, characters, body expressions, and movements and provides the knowledge that forms the foundation of actions in a design process. Thus, the human and the tangible (objects) are closely connected. The knowledge is “tacit” because it is obvious and therefore unnecessary to articulate. It also is closely linked to activity: experts are able to evaluate a situation quickly and will instantly react on the basis of this tacit knowledge. Knowledge through action refers to the total sum of experience and know-how in terms of dexterity, method of operations, perception of form, and so on, that have been inherited from one generation to the next in a knowledge-based community of practice. Tacit knowing is a premise for knowledge through action and enables us to learn or perceive, while knowledge through action describes what we can sense, think, and communicate or mediate through action. Recognition is a substantial feature of the transmission of tacit knowledge and knowledge through action: when a modern-day craftsman recognizes elements, such as tool strokes, it demonstrates that elements from the past are still present. An individual’s practical knowledge is based on interaction with others. According to the Swedish philosopher Bengt Molander (1996), the learning process occurs through awareness, attention, and repeated action. Molander has demonstrated how knowledge is shaped in different training situations. One example he uses to illustrate the relation between master and apprentice is through the interaction of two cello players, the master, Casals, and the apprentice, Greenhouse, who was an experienced musician but wanted to improve his technique and understanding. The relation between the two professional cellists illustrates a learning situation distinguished by discipline and authority. The lessons took place through practical exercise, and the apprentice’s task was to imitate the master’s way of playing, focusing on one of Beethoven’s symphonies. After each lesson, they reflected on whether and why the imitation was correct or

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incorrect. Learning occurred through awareness, attention, repeated action, and reflection. Copying the master and simultaneously creating an abstraction of the process were essential components of the learning process. After each lesson, Casals and Greenhouse discussed the perfor mance in a dialogue that concentrated on Greenhouse’s playing style, evaluating the technique, rhythm, sensitivity, and insights. Casals’s own learning experience, the way his teacher and the musical tradition had affected him, was a crucial part of the process. The training was finished when the student was able to play exactly like the teacher and the latter was convinced that the apprentice had mastered the tradition. Only then was Greenhouse ready to move away from the example and provide his own expression and interpretation. The example above outlines the relation and connection between apprentice and master in one given learning situation and how an apprentice’s character or habitus is formed through the transmission of knowledge (Høgseth 2007, 142–144). The example is transferable to musicians, dancers, carpenters, potters, glass blowers, and so on. Training, learning, and understanding happen through three main stages that apply not just to music but to all forms of learning: 1. Awareness, attention, and repeated action are achieved by imitating technique, rhythm, energy, or strength, and so forth. The technique is practiced through a combination of bodily and mental (reflective) training until the actions become automatic. The master (tradition) dominates the apprentice in this stage. The teacher, who honed his skill and understanding through many years of practice, through both executive and reflective activity in different traditions, transmits his knowledge to the apprentice, who gradually becomes proficient by a combination of inherent skill, observation, and training. At this stage, tradition dominates innovation. The apprentice develops a foundation of skill and capability based on well-established examples. 2. Practical exercises are supplemented by reflection on how the technique, rhythm, sensitivity, and insight can be improved. Feedback from the master and the reaction by the apprentice both during and after the practical work add a cognitive layer to the improvements. The experience, actions, and verbal and body language play a vital role in this reflexive process. At this stage, the apprentice shows a certain degree of mastering the tradition, even if it is still the master’s opinion that dominates and to which the greatest importance is attached. Both the practical training and the abstracted reflections play a crucial role in the process of building knowledge. In this

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stage, the apprentice develops a conscious concept of the required skill and the ultimate purpose of the learning process. 3. When the apprentice is able to (exactly) copy the master through controlling the tone, technique, rhythm, sensitivity, insight, and so on, such as the master and tradition demands, he is ready. Now he can develop his talent and par ticular personal expression. He is ready to achieve a higher level in the pyramid of knowledge. The apprentice has risen in status and has become visible in the tradition, highlighting the apprentice’s own interpretation and approach. He has the possibility to obtain and express his distinctive character and mature in such a way that he gradually appears as a master in his own right, with his own unique qualities. The steps in this process can be considered as “chain of actions” and are connected to each other. The knowledge assembles and performs through practice by the individual and the cultural community. The concept of habitus is relevant for analyzing the different processes transmitting knowledge in craftsmanship. Similarly, it is meaningful to understand procedures in archaeology, or how archaeologists approach and analyze material culture. The concept of habitus also helps us to understand the cultural context not only of the ancient craftsmen but also of the academic institution studying the traces of ancient production. Scholars inherit and develop knowledge and opinions on what is good research and how it should be designed and carried out. In both cases, it is a dynamic process, in a social space, where knowledge is transmitted, learned, developed, and implemented. If we consider the important influence of the context, habitus is a more adequate term to describe the craftsman’s display of knowledge than is knowledge transmitting by action or tacit knowledge. The latter two are dynamic and describe the transmitting processes from one generation to the next but do not express the contextual relation that releases such actions. Habitus, on the other hand, embraces a combination of factors, including knowledge, aspects of time, space, and the cultural/social fellowships. Habitus is thus the triggering factor for the performer’s actions. Pierre Bourdieu connects habitus to the term discourse (Bourdieu 1977, 1987; Broady and Palme 1989). He does so by defining it as a system of common rules, or ethic and moral concepts inside a cultural fellowship, such as an occupational or social group. The system of rules and conventions can be both articulated and tacit. It means that the individual or the group must act in accordance with the rules and principles on a conscious and an unconscious level. In such a way, the discourse is vital for how habitus is formed and developed— and thus how material culture is

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formed. Many social researchers pay attention to the term discourse (Apel 2006; Foucault 2006; Kuhn 1970; Latour 1999; Olsen 1997, 2003). The term includes norms, standards, and technical terms developed by a professional fellowship to describe tools, materials, operations, procedures, and actions. Discursions, dialogs, and conversations among the members of a cultural fellowship also include the way an individual or group consider and acquire superior conditions in the society connected to their livelihood, dwelling, and skill. Sometimes we are able to recognize such presence (rules, attitudes) in written sources or in physical remains after their actions (styles, social practice, etc.). Social practices are in constant development, and a group of practitioners might identify a particularly successful or innovative member, in keeping with or transcending the professional fellowship’s set of rules. Exchange of views and opinions, both articulated and tacit, occurs within crafts and science. Pursuant to Thomas Kuhn, who was in many ways inspired by Polanyi’s work, this happens through paradigms and paradigm shifts (Kuhn 1970; Latour and Braastad Myklebust 1996). These shifts proceed through written or unwritten sets of rules or attitudes and directly affect the practice. Investigations of such rules or attitudes in one professional fellowship related to another opens up interesting questions, answers, and possibilities regarding practice and learning processes (Bourdieu 1977). The discourse is vital for the dynamic and the development in a fellowship and defines the terms for the habitus of individual members. The craftsman’s habitus is in this way his complete set of thoughts and maturity of his experience, skill, and conceptual understanding. Habitus extends through his cultural heritage, his surroundings, and he gains it through attentive observation of the actions and experiences of other craftsmen and through communication and interaction with the community at large. This contact can be a literal, verbal, or bodily display of knowledge. The cultural fellowship, in terms of communication and language, social belonging, familiar conditions, and individual similarities and differences, makes the habitus of every person unique. Important for us is the realization that knowledge is carried out, put into action, and preserved through an active and dynamic process of transmission.

Example 1 I now present a brief example from my research into the characteristics of Norwegian barns from 1860 to 1960. Much of this research is based on Godal’s 2006 article “The Craftsman’s Abstractions with Examples from Boatbuilding and Barn Building.” Among carpenters, building a barn was regarded as the utmost proof of competence. The Norwegian wooden barns were huge and complex

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buildings, the largest about 18 × 60 meters with a construction area of 1,000 square meters. The masters for such building projects required extensive insight and training in organizing complex processes. Studying these barns reveals both the old masters’ technical and esthetic insights and their understanding of the prevalent weather conditions, because the barns are invariably built in sheltered areas of the terrain. The work started with an in-depth discussion with the farmer who needed a barn built. This usually took place in the courtyard of the farmer’s house, often around Christmastime. The previous building was normally finished during October/November, and the planning and organizing of a new building could take place in December, allowing sufficient time for all the building stages, including the selection, cutting, and preparation of the timber. The carpenter produced a sketch that showed the outer measurements and the various inner spaces, such as the cow barn, horse stable, and pigsty. The carpenter used this drawing when going into the forest to blaze (mark) timber for harvest. (See figure 4.1.) As described by Godal, the marked trees were cut and processed in three main categories: rafters, long-wood (beams, joist, post, stave, and cross-brace), and board wood (for boards and planks). If the sawmill was nearby, the long-wood was sawed. If the wood had to be hauled over a long distance to the nearest sawmill, they would saw only the board wood and would cut the rafters and long-wood on the spot with axes. This was seasonal work performed in the wintertime (Godal 2006b, 176). The next step in the process was to lengthen and join the timbers through a mortise-and-tenon connection known as cogging. The cogging joints were cut, and the ends of the vertical staves were tapered (“taped”

Figure 4.1. The farmers’/carpenters’ year-long assignment (after Høgseth 2007, 193) (Impelling = logging and transporting from felling area to construction area.)

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or “tailed”). The framework of the building was finished “flatwise,” which means on the ground. The rafters were test raised on the ground and adjusted, accommodating the slope of the roof, which was often around 34°. The height of the ridge was a third of the building’s width over the raft (the cross-beam that runs between the two side walls). Brick walls were usually built by a mason’s team, and usually this part of the building was completed in June, after which it was time to fully raise the wooden framework. The barn bridge, the loading ramp leading from the ground surface to the barn, served as scaffolding. The complete building was raised with no other scaffolding than the successive placement of the building materials that were subsequently used in the building. This very brief summary outlines the main organizational pattern of building a wooden barn, a system built based on the carpenter’s abstractions. Each geographical area had its own regional organizational systems and its own way of building houses. Typically, what the buildings have in common is that they were all built on a sheltered spot in the terrain, and characteristically, none of them are exactly alike. Each area has its own structural principles, or method (style) of building, standardized procedures, and customs of form. It is the “toolbox” in the broadest sense (the abstraction of the entire building system), which makes the craftsman prepared before he starts building the barn. Through these abstractions (the internalized image of the final product), he is ready to begin the process, to choose the materials, and to decide what the next course of action is in each of the building phases. The craftsmen are tied to the established custom of form, through the system, technique, and procedure, but as Godal describes it, “it is exactly this bond, which creates the circumstances for the fine nuanced adjustment to the landscape, country (building environment) and the farmer’s individual needs” (2006b, 177, translation mine). Building relates to the practice of shaping forms through technique, procedures, systems, tools, and materials. A barn has various functions, has to be secure, and has to have an esthetically pleasing form. The connections among use, form, material, and design are complex. The abstractions (internalized images of the final form) can be partially expressed through figures, numbers, and measurement, but that is not all there is to it: the craftsman depends on an understanding of an ideal system, and it takes time to learn this. Both through ethnological (Berg 1998; Godal 1998) and archaeological (Høgseth 1998, 1999, 2001, 2003) sources, Norwegian carpenters have had a conscious relation to a long craft tradition, which influenced their selection of materials and the building’s characteristics and quality. I have previously concluded that carpenters in medieval times in Trondheim, Norway (the medieval city was originally named Nidaros), selected timbers with different characteristics dependent on their constructive function in

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the building (Høgseth 1998, 83– 84). Viewed against Godal’s investigations of building materials and craftsmen’s knowledge, maintained in different Norwegian traditions today (Godal 1994, 1996a, 1996b, 1998), it is likely that knowledge from the past still is put into practice. Godal’s examinations indicate a relationship between the present conditions and demands and those that carpenters from medieval times made regarding suitable building materials and appropriate tools (Godal 1996a, 1996b, 1998).

Example 2 On ships dating as early as the Bronze Age, we can detect grooves that are indicators of the Norwegian term glepp-hugging, a method of making boat materials out of timber and processing planks, boards, beams, and staves (Sylvester 2006a, 2006b) (figure 4.2). The technique is a work method similar to that indicated by the Norwegian term sprette-telgjing, which is a Northern European carpentry technique of cutting timbers so delicately that the surface of boards, beams, staves, and so on, is very smooth and shell-like (figure 4.3). The term comes from the verb sprette, which means “to bounce,” while telgje means “to whittle” by adze (Larsen and Marstein 2000). It is a technology attested to in medieval and even older timber. Glepp-hugging was a method frequently used in creating both boat and building materials since before medieval times. We find the grooves that are indicative of this technique on boats built as late as the 1980s. The skill and understanding required for these two working methods and the selection of raw materials with the proper characteristics have been transmitted throughout generations of craftsmen. Both glepp-hugging and sprette-telgjing are terms that describe the process a carpenter uses to design beams, raf ters, joists, boards, planks, and so on. Tool marks from both procedures are very characteristic and have a clear longitudinal organization in rows on the wood. Tool marks

Figure 4.2. Glepp-hugging: left, board from the floor in Borgund Stave church (1180–1181 CE); middle, boards from the ceiling curried out in 1711 CE in Gildeskål Church; right, boards from the floor in an outhouse built in 1984. Observe the continuity of technical skill.

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Figure 4.3. Sprette-telgjing from the roof truss in Alstadhaug Church (timbers felled in 1166–1167 CE)

of glepp-hugging have a longer “slash” and are more bowl or cup shaped. The tool marks of sprette-telgjing are outlined as fishbone shapes and are smoother and denser. Based on these two techniques, we cannot help but conclude that a strong connection exists between the knowledge of past and present boat builders, both of whom have the ability to assess the materials, techniques, methods, tools, and procedures. Thus, we can trace the transmission of knowledge from before the Middle Ages to the present. If we accept this assumption, we cannot reject a superior connection in the knowledge and practice between past and present craftsmen. The close connection among craftsman, raw materials, and tools is an important basis for a continuity of practice, provided the knowledge is transferred from one generation to the next.

Conclusion In this chapter, I claim that it is possible to fi nd evidence for apprenticeship and transfer of knowledge in craft traditions. At the same time, I have demonstrated that particular archaeological traces, indicative of specific technological procedures, occur also in modern constructions such as ships and barns built on the foundation of traditional knowledge in craftsmanship. The “inner image” on which the craftsman bases his actions, the collection of materials, construction phases, and building details, is an abstraction of the perfect end result and all the organizational steps and actions needed to reach it. The learning process to internalize that “ideal” product, and the organizational system, is a time-intensive endeavor. The abstractions become obvious to the apprentice through observation, imitation, and active participation in the building process. Imagining the form

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of a boat takes time and is virtually impossible without being involved in the work procedure. Each single boat must have its par ticular form, depending on the user’s need. When Godal asked an experienced boat builder, who himself had learned the craft through the traditional master– apprentice system, how long it takes to learn the craft, he answered after some time of reflection that you need to build about fifteen boats before you could establish an abstraction of the boat form (Godal 2006b, 178). In the craft, the craftsmen communicate their thoughts through methods of action, skill, and sense of all the properties that are relevant in creating the end result: form, stiffness, suppleness, hardness, softness, color, smell, sound, taste, rhythm, flow, space, and so forth. They express themselves not only through their use of materials, tools, and movements but also with words and concepts. During the work process, the master builder might share his knowledge by an ongoing stream of comments, highlighting the history of a particular procedure or outlining how a certain action is best executed (Molander 1996). In that way, the craftsman expresses his inner image, the abstraction of the form, mostly with his body movements and partly with words. Most of all, however, the inner image of the object is expressed in his selection of raw materials and the definite sequences of the process to shape it. To give an object a form is an act of creation, and the craftsman must be able to improvise. But that does not mean that the procedures, systems, or techniques change. The tools that a craftsman uses to create are the technique as a process, the system and practice. The buildings are created based on shared abstractions that result in certain similarities in the constructions. Sometimes it is just the skilled expert who can recognize, on the one hand, the relationship and, on the other, the individual character, the personality among them (after Godal 2006b, 183). For the craftsman, it is this abstraction, the inner form, that in the end dissolves the contrast between chaos and order. His abstractions are dependent on his proximity, as well as his distance to the object: the proximity develops the craftsman’s skill, while the distance enables reflection. In combination, skill and reflection generate knowledge regarding the interaction between materials, tools, and technique. The boat builder’s advice to the apprentice is to estimate the form, create the abstraction, and have a sure eye to allow thinking ahead (Molander 1996, 19; Tempte 1982, 85– 87). All lines must be clean and harmonic, without bumps or swellings. Each single board must be carefully taken out of the material. The process of forming and fastening the length of planking is like an “act of giving birth” (Tempte 1982, 85). All this the apprentice must learn through paying close attention to every single action and detail. The examples above do not constitute proof that specific traditions in craftsmen’s knowledge that exist today actually stretch back to Bronze Age

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or medieval times, but they substantiate that traditions are maintained by the transfer of knowledge through actions. It is likely that other elements of the craft have survived in the same way. Despite the fact that the modern craftsman, who is the carrier of the tradition, does not live isolated from modern society, the examples of continuous knowledge given above illustrate that the use of analogy between modern craftsmen and archaeological materials is valid. The transfer of craft knowledge leaves material traces, such as the tool marks referred to above. Therefore, the craftsman as carrier of tradition should be perceived not as the “key” but rather as a “door opener” to the carrier of knowledge in the past. References Apel, J.K. 2006. Skilled Production and Social Reproduction. Aspects of Traditional Stone-Tool Technologies. Proceedings of a Symposium in Uppsala, August 20–24, 2003. Uppsala: Societas Archaeologica Upsaliensis. Berg, A. 1998. Hus for hus: tillegg og tidfesting (House to house: additions and dating). Oslo: Landbruksforlaget. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1987. What Makes a Social Class? On the Theoretical and Practical Existence of Groups. Berkeley Journal of Sociology 32:1–17. Broady, Donald, and Mikael Palme. 1989. Pierre Bourdieus kultursociologi. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Cornell, Lasse. 1986. Arbete och arbetsformernas utveckling (The development of work and work forms). Meddelanden från Ekonomisk-historiska institutionen vid Göteborgs universitet. Göteborg: University of Göteborg. Foucault, Michel. 2006. Tingenes orden: en arkeologisk undersøkelse av vitenskapene om mennesket (The order of things: an archaeology of the human sciences). Original title: “Les mots et les choses” (1966). Translated by Knut Ove Eliassen. Oslo: Spartacus. Gadamer, Hans-Georg. 1991. Lob der Theorie. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp. Gadamer, Hans-Georg. 2000. Teoriens lovprising: Taler og artikler. Innledning, oversættelse og noter ved Arne Jørgensen. Århus: Systime A/S. (In Praise of Theory: Speeches and Essays. Trans. Chris Dawson). New Haven: Yale UP, 1998 Godal, Jon Bojer. 1994. Tre til tekking og kleding: frå den eldre materialforståinga (Timber to roofing and paneling: understanding from the older material). Oslo: Landbruksforlaget. Godal, Jon Bojer. 1996a. Håndverksregisteret: prinsipp og problemstillingar i dokumentasjonsarbeid knytt til handverk (Norwegian Crafts Development: Principles and issues in documentation related to handicraft). Lillehammer: Maihaugen.

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Godal, Jon Bojer. 1996b. Tre til laft og reis: gamle hus fortel om materialbruk (Timbers to Cog Joints and Framework Constructions: Old Houses tell about use of Materials). Oslo: Landbruksforlaget. Godal, Jon Bojer. 1998. Om materialkvalitetet i ein del mellomalderhus. Lillehammer: Norsk handverksutvikling Maihaugen (About the Quality of Materials in some Medieval Houses. House to house: Additions and Datings). Articles by Halvard Bjørkvik, Jon Bojer Godal and Terje Thun, published by Cultural Heritage and the Norwegian Institute for Cultural Research. Norwegian log houses from the Middle Ages. 1998/6. Oslo: Landbruksforlaget. Godal, Jon Bojer. 1999. Skisser og fabuleringar kring handverkspedagogikk (Sketches and theories around craft pedagogy). Lillehammer: Norsk handverksutvikling Maihaugen. Godal, Jon Bojer. 2006a. Handlingsboren kunnskap (Knowledge through Action). Sand: Ryfylkemuseet. Godal, Jon Bojer. 2006b. Handverkaren sine abstraksjonar med døme frå båtbygging og låvebygging (The Craftsman’s Abstractions with Examples from Boatbuilding and Barn Building). Lillehammer: Høgskolen i Akershus. Godal, Jon Bojer, and Steinar Moldal. 1992. Tradisjonsboren kunnskap om tre som byggematerial (Traditional knowledge of wood as a building material). Lillehammer: Maihaugen. Høgseth, Harald Bentz. 1998. Middelalderske bygningslevninger som kunnskapsformidler: tømmerhus i Nidaros som material- og kulturhistoriske dokument i tiden ca. 1025 til 1475 e. Kr. hovedfagsoppgave. Trondheim: Norges teknisk-naturvitenskapelige universitet. (Medieval building remains as a communicator of Knowledge: Loghouses in Nidaros as the material and historical documents in the period ca. 1025 to 1475 AD. Cand. Philol. Thesis. Trondheim: Norwegian University of Science.) Høgseth, Harald Bentz. 1999. Handlingsbasert kunnskap: bygningslevninger som kilde til kunnskap i det arkeologiske materialet (Knowledge through Action: Building Remains as a Source of Knowledge in the Archaeological material). Primitive tider 2:38– 44. Høgseth, Harald Bentz. 2001. Endringer i middelalderens håndverkskunnskap: mekanismer som påvirker og fornyer etablert byggeskikk. Collegium Medievale, Forening for middelalderforskere:45–77. (Changes in Medieval Craft Knowledge: Mechanisms that influence and renew established building practices. Collegium Medievale, Society for Medieval Scholars. No 14: 2001: 45–77.) Høgseth, Harald Bentz. 2003. Hva slags tre vart bygningsmateriale? In Middelaldergården i Trøndelag: foredrag fra to seminar (What kind of wood was the building material? The Medieval farm in Trøndelag: Presentation of two seminars). O. Skevik, ed. Pp. 63–90. Verdal: Stiklestad nasjonale kultursenter. Høgseth, Harald Bentz. 2007. Håndverkerens redskapskasse: en undersøkelse av kunnskapsutøvelse i lys av arkeologisk bygningstømmer fra 1000- tallet. Trondheim: Norges teknisk vitenskapelige universitet. (The Craftsman’s tool box: A

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Survey of Knowledge Practice in light of Archaeological Building timbers from 1000 AD. Doctoral Thesis. Trondheim: Norwegian University of Science and Technology.) Kuhn, T.S. 1970. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Larsen, K.E., and N. Marstein. 2000. Conservation of Historic Timber Structures. Oxford: Reed. Latour, Bruno. 1999. Pandora’s Hope. Essays on the Reality of Science Studies. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Latour, Bruno, and Ragnar Braastad Myklebust. 1996. Vi har aldri vært moderne: essay i symmetrisk antropologi. Oslo: Spartacus. Meland, Ingmar, and Helge Petersen. In press. Handlingsboren kunnskap og taus kunnskap. Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. 1945. Phénoménologie de la perception. Paris: Gallimard. Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. 1994. Kroppens fenomenologi. Oslo: Pax. (“Phenomenology of Perception,” trans. Donald A. Landes, New York: Routledge, 2012). Molander, Bengt. 1996. Kunskap i handling (Knowledge in Action). Göteborg: Daidalos. Olsen, Bjørnar. 1997. Fra ting til tekst: teoretiske perspektiv i arkeologisk forskning (From things to text: theoretical perspectives in archaeological research). Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Olsen, Bjørnar. 2003. Material Culture after Text: Re-membering Things. Norwegian Archaeological Review 36(2):87–104. Polanyi, Michael. 1958. Personal Knowledge. Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Polanyi, Michael. 1966. The Tacit Dimension. Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith. Polanyi, Michael, and Harry Prosch. 1975. Meaning. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Ryle, Gilbert. 1949. The Concept of Mind. London: Penguin Books. Schön, Donald A. 1983. The Reflective Practitioner. How Professionals Think in Action. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate Arena. Sheed, F.J. 2006. The Confessions of Saint Augustine. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett. Sylvester, M. 2006a. Haugvikbåten fra Sømna: en plankebygd båt fra yngre bronsealder eller førromersk jernalder (The Haugvikboat from Sømna: a wooden boat built in the late Bronze Age or Pre-Roman Iron Age). Viking 2006:91–106. Sylvester, M. 2006b. Norges eldste båt (Norways Oldest Boat). Spor: fortidsnytt fra Midt-Norge 21(42):4–7. Tempte, Thomas. 1982. Arbetets æra: om hantverk, arbete, några rekonstruerade verktyg och maskiner (The Honor of Craft: About Craft, Work, Some Reconstructed Tools and Machines). Stockholm: Arbetslivscentrum. Weber, Max. 1985. Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Wissenschaftslehre. Tübingen: Mohr. Weber, Max. 1999. Verdi og handling (Value and Action). Pax Forlag. Translated by Helge Jordheim. Oslo: Pax Forlag A/S.

CHA P TER FI V E

Placing Ideas in the Land Practical and Ritual Training among the Australian Aborigines Simon Holdaway and Harry Allen

Maurice Bloch (1991) divides learning into the acquisition of two forms of knowledge: linguistic-like knowledge and nonlinguistic, practical knowledge, involving the acquisition of skills. The division between knowledge and skill is extended by François Sigaut (1993, 111–112), who differentiates between the practical side of learning associated with an apprenticeship system and the formal learning that takes place in a school room. She notes that an apprenticeship system implies a contract between the master and the apprentice and often involves payment in cash, kind, or ser vice in return for training. Much knowledge transmission in Aboriginal Australia is informal, taking place between younger and older brothers, between sons-in-law and their fathers-in-law, between girls and their mothers, or between junior and senior wives in a polygamous household. Nonetheless, within such informal learning situations, there are elements of contractual relations where payments in ser vice or kind move from juniors to seniors (Love 2009 [1936], 113–114; Peterson 1997, 181–184). The acquisition of hunting and gathering skills by young Australian Aboriginal boys and girls mostly involves informal learning combined with apprentice-type learning as a minor element. Ritual training for boys more formally involves both apprentice- and school-type learning. Girls

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and women acquire much of the same knowledge indirectly (Kaberry 1939, 227–234). Bloch (1991, 186) observes that these different forms of learning relate dialectically, involving the way things look, sound, taste, and feel, so that knowledge is constantly tested against bodily experience (Bloch 1991, 193; Povinelli 1995; Tamisari 1998). Here we discuss two forms of learning in Australian Aboriginal society: action-based learning and a more formal system of imparting knowledge that is restricted to young males. These involve different combinations of informal and formal (apprentice and schoollike) learning systems. The strength of the Aboriginal system of knowledge transmission comes from how these forms of learning resonate with each other throughout the lives of individuals and the life of the community. Following this, we present studies based on the archaeology of western New South Wales (NSW) that offer differing views concerning continuity of occupation of this semiarid part of central eastern Australia. The conclusions of these studies have implications for our understanding of the past, regarding whether occupation, and hence traditions, were continuous or, alternatively, intermittent. If knowledge and human relationships in this environment have to be reestablished at different points through time, then this affects the nature of the information provided to young people, the manner in which it is imparted, and its effectiveness through time.

Remembering and Education within Hunter-Gatherer Australia In his discussion of relationships between people and land in Aboriginal Australia, Lester Richard Hiatt (1962, 282) distinguishes between economic relationships and ritual relationships. He observes (Hiatt 1962, 284; 1965, 103; 1982, 14) that economic relationships were regarded somewhat casually in that Aboriginal land-owning units were free to exploit the resources of each other’s estates and that food seekers moved freely over broad regions that included the totemic sites of many patrilineal descent groups. He argued that this lack of concern was motivated by an ethic of generosity (see also Myers 1986, 98–99). Ownership in relation to lands, however, was dependent upon the mystical association of par ticular creators with sacred sites. As a consequence, the ownership of symbols representing or emanating from ancestral powers (icons, designs, songs, dances, and ceremonies) was strictly defi ned on the basis of descent or filiation and tended to be circumscribed and jealously guarded. The distinction between economic relationships and ritual relationships found expression in the training of young Aboriginal men and

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women. Training in hunting, gathering, and practical skills was informal; young men went out with their fathers and brothers, young girls with their mothers and sisters, gaining knowledge through observation and participation in the practical life of the community (Berndt and Berndt 1964, 132–133). Through such action-based learning, young men and women became familiar with both the natural and the social world through which they moved. In contrast, ritual training, which was restricted to the young men, was formally organized instruction, whereby a youth passed through a series of grades to achieve adulthood and ritual seniority. Ronald and Catherine Berndt (1964, 137) observe that a man might be middle-aged or relatively old before the final revelations regarding the secret-sacred and esoteric life of the men of his community were made to him. Luke Taylor (1996, 104) notes that, for the initiates, formal training in the meaning of certain ceremonial episodes helps to establish a code for interpretation. Initiates are gradually brought to share understanding of the meaning of ceremonial elements which are collectively understood by other initiated men. In this respect, the meaning of certain designs, songs, dances, and manufactured objects are revealed as Ancestral creations, an order mapped out by the Ancestral beings.

Many societies organize youthful training in this manner, distinguishing between training in practical skills (apprenticeships) and formal and organized training in religious or jural matters (e.g., Bloch 1977). This is a system of relative value whereby societies determine that the transmission of codes plays an essential part in the reproduction of society. However, despite the conceptual separation, there is a constant interplay between mystical knowledge, on the one hand, and one’s practical experience of the world, on the other. As we demonstrate below, understanding how these knowledge systems relate to one another in Aboriginal Australia is essential if the nature of knowledge transfer is to be understood and an archaeology of meaning to be successfully applied. Paul Connerton (1989) and Frances Yates (1966) provide information on how orally based societies retain the large quantities of information required by individuals and social groups. Yates (1966) discusses how, in medieval times, memories were retained using a spatial arrangement. He notes the use of theater architecture in this manner, where a person mentally moves through a building, retrieving memories organized in terms of the sequence of rooms encountered. Connerton (1989) distinguishes between inscribed memory involving monuments and embodied memory involving bodily rituals and behavior. For Connerton (1989, 88), performers in ceremonies

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Peter Sutton (1995, 11–21) provides information on the very detailed ecological and spatial knowledge of Aboriginal communities in northern Australia. Place names refer to mythological occurrences, human actions, and prominent landscape features. As people move through the countryside, they hunt, camp, and visit places that replicate the actions of the ancestral creative beings at those places. This is a two-way process, because Aboriginal ontological systems allow that the landscape is sentient and is capable of independent, and potentially catastrophic, action. As Elizabeth A. Povinelli (1995, 509) notes, because the Dreaming mandate provides all humans, animals, and objects with the potential to act as an agent, all events may be the result of a Dreaming animal’s, or object’s subjective intentionality. Everyone, even small children, monitors bodies, objects, and the environment for changes or odd behaviors that might portend critical meaning— meaning that may be the difference between a hunting trip resulting in bounty or calamity or, more seriously, in a person’s life or death.

The knowledge passed on to youths during painful initiations or long and frequently repeated ceremonies is not abstract knowledge but knowledge that is required for every action through their lives. The mythological narrative is organized spatially into the very landscape that people travel through. These accounts are reinforced through the ceremonial life. Franca Tamisari (1998, 250) in fact argues that land becomes place by being experienced through the body, that the footprints of the ancestors are the same footprints that Aboriginal hunters leave through their bodily presence in the landscape. For the Yolngu of the Northern Territory, the ideology of knowledge is divided between male elders who have access to knowledge and women and uninitiated men who have access only to public knowledge (Morphy 1991, 88). Despite this, men’s and women’s access to knowledge is largely equivalent. As Howard Morphy describes it, while women are excluded from secret rituals, in fact it is this veil of secrecy that demonstrates the overall lack of control over restricted knowledge. Women know many of the things from which they are publicly excluded. If the act of exclusion

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is to be emphasized, then it is important that those without the control of knowledge know something of what they are being excluded from. Participation in ceremonies, even though this participation is controlled by those with access to knowledge, ensures that knowledge leaks out to those who are not initiated. Morphy (1991, 92) contrasts the Yolngu system with Fredrik Barth’s (1975) study of the Baktaman of Papua New Guinea. In this system, knowledge is transmitted as though it were divided into a series of boxes. Knowledge is divided into levels, but each level is organized in such a way as to distort the knowledge available at the next, higher level. Unlike the Yolngu system, there is no evidence that knowledge is widely shared; as Morphy puts it, there are no leaks. Power comes not from retaining secret knowledge but from its selected release into the public sphere. If knowledge is retained until death, it will be lost, and as Morphy (1991, 98) relates, this is seen as a loss of power by the Yolngu and therefore as undesirable. At the heart of the relationship between the different systems of knowledge transfer is an opposition in the ideology of the systems; Aboriginal hunting and gathering practices are flexible and able to accommodate considerable change, whereas Aboriginal mythicoreligious systems maintain an ideology of timelessness and a lack of change. This opposition has been the topic of considerable anthropological debate. A conservative Aboriginal religious system suppressing contradictory knowledge is a notion that Jeremy Beckett (1994) traces to the work of Elkin (1951) and Strehlow (1947), both of whom were sources for Claude Lévi-Strauss’s (1966) concept of a “cold society.” Primitive cold societies, Lévi-Strauss argued, were able through their institutions to remove “the possible effect of historical factors on their equilibrium and continuity in a quasiautomatic fashion” (233–234, cited in Beckett 1993). However, change in cold societies was not denied by Lévi-Strauss; it was simply made retrospective, incorporated into existing mythical accounts and therefore made to be timeless in appearance (Beckett 1994). If people found themselves in new country or found new friends, this was reflected by newly discovered tracks of the ancestors as they passed through the country (Kolig 1981, 43; Myers 1986, 268). This act of discovery involved a reworking of understanding to accommodate new conditions, a process involving active use of historical knowledge. The landscape acted as a store of meaning but not a complete one; there was always more that could be discovered (Rumsey 1994). Discovery involved moving through the country, enabling not only the identification of places where important mythical events occurred but also those events relevant to the individual’s lifetime. From Fred Myers: “For each individual the landscape becomes a history of significant social events. Geography serves,

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it would seem, as a signifier of experiences; previous events become attached to places and are recited as one moves across the country” (1986, 68). Myers observed that The Dreaming stories may be both extensive, in linking up many geographically distant places, and intensive, organizing the details of a single place (64). This dual nature is further reflected in the manner that stories tie individuals to particular areas and at the same time link individuals and places into a wider narrative of the travels of particular Ancestral beings (59). At another level, The Dreaming incorporates current human actions and social relations involving segmented space while simultaneously transcending human affairs through its projection of timelessness (69–70). Morphy (1995, 188–189) argues that this is a process that subordinates time to space. The denial of human agency within Aboriginal Dreaming mythicoreligious traditions is important because within these cultural traditions, human action in the environment, performing ceremonies and looking after country through habitation and exploitation, are seen as necessary to draw the ancestral powers into contemporary existence. As Morphy (1995, 204) puts it, “It is through individual lives that the ancestral past is both renewed and transformed.” Beckett (1993) gives an example of an Aboriginal pastoral worker, Walter Newton, in western NSW who describes a semimythical, semihistorical movement through country in his description of a postcolonial mythology. In this account, Newton’s life experience at locations in western NSW merges with Christianity and traditional Aboriginal mythology into a seamless narrative, an explicit attempt to develop a “History of Australia.” Such considerations draw attention to the nature of structure and agency within Aboriginal society. Neither is opposed to the other; rather, they are both cultural impulses, which are constituted and reproduced through human action (Sewell 1992). The Dreaming involves all aspects of Aboriginal life, and it animates the countryside through which people hunt and gather. As a result, all members of an Aboriginal society have knowledge of The Dreaming. What is gradually imparted to the male youths in their journey toward full adulthood, however, are codes, schemas, and rules, on the one hand, and a direct connection to the resources (sites, ceremonies, songs, designs and objects) that animate these codes, on the other. Schemas are virtual meaning that they can be extended or transposed to new situations. Morphy (1995, 184–186) discusses a case where an individual from the tropical north of Australia was able to mythologically interpret the landscape of Canberra, in the south, using a combination of clues drawn from both the countryside and the stories themselves. Similarly, Myers (1986, 54) noted an occasion when a dream experience allowed an “underground” connection to be made between a distant dreaming track and Balgo, an inland West Australian settlement,

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where the owners of The Dreaming had recently taken up residence. In another case, a rock discovered in a creek was interpreted as the ossified stomach contents of an ancestral kangaroo (Myers 1986, 64– 65). Both Myers (1986, 52–54) and Morphy (1995, 186) make it clear that these were not regarded by their instigators or audiences as inventions, or human creations, as much as a process of discovery, or revelation, making clear what was already there but hidden. Change by this means was incorporated into Aboriginal Dreaming traditions even though the traditions themselves deny creative significance to human actions. In Myers’s words, “The Dreaming organizes experience so that it appears to be continuous and permanent” (1986, 52). Morphy (1995, 204) makes a similar point: In reality places are continually being reformed into new sets. New divisions of the landscape are made as clans die out and new ones emerge. The presentation of ceremonies of these new orders of relationship between the ancestral past and social groups is public confirmation of their existence: it is, simultaneously, a denial that things were ever otherwise. Thus the articulation of social groups with the landscape is always changing, but the mythic screen that covers landscape makes the relationship appear unchanging.

Likewise, resources are tied to par ticular localities and persons, but they can also be transmitted to others, and as place names, ceremonies, designs, songs, and objects, they are portable— they can be transported to new locations or reapplied to existing ones. The act of learning occurs through one’s presence in the landscape accompanied by those with greater levels of knowledge, the same “classroom” where knowledge about the secular world is imparted in a form akin to an apprenticeship. The ability to move both schemas and resources provides the flexibility needed to deal with the nature of past environment and fits well with an archaeological record that demonstrates discontinuity in the use of space (see below). In this sense, Aboriginal knowledge transmission may be seen as a system that was ultimately transportable, an intellectual equivalent to their material culture that, as we outline below, can also be shown to fit with a high-mobility strategy. There were, however, limitations to this process. If people were away for too long, the mythical associations with the landscape would have to be created anew, as relations between people and the landscape, and social relationships between people, are renewed. Traditions might be maintained when people were forced to live in another locality for a long period of time. However, in such cases, the next generation would be instructed in mythologies that applied to a distant, unseen landscape while living in and hunting over areas with other mythological associations. Time also

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increases the possibility that knowledgeable elders and, in fact, entire landowning clans might become extinct. In the section that follows, we use case studies to consider issues of persistence and change in terms of the archaeological record in western NSW.

Three Case Studies The three case studies presented here relate to western NSW but provide quite different perspectives on the interpretation of the late Holocene archaeological record and the way it might be used to provide an archaeology of meaning. In the first study, Dan Witter (2007) describes how song lines (mythic stories of Dreaming ancestors and their journeys across the country) connect ceremonial locations providing a cognitive map of country that has important adaptive value. Ceremonial sites are interpreted as permanent fi xtures with both the sites themselves and the paths that connect them existing since The Dreaming began. In the second study, burial practices from the Murray Basin are reviewed. Here the chronology and physical nature of individual burials indicate accumulation of internments over time as a series of unconnected events rather than repeated internment at locations with a recognized longterm history. Persistent places exist only in the archaeological sense that they were repeatedly reused, but there is no evidence that they were identified as long-term cemeteries. In the third case, the chronology of occupation is considered based on surface archaeological deposits. Gaps in occupation covering several human generations are common at sites investigated at a number of locations in western NSW. Stone artefacts, which are by far the most abundant material remains, show evidence of technological adaptations for mobility. The implications of these results for an Aboriginal ideological system are considered below.

Song Lines and Ceremonial Sites Witter (2007) describes song lines that provide information on the location of a network of pathways that formed a map of ceremonial sites across large parts of Australia, including western NSW. Knowledge of the location of these ceremonial sites in turn permitted the integration of huntergatherer societies across the continent. These pathways enabled people to travel great distances, crossing tribal boundaries, and were particularly useful during times of stress, most notably drought, because they provided people with access to distant lands. Moieties and totemic classes ensured that social relations could be established even between distant

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peoples, and exchange relationships between people ensured that resources were made available to visitors from distant regions when they appeared. Some ceremonial sites were located within tribal land, with a majority concentrated on tribal boundaries. The implication is that preEuropean Aboriginal Australia was divided into a series of socially proscribed regions that could be mapped onto geographic regions with fi xed borders. Knowledge about song lines was held by old men, and access had to be earned by providing goods and ser vices, particularly at ceremonies that involved large numbers of people coming together at par ticular ceremonial sites. Attendance at these ceremonies was compulsory since repeated per formance of rituals was necessary for the continued generation of plant and animal species and therefore the successful mythical operation of the world. Participation in ceremonies conveyed status on individuals and provided the means by which information was exchanged. This in turn acted as a risk minimization strategy providing the setting for the exchange of other information about the location of resources, something that was particularly useful during times of environmental stress. Witter (2007) uses a range of archaeological evidence to identify the ceremonial sites that relate ideology to landscape. He argues that large site size implies the contiguous presence of multiple groups of people at one location consistent with ethnographic accounts of people coming together for ceremonial occasions. Extensive charcoal-rich deposits, a spatial distribution of features including hearths, workshops, art, and evidence for grinding found together, also imply the coalescence of large numbers of people at one spot. To these criteria he adds differences in the composition of artefact scatters (greater and more extensive than in an “ordinary” large camp), the presence of rare and specialized artefacts, and a location near rock art or dense resources capable of feeding large numbers of people. Evidence from a range of archaeological sites in western NSW—Mutawintji, Amphitheatre Gorge, Sandy Creek, and Burkes Cave—indicate deposition from around 1,500 BP. Witter suggests that by this date The Dreaming ideology was in existence, although he also discusses evidence that indicates its beginnings may stretch back into the late Pleistocene. Continuity of use like that proposed by Witter (2007) can be difficult to demonstrate because archaeological chronologies based on techniques like radiocarbon or optically stimulated luminescence lack the necessary precision. Witter’s interpretation suggests that knowledge of ceremonial sites was fi xed in the sense that song lines provided a permanent record of the location of sites that were repeatedly reused. But there is good

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evidence from burial sites in southwestern NSW that reuse need not imply long-term continuity in knowledge transfer.

Long-Term Use of Burial Sites Judith Littleton and Harry Allen (2007) review both the archaeological and historical record of burials. In the central Murray, where there are dunes and lunettes near permanent lakes and rivers, burials are concentrated in these features. On the Hay Plain, however, burials are more widely dispersed. Here they are associated with ephemeral water courses and are frequently located in oven mounds, mounds of soil and ash created by repeated episodes of cooking and occupation, although they postdate the living use of these mounds. Near the Murray River, burials are often found close to one another, but in the Hay Plain, burials are more often isolated. The apparent crowding on the Murray reflects the limited landforms in which burials can be placed, while in the Hay Plain the choice is wider. Cremation and bundle burials, interpreted as a response to the need to delay burial, occur more frequently on the Hay Plain. Orientation of individual burials tends to be toward the southwest in both locations; however, there is variability in orientation and body position within the same locale. Groups of burials will show the same general position and orientation, but adjacent groups will show slight differences even when distances between groups are short (e.g., across a creek line). Interpretation of groups of burials found in the Murray River corridor is similar in some respects to Witter’s (2007) interpretation of ceremonial sites. Colin Pardoe (1988) interprets groups of burials found in high densities within bounded locations as cemeteries and argues that these acted to affirm group membership and the ancestral rights to a par ticular location. He contrasts burials in cemeteries with a smaller number of isolated single internments. Interpreting the Hay Plain burials, however, Littleton and Allen (2007) question whether a simple division between cemeteries and isolated burials is adequate. For adult burials, there is evidence for the preference of par ticular land forms, but suitable locations are not always reused. Dating evidence is limited but, where present, indicates substantial gaps between burial episodes. Littleton and Allen raise the issue that accumulations of burials in particular locations (e.g., Lake Victoria) may occur in suitable sediments, with such locations acquiring significance as a place for burials only after a number of burials have accumulated. However, whether such places were designated as cemeteries from their inception is far from clear. Certain places may have acquired their significance as a consequence of use through time, only later to lose this significance when people moved on.

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A system that appears to be fi xed may never have been originally designed as such. Burial orientation is significant here. Clusters of burials show similar orientations, but as Littleton and Allen (2007) stress, this orientation would not be apparent to groups who later returned to a particular location to bury a new set of individuals. Differences in orientation and position between clusters of individuals interred at the same general location suggest that “what is occurring is almost the opposite of strict territoriality with rigid boundaries” (295). Instead, a more flexible and less bounded system is suggested based on claims by small groups or individuals via a variety of criteria for access to land that shifted through time. Littleton and Allen cite Morphy (1998, 138) in support of this interpretation: “The system linking people, ancestral beings, and places together has resulted in a very stable relationship between ancestral law and place and a very fluid relationship between actual groups of people and place.” This interpretation contrasts sharply with the fi xed system of ceremonial sites and song lines proposed by Witter (2007).

Occupation Discontinuity As described above, dating precision makes determining continuity of occupation difficult. One approach is to list age estimates in order together with their associated error and look for overlap between adjacent ages. The presence of overlap is read as evidence of occupation continuity (e.g., David 2002, 40). The difficulty is that ages using radiocarbon refer to events. The error term reflects the lack of precision in the age of when this event occurred; it does not reflect continuity of occupation across the period of time expressed by the error term. Even what may appear to be a large sample of ages over a period of a few centuries may in fact reflect irregular use of a location only every few generations. An alternative to the use of overlapping ages is to use techniques that treat them as probability distributions. One approach involves using Bayesian analysis of radiocarbon ages to provide measures of not only occupation duration but also the presence and duration of gaps within the record (Holdaway et al. 2002, 2005). A second approach involves using summed age probabilities to look for correlations with environmental proxies. Results of these types of analysis show two things. First, there is a correlation between the probability distribution of radiocarbon determinations and paleoenvironmental indicators that suggests periods with few if any radiocarbon determinations occur during times of reduced precipitation. Occupation, it seems, varied with major shifts in world climate (Holdaway et al. 2002, 2010). Second, analyses of groups of age determinations from single locations show substantial gaps in the distribution of ages with periods measured in centuries (Holdaway et al. 2002, 2005).

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Both of these results indicate that the occupation of any one location in western NSW was intermittent. Locations were certainly returned to, but reoccupation occurred after substantial periods of abandonment. The surface archaeological record of western NSW is abundant with stone artefacts scattered along the banks of creek lines. At first glance, abundance implies dense occupation, but despite persistent attempts (e.g., Smith et al. 2008), there is no simple formula to describe the relationship between the number of stone artefacts, hearths, or radiocarbon determinations and past populations (Davidson 1990; Hiscock 1986; Holdaway et al. 2008a). Abundance is partly a result of surface visibility (e.g., Fanning and Holdaway 2004) and partly a consequence of a strategy that valued the rapid production of a large number of flakes suitable for immediate and future use (Douglass et al. 2008). Analysis of lithic scatters indicates little evidence for redundancy in place use in the sense that the same groups of activities were repeatedly undertaken at the same spatial locations (Holdaway et al. 2008b; Shiner 2008). Rather, assemblages separated by only a few hundred meters represent different sets of behaviors that accumulated over different periods of occupation (Holdaway et al. 2004). The net result is a settlement system that defies simple geographic description. Holdaway et al. (2004), for instance, contrasts an “ideal” settlement pattern, with stone derived from a hilltop quarry and occupation permanence related to catchment grade (reflecting resource availability), with the reality where assemblage composition is uniformly variable with few if any geographic constraints. The chronology of occupation in western NSW shows that while places were reoccupied, this occurred in a discontinuous way. Heat retainer hearths are abundant adjacent to creek lines, often exposed as the deflated piles of heat fractured rock (Fanning et al. 2009). Frequently, groups of hearths occur together at the same location but without stratigraphic evidence that they were reused. There is also little or no archaeologically detectable evidence that hearths were rebuilt in the same location. If reuse did occur, it probably happened over a time period undetectable with radiocarbon dating. In this sense, the hearth chronologies suggest a similar pattern to the burials discussed above. Hearth ages accumulate in locations as a consequence of repeated occupation, but there is no direct evidence that later occupants were aware of previous activities. A pattern of discontinuous occupation fits well with characterizations of the paleoenvironment. Fluctuations in the probability distribution of radiocarbon ages correlate with sea surface temperature variations from the Mindanao core, located near the Philippines, and the Indonesian Throughflow, a conduit for water between the Pacific and Indian Oceans (Holdaway et al. 2010). Sea-surface temperature variations may be re-

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lated to tropical monsoon activity, the southward passage of which brings rain to northwestern NSW. Variation in this system will occur with the El Niño– Southern Oscillation cycle, although short-term El Niño and La Niña events are below the resolution of the radiocarbon dating system. Nevertheless, it is likely that peaks in the radiocarbon plot for western NSW correlate with periods of time when there was an increased likelihood for La Niña-like climates to occur (Holdaway et al. 2010). Although plotting radiocarbon determinations allows current-day scientists to retrodict palaeoclimatic correlations, prediction of future climatic oscillations is today, and would have been in the past, a somewhat hit-or-miss affair. Australia in general is, to quote Dorothea Mackellar’s famous poem, a land of “drought and flooding rains” (Mackellar 1908). Environmental productivity was, as a consequence, patchy and difficult to quantify ahead of time (Kefous 1988). Added to this, for humans Australia lacked a readily accessible and highly nutritious staple (Gould 1991). Small seed grasses, for instance, while at times abundant, are energy intensive to gather and process, meaning that the net energy gain is not high (O’Connell and Hawkes 1984). In the face of uncertainty, high mobility was an obvious strategy, and there is substantial evidence, both ethnographic and archaeological, that a high level of mobility was practiced. But despite extensive experience with the disastrous periods of drought and shorter-term but no less violent floods, there are good historical accounts to indicate that Indigenous populations did, at times, succumb (Davidson 1990; Kefous 1988). Abandonment, therefore, while probably more often than not representing movement away from an area, might also include either local population extinction or at least the loss of those that were most vulnerable, the young and the old (Butlin 1983).

Discussion Despite Witter’s (2007) interpretation that ceremonial sites and the pathways that connect them have permanence in the landscape, the archaeological evidence provided by burials and hearths suggests otherwise. If chronological gaps in the record are the norm, then an Aboriginal knowledge transfer system had to deal with extended time periods when presence in country was not possible. A permanent link between mythicoreligious stories and a geographic location as Witter’s scheme entails would require prodigious acts of memory spanning these periods. Stories were certainly passed down from generation to generation as they are today, but the act of transmission involved changes in details (e.g., Connerton 1989; Yates 1966). In effect, with each transmission, “errors” occurred in the sense that information was added or left out. For a geographically

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based system, this is highly problematic since any change in the song line provides the possibility that the ceremonial site location would at some point be lost. Like memory, loss of information has also attracted the attention of anthropologists, who have remarked on apparent lapses displayed by Aboriginal people when asked to recall historically important events. In a much-cited example, Lauriston Sharp (1952) recounts how the Yir Yiront had apparently forgotten about the death of thirty people seventy years earlier as a result of violent conflict with white settlers. A similar instance was related by W.E.H. Stanner (1966, 139–140). As Beckett (1994) explains, both these examples might be symptomatic of a memory system rooted in an endless and unchanging past where even traumatic events were unable to impinge on the ahistoric past. Erich Kolig (2000, 11), for instance, discusses how myth reduces the “flux of time and events, of people and their deeds, to epiphenomality.” However, alternative interpretations are also possible. Part of the flexibility of Aboriginal traditions outlined in discussions above, even those most closely connecting to Ancestral Dreaming stories, is their ability to incorporate new elements and to apply these stories outside their original settings. As Beckett (1993, 1994) illustrates, there is good evidence for the incorporation of mythical-like characters into postcolonial “historical” accounts by modern-day Aboriginal people as part of the effort to reconcile the effects of white settlement. Despite the level of change that the colonial experience introduced, the nature of myth making in historic times retains links to The Dreaming and therefore the pre-European past. It is reasonable to assume that the act of discovery as a means of incorporating historical experience into a timeless mythical ideology as discussed above was a key part of pre-European Aboriginal ideology. Following Beckett (1994), it is simply a question not of forgetting all historical details but rather of how the mythicoreligious system responded when faced with dramatic change, incorporating and passing on some details and not others. In the postcolonial period, presence in the land was restricted through the actions (deliberate or otherwise) of the European majority. In the precolonial period, presence in the land was restricted by environmental fluctuations, among other things. Rather than simply remembering a huge amount of precise geographic detail and, more important, transmitting this detail with no errors across the generations even when verification through visiting locations was not possible, the mythicoreligious system, The Dreaming, enabled transmission of sufficient knowledge to deal with the need to abandon some areas and reoccupy others. Applying this construction of The Dreaming to archaeology requires a rethinking of the nature of the links between ideology and the archae-

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ological record. Certainly The Dreaming manifests in associations with the landscape, but as Myers (2002) points out, this is a social manifestation first and an association with the secular world second. The Dreaming is both a schema and a set of resources that are transportable. It is conceptually placed in the land in a timeless fashion but not literally so. Therefore, we should not expect, as Witter (2007) suggests, a physical permanency for places associated with The Dreaming. Rather than permanent features in the landscape, it is the pattern of discontinuous occupation seen in the chronology of hearths or the patterns of reuse of locations with burials that demonstrates the operation of The Dreaming. Such discontinuities in occupation and use illustrate two things. First, peoples’ association with place shifted in the past, and second, chronological gaps in the record indicate absences over periods much longer than a human generation. The knowledge transmission system was capable of dealing with this level of discontinuous use because it included mechanisms to allow for the transfer of both schema and resources. This conception of the archaeological manifestation of The Dreaming leads to a modification of that provided by Bruno David (2002, 2006). Whereas in the analysis of western NSW, gaps in the record are the evidence for the operation of The Dreaming, David sees gaps in the chronology as a change in the status of locations and therefore the beginning of mythicoreligious associations that are attested ethnographically. It is argued, for instance, that at Ngarrabullgan in Queensland, the cessation of regular occupation marked the beginning of a mythical association for the mountain by the Djungan people. In Central Australia, excavations at Therreyeererte show a major increase in use years ago as measured by the rate of stone artefact and bone deposition and the number of grinding stone fragments (David 2002, 59). The increases in artefact deposition are interpreted as evidence for the beginning of ceremonies involving the congregation of people connected with the Native Cat totemic ceremonies. From a western NSW perspective, discontinuities in place use as well as the flexibility to shift ceremonial associations with place are the very attributes that characterize the operation of The Dreaming and so are not good candidates as markers for its initiation.

Conclusion A simple typology for the transmission of information and skills—informal, apprentice, and schoollike systems— does not work for Aboriginal knowledge transfer. The conceptual split between the mythical and the secular, the differentiation of who gains access to knowledge, what form this

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knowledge takes, and when it should be passed on, provides only a partial understanding of what is going on in Aboriginal society. While Aboriginal people themselves present an ideology of an unchanging world, the strength of their learning system lies in their ability to learn from an environment that is highly dynamic and subject to extreme fluctuations. The locus for the transfer of all forms of knowledge is the same; all participants must be present in the land, where practical experience and abstract mythological knowledge constantly inform each other. Through this process, The Dreaming is continuously created as an eternal fact. Drawing inferences about Aboriginal knowledge transfer from the archaeological record must take the nature of The Dreaming into account. The temptation is to look for a simple material manifestation of this knowledge, a par ticular feature or location, and give the association with this place an antiquity as in the examples used by David discussed above. But this temptation must be resisted since it places landscape features ahead of social relations and the practicalities of the foraging life. Popular culture has it that Aboriginal people were close to nature, a sentiment that leads to a concept of Aboriginal knowledge that like Witter’s analysis of ceremonial sites places it within the land. In fact, the opposite is true. The Dreaming as a knowledge system is a structured system for dealing with the effects of historic change that might involve its participants moving large distances and spending long periods away before being able to return. It is not something within the land but something that adheres to human agents and, consequently, grows out of human action on the land. The structured learning system associated with this knowledge system was designed to ensure that key sets of knowledge were transferred and remembered using a system that was flexible enough to deal with change as well as mobile enough to incorporate new regions. The nature of Aboriginal systems of learning, based on the interaction of practical experience with abstract coda, enabled the retention of a considerable body of knowledge concerned with complex geographical, ecological, mythological, and sociological relationships. How and when this system developed is a key question for archaeologists but one that must be approached with techniques that guard against a simple equation with the antiquity of place use. Acknowledgments

Discussions with Mark Busse, Matt Douglass, Christine Dureau, Patricia Fanning, Rebecca Phillipps, and Veronica Strang helped refine the arguments presented here. This chapter benefited from discussions over a number of years with Murray Butcher and Warlpa Thompson. Thanks to Willeke Wendrich for inviting us to contribute to this volume.

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CHA P TER SI X

Apprentice to the Environment Hunter-Gatherers and Landscape Learning Marcy Rockman

How do you learn an environment? What skills does it take? What information do you need? In what situations is it best to learn for yourself, and when is it better to be instructed by others? Our common conception of learning a skill or craft is that it is based on observation, imitation, and, often, repetition of actions and methods demonstrated by masters, or at least more skilled individuals. The many chapters collected in this volume address the archaeological record of apprenticeship: what we know about how learning took place in the past, how we recognize the work of an apprentice or learner, and what these indications together tell us about the social aspects of the transfer, development, and change of knowledge. Ancient apprenticeship is an innovative approach to learning about the past because it forces us to consider what we know about learning and transmission of information in the past. This chapter takes the environment as the subject of apprenticeship, particularly from the perspective of hunter-gatherers. It has the primary objective of building a better understanding of how hunter-gatherers in the past identified, used, remembered, and communicated information about natural resources, with a side view toward developing some new ideas about how we might better understand our interactions with our environment in the present.

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Use of the natural environment presents an interesting case for apprenticeship because it does not require a specific skill but rather encompasses a wide range of activities. It is also a category of learning necessary for everyone in some form and so cannot be limited to a specific set of teacher and pupil. Because all members of a group use environmental information and therefore can be expected to share and use common elements of environmental information, environmental learning occurs at both the individual and the group level. In fact, environmental learning at the level of the group is the form in which it is most likely to be identifiable in the archaeological record. The archaeological model of the landscape learning process has been developed previously (Rockman 2001, 2003a, 2003b; Rockman and Steele 2003) to address the process of environmental familiarization that accompanies colonization and to allow comparison of the process in different places and different time periods. The model proposes three types of environmental knowledge that are collected in a generally sequential manner and developed into a groupwide set of thoughts and practices that reflects a new local environment. In this chapter, the landscape learning model will be used as a broad general framework for considering how hunter-gatherers, including young hunter-gatherers, learn to use their respective environments and integrate different sources of environmental information and as a means of considering how this learning process may be visible archaeologically.

Landscape Learning Model Landscape learning is formally defi ned as the means by which human groups gather, share, and remember information about the nature and distribution of natural resources (Rockman 2003a, 2003b). The landscape learning process consists of a sequence of stages of environmental knowledge development from the first contact of a group with a particular environment, such as through colonization or migration, to situations of ongoing, effective use of the collected and shared environmental information. Few if any human groups arrive in an area without experience in and knowledge of one or more previous environments. Therefore, landscape learning is as much about identifying contrasts between earlier and current environments as it is about gathering entirely new information. Given this component of comparison between environments, the concept of landscape learning is relevant to situations of environmental change and questions of how much environmental variation a given population or social system can accommodate before adjustments (informational, structural, economic, social) may be necessary (Rockman 2009).

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From a modeling perspective, landscape learning is predicted to occur in situations of initial colonization, where a given human group is the first to encounter a given environment and must conduct all information collection, and situations with one or more previously established groups that may be able to provide at least some environmental information. Learning in situations with previously established populations is likely to be more complex than in initial contact situations. Because humans have encountered new environments from the time of earliest hominid movements within and out of Africa to the recent historical and modern time periods, there is potential for many geographic areas to have been “learned” multiple times by different groups with different environmental needs and outlooks. The archaeological record, therefore, may contain traces of multiple, possibly overlapping, learning sequences. Landscape information is gathered by individuals, but the heart of the process is the transfer of knowledge from individuals to the group such that individual experiences contribute to a sense of “this is how we live here” held in common by members of the group that reflects, to at least some extent, the potentials and limitations of the given environment in which the group makes its living. While an individual may learn quickly, the process is concerned with the development of the group level of information, which may not be instantaneous. Because of this probable time lag in the process, it may be possible to identify landscape learning archaeologically in some cases. If this is true, it may be possible to study not only the process of environmental familiarization at different points in time and different environments but also changes in the landscape learning process itself. This aspect of landscape learning process makes it relevant to many other areas of study, including the archaeology of nonhunter-gatherer (generally termed complex) societies and economies (see, e.g., Blanton 2003; Fiedel and Anthony 2003; Hardesty 2003), and links it to other models of human evolution and adaptation (Rockman 2009). Landscape learning is here taken to be a type of apprenticeship in that individuals learn how to function in an environment through observation, imitation, and repeated use of information derived both directly and indirectly from others in their social group. Landscape learning is a unique type of apprenticeship compared to the traditional definition of master-to-pupil transmission because of the many types of knowledge involved, its ties to a large social network of environmental information, and the potentially very long time frames that can be required to collect relevant environmental information.

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Types of Environmental Knowledge Landscape learning occurs through the acquisition, integration, and communication of three types of environmental knowledge (Rockman 2003a, 2003b): • Locational knowledge • Limitational knowledge • Social knowledge Locational knowledge consists of information relating to the spatial and physical characteristics of par ticular resources, such as the geographic position of a par ticular lithic outcrop, spring, or animal migration route or feeding or watering spot. Locational knowledge is likely the easiest form of environmental information to collect and can probably be gathered in the space of days, weeks, or months once it is looked for, assuming the given resource exists in the environment in question. Limitational knowledge includes information about the usefulness and reliability of various resources and the ranges of variation within the overall environment. For example, how many types of animals live in the area, and how stable are their populations and behavior and movement patterns? Are the lithic raw materials of good quality? How extreme are the temperatures in winter and summer? Limitational knowledge cannot be gathered instantly but requires a period of learning through experience, and the time can differ dramatically for various aspects of the environment. For instance, it may take only a few winters and summers to get a sense of seasonal variation but longer to see and accommodate extremes or variable cycles such as drought or floods. Social knowledge comes from the attribution of names, meanings, and patterns to natural features and the storage of locational and limitational knowledge in forms that are remembered and transmitted by the group to succeeding generations (see also chapter 5 this volume). The time needed for the development of social knowledge is unknown but depends on the time frames of the other two types of knowledge. Because locational and limitational knowledge for different resources are developed in different time frames, it is anticipated that social knowledge for a given area will be created piecemeal, with some aspects of the local environment understood and communicated well before other aspects. Examples of well-developed social knowledge is the Western Apache use of place names in conversation to recall fablelike stories associated with those places as recorded by Keith Basso (1996), sea-land/whale-wolf migration stories of the Arctic Tareumiut as presented by Minc (1986) and Minc and

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Smith (1989), and Paiute names for Mojave water sources studied by Fowler (2004).

Hunter-Gatherers and Landscape Learning Studying how hunter-gatherers learn and adapt to environments is a complex task. Ethnographer and archaeologist Robert Kelly (1999, 2003; Kelly and Todd 1988) has studied aspects of hunter-gatherer landscape learning from several perspectives, and I am indebted to him for several of the quotes and data below. He recently noted that he has taken some flak for this, with the point made to him that “all hunter-gatherers know their landscape well.” His response is that this is “true enough for ethnographically known hunter-gatherers, people who have lived someplace for a long time. [He] would be surprised if they did not know their landscape very well” (Kelly 2003, 45). We must consider, however, that this may not be true in all the contexts addressed by archaeology. The combination of environmental change and human response time in terms of human life span have been proposed as key factors in the development of the human ability to learn. Several scholars have examined the role of long childhood or juvenile period as integrally linked with the evolution of skill-based adaptations, such as hunting as it is practiced by humans (see, e.g., Blurton-Jones 2005; Bock 2005). In the longest evolutionary view, Richard Potts’s (1998) model of variability selection, humans are in fact adapted to a variable environment. Our capacity for— in fact, dependence on— culture, learning, and essentially plastic behavior developed in response to the rate of environmental change throughout the Pleistocene. The environment changed so fast that it was not possible to physically adapt to new conditions, so we evolved the ability to adapt behaviorally (see Boyd and Richerson 1985; Richerson and Boyd 2005). Learning—both of the environment directly and the capacity to transmit information within a group and between generations—is a key component of this. In this sense, learning is what makes us human. Apprenticeship and the transmission of information from one generation to the next are not recent developments but have been an integral part of hominid as well as human prehistory and history. Ethnographic information about mobility and ranges sets the scope for landscape learning by hunter-gatherers. In general, hunter-gatherers can know a great deal about and function quite well over areas that are quite large. Lewis R. Binford’s work among the Nunamiut in Alaska documented territories as large as 22,000 km2 effectively in use at a given time, and 300,000 km2 used over the course of a hunter’s lifetime (Binford 1983a,

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115, fig. 52). Effective territory size varies widely by environment, tending toward smaller areas in temperate and tropical environments. For example, data reported by Kelly indicate that the G/wi of the Kalahari have annual ranges of approximately 780 km2 (Kelly 1995, table 4-1); although most members have knowledge of approximately 20,000 km2, a few may have knowledge of up to 196,000 km2 (Kelly 2003, 45). Regardless of size, hunter-gatherers have noted that such territories are not known instantaneously. Rather, they must be learned. A Kutchin man from the boreal forests of western Canada noted to an ethnographer that “a man learns to find his way around in an area after a couple of years, but it takes much longer to become highly efficient as a huntertrapper. Knowledge of the landscape is almost as important to successful exploitation of the boreal forest environment as knowledge of hunting and trapping techniques” (Nelson 1986, 184 cited in Kelly 2003, 47). Even gathering of specific information by experienced hunters from direct observations of animals and their behavior can take time. One !Kung hunter reported how he had discovered that a mother kudu never goes to the location of her infant. He followed the tracks of a mother again and again, going back and forth to the same place. Finally, he saw the same tracks of the mother with tracks of an infant. He determined how the tracks had come about, followed the pair, and then killed the infant. The full period of research took about two months (Blurton-Jones and Konner 1976, 338). Hunter-gatherer landscape knowledge also should not be considered to be limited to a single, even if large, territory. As noted by Binford (1983b, 33), “The Eskimo expected to be living in one place for a substantial period of time—at least long enough for the young men to learn a regionally specific body of folklore— but acknowledge that they would most likely be living elsewhere during much of their life.” Movement from one place to another may take place for many reasons, including motives that appear to be primarily social. For instance, Binford observed that it was not uncommon for a marriage to precipitate a move from one residential core area to another since it was considered “impolite” for the resident males to “know too much about the area when the new husband moved in, much better for all the men to learn the details of the area together, then they always respect each other” (39). Prime hunting age is considered to be 32– 40 among the Nunamiut (33). Therefore, it can be common for at least some men not to have learned as children the details of the territory in which they hunt as adults. Even when hunter-gatherers stay in the same area for an extended period of time, constant awareness and acceptance of new information are critical. Hugh Brody noted that although the hunters of the northern

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Arctic will follow annual rounds along familiar routes and reoccupy sites known and used for generations, hunting itself “must defy habit as well as follow it: no two seasons are identical, animal migrations are never wholly predictable” (1987, 89). Further, hunters make thousands of critical decisions each year. The processing of this information leads into the domain of spirituality and metaphor, where accumulated knowledge, intuition and the subtlest of connections with the natural world can generate choices on a basis that is quicker and surer than a narrow rationality. In this way, the decisions of hunters are close to the certainties of artists. By denying reduction to a limited set of variables, the fullness of both culture and consciousness come to bear on each day’s activities. (93)

Therefore, as indicated in the Kutchin comment quoted above, it follows that education of young hunter-gatherers includes instruction about both specific areas and general resource-related techniques. Brody (1981), in his study of indigenous land use in northeastern British Columbia, noted that the ability to continually incorporate new information while hunting is a highly valued skill. The same emphasis has been observed among the !Kung hunters who described to ethnographers four mental qualities they consider to be essential for hunting: knowledge (chi!á), sense (kxai ≠ n), cleverness (∕ xudi), and alertness (chiho) (Blurton-Jones and Konner 1976, 342). Only one of these, knowledge, can be gathered from others or through direct experience from the environment. The rest are means and characteristics of approaching environmental information. While development of these qualities can be encouraged, they cannot be taught by rote.

Gathering Environmental Information It follows, then, that quality and character of environmental data are key components of the means and forms by which environmental information is gathered, shared, and applied by modern-day hunter-gatherers. A series of seminars conducted with adult male !Kung by Nicholas BlurtonJones and Melvin J. Konner (1976) indicated that !Kung hunters are very careful in distinguishing data from interpretations and, particularly, directly observed data from information heard from others. Directly observed data (locational knowledge) were further divided into information gathered from observation of animals and information gleaned from tracks. Inquiries about specific items tended to lead to extended careful descriptions of animal observations or tracking evidence. Blurton-Jones

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and Konner concluded that !Kung hunters do not have a great interest in or need for general explanations of animal behavior; rather, while they do generate hypotheses, their concern is explaining individual par ticular circumstances. They also noted that the !Kung appeared to be most comfortable discussing mammals and did not have the same comfort level in discussing other taxa such as birds. The context of pieces of information may be as important as the data proper. Blurton-Jones and Konner (1976) observed that the !Kung hunters they interviewed admitted ignorance readily, with no indication of prevarication. Hunters sometimes disbelieved each other and seemed to expect skepticism, but new data were reported without pressure or hesitation. Hunters argued about generalizations based on limited data, and attempted to reach a conclusion. Guessing did not appear to be acceptable. The importance of having confidence in what one knows can be seen as an integral part of hunter-gatherer mobility. As described by Brody (1987, 101), an Inuit family can survive more or less indefinitely with a knife or ax for making snares, harpoon, bow and arrow and rifle, snow knife, needles and thread, three or four caribou hides for bedding, and a cooking pot. With these also travels a confidence that these supplies, minimal by modern Western standards, are— along with Inuit know-how—sufficient to procure or make other necessary items as needed with nearby materials. Men’s hunting knives among the Alyawara in Australia serve such a purpose, providing not only a tool in its assembled form but also a portable toolkit that can be disassembled and used piecemeal should need arise while in the bush (Binford 1986). In a similar vein, women’s work recorded among the !Kung requires not only a knowledge of where different food sources are located (locational knowledge), in what seasons they are edible (limitational knowledge), and how to keep oriented in the bush and identify dangers such as snakes, but also the stamina to walk 16 km or more per day carry ing the day’s harvest and sometimes an infant as well (Draper 1976, 216–217). It is the task of hunter-gatherer training to instill the confidence to move with few things and the ability to continually remake the material world (Brody 1987, 101).

Hunter-Gatherer Approaches to Learning Hunter-gatherer training appears to be primarily informal in nature and to draw on a variety of sources. Experience, or learning for oneself, is common. One ethnographer noted an argument between young men who had not done much hunting and some older men who were much more active and experienced in hunting. The young men accused the older men of not teaching them to hunt. The older men replied that hunting

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“was not something that one taught anybody, it was something that one just did” (Blurton-Jones and Konner 1976, 339). Indeed, the interviewers noted that “You teach yourself” is a very common phrase among the !Kung (Blurton-Jones and Konner 1976, 339). Neither the Blurton-Jones and Konner (1976, 342) research among the !Kung nor Binford’s (1984, 1986) research among the Alyawara identified a structured system of information transmission. In the case of Blurton-Jones and Konner, there seemed to be relatively little transmission of information from man to man or even old to young. Instead, there is a distinct tendency and preference for information to be given informally. Among the Alyawara, despite their efforts to respond to the archaeologists’ request to be taught knife manufacture, tasks to be observed were selected and rearranged from their normal patterns because the archaeologists did not have underlying knowledge that should have been gathered when they were children; in other words, there was difficulty in “starting from the beginning.” Work by Lee (1969) and Gould (1969) indicated that both the “!Kung and Yiwara Australian aborigines can be irritated by and can disapprove of people who tell other people what to do or in any way set themselves above anyone else” (as cited in BlurtonJones and Konner 1976, 345).

Environmental Learning by Children Available data collected specifically for the purpose of assessing learning among hunter-gatherer children are scarce (Bird-David 2005). Compilation of data from many groups worldwide does indicate some common themes, however, including high amounts of leisure among children and a corresponding combination of work with play, scaling of work and environmental interaction to children’s physical sizes and abilities, and recognition that skills continue to develop into adulthood. These data not only generally confirm the informal nature of hunter-gatherer environmental learning but also indicate substantial remaining data gaps about how and how quickly learning takes place once children and adolescents begin to assume adult roles. One of the best-studied cases of variability in children’s interactions with the environment is that of the !Kung and Hadza (Blurton-Jones et al. 1994a, 1994b). !Kung children seldom forage. Hadza children between the ages of five and fifteen forage successfully, bringing back to camp enough returns to provide up to half of a given child’s caloric requirements with approximately two hours of work. The primary source of difference between the two appears to be local topographic relief and related distribution of natural resources. The !Kung environment in northwestern

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Botswana and northeastern Namibia is strikingly flat, and resources to be gathered are often a substantial distance from permanent water sources. Therefore, !Kung children appear at considerable risk of getting lost if they wander into the bush, and distances are too far for children to travel without becoming tired and thirsty and slowing down foraging adults. A primary resource for the !Kung is mongongo nuts, which require substantial amounts of processing. Children can do this work while in camp, and analysis suggests that this arrangement has a better cost–benefit ratio than having children forage until they are adolescents. In contrast, the Hadza environment in northern Tanzania is much more legible (after Golledge 2003), with greater topographic variation that provides opportunities to identify and navigate by landmarks, and resource distribution that includes resources close to camp locations, such as berries, that require less processing. Studies among the Martu people of Australia by Douglas Bird and Rebecca Bliege Bird (2005) support the implications from the !Kung that environmental learning is less constrained by children’s cognitive abilities than by their smaller size and corresponding physical strength and endurance. A preferred prey of the Martu is the goanna lizard, several varieties of which inhabit sandhills and rocky outcrop areas. Adults tend to hunt in the sandhills, while children show a strong preference for tracking lizards in the rocky areas. Bird and Bliege Bird noted that after about age five, age alone has little effect on children’s hunting success. Rather, hunting success is better predicted by standing height and walking speed. Further, the process that children use to hunt suggests that, when their size allows, they can learn hunting procedures very quickly. Tracking prey in both sandhills and rocky patches requires hunters of any age to synthesize and apply complex information about goanna behaviors and related traces. Hunters in both environments use the same tools and exert approximately equal amounts of energy to pursue and process the lizards once they are located. The primary difference between the habitats is that prey is smaller but more frequently encountered in the rocky habitats than in the sandhill areas, so tracking lizards in the rocky areas requires less walking. A similar situation and result for tuber foraging has been observed by  Bram Tucker and Alyson Young (2005, 169) among the Mikea of Madagascar. Children preferentially dig young ovy plants, the tubers of which are small but shallow, while adults go after older ovy plants, which are larger but more deeply buried. Children also exploit patches more thoroughly than do adults, again reducing distance traveled for tubers gained, which appears to be a rational choice for their size and physical abilities.

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Sources of learning include adults and other children of many ages. Among the !Kung, children’s lives are characterized by high levels of adult supervision and nearly negligible levels of task assignments and direct instruction. Because of the small size of the !Kung groups studied, averaging a band size of 34, children have few if any agemates and consequently associate closely with a variety of adults, apart from their parents. By extension, children can observe adults performing common activities on a daily basis with no special arrangements (Draper 1976, 215). In the observations documented by Patricia Draper (1976, 215), the low levels of children’s assignment to and participation in tasks such as gathering suggest that specific child-to-child task instruction or transmission via observation is also low, although transmission of general skills from such as navigation in near-camp settings from older to younger children (Draper 1976, 206) is likely very common. Martu children, including both boys and girls, tend to hunt together in the same group (Bird and Bliege Bird 2005). Likewise, Mikea children do not appear to be actively trained by older people and get the same return rates when foraging with potential trainers (adolescents and adults) as when foraging with other children (Tucker and Young 2005, 169). In a group studied by Draper (1976), !Kung girls did not begin regular food gathering and collecting of wood and water until they were about 14 years old. When they began collecting, they appeared to learn informally in small groups. As noted by Blurton-Jones et al. (1994a), when women gather mongongo nuts, they divide into groups of two or three. Once the groups are out of each other’s line of sight, the different groups sing a characteristic song that keeps all the groups oriented to the locations of the others. Although this practice illustrates accommodation of the flat terrain, it also demonstrates the size and group dynamics in which young women are likely to learn to forage at an adult level. Among many groups, boys begin to learn the landscape by accompanying their fathers on hunting trips. In the Arctic, boys begin to accompany their fathers at about age 12 (Kelly 2003; Turney-High 1941, 117), and by the age of 14, young people “work alongside their parents and are relied upon to sew, take care of vital equipment, fish, trap, and hunt” (Brody 1987, 141). The age of 12 also marks a general start to hunting among the !Kung and Australian aborigines (Kelly 2003). !Kung boys are 16 or more years of age when they start to hunt at or near an adult level (Draper 1976, 211–212). Among the Kutenai of the northwestern United States, boys are known to have accompanied their fathers as early as age six (Kelly 2003; Turney-High 1941, 117). The Klamath of the Pacific Northwest fall between this range, as boys can receive their first bow by the age of 6 but do not accompany their fathers until “several years later” (Kelly 2003, 47).

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Hunter-gatherer training can include more formal educational trips, such as recorded by Binford among the Nunamiut: While a local group may be using a given “annual range,” a traveling party made up of older relatives and young men may commonly set out to visit places of particular importance over the extended range. The composition of such a “walkabout” group among the Nunamiut is not uncommonly a young man (12–16 years of age) and a male cousin guided by his mother’s brother. The duration of such a trip is frequently from about April until the following October. (Binford 1983b, 40)

Following the return of such a walkabout party to the residential camp, several days may be spent in conversation and detailed descriptions of the area covered, terrain, evidence of game densities, and overall discussion of specific places visited. Older men who had once lived in the area visited will ask seemingly endless questions of the young boys regarding their experiences. All of this information may be applied in the following several years to a decision about moving the annual range and exploiting another segment of the extended territory. (41)

By this means, older group members learn from younger members, and both learning and skill development are recognized as lifelong processes. Data from three neotropical foraging societies, Machiguenga, Piro, and Ache, show that young people do not achieve positive net production of food until around the age of 20 (Kaplan 1997, cited in Tucker and Young 2005, 148). Similarly, Ache women of Paraguay reach peak palm extraction rates during their early twenties (Tucker and Young 2005). In Venezuela, Hiwi men master honey foraging at age 25, and Hiwi women are most proficient at root digging at around ages 35 to 45 (Kaplan et al. 2000; Tucker and Young 2005). Hambukushu of the Kalahari reach the peak of mongongo nut cracking at age 35. A study of Ache men that combined longitudinal hunting data with an archery contest showed that men almost always increase foraging efficiency with age and that archery skill peaks around age 40 (Tucker and Young 2005, 148; Walker et al. 2002). As important as environmental learning is for hunter-gathers, it is not approached with the dread of school on a Monday morning. Tucker and Young (2005, 169) note that Mikea children are not pressured to bring home a full load of tubers when they forage, because adults will provide for them, nor are children pressed for time when foraging, because there is little else they are expected to do. So, although Mikea children learn while foraging, they do so at their own leisurely pace, and their purpose

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in foraging may be primarily social and recreational. In this, they have playmates among the Hadza. Blurton-Jones et al. (1994a, 195) note that, despite the distinct difference in workload between !Kung and Hadza children, it is important not to suppose that Hadza children’s foraging is accompanied by a lack of play or by any par ticular solemnity. Rather, “children’s foraging is conducted with more enthusiasm, pride, and humor than adult foraging.”

Environmental Apprenticeship in the Archaeological Record The review above sketches a general picture of the informality, scope, and duration of the hunter-gatherer environmental learning process. There is no one skill that defi nes a hunter-gatherer; rather, the key ability is the capacity to take in multiple types of information and use them to make on-the-go decisions. Within the range of known huntergatherers, the skill development process varies from location to location but generally extends from middle childhood into and through middle adulthood. Given the integration of those who are learning with more experienced hunter-gatherers and incorporation of learning tasks with everyday activities, individual instances of learning are very likely to be very difficult to identify within the archaeological record. By the same argument, however, because members who are learning are continually with the group, traces of learning may permeate the archaeological record. Returning to the framework of landscape learning, locational knowledge is particularly useful in considering how learning by individuals or a group may be recognized archaeologically. As noted above, locational knowledge consists of information relating to the spatial and physical characteristics of par ticular resources, such as the geographic position of a particular lithic outcrop, plant or animal resource patch, or animal migration route. With respect to general archaeological signatures, development of locational knowledge may be indicated by repeated archaeologically detectable use of a resource, such as a type or source of lithic raw material (see, e.g., Cackler et al. 1999; Hoard et al. 1993; Malyk-Selivanova et al. 1998), or archaeological presence at a particular location that can be seen as reuse—meaning sequential uses that are spatially congruent and appear to acknowledge previous uses, as opposed to reoccupation, which does not (following Brooks and Yellen 1987; Schlanger 1992; and Wandsnider 1992), such as a site located at a spring (Barton 1995) or other topographically distinctive location, such as the hunting area preferred by Martu children (Bird and Bliege Bird 2005).

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Considered individually, archaeological traces of locational knowledge paint a sparse picture of environmental learning. When the use histories of multiple locations over a wide region and the ethnography of learning are taken into account, a fuller sense of the development of use of the landscape is possible. For example, the Nunamiut trips of young and older men described above may leave a number of small, single-use sites behind. Even if the area explored is occupied in the next several years, some of those par ticular locations themselves may not be reused or reoccupied. Given the marriage customs among the Nunamiut, the boy or boys who first used some locations may no longer be with the group. It is also possible that some locations may be revisited on account of a particularly clear memory or description, while others will be forgotten or remain unused for so long that subsequent uses of the location may bear little or no relationship to the earlier use. There are many reasons and forms through which sites or use locations are abandoned or reused (Brooks and Yellen 1987; Schlanger 1992). Ratios and distribution of isolated features, artefacts, and small sites, in relation to larger camps or longer-term occupation sites, may be due at least in part to individual training as well as group-level landscape learning (Rockman 2008). Limitational knowledge, information about the usefulness and reliability of various resources and the ranges of variation within the overall environment, is more difficult to detect archaeologically but may be extrapolated from repeated use of a raw material at a single or limited number of sites or built features that indicate multiple harvests of a local resource over an extended period of time (Nelson and Lippmeier 1993; Smith and McNees 1999). Identification of limitational knowledge by its nature implies successful transfer of knowledge between individuals or within the group within the time cycle of the given resource or environmental characteristic. Social knowledge comes from the attribution of names, meanings, and patterns to natural features and the storage of locational and limitational knowledge in forms that are remembered and transmitted by the group to succeeding generations. Because social knowledge is complex and has many potential pathways and applications, there are many possible related archaeological traces. Examples include sites with traces of use over the long term that include features that signify meaning, such as rock art (Rockman 2008). Evidence of established contact across environmental zones, such as the coastal-inland connections described in Arctic oral histories (Minc 1986; Minc and Smith 1989) or as suggested in the later organization of the California Chumash (Johnson 2000) also may represent social knowledge.

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Summary and the Importance of Learning Today Learning an environment requires individual information gathering, with a framework drawn from and shared back with a group. Richerson and Boyd (2005) have noted that the ability to learn from and within a group itself requires a theory of mind, an understanding of the motives and intentions of others. Such understanding does not develop quickly; rather, the capacity to do so is possible only within a social context of interacting minds over a long period of time. Our capacity to learn environments and share that information is part of our evolutionary heritage. The landscape learning process describes the environmental learning experience of a group during initial colonization, but its sequence of stages may also be considered environmental familiarization from what is essentially an adult perspective. In other words, someone who already functions well in the environment may add a new environmental feature or phenomenon to his or her preexisting knowledge base, such as the hunter who learned about the mother and child kudu described above. The primary means through which hunter-gatherer children learn is informal, with much interaction with adults and other children. Therefore, their learning may be “backward” with respect to landscape learning, hearing aspects of social knowledge and limitational knowledge fi rst from others, adding in specific locational knowledge later. That, then, is the essence of hunter-gatherer environmental apprenticeship: learning how to gather all of the available locational, limitational, and social knowledge together into a meaningful and effective approach to use of the environment. George Silberbauer (1994, 119) noted that Zimbabwean anthropologist Angela Cheater once said that she did not think that anthropology was worth doing unless it could be applied. By this she did not mean that only applied anthropology was worthy but that one’s research eventually should have some application. Archaeological traces of landscape learning have not yet been extensively tested (but see Rockman 2003b; Rockman and Steele 2003). It is not yet clear under what conditions or in which situations we learn environments quickly (possibly below current archaeological resolution) and in which we learn more slowly (within the range of current archaeological techniques). There is great potential, however, for studies of landscape learning and environmental apprenticeship to be meaningfully applied to the present day. At the time of writing, this author is undertaking a fellowship with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to assist with policies regarding public perceptions of risk in the areas of homeland security and climate change. Issues such as greenhouse gas reductions

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and decontamination procedures may seem worlds removed from models of how hunter-gatherers learn landscapes—but they aren’t. Underlying all such federal policies and implementation rules are assumptions about how the world, and particularly human behavior, works; how information should be distributed; and how populations are likely to respond. There is growing recognition across many organizations within the federal government that more social science— and more social scientists— are needed to identify such assumptions and improve understanding of these sorts of aspects of human behavior and their incorporation into public policy. This path is not yet a direct one, and much translation is needed on both sides, from policy needs to researchers and back again. Volumes such as this one, which digs into how information and tasks have been shared in many different settings over long periods of time, are an important step in laying out patterns through which humans learn about the natural and cultural world. References Barton, R.N.E. 1995. Persistent Places in the Mesolithic Landscape: An Example from the Black Mountain Uplands of South Wales. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 61:81–116. Basso, K. 1996. Wisdom Sits in Places: Landscape and Language among the Western Apache. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. Binford, L. 1983a. In Pursuit of the Past: Decoding the Archaeological Record. New York: Thames and Hudson. Binford, L. 1983b. Long Term Land Use Patterns: Some Implications for Archaeology. In Lulu Linear Punctated: Essays in Honor of George Irving Quimby. R.C. Dunnell and D.K. Grayson, eds. Pp. 27–53. Ann Arbor: Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan. Binford, L.R., and J.S. O’Connell. 1984. An Alyawara Day: The Stone Quarry. Journal of Anthropological Research 40(3):406– 432. Binford, L. 1986. An Alyawara Day: Making Men’s Knives and Beyond. American Antiquity 51(3):547–562. Bird-David, N. 2005. Studying Children in Hunter-Gatherer Societies: Reflections from a Nayaka Perspective. In Hunter-Gatherer Childhoods: Evolutionary, Developmental and Cultural Perspectives. B.S. Hewlett and M.E. Lamb, eds. Pp. 92–101. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction. Bird, D.W., and R. Bliege Bird. 2005. Martu Children’s Hunting Strategies in the Western Desert, Australia. In Hunter-Gatherer Childhoods: Evolutionary, Developmental and Cultural Perspectives. B.S. Hewlett and M.E. Lamb, eds. Pp. 129–146. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction. Blanton, D.B. 2003. The Weather Is Fine, Wish You Were Here, Because I’m  the Last One Alive: “Learning” the Environment in the English New

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World Colonies. In Colonization of Unfamiliar Landscapes: The Archaeology of Adaptation. M. Rockman and J. Steele, eds. Pp. 190–200. London: Routledge. Blurton-Jones, N. 2005. Introduction. In Hunter-Gatherer Childhoods: Evolutionary, Developmental and Cultural Perspectives. B.S. Hewlett and M.E. Lamb, eds. Pp. 105–108. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction. Blurton-Jones, N., K. Hawkes, and P. Draper. 1994a. Differences between Hadza and !Kung Children’s Work: Original Affluence or Practical Reason. In Key Issues in Hunter-Gatherer Research. E.S. Burch, Jr., and L.J. Ellanna, eds. Pp. 189–215 Oxford: Berg. Blurton-Jones, N., K. Hawkes, and P. Draper. 1994b. Foraging Returns of !Kung Adults and Children: Why Didn’t !Kung Children Forage? Journal of Anthropological Research 50:217–248. Blurton-Jones, N., and M.J. Konner. 1976. !Kung Knowledge of Animal Behavior (Or: The Proper Study of Mankind Is Animals). In Kalahari Hunter-Gatherers: Studies of the !Kung San and Their Neighbors. R.B. Lee and I. DeVore, eds. Pp. 325–348. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Bock, J. 2005. What Makes a Competent Adult Forager? In Hunter-Gatherer Childhoods: Evolutionary, Developmental and Cultural Perspectives. B.S.  Hewlett and M.E. Lamb, eds. Pp. 109–128. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction. Boyd, R., and P. Richerson. 1985. Culture and the Evolutionary Process. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Brody, H. 1981. Maps and Dreams: Indians and the British Columbia Frontier. Vancouver: Douglas and McIntyre. Brody, H. 1987. Living Arctic. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Brooks, A., and J. Yellen. 1987. The Preservation of Activity Areas in the Archaeological Record: Ethnoarchaeological and Archaeological Work in Northwest Ngamiland, Botswana. In Method and Theory for Activity Area Research: An Ethnoarchaeological Approach. S. Kent, ed. Pp. 63–106. New York: Columbia University Press. Cackler, P.R., M.D. Glascock, H. Neff, H. Iceland, K.A. Pyburn, D. Hudler, T.R. Hester, and B.M. Chiarulli. 1999. Chipped Stone Artefacts, Source Areas, and Provenance Studies of the Northern Belize Chert-Bearing Zone. Journal of Archaeological Science 26:389–397. Draper, P. 1976. Social and Economic Constraints on Child Life among the !Kung. In Kalahari Hunter-Gatherers: Studies of the !Kung San and Their Neighbors. R.B. Lee and I. DeVore, eds. Pp. 199–217. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Fiedel, S.J., and D.W. Anthony. 2003. Deerslayers, Pathfinders, and Icemen: Origins of the European Neolithic as Seen from the Frontier. In Colonization of Unfamiliar Landscapes: The Archaeology of Adaptation. M. Rockman and J. Steele, eds. Pp. 144–168. London: Routledge.

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Fowler, C.S. 2004. What’s in a Name? Some Southern Paiute Names for Mojave Desert Springs as Keys to Environmental Perception. In Spring-Fed Wetlands: Important Scientific and Cultural Resources of the Intermountain Region, May 7–9, 2002, Las Vegas, NV, 2004. DHS Publication No. 4120. Golledge, R. 2003. Human Wayfinding and Cognitive Maps. In Colonization of Unfamiliar Landscapes: The Archaeology of Adaptation. M. Rockman and J. Steele, eds. Pp. 25– 43. London: Routledge. Hardesty, D. 2003. Mining Rushes and Landscape Learning in the Modern World. In Colonization of Unfamiliar Landscapes: The Archaeology of Adaptation. M. Rockman and J. Steele, eds. Pp. 81–96. London: Routledge. Hoard, R.J., J.R. Bozell, S.R. Holen, M.D. Glascock, H. Neff, and J.M. Elam. 1993. Source Determination of White River Group Silicates from Two Archaeological Sites in the Great Plains. American Antiquity 58(4):698–710. Johnson, J.R. 2000. Social Responses to Climate Change among the Chumash Indians of South-Central California. In The Way the Wind Blows: Climate, History, and Human Action. R.J. McIntosh, J.A. Tainter, and S.K. McIntosh, eds. Pp. 301–327. New York: Columbia University Press. Kaplan, H. 1997. The Evolution of the Human Life Course. In Between Zeus and the Salmon: The Biodemography of Longevity. K.W. Wachter and C.E. Finch, eds. Pp. 175–211. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. Kaplan, H., K. Hill, J. Lancaster, and A.M. Hurtado. 2000. A Theory of Human Life History Evolution: Diet, Intelligence, and Longevity. Evolutionary Anthropology 9(4):156–183. Kelly, R.L. 1995. The Foraging Spectrum: Diversity in Hunter-Gatherer Lifeways. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press. Kelly, R.L. 1999. Hunter-Gatherer Foraging and Colonization of the Western Hemisphere. Anthropologie 37(2):143–153. Kelly, R.L. 2003. Colonization of New Land by Hunter-Gatherers: Expectations and Implications Based on Ethnographic Data. In Colonization of Unfamiliar Landscapes: The Archaeology of Adaptation. M. Rockman and J. Steele, eds. Pp. 44–58. London: Routledge. Kelly, R.L., and L.C. Todd. 1988. Coming into the Country: Early Paleoindian Hunting and Mobility. American Antiquity 53(2):231–244. Malyk-Selivanova, N., G.M. Ashley, R. Gal, M.D. Glascock, and H. Neff. 1998. Geological-Geochemical Approach to “Sourcing” of Prehistoric Chert Artifacts, Northwestern Alaska. Geoarchaeology: An International Journal 13(7): 673–708. Minc, L.D. 1986. Scarcity and Survival: The Role of Oral Tradition in Mediating Subsistence Crises. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 5:39–113. Minc, L.D., and K.P. Smith. 1989. The Spirit of Survival: Cultural Responses to Resource Variability in North Alaska. In Bad Year Economics: Cultural Responses to Risk and Uncertainty. P. Halstead and J. O’Shea, eds. Pp. 8–39. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Nelson, M.C., and H. Lippmeier. 1993. Grinding-Tool Design as Conditioned by Land-Use Pattern. American Antiquity 58(2):286–305. Nelson, R. 1986. Hunters of the Northern Forest. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Potts, R 1998. Variability Selection in Hominid Evolution. Evolutionary Anthropology 7:81–96. Richerson, P.J., and R. Boyd. 2005. Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Rockman, M. 2001. The Landscape Learning Process in Historical Perspective. In 31st Annual Chacmool Conference Proceedings. J. Gillespie, S. Tupakka, and C. de Mille, eds. Pp. 493–509. Calgary, BC: Archaeological Association of the University of Calgary. Rockman, M. 2003a. Knowledge and Learning in the Archaeology of Colonization. In Colonization of Unfamiliar Landscapes: The Archaeology of Adaptation. M. Rockman and J. Steele, eds. Pp. 3–24. London: Routledge. Rockman, M. 2003b. Landscape Learning in the Late Glacial Recolonization of Britain Ph.D. Dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of Arizona. Rockman, M. 2008. The Importance of Places: Combining Sites and Isolates in a Long-Term Land-Use Approach to the Archaeology of the Western Papagueria. In Fragile Patterns: The Archaeology of the Western Papagueria. J.H. Altschul and A.G. Rankin, eds. Pp. 379– 400. Tucson, AZ: SRI Press. Rockman, M. 2009. Landscape Learning in Relation to Evolutionary Theory. In Macroevolution in Human Prehistory. A. Prentiss, I. Kuijt, and J.C. Chatters, eds. Pp. 51–71. New York: Springer. Rockman, M., and J. Steele, eds. 2003. Colonization of Unfamiliar Landscapes: The Archaeology of Adaptation. London: Routledge. Schlanger, S.H. 1992. Recognizing Per sistent Places in Anasazi Settlement Systems. In Space, Time, and Archaeological Landscapes. J. Rossignol and L. Wandsnider, eds. Pp. 91–112. New York: Plenum. Silberbauer, G.B. 1994. A Sense of Place. In Key Issues in Hunter-Gatherer Research. E.S. Burch, Jr., and L.J. Ellanna, eds. Pp. 119–143. Oxford: Berg. Smith, C.S., and L.M. McNees. 1999. Facilities and Hunter-Gatherer LongTerm Land Use Patterns: An Example from Southwest Wyoming. American Antiquity 64(1):117–136. Tucker, B., and A.G. Young. 2005. Growing Up Mikea: Children’s Time Allocation and Tuber Foraging in Southwestern Madagascar. In HunterGatherer Childhoods: Evolutionary, Developmental and Cultural Perspectives. B.S. Hewlett and M.E. Lamb, eds. Pp. 147–171. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction. Turney-High, H.H. 1941. Ethnography of the Kutenai. Memoir 56. Washington, DC: American Anthropological Association.

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Walker, R., K. Hill, H. Kaplan, and G. McMillan. 2002. Age-Dependency in Hunting Ability among the Ache of Eastern Paraguay. Journal of Human Evolution 42(4):639– 657. Wandsnider, L. 1992. The Spatial Dimension of Time. In Space, Time, and Archaeological Landscapes. J. Rossignol and L. Wandsnider, eds. Pp. 257–282. New York: Plenum.

CHA P TER SEV EN

Lithic Raw Material Availability and Palaeo-Eskimo Novice Flintknapping S. Brooke Milne

For more than a century, archaeologists have replicated prehistoric lithic artefacts to understand stone tool reduction sequences (e.g., Cushing 1895; Holmes 1891). More recently, there is growing interest in identifying when and where people learned this skill and how the material signatures of novices differ from those of expert toolmakers (e.g., Ferguson 2003; Finlay 1997; Milne 2005; Stout 2002; Weedman 2002; Will 2000). As with any craft, expert flintknappers consistently produce more finely made objects than do novices, and novices tend to repeat the same kinds of mistakes, creating distinct material patterns in the archaeological record (e.g., Bonnichsen 1977; Shelley 1990). Novice flintknapping is wasteful of raw material; therefore, archaeologists should expect to find evidence of novice reduction in places where tool stone is abundant (Finlay 1997; Ferguson 2008; Milne 2005; Will 2000). Like plants and animals, lithic raw materials must be considered an essential exploitable resource in the economies of stone-tool–using mobile hunter-gatherers (Bamforth 1986, 40; Beck et al. 2002, 482; Daniel 2001, 261). Because tool-stone source areas are fi xed in their location (Nelson 1991, 77), they are easily manipulated when encountered and can be exploited repeatedly once discovered. However, since food and lithic resources are not always found in the same place, access to raw materials

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is compromised when other economic activities must be pursued away from source locations (Andrefsky 1994; Bamforth 1986; Beck and Jones 1990; Kelly 1988). This means that lithic acquisition was frequently a scheduled activity within a group’s seasonal round so as to ensure that enough tool stone was acquired to meet peoples’ tool-using needs for the rest of the year. As a corollary to this kind of scheduling, opportunities for novices to learn flintknapping were similarly scheduled (Pigeot 1990, 138), and if access to lithic source areas was restricted, episodes of novice knapping would have been equally so. On southern Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic (see figure 7.1), lithic raw materials are geologically localized in the interior region (Milne et al. 2009), and for the early Palaeo-Eskimos who lived there, this meant that

Figure 7.1. Map of southern Baffin Island, Arctic Canada, illustrating the locations of features discussed in the text

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toolmakers had to travel inland to renew their tool-stone supply on a seasonal basis (Milne 2003, 2005; Milne and Donnelly 2004). Given the ubiquity of raw materials in the island’s interior, it also provided ideal opportunities for novices to “break rocks.” My previous study of PalaeoEskimo novice flintknapping identified novice material signatures among two inland sites (see Milne 2003, 2005). The objective of this chapter is to further illustrate that this phenomenon is localized in the island’s interior. Data from four coastal sites near Frobisher Bay are compared to those from two interior sites located near Nettilling Lake to highlight that novice skill and site location are statistically dependent variables (see figures 7.2

Figure 7.2. The Frobisher Bay area, illustrating the locations of the sites discussed in the text

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Figure 7.3. The Burwash Bay area, illustrating the locations of the sites discussed in the text

and 7.3). The results of this analysis indicate that Palaeo-Eskimo novice flintknappers were traveling long distances to the interior of Baffin Island during the Arctic warm season to learn how to make stone tools. Moreover, novice flintknapping does not appear to have been undertaken in coastal regions, where the availability of chert is geologically restricted. Based on ethnographic accounts from 1888 of the southern Baffin Island Inuit (Boas 1964), Palaeo-Eskimo toolmakers would have traveled

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at least 50 km to reach the interior of the island. I further propose that novice Palaeo-Eskimo toolmakers, through this act of traveling, were not only learning how to break rocks but also were afforded the opportunity to learn the local landscape (see also Milne 2011). Recent ethnoarchaeological research has found that novice apprenticeships not only teach young people important technological skills but also facilitate enculturation through the act of learning “how to do” (e.g., Stout 2002; Weedman 2002). I begin with an overview of Palaeo-Eskimo culture. I then describe the material signatures of novice knapping among bifaces, cores, scrapers, and debitage, followed by a discussion of how lithic raw material availability and novice flintknapping are linked. Thereafter, I present the data from the southern Baffin Island sites showing that Palaeo-Eskimo novice flintknapping was locationally and seasonally specific to the interior. Finally, I explain how novice flintknapping, landscape learning, and enculturation were linked within the Palaeo-Eskimo culture of southern Baffin Island.

Palaeo-Eskimo Culture The earliest inhabitants of the eastern Arctic are known archaeologically as the Palaeo-Eskimos. These peoples migrated eastward from Alaska roughly 4,500–5,000 years ago. Palaeo-Eskimo means “Old Eskimo,” and the term simply acknowledges that these earliest populations lived in the same environment that is now occupied by today’s Eskimo and Inuit peoples (McGhee 1996, 7). There is, however, no evidence to indicate cultural continuity between the Palaeo-Eskimos and the present inhabitants of the Arctic (Park 1993, 2008). For the purpose of this discussion, the Palaeo-Eskimo occupation of Baffin Island is divided into three temporal periods: early (4,500–2,800 BP), middle (2,800–2,500 BP), and late (2,500–1,000 BP) (dates from Helmer 1994, 18). The early period represents a time of relative cultural stability when the Arctic environment was warmer than what is experienced there today. The middle period coincides with the start of an environmental change where the climate was rapidly cooling, leading to longer, harsher winters and shorter, cooler summers. It is inferred that the Palaeo-Eskimo culture underwent rapid and significant change during this period in response to the climatic changes experienced. The late period marks notable changes in the Palaeo-Eskimo culture, when an emphasis on sea mammal hunting emerged and presumably led to the adoption of a more coastal/marine-oriented way of life (McGhee 1996, 118). While the

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Palaeo-Eskimos lived in the eastern Arctic for an impressive 3,500-year period, this chapter focuses on site data from the early period only. The early Palaeo-Eskimos are best known from the remains of their sophisticated lithic technology, and the most striking characteristic of these stone tools is their small size. Inuit oral histories suggest that the makers of these tiny tools must have been dwarfs because only small hands could have worked and used them (Maxwell 1985, 40). In the late 1950s, William Irving (1957) coined the name “Arctic Small Tool tradition” and applied it to all Palaeo-Eskimo sites from Alaska to Greenland where these tiny lithics were found since he believed, based on this trait, that they all belonged to the same culture. The early Palaeo-Eskimos were adapted to hunting both marine and terrestrial species, and their small, easily transportable toolkit was well suited to a mobile lifestyle (Bielawski 1988). In the spring, populations presumably traveled inland to exploit caribou, Arctic char, and nesting waterfowl, and with the onset of winter, they moved back to the coast to hunt seals on the sea ice. To accommodate this seasonal mobility, early Palaeo-Eskimo social organization is interpreted as flexible, where peopled wintered in groups of thirty or more and then spent the rest of year in smaller, single-family units (Maxwell 1985, 98). The early PalaeoEskimos lived in skin tents during the late spring, summer, early fall and snow-walled houses during the winter (Ramsden and Murray 1995).

Material Signatures of Novice Flintknappers: Bifaces, Cores, Scrapers, and Debitage It is certain that novices contributed to the variability identified in lithic tool assemblages since no one was ever “born” an expert flintknapper (see Shelley 1990). Shelley’s (1990) analysis of contemporary novice flintknappers found that when producing bifacial and blade cores, regardless of the reduction strategy used and the raw material type being worked, the same mistakes were repeated, resulting in distinct material signatures (Shelley 1990, 188). These mistakes consistently involved unsuccessful attempts at flake removal from either the biface edge or the blade core platform. Novices also repeatedly tried to remove flakes from the same location using too much force, creating “stacked” sets of flake terminations on the dorsal or ventral surface of the biface, and from the front of the core directly below the striking platform (Shelley 1990, 188). These repeated attempts at flake removal from the same location, combined with misplaced blows, resulted in considerable battering of the striking platform. Among bifaces, these stacks yielded thick cross sections and sinuous edge shapes, whereas among blade cores, excessive platform

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battering left a tiered appearance where all possible angles to salvage the core were exhausted. Kathryn Weedman’s (2002; see also Brandt and Weedman 2002) analysis of stone scrapers used by the Konso of Ethiopia to work cowhides documented discrete patterns reflecting differences in skill between novices and experts for this tool category. Scrapers made, used, and maintained by novices frequently displayed spurs on their working edges and were broken along the midline where the scrapers were mounted into a haft. Spurs are accidentally created when the working edge is resharpened. Novice toolmakers continue to use “spurred” scrapers since they are not skilled enough to remove the spurs without breaking the tool. When they do try to remove them, the scrapers consistently break because novices cannot gauge how much pressure to apply to the working edge to successfully remove the spur. Novices also tend to exert too much pressure on the scraper when working hides, causing them to break along the midline. In contrast, expert toolmakers can and do successfully remove spurs from the working edge of their scrapers, but in instances where they cannot, they have the foresight to know this and will discard the scraper intact with the spurs remaining untouched. Experts also know how much force to apply to the scraper when working hides and are less likely to break them along the midline, resulting in higher frequencies of discarded intact scrapers. Therefore, novice scrapers are frequently spurred along the working edge and broken along the midline, whereas expert scrapers are typically discarded unspurred but exhausted and intact or spurred and intact (Weedman 2002, 739). Among flakes, skill is reflected in platform preparation, platform trimming, force loads, and flake termination states (Shelley 1990, 191–192). Experts typically invest more energy in preparing striking platforms and trimming overhang from previous flake detachments than do novices. Experts also have better control over the amount of force applied to detach flakes at different stages of reduction, which affects flake termination states. When too much force is applied, it can result in snap and plunging terminations, while not enough force can yield hinge and step terminations. Lastly, because novices have difficulty judging the amount of force required for flake detachment, which results in a lack of control over the fracture process, they generate higher frequencies of flake shatter regardless of reduction technique or lithic raw material type (Shelley 1990, 191).

A Question of Skill: Distinguishing Novice and Expert Material Signatures Determining exactly how much of an assemblage is attributable to low skill presents certain challenges (Andrews 2003; Clark 2003; Finlay 2008).

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However, before attempts are made at quantifying skill, two important factors must be considered: (1) the availability of lithic raw material and (2) the involvement of experts helping novices learn. First, the availability of lithic raw material will directly influence mistakes in lithic reduction, whether created by experts or novices. In instances where raw material is in short supply and therefore of higher value, experts are more likely to try to salvage a tool or rejuvenate it, thus, increasing the likelihood of eliminating evidence of mistakes made at a site. In contrast, at those locations where tool stone is abundant and of lower value, the need to salvage or repair a tool is reduced entirely since if a mistake is made, a new piece of stone can easily be picked up to start over again. Consequently, the visibility of mistakes is potentially much higher at source locations. Two additional factors complicate the influence of raw material availability on novice knapping: (a) tools that are successfully knapped at an acquisition site are removed when the occupants leave, resulting in a higher frequency of rejected tools, blanks, or preforms, which can amplify or distort the actual rate of error in toolmaking (Clark 2003, 224); and (b) novices are more likely to practice in locations where raw material is abundant, which means there may be two different skill levels (i.e., novice and expert) contributing crude tools or rejects to the same assemblage. Second, experts can erase evidence of novice flintknapping at a site by correcting novice mistakes or salvaging their rejected pieces (Shelley 1990, 191). During the learning process, experts frequently help novices by giving them verbal advice or by providing actual hands-on assistance to remove a problem area (Stout 2002, 702–703). This apprenticeship system creates a blurred boundary separating novice from expert reduction. Moreover, depending on the nature of the apprenticeship and the context of learning, the expert may be so involved with reduction that he or she may eliminate altogether any evidence of novice flintknapping at the site. It must be acknowledged that experts do occasionally produce crudelooking tools that appear to exhibit evidence of low skill, especially when using an expedient reduction strategy. It is also certain that experts make mistakes during tool production and that the pieces they are working sometimes fail and are discarded as a result. Experts are, however, less likely to repeat the same mistakes since, as John Clark observes (2003, 221), they have more experience breaking rocks and become better at it the longer they do it (see also Ferguson 2008, 54). Clark (2003, 230) states, “The products of an apprentice should exhibit a greater error rate and less uniformity, resulting from lack of experience, than the output of the master.” In other words, the mistakes made by novices and their consistency differ qualitatively and quantitatively from the mistakes made by experts. This should make it possible to distinguish those items pro-

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duced by novices from those made by experts who might have been having an “off day.” Consideration of the conditions influencing the occurrence of novice knapping will also facilitate a distinction of skill. These include the material, locational, and social contexts influencing when and where novices learn. This chapter focuses specifically on the material and locational conditions, namely, the availability of lithic raw material on southern Baffin Island and its geological distribution restricted in the interior region (Milne et al. 2009).

The Availability of Lithic Raw Material and Palaeo-Eskimo Novice Flintknapping Because novice flintknappers frequently make mistakes that can rapidly consume available lithic raw materials (Finlay 1997; Pigeot 1990; Shelley 1990; Will 2000), patterns of variability associated with novice reduction should be expected in places where tool stone is abundant, including lithic quarries, bedrock outcrops, or pebble-strewn beaches (Ferguson 2003; Finlay 1997; Shelley 1990). On southern Baffin Island, chert is restricted seasonally and geologically. Throughout the Arctic winter, the ground is covered by ice and snow, which would have impeded peoples’ efforts to locate tool stone at this time of year (Hayden 1989; Rolland 1981). Therefore, the most ideal time to acquire it would be during the late spring, summer, and early autumn (Milne 2005; Milne and Donnelly 2004). The interior of southern Baffi n Island is dominated by Nettilling, Amadjuak, and Mingo lakes and the riverine system connecting them (figure 7.1). To the west and southwest lies the Great Plain of the Koukdjuak— a remarkable low-lying, flat, marshy tundra area that consists entirely of undivided carbonate and siliciclastic rocks (De Kemp et al. 2006), including chert. Other areas surrounding Nettilling Lake are geologically diverse, consisting predominantly of granite monzonite syenite, granulite-facies granitoid, undivided granulite-facies gneiss, and granulitefacies paragneiss (de Kemp et al. 2006). Given the composition of these formations, naturally occurring sources of chert most likely will be found in the west to southwestern part of the Nettilling Lake region. The chertbearing geological formations that characterize the Great Plain of the Koukdjuak extend to the west and southwest of Amadjuak Lake and to the north of Mingo Lake (de Kemp et al. 2006). Formations to the east of Amadjuak Lake and along the remainder of the east, west, and southern shores of Mingo Lake are dominated by granite monzonite syenite and granulite-facies granitoid (de Kemp et al. 2006). Like Nettilling Lake, the

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composition of these granitic formations will not yield naturally occurring sources of chert. Deposits of glacial till throughout the southern Baffin Island region also provide a secondary source of usable chert. In stark contrast, tool stone is not readily available throughout the southern coastal regions because of the local geology, which consists predominantly of granite and gneiss formations (Maxwell 1973, 10–11). Therefore, the largest and most reliable tool-stone source area on southern Baffin Island is in the interior, where chert can be found within the naturally occurring rock formations near Nettilling, Amadjuak, and Mingo Lakes, and from glacial till deposits. Local Inuit oral histories further corroborate this since they have long said that chert tool stone can be found in abundant supply in the interior of the island. Amadjuak Lake is considered an especially important place to acquire it, since its name, “Amadjuak,” is an English corruption of the Inuktitut word ammaq or angmalik. Ammaq means chert, and the reference to Ammaaq Lake, loosely translated, means “the place chert comes from” (Stenton and Park 1998, 25). I have also observed the abundance of chert throughout the region, where it litters the local landscape almost like a chert “carpet” (Milne et al. 2009). The ubiquity of chert in the interior of the island would strongly favor novice knapping episodes, while the absence of reliable sources in the coastal regions would work to curtail, restrict, or prohibit them altogether. The value of tool stone in the coastal sites must also be considered since it would have been carried a considerable distance from the interior, and without reliable sources nearby, efforts to conserve it in coastal camps would have been high. In cases where raw material value is high and availability is low, novice experimentation would be unsanctioned (Ferguson 2008, 54). Jeffrey Ferguson (2008, 53) notes that raw material access and value are important universal factors that directly influenced how and where novices were incorporated into stone tool production. Even if novices did participate in reduction activities in the coastal regions of Baffin Island, the methods used to teach them would likely be designed to increase skill while minimizing raw material loss (Ferguson 2008, 54), and the involvement of the expert might be so significant because of the high value assigned to chert in these locations that traces of novice skill, as noted already, might be erased all together. Therefore, patterns of novice skill are expected to be most visible in the interior of the island, where access to tool stone is virtually unlimited. It is acknowledged that to be a novice toolmaker, one does not have to be a child (Finlay 1997, 207). In fact, individuals may not start to learn this skill until they are in their late teens or early twenties (Stout 2002, 702; Weedman 2002, 738). Ferguson (2003, 124) also observes that the

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role of upper-body strength and the need for precise force application likely prevented very young children from learning to knap stone. Therefore, in considering these additional factors, it is possible that lithic skill acquisition for the early Palaeo-Eskimos was not only seasonally and locationally restricted but also possibly delayed until later in life when these most basic criteria of age and strength were met (Milne 2005, 342).

Novice Knapping: Evidence from Southern Baffin Island I have previously established the presence of novice fl intknapping in the interior of southern Baffin Island (see Milne 2003, 2005). Here I present comparative data from four early Palaeo-Eskimo coastal occupations to illustrate the restricted occurrence of novice reduction episodes in the interior. Artefact categories considered include debitage, cores, bifaces, and scrapers. The four coastal occupations are within 10 km of one another in the coastal uplands of Frobisher Bay. They include Area Q and Area D (both located within the larger Tungatsivvik site), Davidson Point, and Shaymark (see figure 7.2). All sites yielded lithic assemblages containing debitage and informal and formal tools (see table 7.1). Toolmakers used two reduction strategies at Area Q and Area D: (1) late-stage reduction and maintenance of heavily curated toolkits and (2) a bipolar strategy on local chert pebbles to produce a limited number of expedient flake tools. Reduction strategies at Davidson Point and Shaymark focused predominantly on late-stage reduction and maintenance activities, yet toolmakers appear to have been working with a renewed tool-stone supply that, based on macroscopic raw material attributes, was procured in the interior region and transported back to the coastal uplands (Milne 2003, 272). Reduction strategies identified among the coastal occupations contrast sharply with those identified at the Mosquito Ridge and Sandy Point sites, which are both located near Nettilling Lake in the interior (see figure 7.3). Inland reduction activities focused on raw material procurement and early- to middle-stage reduction of preforms and blanks (Milne 2005, 340–341; Milne and Donnelly 2004, 103). People were “gearing up” and renewing their tool-stone supply while inland, given local raw material abundances. These localized differences are illustrated by the frequencies of minimally modified versus advanced platform states recorded among the respective debitage assemblages and the overall percentages of the reduction continuum present at each site (see table 7.2 and figure 7.4). The higher frequencies of advanced platforms in the coastal locations

Debitage

314 295 943 3,583

19,800 1,176

Location

Frobisher Bay Area Q Area D Davidson Point Shaymark

Burwash Bay Mosquito Ridge Sandy Point 26 13

5 2 10 23

Cores

113 29

2 9 43 153

Informal tools

127 6

11 3 30 476

Burin spalls

Table 7.1. Artefact frequencies for the coastal and inland sites

47 16

8 6 15 208

Burins

69 18

6 3 29 137

Bifaces

7 3

3 0 8 14

Scrapers

283 16

6 4 27 434

Microblades

20,472 1,277

359 324 1,123 5,091

Total

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Figure 7.4. Stages of the reduction continuum present (striking platform × dorsal scar count on complete flakes only)

Table 7.2. Percent frequencies of prepared striking platforms for coastal and inland sites

Location

Percent frequency (N) Indeterminate

Minimally modified

Total N Advanced

Frobisher Bay Area Q Area D Davidson Point Shaymark

40% (126) 43% (127) 46% (434) 36% (1,290)

31% (97) 26% (77) 22% (204) 27% (967)

29% (91) 31% (91) 32% (305) 37% (1,326)

314 295 943 3,583

Burwash Bay Mosquito Ridge Sandy Point

39% (6,095) 37% (435)

40% (6,251) 46% (565)

21% (3,282) 15% (176)

15,628* 1176

*A sample of 79% of the Mosquito Ridge debitage assemblage was drawn for analysis. Thus, all attribute frequencies presented here are based on a study population of 15,628 flakes. See Milne (2003) for a detailed discussion of this sampling procedure.

also indicate the presence of skilled flintknappers since they more frequently invest the time and energy required to prepare and successfully detach them (Shelley 1990, 191–192). Table 7.3 lists attribute states associated with the use of excessive force loads. Eraillure scar frequencies are notably lower in the coastal sites assemblages, as are frequencies of platform battering at Area D and Davidson Point. Platform battering frequencies are higher at Area Q and Shaymark. This is expected at Area Q, given the use of a bipolar reduction strategy, while at Shaymark there is some evidence of tool-stone liquida-

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Table 7.3. Percent frequencies of force load attributes for coastal and inland sites Location

Percent observed on flakes (N) Flakes with intact platforms only Eraillure scars

All flakes

Battering

Compression rings

Bulbs of percussion

Frobisher Bay Area Q Area D Davidson Point Shaymark

13% (40) 11% (32) 7% (61) 14% (321)

20% (64) 1(27) 3% (24) 20% (467)

56% (175) 82% (242) 83% (262) 79% (2,830)

76% (237) 51% (150) 39% (368) 55% (1,261)

Burwash Bay Mosquito Ridge Sandy Point

20% (1,900) 27% (200)

21% (1,960) 33% (388)

66% (10,264) 58% (682)

52% (8,055) 84% (989)

Table 7.4. Distal flake termination state percentage frequencies for coastal and inland sites. Bracketed figures are actual counts.

Total

Absent/ Ind. % (N)

6.4 (20) 0.6 (2) 7.8 (23) 0.7 (2) 3.4 (32) 0.4 (4) 5 (180) 0.8 (29) 4.6 (712) 0.5 (74) 4.1 (48) 1 (11)

Snap % (N)

7 (22) 7.1 (21) 6.6 (62) 5.1 (183) 8.5 (1332) 8.1 (95)

Outrepassé % (N)

Step % (N)

31 (96) 37 (109) 28.7 (271) 28.2 (1011) 29 (4463) 37 (436)

Hinge % (N)

Feather % (N) Area Q Area D Davidson Point Shaymark Mosquito Ridge Sandy Point

43 (136) 12 (38) 314 39.6 (117) 7.8 (23) 295 52.3 (493) 8.6 (81) 943 54.7 (1960) 6.2 (220) 3583 50 (7814) 7.9 (1233) 15,628 42.7 (502) 7.1 (84) 1176

tion, indicating toolmakers were extracting as much utility as possible out of better quality materials. Tool-stone liquidation could certainly account for higher frequencies of platform battering at this site. While distal flake termination states recorded for all assemblages display relatively consistent patterns for every category (see table 7.4), when they are cross-tabulated with other diagnostic debitage attributes used to assess skill, qualitative differences emerge (see table 7.5). These figures illustrate lower frequencies of flakes displaying attributes associated with novice skill among coastal sites, indicating that novices were not actively

133

Material Availability and Novice Flintknapping Table 7.5. Cross-tabulated frequencies of flakes displaying attributes associated with novice skill (i.e., minimally modified platforms, heavy force loads, step or hinge distal terminations) Measure

Total Percent

Frobisher Bay

Burwash Bay

Area Q

Area D

Davidson Point

Shaymark

Mosquito Ridge

Sandy Point

6 1.9%

3 1%

10 1.1%

35 1%

547 3.5%

276 23.5%

Figure 7.5. An example of a debitage flake from the Sandy Point (LlDv-10) site displaying attributes states associated with novice skill (e.g., minimally modified striking platform, battering, pronounced distal hinge termination)

flintknapping in these locations. In contrast, inland attribute frequencies are much higher indicating novices were present and working local tool stone. Figure 7.5 illustrates a flake displaying attributes associated with novice skill. Formal tools displaying evidence of low-skill mirror patterns were identified in the debitage. Among bifaces (see table 7.6), Mosquito Ridge and Sandy Point yield the highest frequencies of attributes associated with low skill, including stacked fractures on dorsal and ventral surfaces, exaggerated cross sections, and higher degrees of edge sinuosity. The three bifaces identified at Shaymark with stacked fractures and exaggerated cross sections are all fragments, and it appears that these specimens broke while toolmakers attempted to remove the stacked fractures. Given the minimal edge sinuosity displayed by these bifaces, they appear to be the products of more proficient knappers who were simply unable to successfully remove a flaw created through biface maintenance activities. Two bifaces in the Davidson Point assemblage display attributes associated with low skill; however, the overall size of the associated debitage assemblage is small (see table 7.6), suggesting that these tools were not made at the site, given that biface production generates high flake frequencies (see Deller and Ellis 1992, 89). Alternatively, it could be that

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Table 7.6. Frequencies of bifaces displaying attributes associated with low skill

Location

Bifaces in assemblage

Stacked fractures

Exaggerated cross section

Degree of edge sinuosity

Frobisher Bay Area Q Area D Davidson Point Shaymark

6 3 29 137

1 0 2 3

0 0 2 3

Minimal Minimal High Minimal

Burwash Bay Mosquito Ridge Sandy Point

69 18

7 4

3 3

Moderate Moderate

Figure 7.6. Novice bifaces (center and left) from the Mosquito Ridge (MaDv-11) site displaying low skill (e.g., sinuous edges, irregular shapes [asymmetrical outlines], thick cross sections, stacked dorsal fractures). On the right is an example of a novice scraper with a spur present on the left side of the working edge and a snap through the midline of the tool, both of which are associated with low skill. The length of the center biface is 3.71 cm.

novices were present at Davidson Point and were participating, albeit in a controlled or limited capacity, in tool reduction activities. As Ferguson (2008, 54) notes, when raw materials are scarce and have a high cost associated with them, novice knappers did not participate in reduction; however, if they did, the teaching methods in these settings would be

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135

Figure 7.7. Examples of bifaces from the Mosquito Ridge (MaDv-11) displaying attributes associated with high skill, including straight edge morphologies, symmetrical outlines, fine flaking patterns including edge serration, and thin cross sections (although not visible from this angle). The biface on the left is an endblade (length, 3.23 cm), which would be mounted into a harpoon head, while the biface on the right is a sideblade (length 2.36 cm), which would be inserted laterally onto a weapon to increase the efficacy of killing prey.

designed to increase skill while minimizing raw material loss. This would suggest a more controlled incidence of novice knapping, but the absence of other artefacts displaying low skill seems to contradict this, particularly among lithic debitage. It is also possible that these bifaces are the products of experts who were simply having an “off day” (see Clark 2003, 230; Milne 2005, 336) and chose to discard the tools without further modification. Figure 7.6 illustrates examples of novice bifaces from the Mosquito Ridge (MaDv-11) site, while figure 7.7 illustrates contrasting expert examples from the same site. The majority of the cores identified in these assemblages are highly fragmentary, making it more difficult to evaluate knapping skill. Many of these fragments, like those identified at Davidson Point and Shaymark, consist of better-quality tool stone, and it appears that toolmakers were extracting as much utility as possible out of them prior to discard, resulting in the observed stacked fractures. However, two cores from Sandy Point display obvious evidence of low skill (see table 7.7; Milne 2005, 333– 334), as indicated by heavy battering and stacked fractures around the

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platform, producing a tiered striking platform where no further modification or salvaging of the object could be made. These cores have remaining utility, indicating they were discarded without any further attempts to salvage them, which is common among novice knappers who reach this stage of reduction and do not have the skills or know-how to proceed (see Milne 2005, 334; Pigeot 1990, 138; Shelley 1990, 191). Scrapers displaying evidence of low skill were identified at Mosquito Ridge (see table 7.8). One specimen exhibits spurs on its working edge, and it is broken along the midline, while a second scraper is also broken along the midline. Scrapers with spurs were identified at Davidson Point and Shaymark. However, all of these specimens are intact, sugTable 7.7. Frequencies of cores displaying attributes associated with novice skill Location

Cores and core fragments in assemblage

Platform battering

Stacked step terminations

Frobisher Bay Area Q Area D Davidson Point Shaymark

5 2 10 23

0 0 0 0

0 0 4 6

Burwash Bay Mosquito Ridge Sandy Point

26 13

0 2

0 2

Table 7.8. Frequencies of scrapers displaying attributes associated with low skill

Location

Scrapers in assemblage

Evidence of spurs

Midline breakage

Complete

Frobisher Bay Area Q Area D Davidson Point Shaymark

3 0 8 14

0 0 4 4

0 0 0 0

3 0 7 10

Burwash Bay Mosquito Ridge Sandy Point

7 3

1 0

2 0

3 3

Material Availability and Novice Flintknapping

137

Table 7.9. Frequencies of formal tools from inland and coastal displaying clustered attributes associated with low skill

Location Inland Coastal Total

Tools exhibiting attributes of novice skill

Tools lacking evidence of novice skill

Total

9 5 14

127 235 362

136 240 376

gesting that the persons who used and maintained them knew the spurs could not be removed and were careful to discard the scrapers before they broke or tore the materials that were being scraped. According to Weedman’s (2002, 739) observations, experts consistently have this foresight and know when to throw the scraper away when the working edge becomes spurred. Consistently higher frequencies of attributes reflecting low skill among debitage, bifaces, cores, and scrapers are found in the inland site assemblages compared to those from the coastal sites. To examine the statistical significance of these patterns, a chi-square test was performed. All formal tools from each of the six site components that exhibited all of the attributes associated with low skill were included in this calculation (see table 7.9). The results (chi squared: critical = 3.841; obtained = 4.85) indicate that there is a statistically significant correlation between the occurrence of tools exhibiting novice skill and site location. This lends further support to the interpretation that novice skill acquisition was localized in the interior of southern Baffin Island.

Discussion The material signatures of novice flintknappers are distinct compared to those of experts using different reduction methods, including expediency, curation, and bipolar. Because novices repeat the same mistakes, the by-products of their activities are qualitatively different and detectable through detailed lithic analysis. As such, the patterns of variability associated with novices among the southern Baffin Island sites are not the result of equifinality; they match precise criteria defined through lithic reduction experiments and archaeological assemblage analyses for biface, core, scraper, and debitage tool categories (Andrews 2003; Bamforth and Finlay 2008; Bonnichsen 1977; Clark 2003; Ferguson 2003; Finlay 1997, 2008; Milne 2005; Weedman 2002).

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When skill is explicitly considered in the analysis of a lithic assemblage, it is possible to distinguish the actions of novice toolmakers from those of the experts, and these patterns are most visible in locations where toolstone access is unrestricted and value is low (Ferguson 2008, 54), as is the case in the interior of southern Baffin Island. In these situations, novices can experiment on their own or under the supervision of an expert because their wasteful actions do not threaten the larger group’s supply of usable tool stone. Conversely, when tool-stone access is restricted and value is high, as is the case among the Frobisher Bay coastal sites, novice experimentation will not be sanctioned. Without question, it is easier to identify the extremes of the skill spectrum (i.e., novice vs. expert), which this study has done. However, future analyses must also consider how to isolate and quantify different levels of skill that make up an assemblage, which is much more difficult to do (Finlay 2008). Social factors also strongly influenced when and where novices engaged in knapping activities (Ferguson 2008, 53), and it is possible that taboos may have forbidden novices from practicing in certain locations altogether. Among the Inuit, there is a strong belief that certain activities should be performed only in certain places at specific times of the year (e.g., working and sewing caribou skins; Balikci 1970, 218–224; Boas 1964, 170). Therefore, in order to acquire the skills needed to be proficient at these specific activities, one had to travel on the landscape to learn them at the designated place (Milne 2011). It is possible the PalaeoEskimos deemed the interior of Baffin Island as the designated place to learn flintknapping, thus further accounting for the presence of novice material signatures in the inland sites and their absence among those located along the coast.

Summary and Conclusions Technology is inherently social, and lithic production takes place in a structured social setting where, depending on the situation and who is present, status can be negotiated through the display of individual skill (Dobres 1995, 1999; Dobres and Hoffman 1994; Sinclair 2000). For those individuals who have not yet acquired the skills necessary to knap stone competently, access to this arena will be restricted. To gain access, individuals go through a period of apprenticeship that can last for many years (Stout 2002, 702). In the process of learning, novices are exposed to important social values that are vital to a culture’s lifeways, including dedication, perseverance, and concentration (Stout 2002, 703). Therefore, learning to make stone tools not only involves “learning how to do” but also involves “learning how to act,” since the process facilitates

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139

enculturation by exposing novices to the norms that structure their technological, social, and economic environment. Given the vital importance of stone tools to Palaeo-Eskimo lifeways, it is not difficult to imagine that acquisition of this technological skill served a similar purpose. Among hunter-gatherers, adults who instruct novices are usually close family members (Binford 2001; Stout 2002), and it is their responsibility to ensure that children receive the necessary guidance that enables them to develop into functioning members of their society (Binford 2001, 467). These apprenticeships usually involve repeated visits to important places on the landscape (see Ingold 1993, 2000). Through an “education of attention,” novices learn as they travel the landscape, and knowledgeable elders point out to them important features and the lore that is tied to them (Ingold 1993, 153). The Palaeo-Eskimo landscape was likely defined by specific travel routes; locations for hunting, camping, and raw material extraction; local stories; and expectations about location specific behaviors, norms, and values. In turn, these phenomena likely helped reinforce and reaffirm the Palaeo-Eskimo sense of identity as individuals traveled through and experienced their surroundings (Milne 2011). On southern Baffin Island, the important place where novices could learn to make stone tools was in the interior. Given the distance to be traveled and the arduousness of making such a trip, it would seem that individual attributes such as age, skill (or lack thereof), and endurance were important factors in the formation of the task groups that went inland to procure lithic raw material (Milne 2005, 2011). The interior of the island is centrally located and easily accessible from every coastal region via the coastal upland areas, and it appears to have served for every Arctic culture as a focal point for seasonal interactions on an interregional scale (Stenton 1989, 118). In addition to skill acquisition, traveling to the interior as young adults would have important implications for group social interactions, particularly within a culture that lived in small, isolated groups for most of the year. It is highly probable that other Palaeo-Eskimo groups living in these distant locations also came to the interior to acquire tool stone and to socialize. These meetings would provide novices opportunities to interact and find potential mates. This would also help to ensure the larger population’s reproductive stability. The interior of southern Baffin Island supports an abundance of subsistence resources during the Arctic warm season, including nesting waterfowl, caribou, Arctic char, and a variety of plants and berries (Milne and Donnelly 2004; Soper 1928; Stenton 1989). These resources can be reliably procured and in large quantities; therefore, food would have been plentiful. Among the Inuit, the Arctic warm season was a welcome time of year (e.g., Bilby 1923; Boas 1964; Stenton 1989). After a long winter on

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the sea ice, people felt excitement and anticipation about spring time travels to the interior since they provided the Inuit with a chance to visit with old friends whom they had not seen for some time. These journeys also provided the Inuit with a welcome change in scenery, activity, and diet (Bilby 1923, 237–241). Julian Bilby (1923) notes that at this time of year, the days passed very pleasantly; the scenery was grand, and the weather was clear and sunny. People were carefree and happy, and they had no immediate worries. Archaeological evidence (Milne 2003, 2005, 2011) indicates that the interior also served as a similar warm-season refuge for the early PalaeoEskimos. Spending time in the interior at this time of year would have provided these earliest peoples with the opportunity to relax and socialize, and the journeys to get there would have served an important function in the enculturation of all members of the society. Undoubtedly, novices observed experts making and maintaining tools throughout the year; however, flintknapping is a skill that requires hands-on practice to master. Therefore, learning through observation is not enough to become proficient; one must handle the material and learn through feeling (see Ingold 2000, 21–22). This means the most critical component of acquiring this skill is getting to actually break rocks (Clark 2003, 221), and for novices, this likely added to the motivation to go inland since the abundance of tool stone there would have afforded them the opportunity to learn. Travel is an essential part of a northern lifestyle since it is the primary means by which people acquire information about the land they depend on for survival (Stenton 1989). Travel enables them to locate critical material and subsistence resources and to learn the lore of important features that comprise their social and cultural landscape. It is easily conceivable that travel would have been as important for the early Palaeo-Eskimos and that, in the process of traveling inland to find lithic source areas, novices would also have been learning their landscape and gathering cultural wisdom to pass on to subsequent generations. Moreover, meeting in the interior region would have provided opportunities for novices to find prospective mates, which would serve to maintain the biological viability of this small, widely dispersed population. During the Arctic warm season, the interior of southern Baffin Island is an ideal spot for all of these pursuits; warm weather, abundant food, and visiting with other peoples would have created a relaxed atmosphere for novices to learn flintknapping. Acknowledgments

Funding for this research was generously provided by the Social Sciences Humanities Research Council of Canada’s Doctoral Fellowship Program, Post-Doctoral Fellowship Program, Northern Research Development

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Grants Program, and Standard Research Grants Program. Additional funding support was provided by the Association for Canadian Universities for Northern Studies Studentship Program, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada’s Northern Scientific Training Program, and The Faculty of Graduate Studies, McMaster University. I thank Willeke Wendrich for her patience and perseverance in helping me complete the final draft of this chapter while I was on maternity leave. Thanks also to Aubrey Cannon and two anonymous reviewers whose comments helped improve a previous version of this chapter. References Andrefsky, W.J. 1994. Raw Material Availability and the Organization of Technology. American Antiquity 59(1):21–34. Andrews, B. 2003. Measur ing Prehistoric Craftsman Skill: Contemplating Its Application to Mesoamerican Core-Blade Research. In Mesoamerican Lithic Technology: Experimentation and Interpretation. K.G. Hirth, ed. Pp. 208– 219. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Balikci, A. 1970. The Netsilik Eskimo. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland. Bamforth, D.B. 1986. Technological Efficiency and Tool Curation. American Antiquity 51(1):38–50. Bamforth, D.B., and N. Finlay. 2008. Introduction: Archaeological Approaches to Lithic Production Skill and Craft Learning. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 15:1–27. Beck, C., and G.T. Jones. 1990. Toolstone Selection and Lithic Technology in Early Great Basin Prehistory. Journal of Field Archaeology 17:283–299. Beck, C., A.K. Taylor, G.T. Jones, C.M. Fadem, C.R. Cook, and S.A. Millward. 2002. Rocks Are Heavy: Transport Costs and Paleoarchaic Quarry Behaviour in the Great Basin. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 21:481–507. Bielawski, E. 1988. Palaeo-Eskimo Variability: The Early Archaic Small Tool Tradition in the Central Canadian Arctic. American Antiquity 53:52–74. Bilby, J.W. 1923. Among Unknown Eskimo. London: Lippencott. Binford, L.R. 2001. Constructing Frames of Reference: An Analytical Method for Archaeological Theory Building using Hunter-Gatherer and Environmental Data Sets. Los Angeles: University of California Press. Boas, F. 1964. The Central Eskimo. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. Bonnichsen, R. 1977. Models for Deriving Cultural Information from Stone Tools. Ottawa: National Museums of Canada. Brandt, S.A., and K.J. Weedman. 2002. Woman the Toolmaker. Archaeology 55(5):50–54. Clark, J.E. 2003. Craftsmanship and Craft Specialization. In Mesoamerican Lithic Technology: Experimentation and Interpretation. K.G. Hirth, ed. Pp. 220–233. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.

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CHA P TER EIGHT

Apprenticeship and Figured Ostraca from the Ancient Egyptian Village of Deir el-Medina Kathlyn M. Cooney

A figured ostracon is a limestone flake or potsherd that bears a drawing or design on its surface, rather than, or in addition to, a text. Flakes of limestone and pieces of pottery were plentiful in ancient Thebes and readily available for sketching. Ostraca, a disposable medium, can be considered as remnants of learning by draftsmen from ancient Egypt. This chapter examines this statement considering both the cognitive process involved in art creation (normative images, repetition, peripheral practice) and the context for this learning (the community of workmen with its shared and negotiated repertoire of skills, images, and style). Learning is seen here as both internal and external, and collections of figured ostraca are an excellent case study for skill acquisition in ancient Egypt. The learning that took place in a village like Medina during the later New Kingdom (1315–1081 BCE), and probably in other ancient Egyptian craftsmen’s workshops, was not abstract but contextualized because the activity of the group was inherently useful to them, given that members received salaries from the state if they gained access to the formal workshop structure. Figured ostraca are the remnants of a practice of enculturation: the following case study includes poor-quality beginning-student

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hands, medium-level apprentice hands, and high-level master hands, indicating that learning through practice on a disposable medium was occurring at all skill levels in the community, not just among its peripheral members. Figured ostraca provide evidence for learning and apprenticeship as an informal and ongoing acquisition (Rogers 2003) within a “community of practice” (Lave and Wenger 1991) in which people of all skill levels participated. Figured ostraca are remnants of cognitive skill building by an entire community, a result of constant input by participants with a variety of skill levels and goals. A figured ostracon could be created by a skilled or novice hand and could have one or more colors of ink. The drawing could be carved in relief (Brunner-Traut 1956, no. 31, O. Berlin 21449), but more often the ink lines would be left untouched. Sometimes, the ostracon could represent a copy of formal art on a temple wall, as seen in the Lady of Punt example in Berlin (Brunner-Traut 1956, O. Berlin 21442). Much more rarely, the sketch was an original work, such as the evocative image of the stonemason holding a chisel in the Fitzwilliam Museum (Brunner-Traut 1979, EGA 4324-1943) or the expressive woman crouching to blow air into her fire (Brunner-Traut 1956, no. 62, O. Leipzig 1894). Humans were the most commonly depicted subjects in these sketches, but animals are by no means unusual. Artisans even created a fantastical series of figured ostraca representing animals in human dress and behavior (Brunner-Traut 1979, 11–18; Peck and Ross 1978, 49–50). For the most part, these objects were informal; that is, they were unfi nished in the traditional ancient Egyptian sense. The drawn figures are usually incomplete in outline and color, and they generally lack textual captions. These ostraca were easily discarded, as many of them were found in refuse dumps. Egyptological scholarship usually investigates these informal sketches as cultural objects that allow a glimpse into the daily life of the ancient Egyptians (Brunner-Traut 1956, 1979; Keimer 1941; Minault-Gout 2002; Page 1983; Peck and Ross 1978; Peterson 1974; Pomerantseva 1992), or it focuses on functional issues of visual genre (Borchardt 1910; Davies 1917; Shäfer 1916) or trial sketching and formal teaching (Brunner-Traut 1956; Peck and Ross 1978; Peterson 1974), typically within the traditional scholarly specializations of Deir el-Medina or Valley of the Kings studies (Bierbrier 1982; Bruyère and Nagel 1922–1953; Cerný 1973; Valbelle 1985). Most Egyptological catalogs compiling Egyptian figured ostraca focus on unusual, masterful, or especially detailed examples (Andreu 2002; Minault-Gout 2002; Peck and Ross 1978), but to understand figured ostraca from the perspective of cognitive formations, we have to look at characteristics shared by the entire oeuvre.

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The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) owns a collection of figured ostraca that display characteristics shared by most figured ostraca in museum collections around the world: repetition of theme and serialization of genre with occasional bursts of creativity; they thus provide an excellent case study for normative practices. I argue that sketching on ostraca was part of an informal system of ongoing cultural and artistic practice by succeeding generations of artisans based on common images and styles that enabled increased proficiency in proportion, color use, and dexterity, as well as creating an avenue for creativity and innovation. The figured ostracon allowed a complex network of knowledge transference, not only linearly, perhaps within master–student apprenticeship systems, but also diffusely among intermediate and skilled members of the artisanal community.

The LACMA Figured Ostraca The LACMA owns nine New Kingdom figured ostraca, all but two previously unpublished. In 1980, LACMA received hundreds of ancient Egyptian artefacts and texts from the private collection of George Michaelides (Clackson 1994; Dawson et al. 1995), antiquities assembled in Cairo in the twentieth century.1 None of the LACMA ostraca has a recorded findspot, a disappointing fact because even approximate provenance within the Western Theban context could have provided useful information.2 Bengt Julius Peterson (1974) initiated groundbreaking work that examined published and provenanced Ramesside figured ostraca, comparing their subject matter to their findspot. He found more variety in the motifs and subject matter in the village of Deir el-Medina, where the community lived, compared to the Valley of the Kings, where the artisans worked and where ostraca subjects were generally connected to the visual motifs and iconography of the royal tombs—in other words, Valley of the Kings ostraca preserve countless representations of the king in various actions (Daressy 1901). Peterson (1974) also noted higher skill levels in the figured ostraca in the Valley of the Kings—as would be expected because the worksite employed draftsmen who were capable of working with quality precision and were thus either formally a part of the work team or apprenticed to it in an intermediate capacity (Janssen and Janssen 1990). Lower-quality draftsmanship is usually seen in the figured ostraca from the village, where individuals informally and peripherally connected to the workshop lived. The first LACMA figured ostracon (figure 8.1, M. 80.199.47) shows one of the most popular sketch subjects from Western Thebes: the Egyptian

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Figure 8.1. Ostracon M. 80.199.47: a standing king wearing the blue crown. Date: probably New Kingdom, Dynasty 19 or 20(1315–1081 BCE). Material: limestone. Dimensions: 14.7 × 10.6 cm. Provenance: probably Western Thebes, Upper Egypt; gift of the estate of Coletta Miller, 1980. For comparison ostraca, see O. Cairo 25124 (Daressy 1901, 24, plate 24) for a similar pose of the king with arm outstretched. O. DeM 2551 shows a king standing with arm outstretched holding a scimitar (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, plate 69). Also see UC 33210 (Page 1983, 18–19, no. 24), which depicts a king with a solarizing crown and holding his arm outstretched. Source: LACMA.

king, here standing and drawn in black ink. The king faces right, with his arm outstretched, probably meant to hold a weapon or some other ritual object now lost. He wears a blue crown, collar, and short kilt. The head is somewhat oversized in proportion to the body, and the facial profile is poorly formed, with a large nose, uneven eye, and nondescript mouth, suggesting a draftsman in training unable to form strong, even lines of various thicknesses.

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The second ostracon (figure 8.2, M. 80.199.48) is inscribed with images of the king on both sides in both red and black ink. Both sketches exhibit high-quality, practiced and steady lines of varying thickness. It is unclear if the same hand was responsible for both sides. The recto depicts a king in black ink, facing right, wearing a solar double-plumed headdress with a sun disk and ram’s horns. The verso depicts another king’s profile facing right, this one drawn in multiple colors. This sketch includes a detailed blue crown surmounted by double ma‘at feathers, ram’s horns, and a sun disk with uraei. The blue crown includes details of roundels in thin black ink lines throughout, accentuating the skill of the draftsmen, and the ma‘at feathers are internally detailed with thin-lined striations. The sun disks in the headgear are painted a darker shade of red compared to the skin of the king, which is painted a lighter pink color. This a b

Figure 8.2. Ostracon M. 80.199.48. a. Recto: a king wearing a solar crown. b. verso: multicolor king wearing a solar crown looking right, broken at the face. Date: probably New Kingdom, Nineteenth or Twentieth Dynasty (1315–1081 BCE). Material: limestone. Dimensions: 14.5 × 10.8 cm. Provenance: unknown but probably Western Thebes, Upper Egypt; gift of the estate of Coletta Miller, 1980. For sketches of the royal profile with various crowns, see O. Cairo 25144–25165 (Daressy 1901, 29–32, plates 29 and 30), O. DeM 2568–2592 (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 116–121, plates 72–76), and O. DeM 2969–2986 (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 212–216, plates 141–147). Photographs of this ostracon with probable provenance of Western Thebes were published before the purchase by Michaelides (Keimer 1941, 12–13, nos. 30 and 34, plates 10 and 11). Source: LACMA.

Figure 8.3. Ostracon M. 80.199.50: monkey climbing a tree. Date: probably New Kingdom, Nineteenth or Twentieth Dynasty (1315–1081 BCE). Material: limestone. Dimensions: 12 × 14.5 cm. Provenance: unknown but probably Western Thebes, Upper Egypt; gift of the estate of Coletta Miller, 1980. Some similar pieces are O. DeM 2001–2005, 2009 (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 1–5, plates 1–3), O. DeM 2734–2738 (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 161–162, plate 117), and EGA 4292-1943 (Brunner-Traut 1979, 50, plate 17). Some Egyptologists place the scene of the monkey and palm tree into a kind of “daily life” category (Keimer 1941). BrunnerTraut (1956, 110) connects the scene with “Kleinkunst” and domestic house painting and sees this figured ostracon theme as practice for such domestic decoration. Source: LACMA.

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draftsman was adept in not only the formation of line but also the application of various color hues. The third figured ostracon from LACMA (figure 8.3, M. 80.199.50) depicts a monkey climbing a palm tree, drawn in a fluid fashion in red and black ink. The subject of a monkey climbing a palm is quite popular in Ramesside Period Western Thebes (Andreu 2002, 102, no. 39; Minault-Gout 2002, 105–109; Peterson 1974, 33, 44). The monkey on this

Figure 8.4. Ostracon M. 80.199.184: man with arms upraised before a tree. Date: probably New Kingdom, Nineteenth or Twentieth Dynasty (1315–1081 BCE). Material: limestone. Dimensions: 9 × 7.5 cm. Provenance: unknown but probably Western Thebes, Upper Egypt; gift of the estate of Coletta Miller, 1980. For images of worship before deities and kings, see O. Cairo 25036–25037, 25041 (Daressy 1901, 8–9, plates 8 and 9), O. DeM 2404, 2407–2412, 2421 (Vandier D’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 83– 87, plates 58– 61), O. DeM 2881–2883 Vandier D’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 192–193, plates 126 and 127), and O. Berlin 3299 and O. Hamburg 12:18:7 (BrunnerTraut 1956, 55–56, plate 18). Source: LACMA.

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ostracon faces left, with one hand outstretched to the fruit in the tree while the other hand holds the trunk. The image is drawn in a reasonably smooth and practiced hand, even though the sketch is abbreviated and schematic, probably indicating that it was done quickly, perhaps by an intermediate-level draftsman. Only the basic lines of the monkey’s head and body have been included; this abridged and stylized sketch bears little detail. There is only some internal stippling in thick red and black dabs in the body of the monkey. The tail extends behind, filled with reddish brown ochre. The lines of the palm tree have been quickly drawn, with thick-lined and firm diagonal slashes in red and black along trunk. The fourth LACMA figured ostracon (figure 8.4, M. 80.199.184) represents a scene of piety before a god: a man stands with arms upraised in worship of a tree. The ostracon is decorated on one side only, and much of the depiction is now worn away. The tree probably represents the tree goddess, a common image of veneration from the Theban area in Ramesside times. In addition to black and red paint, there are traces of yellow and expensive green pigments, suggesting that the ostracon may have served a votive purpose and thus deserved further color embellishment. The artisan seems of average skill level. The application of line is not very firm, and the body of the man is unmodeled and stiff. There is little detail; quickly sketched, thick lines were drawn on the man’s kilt and within the trunk of the tree. The fifth ostracon (figure 8.5, M. 80.202.28) depicts a popular subject: the king, in this case striding toward the right, holding a staff. The body is sketched in a black line and filled with reddish brown paint. There are traces of a white paint wash over the red ochre on the kilt. The pottery ostracon is broken just above king’s forehead, but the remainder of the crown is filled with blue paint, a rare and expensive pigment on figured ostraca, again perhaps suggesting a votive purpose, perhaps even as the deified Amenhotep I (for this cult, see Cerný 1927). The draftsman has added a uraeus on the forehead and streamers extending from the back of crown in black ink. The draftsman’s line application is firm but lacks some fluidity. There is no internal detail sketching in the crown or kilt. The sixth figured ostracon in this case study is a marl potsherd with many sketches on both the recto and verso, all drawn in an unpracticed hand (figure 8.6, M. 80.202.29). On the recto is a human profile wearing a short wig, facing left with drafting guidelines preserved at the top of the head and at the mouth level. The guidelines and the insecure, choppy quality of line indicate a beginning-level student draftsman. Next to this head are two more indistinct and roughly drawn sketches: a rectangle above and a trapezoidal shape to the bottom right. The verso (not shown) bears more sketches, which are practically illegible as they are not in

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Figure 8.5. Ostracon M. 80.202.28: standing king holding a staff. Date: probably New Kingdom (1504– 1081 BCE). Material: Nile silt potsherd. Dimensions: 14 × 18.5 cm. Provenance: unknown; gift of Jerome Snyder, 1980. Images of standing kings abound on figured ostraca. See O. Cairo 25001–25023 (Daressy 1901, 1–5, plates 1– 4) and O. DeM 2551–2553 (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 113, plates 76, 69, and 70). Source: LACMA.

same orientation and overlap one another. This ostracon may be a remnant of skill acquisition in early stages. The seventh ostracon (figure 8.7, M. 80.203.195) is inscribed with black ink on two sides. On one side are two rudimentary columns of hieroglyphs, presumably private names, written in what seems to be an unpracticed hand. On the other side is a sketch of a nonroyal facial profile. This example is drawn looking left, wearing a fillet and a shoulderlength wig. The line is strong and fluid, although there is no variation of line thickness and the eye is ill-formed. A poorly drawn sketch fills the area to the left of this profile—perhaps a fisted human hand— suggesting at least two draftsmen’s hands on one side of this ostracon. The eighth LACMA ostracon (figure 8.8, M. 80.203.202) depicts two kings’ profiles in red and black ink. The left profile shows a king wearing a detailed Nubian wig and uraeus. The right profile depicts a king wearing the blue war crown and uraeus. Both royal profiles have a red undersketch with a black ink line, and both were sketched with the same practiced, fi rm, fluid line with small-scale internal details in varying

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Figure 8.6. Ostracon M. 80.202.29: human profi le looking left and other sketches. Date: New Kingdom (1504—1081 BCE). Material: marl potsherd. Dimensions: 13.3 × 13.5 cm. Provenance: unknown; gift of Jerome Snyder, 1980. There are many examples of human heads and bodies drawn with grids on limestone and wood from the Eighteenth Dynasty (Hayes 1942, 9, no. 1, plate 1; Peck and Ross 1978, no. 32), and some Ramesside ostraca (e.g., MMA 15382) show a number of sketches of royal and private male profi les accompanied by other figured sketches drawn by multiple hands (Peterson 1974, 73, plate 12). Source LACMA.

thickness. On the other side of this ostracon is a letter written in hieratic Late Egyptian by a scribe named Ipuy to another scribe, concerning farmland. Deities of Khar (Syria-Palestine) are called upon. Also mentioned is an upcoming festival for the goddess Antit (Anath) of Gaza (Goedicke and Wente 1962, 24, no. 85, plate 93; Grdseloff 1942, 35–37, plates 7 and 8; Wente 1990, 127). It is likely that the letter was inscribed first and, when it arrived at its destination (probably Deir el-Medina), a sketch was added to the verso. The text and image have almost nothing to do with one another; the letter may have been received by a scribe, whose highquality hand decorated the other side.

a

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Figure 8.7. Ostracon M. 80.203.195. a. A human profile looking left and other sketch. b. Practice hieroglyphs. Date: probably New Kingdom, Nineteenth or Twentieth Dynasty (1315–1081 BCE). Material: limestone. Dimensions: 13 × 14.5 cm. Provenance: unknown but probably Western Thebes, Upper Egypt; gift of Carl W. Thomas. Photographs of the ostracon with probable provenance of Western Thebes were published before the purchase by Michaelides (Keimer 1941, plate 9, fig. 7). For some images of human profiles, see O. DeM 2505–2550 (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 104–112, plates 66– 68). Many examples, including O. Cairo 25024, O. Cairo 25025 (Daressy 1901, 6, plate 5), and O. Cairo 25160 (Daressy 1901, 31, plate 30), show men wearing a similar wig and similar band around the forehead. Source: LACMA.

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Figure 8.8. Ostracon M. 80.203.202. a. Two king’s profiles. b. Late Egyptian letter in hieratic. Date: New Kingdom, Nineteenth Dynasty (1315–1201 BCE). Material: limestone. Dimensions: 13 × 24.3 cm. Provenance: unknown but probably Thebes, Upper Egypt; gift of Carl W. Thomas, 1980. For more depictions of royal profiles, see O. Cairo 25144–25165 (Daressy 1901, 29–32, plates 29 and 30), O. DeM 2568–2592 (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 116–121, plates 72–76), and O. DeM 2969–2986 (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, 212–216, plates 141–146). There are a number of examples in German collections as well (Brunner-Traut 1956, 48–51, plates 14–16). Source: LACMA.

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The last and ninth ostracon (figure 8.9, M. 80.203.209) in this case study is not a figured ostracon per se but has been included to show evidence of learning. One side depicts multiple hieratic bird signs in black ink as if the maker were practicing his penmanship. These bird hieroglyphs represent the wr or “great” bird (G 37 in the Gardiner sign list;

Figure 8.9. Ostracon M. 80.203.209 showing practice wr bird hieroglyphs. Date: New Kingdom, Eighteenth to Twentieth Dynasty (1504–1081 BCE). Material: limestone. Dimensions: this large ostracon is broken into three pieces, a, 19 × 28 cm; b, 10.8 × 18.5 cm; and c, 14 × 17 cm. Provenance: unknown but probably Western Thebes; gift of Carl W. Thomas, 1980. For an example in which a less accomplished draftsman practiced the nb basket hieroglyph, see O. Berlin 23972 (Brunner-Traut 1956, 130, plate 44). Source: LACMA.

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Gardiner 1957), and the line quality is adequate. The repeated sketching of hieroglyphic signs and motifs was not uncommon (Peterson 1974, 24, 48). The recto of this large ostracon preserves a text of 10 lines from a piece of wisdom literature certainly written in a different hand. It is likely that a large ostracon was chosen for the inscription of the wisdom text, which was applied first. A second, less skilled individual then used the verso to practice handwriting. All of these LACMA examples share characteristics with New Kingdom figured ostraca from Western Thebes. All the limestone chips or potsherds have an irregular, unfinished shape, and there was no attempt at formal layout or symmetry in the image inscribed on its surface. The drawings are incomplete, partly owing to the nature of the drawing medium and partly because they were meant as informal sketches. These objects are typically the end results of fast drawing with no erasures or plaster corrections. If mistakes were made, lines were simply redrawn over previous marks. Figured ostraca rarely have text accompanying the drawings. Unlike formal Egyptian artistic depictions on tomb and temple walls, these sketches often remain unlabeled and therefore according to the prescribed artistic standards of educated ancient Egyptians, unidentified, informal, and without any explicit purpose— apotropaic, votive, or otherwise. Most of the LACMA figured ostraca depict generalized subject matter devoid of context, another pattern in keeping with the majority of New Kingdom figured ostraca in collections around the world (Peterson 1974). There are several dominant and constantly repeated motifs, such as king’s figures and profiles, isolated human images, and sketches of various animals. In fact, the LACMA corpus is characterized chiefly by its homogeneous and commonplace subject matter. Ostraca with repetitive and standardized subjects are often overlooked in the Egyptological literature, in favor of either those rare pieces that depict more narrative visual genres (providing context and thus perhaps more cultural information) or those that represent the hand of a true master. The LACMA ostraca reveal a variety of abilities among those engaged in the sketching. Some figures are practically unrecognizable (figure 8.6); others are masterfully rendered in evocative detail (figures 8.2 and 8.8). Most are adequate and of intermediate skill level (figures 8.1, 8.3– 8.5, 8.7, and 8.9). Drawing on limestone flakes was not restricted to the very accomplished, nor was it considered appropriate only for the unskilled. The vast majority of figured ostraca are commonplace images presented without context—isolated and incomplete depictions of an animal, a human profile, or a standing king, just as we see in the LACMA collection. Although such generalized images make up the bulk of figured ostraca collections, there is little discussion of this homogeneity in subject

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matter in the Egyptological literature. The most popular subject in the LACMA collection, as with all figured ostraca, is the image of the king (figures 8.1, 8.2, 8.5, and 8.8). In two other LACMA ostraca, a nonroyal man’s face is represented in profile (figures 8.6 and 8.7), another very common depiction in New Kingdom sketches. In another piece, a monkey is depicted climbing a palm tree (figure 8.3), again a popular subject in Deir el-Medina ostraca sketching. Most figured ostraca represent the same repertoire of abbreviated humans and animal figures without much, if any, text or context, and they remain without any specific function. How should we explain the existence of sketches like these? Why did artisans take the time to produce this mass of sketched material, and why was there such a limited range of subject matter? Was it preparatory work? Do these images represent pattern books or collections of standard iconography? Are they the remnants of schooling in remedial and advanced draftsmanship? Are these figured ostraca copies of formal art in tombs and temples? Or are they simply sketches that were made out of boredom, functioning only for the moments that they were works in progress? If the LACMA ostraca, and the thousands of others like them, represent “practice” sketches whose usefulness expired once the sketch was complete, why would the artisans of Deir el-Medina have needed this “practice” when they were constantly active painting tomb walls? The LACMA provides an excellent collection through which the functionality of sketching can be reviewed and challenged. Egyptologists have assigned a number of different functions to figured ostraca, as trial sketches, pattern books, practice media, or school exercises, but none of them can fully account for the key characteristics of these sketches—namely, the repetitive and homogenized subject matter in combination with a variety of skill levels.

Trial Sketches Many Egyptologists have suggested that figured ostraca acted as preparatory sketches for the formal paintings drawn on the walls of royal and private tombs (Borchardt 1910; Maspero 1912, 168–169). According to this thinking, the ancient Egyptian artisan sketched a trial drawing on a potsherd or piece of limestone that he could then use as a guide when applying paint to a formal surface, such as a plastered tomb wall or stela. Emma Brunner-Traut (1956, 6) has noted one obvious example: a sketched image on an ostracon that corresponds with the formal scene in a tomb. This ostracon probably dates to the 18th Dynasty and may very well represent some kind of trial piece used to guide the team of tomb artisans responsible for layout and drawing. William C. Hayes (1942, 5) also notes

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a number of possible instances of trial sketches, claiming that most ostraca acted as “preliminary studies of figures, scenes, or decorative elements which were, or were to have been, painted on the walls of the tomb—that is, drawings made with a definite purpose in view.” However, these few examples for trial sketching come from the 18th Dynasty, a time to which few figured ostraca can be dated and just before the explosion of figured ostraca production in the Ramesside period. Some Ramesside ostraca do provide the basic layout for the painting on a coffin, as seen in an unpublished ostracon in Turin, which depicts a Ramesside coffin, planned out in multidimensional form with text bands. There are also some 19th and 20th Dynasty ostraca with geometric designs that correspond to the ceiling decoration of private tombs (Peterson 1974, 52, 57–58, 64OK) or others representing false doors or columns (Vandier d’Abbadie and Gasse 1936–1986, O. IFAO 2701, 2702, plate 91). Some ostraca from the Valley of the Kings, found near the tomb of Ramses VII, represent scenes similar to what one would see in a royal tomb, although they are “not paralleled among the known netherworld books” (Demarée 2003: 25). Brunner-Traut (1956, 64– 65) identifies a number of Ramesside examples depicting nude adolescent females and mothers with children, which she believes acted as trial sketches for domestic wall paintings, but this is a contested interpretation (Peterson 1974). There are thus occasional correlations between informal sketches on figured ostraca and formal, functional art, but we should question the frequent assumption that such drawings were preparatory sketches or copies of existing designs. The notion of trial sketching alone cannot account for the creation of so many figured ostraca. In fact, there are very few Ramesside figured ostraca that lay out scenes found on a tomb wall, coffin, or sarcophagus, even though we know that Deir el-Medina craftsmen decorated dozens of royal and private tombs and produced hundreds of private coffins during 19th and 20th (Cooney 2007). If artisans used figured ostraca primarily as preparatory sketches, one might expect to see more images of the Four Sons of Horus, the Tree goddess, the winged figure of Nut, or underworld genies from Book of the Dead scenes. Instead, it is clear that most figured ostraca do not have specific, identifiable sources but rather, as the LACMA examples show, are derived from a generalized set of iconographical images.

Pattern Books Another suggested function is that sketches were akin to pattern books, which allowed artisans to collect imagery they wished to maintain in their collective consciousness. Heinrich Schäfer and Norman de Garis

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Davies were the first to reject the notion that figured ostraca were used chiefly for preparatory layout, instead interpreting these sketches as a disposable medium for pure sketching. The very fact that West Theban ostraca were usually found in ancient refuse dumps suggested to them that their use was usually short-lived. Davies believes the drawings were a creative outlet for times of boredom and idleness and suggested the rather Marxian interpretation that these drawings gave a discontented population a narrow avenue for the venting of emotions of social disgust and professional dissatisfaction (1917, 236–237). Schäfer, on the other hand, saw very little overlap in specific content between the royal tomb walls, which these draftsmen painted, and ostraca images from the Valley of the Kings. To him, figured ostraca are the end result of artisans copying and collecting existing formal art, such as the image of the Punt queen from the funerary temple of Queen Hatshepsut at Deir el Bahari found on an ostracon in the village of Deir el-Medina (1916, 46). Schäfer argued that figured ostraca are collections of artistic images and thus representative of years of “artistic breeding” among the Deir el-Medina draftsmen (“jahrtausendlange künstlerische Zucht eines ganzen Volkes,” 50–51). In one sense, Schäfer’s understanding of figured ostraca might fit with the art historical notion of a “pattern book” or “model book” (Alexander 1992; Buchthal 1979; Evans 1969; Scheller 1963)— a collection of the most common images and iconography used by artisans as guides and inspiration in their daily work. However, only a tiny minority of figured ostraca can be proven to be copies of formal art. According to Peterson’s (1974) comprehensive survey, Western Theban figured ostraca subjects are usually not derived from traditional scenes and images from temples or tombs but rather are “details” or abstract likenesses that can be only loosely associated with such formal art. Peterson states that these objects are free from the usual iconographical traditions (“mehr oder weniger frei von den üblichen ikonographischen Traditionen,” (Peterson 1974, 18). This does not mean that there is no correspondence between formal and informal art—just that the functional link is difficult to identify. For example, there is a loose correlation in subject matter between ostraca from the Valley of the Kings and the images from the royal tombs themselves, evident in the countless figured ostraca depicting royal figures. Peterson consequently categorizes many figured ostraca as “zielbewusster Übungen”(1974, 23). His notion of “practice with a purpose” removes the necessity of dealing with figured ostraca as preparatory sketches, looking instead to a more abstract function. To Peterson, the commonality of images in figured ostraca represents a kind of canonical practice material. This would explain the recurrence of the same subjects—the same im-

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ages of kings, human profiles, monkeys climbing trees, and deities that we see in the LACMA collection. Yet all of this raises another question that Peterson does not address: Why did these artisans need so much practice?

Sketching for Practice Davies was the first to point out that the explosion of figured ostraca creation coincided with the disappearance of the grid as a means of creating art and the appearance of freehand drawings during the Ramesside Period, even in the most formal settings (Davies 1917, 237). Davies recognized a correlation between the increasing number of figured ostraca and the methodological changes in art production. However, he did not explain the increase in figured ostraca and sketching activity through the loss of the grid; rather, he argued that artisans increasingly turned to sketching because of changes in subject matter found in Ramesside private tombs, most especially owing to the loss of expressive scenes of daily life that were so common in the 18th Dynasty: “The draughtsman, therefore, suddenly withheld from professional use of much of his hardly-won capacities, naturally gave them exercise in idler moments and in satirical compositions” (237). Not only does this “creative outlet” explanation betray Davies’s lack of respect for Ramesside tomb scenes in comparison to 18th Dynasty examples, but also it misses a key point: without the grid, artisans may have needed a way to practice drawing a figure to scale and proportion without any guidelines. In the 18th Dynasty, the use of grid squares provided a means of equalizing skills among craftsmen of different capabilities and perhaps even stylistic sensibilities. When the use of grids declined, informal sketching may have become more important. The repeated sketching of humans, gods, and animals may have fulfilled a need for practicing freehand proportional and stylistic sensibilities— practice now needed by the entire artisanal population, skilled and unskilled alike. But, if figured ostraca filled this important function, then why do we not also have masses of figured ostraca from other sites beyond Western Thebes? The limestone chip may be part of the answer; it was a plentiful waste product of the work in the Valley of the Kings in particular, and it seems to have become the medium for sketching in Western Thebes in the Ramesside period. Other time periods and other places would have used other media connected to their own work and contexts, including potsherds and reusable writing boards (Peck and Ross 1978). The 18th Dynasty site of Tell el Amarna in par ticular has preserved a number of figured ostraca mostly on potsherds, although nowhere near the numbers

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of Ramesside Western Theban examples, depicting the expected royal subject matter (Frankfort and Pendlebury 1933, 16–31, 58, 91, plate 35; Peet and Woolley 1923, 14–15, 27–28, 66, 72, 74, plates 10.6, 14.3, 23.2; Pendlebury 1951, 64–74, 88, plates 70.5, 74.2). The disappearance of the grid may explain a need for more “practice” by draftsmen, but given the fact that it was already in decline in the reign of Amenhotep II in Dynasty18, it does not neatly explain the need for artisanal sketching overall.

Sketches as School Exercises Many scholars believe that the large number of ostraca represents the product of school exercises (Brunner-Traut 1956, 8; Brunner-Traut 1979, 7; Keller 1991; Peck and Ross 1978, 31; Peterson 1974, 53), arguing that the limited repertoire of representations may owe its origins to some kind of formal training system in which groups of boys were given similar subjects on which to work. Many of the LACMA ostraca could indeed have been school exercises. The subject matter in all examples is generalized and part of the same popular series of motifs. More important, the skill level of many of the LACMA examples represents medium- to low-quality draftsmanship (figures 8.1, 8.3– 8.7, and 8.9). However, we are treading on a slippery slope when we equate inferior quality with evidence for training. When is skill level poor enough for the modern scholar to categorize an ostracon as a formal school exercise? And why did the skilled draftsmen (e.g., those responsible for figures 8.2 and 8.8) create figured ostraca with the same bland subject matter, despite their more practiced hands? It might be possible to conclude that higher-quality ostraca represent the model examples that the students were meant to copy (Peck and Ross 1978, 27), as some Egyptologists assume is the case in the famous Berlin ostraca pair (figure 8.10) that depicts, in one ostracon, a high-quality seated king and, in the other, a different copy read by some as lesser quality and thus supposedly drawn by a student (Brunner-Traut 1956, 44– 47, cat. nos. 28, 29, plate 12; Janssen and Janssen 1990, 88). However, the difference between these two pieces may not be as much qualitative as it is reflective of different stylistic sensibilities. These pieces are not necessarily the products of formal artistic training, at least not in a linear student–master relationship. There are many theoretical problems with the evocation of schools, or linear master–pupil relationships, in this sketched material. Equating the quality of these informal sketches with a formal function is fraught with inconsistencies and assumptions. There are insufficient examples of matching depictions of varying quality to sustain the conclusion that so many figured ostraca find their origins in formal school activities based

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Figure 8.10. Ostraca pair from Berlin. Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin AM 21434 and 21435.

on mimesis. In fact, a quality assessment of figured ostraca in collections around the world, and in the LACMA case study, shows a very wide continuum of skill levels. Given the lack of evidence for formal artistic education in Deir el-Medina based on mimetic activity between teacher and pupil, it is more likely that most craft instruction did not happen in a formal setting but, rather, informally, continuously (Rogers 2003), and even unconsciously at the work site and in the craftsmen’s village, among small groups of artisans and apprentices who networked diffusely, not linearly. When we see sketching as an informal and organic product of the entire artisanal community, we are approaching a fuller understanding of mechanisms of learning, capturing, and transferring visual imagery.

Practice, Proportion, and Play as Skill Equalization In the Valley of the Kings, the Deir el-Medina craftsmen probably spent long stretches of time waiting for the roster to be taken, for the supplies and rations to arrive, or for the heavy labor crews to finish certain tasks. Much of this time must have been spent creating the multitude of figured ostraca now found in museum collections around the world today. Most such sketches are not copies of older art, nor are they trial pieces or formal school exercises. The selection of motifs do not represent clear common denominators that appear in most forms of formal art; actually,

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some of the most commonly sketched elements are not seen in formal images at all. For example, there are very few representations of monkeys and other animals in naturalistic behavior in formal funerary or temple art, but ostraca from Western Thebes preserve hundreds of such examples. These artisans used a differentiated and homogenized set of iconography for informal sketching. The LACMA figured ostraca are examples of just such visual material, and it is the limited generality that makes such images the perfect subject matter for Deir el-Medina artisans and their apprentices, who are learning the craft of their fathers, uncles, and cousins. As for the specific details within the homogenized set of representations, we must assume some choice at least within the details for the artisan, and we might also conclude the lack of a copied model in most cases. Limiting sketching to certain subjects could be compared to the cognitive socialization of Western children when they practice drawing (not to suggest that Egyptian art is childlike in quality or sophistication). Children are encouraged to stay within an understood repertoire of subjects—to draw boxlike houses, puffy clouds, stick figures, and angular cars. They are also encouraged to practice a style of representation that is recognizable— one that avoids perspective and excessive, unreadable creativity— by constantly repeating and practicing a generalized set of known images (Piaget 1962). Explanations for repetitive practice are as dependent on basic human psychology as they are on ancient Egyptian social and aesthetic structures. If one looks at the work of cognitive scientists, neurologists, biologists, and anthropologists (Callois 2001; Csikszentmihalyi and Bennet 1971; Dissanayake 1988; Gardner 1973; Grimes 1995, 43– 44; Harth 1999; Stokes 1972) as it pertains to sketching and art production, it is documented that the repetition of common and known imagery helps the brain to process form and style. Cognitive scientist Erich Harth (1999) argues that neural patterns of serialization and grouping reinforce images into a kind of internal neural sketchpad. He also notes that “every act of invention or creation involves trial patterns in the head that are being judged for their adequacy and modified until they appear satisfactory” (104). Thus, the creation of figured ostraca with serialized and common subject matter was an external communitywide method of processing images, allowing common denominators of iconography to be chosen among an entire community of Egyptian artisans and those learning their craft. Psychological and biological imperatives for informal artistic production and sketching can be accounted for in anthropological theories of adult “play behavior”— spontaneous practice within the entire community that is nonetheless controlled by cultural norms and expectations of

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style and form. Informal art production is a materially unproductive, but cognitively productive, play activity, supporting learned behaviors and lessening tension during times of boredom or stress (Dissanayake 1988, 65– 66; Stokes 1972). Informal artistic production, such as sketching, has been called “a kind of adult play behavior” (Dissanayake 1988, 75) because “repetition, recurrence, and restoration of order” are part of a spontaneous and informal cultural activity that all humans participate in to process and serialize the world around them and the activities that take place in it (77). Some neurologists have concluded that sketching can be called a “goal directed form of play” (Gardner 1973, 166), mirroring Egyptologist Peterson’s notion of “practice with purpose.” Ancient Egyptian artisanal communities were constantly practicing and playing with images, form, and repetition in order to process the world around them. Playing with form and line is a participatory, informal, nonstructured learning process that allows practitioners to create memory structures and determine how images are perceived, processed, stored, retrieved, changed, and discarded. Play among humans develops boundaries and norms (Gosso et al. 2005); it is practiced through repetition of acts punctuated by spells of free experimentation (Dissanayake 1988, 74–91). Among the draftsmen of Deir el-Medina, much of the sketching on ostraca allowed an informal and spontaneous conversation involving subjects belonging to visual standards, removing images that were irregular, exaggerated, or in any way out of bounds, thereby establishing what was accepted as a visual norm. The majority of sketching at Deir el-Medina followed visual standards in style, subject matter, and methodology. However, figured ostraca are nonetheless punctuated with unexpected, new, and fresh examples that do not follow the accepted standards of proportion, form, dimension, perspective, or subject matter. Informal sketching allowed the craftsmen of Deir el-Medina not only the opportunity to learn and practice their accepted norms but also the chance to risk and test new artistic forms and combinations. It was one of the main methods by which style was maintained, but it was also the avenue through which styles were updated and modified—a psychological and neurological mechanism for taste change.

Skill Acquisition and the Community of Practice Play and practice with the repetition of images helps us to understand cognitive internalization. But we also have to see learning as externalization, and here we recognize the figured ostracon as the bridge between play, practice, and work within a larger community. For the ancient

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Egyptian draftsman, artistic knowledge was attained through practice, and this knowledge was created within a particular cultural context of accepted standards and norms (Bourdieu 1977). The serialization of a differentiated set of images indicates an ongoing communal agreement of subject matter, and thus that sketching activity happened within a communal structure, one that we could call a “community of practice” (Lave and Wenger 1991; Wenger 1998). Not everyone living in Deir el-Medina, or within any other artisanal workshop setting in ancient Egypt, was a part of the community of practice; only those actively involved played a part: craftsmen with a formal role in workshop activity and their offspring whose goal was formal admittance to that workshop. The community of practice in ancient Egypt was a flexible and adaptable teaching system that did not rely on linear master–pupil relationships. All those who belonged shared an interest in visual memory acquisition, equalization, style, socialization, standardization, and creativity. The members of this community of practice held different areas of influence— some were masters and thus full participants, some were capable draftsmen and thus active participants, and others were just learning and thus on the periphery of the system. Those who were part of the official work gang could use figured ostraca to teach, to explain a plan of action, to show their skill, and even to compete with other artisans, and thus maintain their position in the community; those on the periphery used sketching to develop and display specialized skill sets and knowledge, which were key to entrance into the workshop. Sketching was peripheral to the real practice of funerary art production and provided a system of guidance and skill acquisition with less risk and intensity than painting a formal art object. The practice of sketching utilized the cognitive skills of the entire community— as a source of normative styles and themes and as a source of innovation. The homogeneity of subject matter indicates that the learning process of a craftsman was a social process and that knowledge was embedded in the practice of artistic creation, whether formal or informal. Figured ostraca are remnants of an informal dialogue of learning and accountability between practitioners, a dynamic negotiation of form and meaning that has been frozen in time because it was recorded on a limestone flake. Acknowledgments

I thank a number of people at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art who made this work possible, especially Nancy Thomas, who kindly permitted me to publish these pieces; Renée Montgomery and Delfin Magpantay, who facilitated my work at the museum; and Peter Brenner, who kindly allowed me use of many of his photographs. I thank Nancy Thomas,

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Violaine Chauvet, and Regina Schulz for reading and commenting on the first draft, and Neil Crawford for his input throughout the project. A shorter version of this research was presented at the American Research Center in Egypt’s annual meeting, April 17, 2004, in Tucson, Arizona, titled “Drawings Unseen and Rediscovered: New Kingdom Figured Ostraca in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.” Finally, I thank Cathleen Keller, who made helpful comments about the research in its initial stages. She will be missed. Notes 1. Michaelides died in 1973, after which most of his collection was purchased by antiquities dealers, who then sold lots to individuals, other dealers, and various institutions, including the British Museum, Cambridge University Library, and the British Library. Because so many dealers were involved in the transactions after Michaelides’ death, it is unclear which individuals and institutions purchased ostraca and when they acquired them. LACMA was given approximately 30% of the Michaelides textual hieratic ostraca. All of the original hieratic Late Egyptian textual ostraca in the Michaelides collection have been published (Goedicke and Wente 1962), but the figured ostraca were not included in the volume. Two of the figured ostraca (LACMA M. 80.203.195 and LACMA M. 80.199.48) were published before they were purchased by Michaelides (Keimer 1941). Seven of the nine LACMA figured ostraca are published here for the first time. LACMA was also given a number of texts, including mummy tags and a selection of the Michaelides textual ostraca, made of both limestone and terracotta, written in hieratic Late Egyptian, Demotic, Greek, Coptic, and Arabic. In this lot are only nine figured ostraca. I have not been able to locate any other figured ostraca from the former Michaelides collection, although it is almost certain that examples exist that were sold between 1973 and 1980 to museums or to private collectors. 2. Despite the fact that these LACMA ostraca are unprovenanced, the type and cut of the limestone and the style of representation strongly suggest an origin in the Western Theban area of Upper Egypt and a date during the New Kingdom, most of them more specifically attributable to the Ramesside period (19th and 20th Dynasties, 1315–1081 BCE). The Ramesside period is the most prolific time for figured ostraca preservation, if not also production (Bruyère and Nagel 1922–1953). Thousands of Ramesside ostraca from Western Thebes found their way onto the art market around the turn of the 20th century, and it is likely that those purchased from Michaelides come from this time period and area as well. Many of the LACMA ostraca can probably be linked even more precisely to Deir el-Medina artisans and to their village or work sites in the Valley of the Kings or Valley of the Queens, given the diagnostic rock type, the subject matter associated with royal tomb production, and style of the images,

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such as long, narrow, often unmodeled Ramesside body shapes and post-Amarna neck lines and eye shapes (Werbrouck 1932). The work of these Western Theban craftsmen— cutting and decorating the tombs in the Valley of the Kings— produced a tremendous amount of limestone chips of this size and density, which were then used to keep records, write letters, and sketch. Even if the LACMA figured ostraca do not find their origins in Ramesside period sites in Western Thebes, which is unlikely, they are still relevant to a larger discussion on skill acquisition. Regardless of their origins, they provide a great deal of information about sketching and practice of individuals engaged in image creation, particularly by showing a variety of quality levels—from the basic beginner to the capable apprentice to the master hand. References Alexander, J.J.G. 1992. Medieval Illuminators and Their Methods of Work. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Andreu, G. 2002. Les artistes de pharaon: Deir el-Médineh et la Vallée des Rois. Paris: Musée du Louvre. Bierbrier, M.L. 1982. The Tomb Builders of the Pharaohs. London: British Museum Publications. Borchardt, L. 1910. Studien und Entwürfe altägyptischer Künstler. Kunst und Künstler 8 (1910): 34– 42. Bourdieu, P. 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Brunner-Traut, E. 1956. Die altägyptischen Scherbenbilder (Bildostraka) der Deutschen Museen und Sammlungen. Wiesbaden. Brunner-Traut, E. 1979. Egyptian Artists’ Sketches: Figured Ostraka from the Gayer-Anderson Collection in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. Leiden: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut te Istanbul Bruyère, B., and G. Nagel. 1922–1953. Rapport sur les fouilles de Deir el Médineh. Cairo: Institut français d’archéologie orientale du Caire. Buchthal, H. 1979. The “Musterbuch” of Wolfenbüttel. Vienna. Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaft. Callois, R. 2001. Man, Play and Games. M. Barash, trans. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2001. Cerný, J. 1927. Le culte d’Amenophis Ier chez les ouvriers de la nécropole thébaine. BIFAO (Bulletin de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale) 27: 159–203. Cerný, J. 1973. Community of Workmen at Thebes in the Ramesside Period. Cairo: Institut français d’archéologie orientale. Clackson, S.J. 1994. The Michaelides Manuscript Collection. Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 100:223–226.

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Cooney, K.M. 2007. The Cost of Death: The Social and Economic Value of Ancient Egyptian Funerary Art in the Ramesside Period. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. Csikszentmihalyi, M., and S. Bennet. 1971. An Exploratory Model of Play. American Anthropologist 73(1):45–58. Daressy, M.G. 1901. Ostraca. Vols. 25001–25383. Cairo: Institut Français d’archéologie Orientale. Davies, N.G. 1917. Egyptian Drawings on Limestone Flakes. Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 4:234–240. Dawson, W.R., E.P. Uphill, and M.L. Bierbrier. 1995. Who Was Who in Egyptology. London: Egypt Exploration Society. Demarée, R. J. 2003. Ramesside Ostraca. London: British Museum Press. Dissanayake, E. 1988. What Is Art For? Seattle: University of Washington Press. Evans, M.W. 1969. Medieval Drawings. Feltham, New York: Hamlyn. Frankfort, H., and J.D.S. Pendlebury. 1933. The City of Akhenaten II: The North Suburb and the Desert Altars. London: Egypt Exploration Society. Gardiner, A.H. 1957. Egyptian Grammar. London: Oxford University Press. Gardner, H. 1973. The Arts and Human Development. New York: Wiley. Goedicke, H., and E.F. Wente. 1962. Ostraka Michaelides. Wiesbaden: O. Harrassowitz. Gosso, Y., E. Otta, M. De Lima, S.E. Morais, F.J.L. Ribeiro, and V.S.R. Bussab. 2005. Play in Hunter-Gatherer Society. In The Nature of Play: Great Apes and Humans. A.D. Pellegrini and P.K. Smith, eds. Pp. 213–253. New York: Guilford. Grdseloff, B. 1942. Les débuts du culte de Rechef en Égypte. Cairo: Institut français d’archéologie orientale. Grimes, R.L. 1995. Beginnings in Ritual Studies. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press. Harth, E. 1999. The Emergence of Art and Language in the Human Brain. Journal of Consciousness Studies 6(6–7):97–115. Hayes, W.C. 1942. Ostraka and Name Stones from the Tomb of Sen-Mut (no. 71) at Thebes. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art. Janssen, R.M., and J.J. Janssen. 1990. Growing Up in Ancient Egypt. London: Rubicon. Keimer, L. 1941. Sur un Certain nombre d’ostraca figurés, de plaquettes sculptées, etc. provenant de la Nécropole Thébaine et encore inédits. Études d’Ègyptologie 3:1–24. Keller, A.C. 1991. Royal Painters: Deir el-Medina in Dynasty XIX. In Fragments of a Shattered Visage: Proceedings of the International Symposium of Ramesses the Great. E. Bleiberg and R. Freed, eds. Pp. 50– 86. Memphis, TN: University of Memphis. Lave, J., and E. Wenger. 1991. Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Maspero, G. 1912. Guide du visiteur au Musée du Caire. Cairo: l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale. Minault-Gout, A. 2002. Carnets de pierre: l’art des ostraca dans l’Égypte ancienne. Paris: F. Hazan. Page, A. 1983. Ancient Egyptian Figured Ostraca in the Petrie Collection. Warminster, UK: Aris & Phillips. Peck, W.H., and J.G. Ross. 1978. Egyptian Drawings. New York: Thames and Hudson. Peet, T.E., and C.L. Woolley. 1923. The City of Akhenaten I: Excavations of 1921 and 1922 at el-’Amarna. London: Egypt Exploration Society. Pendlebury, J.D.S. 1951. The City of Akhenaten III: The Central City and the Official Quarters. London: Egypt Exploration Society. Peterson, B.J. 1974. Zeichnungen aus einer Totenstadt; Bildostraka aus ThebenWest ihre Fundplätze. Themata und Zweckbereiche mitsamt einem Katalog der Gayer-Anderson-Sammlung in Stockholm. Stockholm: Medelhavsmuseet. Piaget, J. 1962. Play, Dreams, and Imitation in Childhood. C. Gattegno and F.M. Hodgson, trans. New York: Norton & Company. Pomerantseva, N. 1992. The Sketches on Ostraca or “The Sheets of Sketchbook” of Ancient Egyptian Masters. Sesto Congresso Internazionale di egittologia: atti 1:513–518. Rogers, A. 2003. What Is the Difference? A New Critique of Adult Learning and Teaching. Leicester: National Institute of Adult Continuing Education. Scheller, R.W. 1963. A Survey of Medieval Model Books. Haarlem: Erven F. Bohn. Shäfer, H. 1916. Ägyptische Zeichnungen auf Scherben. Jahrbuch der Königlich Preuszischen Kunstsammlungen 37:23–51. Stokes, A. 1972. The Image in Form. London: Penguin. Valbelle, D. 1985. Les ouvriers de la tombe: Deir el-Médineh à l’époque ramesside. Cairo: Institut français d’archéologie orientale du Caire. Vandier d’Abbadie, J., and A. Gasse. 1936–1986. Catalogue des ostraca figurés de Deir el Médineh. Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale. Wenger, E. 1998. Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity. New York: Cambridge University Press. Wente, E.F. 1990. Letters from Ancient Egypt. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Werbrouck, M. 1932. Ostraca à figures. Bulletin des Musées royaux d’art et d’histoire 4(5):106–109.

CHA P TER NINE

Craft Apprenticeship in Ancient Greece Reaching beyond the Masters Eleni Hasaki

In the study of ancient Greek culture, the figure of the accomplished master artisan—in vase painting, wall painting, sculpture, gem cutting, or architecture—has been the protagonist. When ancient sources or signatures do not single out any masters in a par ticular period or craft, modern scholars designate “masters,” “painters,” or “architects.” Indeed, the “Rampin Master” (530 BCE; Boardman 1978) in sculpture, the “Berlin Painter” (470 BCE; Beazley 1911) in vase painting, and the “Theseion Architect” (440 BCE; Dinsmoor 1940) in architecture, all of whom are called by fictional names in the absence of signed works, must have been style-setting figures in Late Archaic and Classical Athens. This focus on accomplished and innovative master craftsmen, however, has meant that the role of apprenticeship—whether that of the master as apprentice himself in his early career or that of the master as a teacher to others in his later years—is rarely considered. The tendency of ancient sources to place the spotlight on the first inventor (Greek protos euretes) of a specific artistic technique, also obscures the gradual process of acquiring craft knowledge that lays the foundation for the innovation to occur (Kleingünther 1933). Accomplished architects, sculptors, painters, and military engineers secured their legacy in

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posterity by writing technical treatises after the completion of major projects, proudly offering lavish dedications in major sanctuaries or displaying the tools of their crafts on their gravestones. As for their treatises, they are now lost, except for lists of titles and authors’ names of a select few. Their number in antiquity must have been considerable, however, since the Athenian Euthydemos in the fourth century BCE could actually boast of his collection of technical treatises (Xenophon, Memorabilia 4.2.8–10). Euthydemos’s collection may have included the treatises “On Painting” and “On Symmetry and Colors” by his contemporaries Melanthius and Euphranor, respectively. The popularity of treatises, primarily on mathematics, astronomy, military engineering, and medicine, increased in the Hellenistic period (Gutzwiller 2007; Meissner 1996). In Roman times, the architect Vitruvius mentions in his treatise at least thirty-seven architects and engineers who had previously authored treatises (On Architecture, Intro. 11–14, 1st cent. BCE). These treatises were intended mostly for self-promotion and for the attraction of potential new customers (civic entities or individuals) rather than for didactic uses. Despite the plethora of now lost treatises, no craft-related beginner’s handbook is mentioned or has survived from Greek antiquity. Ancient cultural priorities and the limitations of our current analytical models make our search for the ancient apprentice even more difficult. The works of ancient apprentices may lie hidden in catalogued objects described as “unfinished,” “poorly executed,” or “primitive.” We look around the workshop for an apprentice only when the work is too shabby to have been executed by the master of the culture and the period under study. Anabel Thomas (1995, 76), in her work of Renaissance painters, notes poignantly: “Unidentified members of the workshop force are on occasion plucked from an ill-defined background, to take responsibility for apparently ‘mediocre’ or ‘uncharacteristic’ work that would otherwise have to be attributed to the master.” Most important, the work of apprentices is rarely detectable; it is usually destroyed before it enters the archaeological record: clay is reshaped, metal recast, glass recycled, wood reshaped, textile rewoven, marble reshaped or burnt into lime. This study is the first attempt to document, extensively but certainly not exhaustively, both tangible remains of and the ancient references to craft apprenticeship in the Greco-Roman world (with an emphasis on Greek antiquity) and to lay the foundations for more extensive and intensive studies of craft apprenticeship in Greek and Roman antiquity. I discuss first the evidence that originates within the world of craftsmen (apprentice pieces, iconography of apprentices at work, signatures, curse tablets, apprenticeship contracts) and then the evidence for craft apprenticeship originating outside the world of craftsmen, usually in the writings of philosophers and encyclopedists (table 9.1).

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Table 9.1. Primary and secondary sources for craft apprenticeship in ancient Greece Primary sources for craft apprenticeship in ancient Greece Archaeological remains of apprenticeship (e.g., apprentice pieces) Representations of assistants/apprentices at work Artists’ signatures Papyrological and epigraphical evidence (e.g., apprenticeship contracts, curse tablets) Written sources (e.g., philosophical works, scientific treatises, encyclopedias of ancient art) Secondary sources for craft apprenticeship in ancient Greece Apprenticeship methods in other areas in Greek antiquity (e.g., formal education, athletic or rhetorical training) Connoisseurship of craft apprenticeship Ethnoarchaeological and ethnographic accounts of modern-day traditional practitioners Comparative material from other cultures [Renaissance artists’ biographies, craft handbooks, and apprenticeship contracts (ricordanze; e.g., Vasari, Lives of the Artists; Hinds 1963)]

Apprenticeship was central to the successful transformation of a novice into a master craftsman; its importance seems even to override natural inclination or talent, as Aristotle in the fourth century BCE boldly states: “Crafts are teachable; otherwise, good craftsmen would be born, not made” (Nicomachean Ethics 2.1). Moreover, the goal of an apprenticeship for a leading artist is not the mastery and collage of different styles but the creative development of a distinct, personal style. In the following passage from a handbook on rhetoric, the (unknown) author warns his readers about uncritically combining styles of rhetoric by presenting an example from the world of sculpture apprenticeship. The master sculptors mentioned were active in the fourth century BCE: Chares did not learn from Lysippus how to make statues, by Lysippus showing him a head by Myron, arms by Praxiteles, a torso by Polykleitus but observed the master making all right in front of him; he would study the works of others, if he wished, on his own initiative. (Rhetorica ad Herennium 4.6.9; first century BCE)

Ancient descriptions of the (predominantly) male artist in ancient Greece tended to include three main components: his name and birth-

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place, his apprenticeship credentials (but not the apprenticeship process itself), and a selection of his most important works. This tripartite formula changed little over the centuries. Pausanias’s second-century CE presentation of the credentials of the artists whose works were set up at Olympia or at Delphi and Vasari’s account of Renaissance artists and their portfolios (sixteenth century CE; see Hinds 1963) are indeed quite similar, despite their chronological distance. Our two main textual sources for apprenticeship in ancient Greece— Pliny the Elder (23–79 CE), whose encyclopedia (Natural History [Rackham 1969–1989]) covered many topics including arts, and Pausanias, with his guidebook to the sites of Greece (Description of Greece [Levi 1979])—provide numerous but painfully brief references to apprentices in bronze and stone sculpture and in mural painting. Neither of them was a craftsman. The compendiary character of their works explains the brevity of their notices on apprenticeship, which often state simply that “X” was the pupil of “Y.” The types of evidence are varied but brief. Even more important, questions on craft apprenticeship in ancient Greece have not been framed within larger theoretical considerations of cultural transmission of knowledge. The notion of “communities of practice” (Wenger 1998) will find fertile ground for application in the noisy and malodorous artisanal quarters of Greek and Roman cities. While scholars tend to study ancient artefacts according to medium, period, or famous artist, this survey of ancient references to ancient craft apprenticeship, albeit not exhaustive, aims to underline the commonalities among the crafts and to detect some general trends that hold true regardless of the specific craft involved.

Archaeological Evidence for Apprenticeship This section presents the evidence provided by objects left behind by the artisans themselves or originating within their world. The crafts mainly represented are stone sculpture and vase painting, a reflection of what the general archaeological record consists of, since bronze sculpture was often melted down in antiquity (about only thirty original Greek life-size bronzes survive from antiquity: Stewart 1990), and even fewer wall paintings are preserved from the Greek world. The apprenticeship contracts preserved on papyri refer primarily to weaving. All types of evidence refer to craftsmen who work in “workshops” mostly staffed by four to six workers and operating on a “workshop industry” mode of production (Van der Leeuw 1977). Unfortunately, craft workshops have come to light only in an incomplete fashion, as a result of rescue excavations, and they are limited to kilns (Hasaki 2002), casting pits (Zimmer 1990), wasters, marble chips, and unfinished sculp-

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tures (Jockey 1998a, 1998b; Nolte 2005), with no references to microdebitage or other deposits that may include apprentices’ works.

Practice Pieces Very few practice pieces of craft apprentices survive from antiquity. If the practice pieces were successful, they were probably sold and have entered the archaeological record unnoticed except as as “second-rate” products. If they were unsuccessful, then they were crushed, melted down, reshaped, painted over, or rewoven. Exceptions do occur, however: in Aphrodisias, a large number of practice pieces have been found; some were found in secondary contexts, while others were associated with a Roman sculpture workshop active from the second to fourth centuries CE (Van Voorhis 1998, 2005). The apprentice sculptors were practicing on feet and hands, the most difficult human body parts to render in sculpture and in painting. Many plinths have survived with tests of two right feet, or two left feet, or single tests of feet and hands (figure 9.1). Apprentice/practice pieces are often associated with children’s work. Important work on children’s practice pieces in pottery of the U.S. Southwest has been conducted by Patricia Crown (1999, 2001; Minar and Crown

Figure 9.1. Practice piece (two left feet on one plinth) at Roman sculptor’s workshop at Aphrodisias, Turkey; inv. no. 66–108, dated to second–fourth centuries CE; New York University Excavations at Aphrodisias

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Figure 9.2. Corinthian black-figured terra-cotta plaque from Penteskouphia (possibly an apprentice piece); © Antikensammlungen, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, inv. no. F 722, dated to mid-sixth century BCE (Archaic period)

2001), who has discerned the cognitive developmental stages for drawing and forming. Our increased familiarization with similar studies can encourage us to look more closely in the storerooms of museums for apprentice pieces. More than 1,000 terracotta plaques from Penteskouphia near Corinth, dated to the sixth century BCE, carry depictions of Poseidon, horseback riders, animals, and potters at work, which exhibit a variety of skills in the composition and execution of the scenes. For example, a plaque with a disproportionate and rough drawing of a feline and the unstructured filling of the background with various motifs may point to the work of a young apprentice (figure 9.2). Many of the miniature votives (both vessels, often made in the pinch method, and figurines) that are recovered by the hundreds in ancient Greek sanctuaries may be the work of children in their very early stages of pottery apprenticeship. Knappett (1999) has suggested that many of the thousands of Middle Bronze Age conical cups from Crete (ca. 2000–1400 BCE) may have been the product of apprentice potters. Children, as evidenced by fingerprints, also participated in the making of small rectangular tablets with Linear B script at Knossos in the Bronze Age (fourteenth century BCE; Sjöquist and Åström 1991, 12, tables I and III).

Iconography Craft scenes, albeit not as common as heroic or mythical scenes, constitute a distinct group in ancient vase-painting iconography. Paintings on Greek

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vases from the sixth to the fourth centuries BCE and carvings on Roman reliefs and gravestones are the two main categories of scenes with craftsmen at work. The latter group is not useful for apprenticeship studies because the artisan appears by himself and with a few tools of his craft (Zimmer 1982). Ancient Greek vase paintings show potters, metalsmiths, sculptors, carpenters, and other craft practitioners at work, but scenes of potters are by far the most popular (Hadjidimitriou 2005; Vidale 2002; Williams 2009; Ziomecki 1975). Corinth and Athens, the two most important pottery manufacturing centers in Archaic and Classical antiquity, provide us with the bulk of scenes of potters at work (ca. 120 in number) dating from the sixth to the fourth centuries BCE. Most show a male figure (presumably the master craftsman/owner of the workshop?) and a younger male worker (advanced assistant or apprentice) looking on or helping. Besides this age difference, which was inevitable (and perhaps required) in a system where craft apprenticeship was slow and gradual (see “Philosophical Works,” below), there are no iconographical distinctions in tasks or in clothing reflecting differentiated status in craft apprenticeship (e.g., among associate artists, workshop assistants, apprentices, or unskilled workers, who are hired solely for menial tasks without any ambition of becoming masters or full-time pottery personnel). Furthermore, the iconographical convention of depicting both youths and slaves at a smaller scale in ancient Greek representational arts blurs the distinction

Figure 9.3. Corinthian black-figured terra-cotta plaque from Penteskouphia; © Antikensammlungen, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, inv. no. F 871, dated to mid-sixth century BCE (Archaic period)

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of age and social status. Occasionally potential customers are also included in these workshop scenes. The vase paintings seem to depict an already advanced stage of apprenticeship: the assistant has mastered the ability to anticipate the needs of a master. Such depictions tell us nothing of the experiences of the early-stage apprentice who had to run errands and perform menial tasks before he was promoted to more engaging duties, such as assistance with turning the wheel or with inspecting the kiln (for the contribution of ethnoarchaeology to pottery apprenticeship studies, see “Concluding Remarks,” below). Unlike the Athenian scenes that focus on the forming and decoration of the pots, the Corinthian scenes on the Penteskouphia plaques depict assistants/apprentices involved in tasks away from the wheel. On one Penteskouphia scene (Berlin, Antikensammlungen inv. no. F 871; figure 9.3), both younger and older members of a workshop are shown collecting clay;

Figure 9.4. Corinthian black-figured terra-cotta plaque from Penteskouphia; © Antikensammlungen, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, inv. no. F 811, dated to mid-sixth century BCE (Archaic period)

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this was one of the most advanced stages in a pottery apprenticeship, in which the aspiring potter learned to locate the material suitable for clay or for the temper. On another Penteskouphia plaque, younger assistants/apprentices are shown following adult workmen and carry ing small vessels, fuel, and equipment to the kiln (figure 9.4). Assisting with kiln firing was a favorite scene on many Corinthian plaques (Hasaki forthcoming). In contrast, the Athenian depictions of potters at work mostly focus on the single potter forming or decorating a pot. In twenty scenes, younger assistants or apprentices are depicted. The scenes are divided into two groups: (a) the scenes where a master potter, always older as evidenced by his beard, is assisted by an always younger, beardless worker in turning the low hand-turned wheel (Schreiber 1983; figures 9.5 and 9.6), and (b) in more crowded scenes inside a pottery workshop, where assistants/

Figure 9.5. Athenian black-figured lip cup with potter and assistant at work; found at Etruria. Karlsruhe Badisches Landesmuseum, inv. no. 67/90, dated to 550 BCE (Archaic period)

Figure 9.6. Drawing of Athenian red-figured calyx crater with potter and assistant at wheel, overseen by goddess Athena; Il Museo Regionale della Ceramica di Caltagirone (SiciliaItalia), inv. no. 1120, dated to 500– 450 BCE (Classical period)

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apprentices are shown in a variety of duties, such as carry ing formed or painted pots to the drying area (figure 9.7) or painting the subsidiary, decorative zones on larger vessels (figures 9.8 and 9.9). A panel on the shoulder of the Caputi hydria (figures 9.8 and 9.9), measuring approximately 12 cm in height, it is very informative to see how the two younger, beardless painters who must be at the beginning of their artistic careers and are assigned the decoration of the palmette ornamental zones on craters: one has just finished the top border of a volute crater, and the second is working on the lower border of a kalyx crater. Framing or filling motifs range from the simple, such as a stepped meander, to the more intricate, such as palmettes, tendrils, and miniature animal friezes. In drawing these motifs, the apprentice practiced stability in holding the brush, gradually developed a clear conception of space availability, and placed symmetrically the chosen motif. In the many instances in which more than one framing motif was used, the apprentice had to scale them up or down, depending on the size of the vessel. Dividing the vessel into bounded areas and filling them with designs was a very important skill in a hierarchically organized painting system (Friedrich 1970). The apprentice vase painter had to learn the spatial division of a vessel, what visual element to use as a boundary marker, and how to choose the appropriate design configuration within each spatial division.

Figure 9.7. Athenian black-figured hydria with scenes of potters at work, found at Vulci; Staatliche Antikensammlungen und Glyptothek München, inv. no. 1717, attributed to Leagros Group, dated to 520 BCE (Archaic period)

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Figure 9.8. Athenian red-figured hydria, also known as “Caputi” hydria, with potters/painters decorating vessels; Vicenza Banca Intesa Collection, inv. no. C 278, dated to ca. 460 BCE (Classical period)

Figure 9.9. Detail of figure 9.8

There were apparently many repetitive tasks to be performed in a workshop: Hemelrijk (1979, 1984, 1991) found evidence that templates were used for the drawing of palmettes on the shoulders of Caeretan hydriae (water jugs) of the sixth century BCE, and it seems plausible that drawing

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these was a task allocated to apprentices. After mastering this ornamentation, they could have been entrusted with finishing the preliminary sketches of the main scenes drawn by masters on the vases (Hoyt 2006a, 2006b). Both seasoned artists and novices could have used sketchbooks, or pattern books, as educational materials during their apprenticeship, moving from less complicated to more complicated themes and decreasing their dependence on these sketchbooks with the increased accumulation of skill and speed. On the 190-m-long frieze of the Athenian Parthenon (447– 432 BCE), scholars have detected patterns of repetition (dittography). Younger (2004) firmly believes that assistant sculptors working from prepared sketches, finished in stone what master sculptors had carefully drawn on parchment.

Signatures During the seventh century BCE, in Greece stone sculptors and potters increasingly connect their name to their finished product and start signing their works (Boardman 1970; Burford 1971, 84– 85). Signatures of artisans, whether in two- or three-dimensional arts, are brief and formulaic, whether they are inscribed on marble (where economic considerations require brevity), precious stones (gems; Boardman 1970), or terracotta vessels. Throughout Greek and Roman antiquity artists’ signatures retained a standardized formula that “so-and-so made me (or it),” occasionally augmented by the addition of the artisan’s patronymic and/ or his demotic or regional affiliation. Such signatures were placed on vases (Cohen 1991; Williams 1995), sculptures (Marcadé 1953), gems (Boardman 1968, 1969, 1978), and mosaics that are often thought to copy wall paintings (Dunbabin 1999). Vases also feature the signature “so-and-so painted me” (Greek egraphsen) and occasionally “so-and-so potted me” (Greek ekerameusen). Signatures, however, rarely include references to the artist’s teacher, except for two Neoclassical sculptures of the first century BCE in Rome: one of a youth, which bears the signature “Stephanos the pupil of Pasiteles” (Villa Albani, inv. no. 909), placed on a relatively prominent place on the tree trunk supporting the figure, and a sculptural group representing Orestes and Elektra signed by “Menelaos the pupil of Stephanos,” where it was much less visible (Palazzo Altemps, inv. no. 8604; Pollitt 1986, 175, figs. 183–184; see figure 9.10). In other words, one’s apprenticeship pedigree enhanced one’s overall reputation, but after a certain time, the artist/artisan had to sever these ties, thus securing both his artistic independence and personal commissions. A Roman mosaic from Lillebonne, France, dating to the third century CE (Donderer 1989, 108–109, A86; but see skepticism in Dunbabin 1999,

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Figure 9.10. Frontal view and sculptor’s signature of Orestes and Elektra signed by “Menelaos the pupil of Stephanos” (Palazzo Altemps, inv. no. 8604, dated to first century BCE) courtesy of Ministero per in Beni e le Attivita Culturali- Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di Roma

274 n. 26) records in Latin the name of the main artist, a free citizen from Puteoli near Pompeii, T. Sen(nius) or Sex(tius) Felix, who collaborated with a slave apprentice (Latin discipulus), Amor, from the local Gallic tribe of Kaleti; they both signed the mosaic (figure 9.11). Their abbreviated signatures, however, were not placed right next to each other in a continuous text; instead, the master’s signature crowned the composition, and the slave apprentice’s name, Amor, was placed at the bottom of the scene. Of the more than 140 signatures of Athenian vase painters and potters that have survived, none mentions any apprenticeship credits (Beazley 1989, 54). Their goal is to state the skill that the artist had acquired and mastered. In a large group of Athenian drinking cups from the sixth century BCE, the so-called Little Masters Cups, which were extremely

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Figure 9.11. Detail of apprentice signature on a Roman mosaic from Lillebonne, France; Rouen, Musée départemental des Antiquités inv. no. R.90.59, dated to third century CE; cg76—Musée départemental des Antiquités— Rouen, photo Yohann Deslandes (courtesy Musée départemental des Antiquités)

Figure 9.12. Athenian black-figured kylix of the Little Masters Cups type, signed “Tleson son of Nearchos”; Louvre Museum, inv. no. F 86, dated to 520 BCE (Archaic period)

delicate in their forming and firing, the signatures consist of the name of the potter who proudly mentions his patronymic, for example, “Tleson, son of Nearchos” (figure 9.12). This type of signature celebrates a long family tradition of excellence in this specialized form that is transmitted from generation to generation. In other cases, the indebtedness to family instruction and legacy would be taken a step further: sons of famous artists would completely “efface” their identity and sign simply as the sons of their father, e.g., “The sons of Brentes made and dedicated” (Archilochus fr. 115–116; Gerber 1999).

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Curse Tablets and Punishment Apprenticeship, albeit necessary, was not without its woes. Occasionally, we get a glimpse of the frustration of an apprentice who expresses his dissatisfaction with his workshop’s master to his family. A pupil in a bronze smithy in Classical Athens composed a lead tablet (similar to the numerous lead curse tablets that survive from antiquity), folded it, and placed it in a well in the Athenian Agora, most likely within the vicinity of its intended destination (Jordan 2000; see figure 9.13). This apprentice vividly describes the unpleasant conditions in a foundry, which included corporal punishment of the younger apprentices: Lesis is sending a letter to Xenokles and to his mother by no means to overlook that he is perishing in the foundry but to come to these masters and find something better for him. For I have been handed over to a man thoroughly wicked. I am perishing from being whipped; I am tied up; I am treated like dirt more and more.

Even the term used in this tablet to refer to the foundry’s master (Greek despotai), borrowed from the political world, reflects a despotic environment without the encouragingly pedagogical overtones that are more common in modern scholarship on pedagogy and learning. Given the

Figure 9.13. “Lesis” lead tablet; Athenian Agora inv. no. IL 1702, dated to fourth century BCE (Classical period). After Jordan (2000, fig. 2), courtesy Agora Excavations, American School of Classical Studies at Athens.

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Figure 9.14. Drawing of black-figured skyphos from Abes cemetery in Eastern Locris, Boeotia; Athens, National Museum, inv. no. 442, dated to 400–390 BCE (Classical period); © Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Tourism/ Archaeological Receipts Fund (courtesy National Archaeological Museum, Athens)

complaints of this apprentice, it comes as no surprise that many lead curse tablets contain curses addressed to smithy owners, perhaps originating from earlier rough apprenticeship periods as well as from rivalry between contemporary workshops (Curbera and Jordan 1998). Punishment perhaps associated with apprenticeship may be detected in a highly unusual scene on a Boeotian drinking cup (Greek skyphos) from the Classical period. It would be a usual workshop scene with two potters working on the wheel and two workmen transporting vessels to stack them were it not for a figure literally suspended from the ceiling (figure 9.14). Is this a true depiction? Or a visualization of a verbal threat that the master potter repeated endlessly to young apprentices? Or, as Daumas (2000) suggested, is it the punishment of the workman who did not produce the right vessels required for the mystery cult of the nearby sanctuary?

Apprenticeship Contracts In the Archaic and Classical periods, as our textual sources and the potter’s signatures indicate, most craft knowledge was transmitted within the family or to extended kin. In later times, when apprentices left the protected and closed environment of the extended family, apprenticeships may have become more challenging, and people often found it necessary to sign apprenticeship contracts. More than 40 apprenticeship contracts, mainly describing weaving apprenticeships, have survived on papyri from Hellenistic and Roman Egypt, dating mostly to the first and second centu-

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ries CE (Bergamasco 1995; Van Minnen 1998; Westermann 1914). One contract (P.Oxy. 1647.G; second century CE) is signed between a girl and her guardian brother and the master weaver. The apprenticeship is strenuous, with a daily schedule of more than 12 hours (from sunset to sundown), and lasts for four years. Time off is limited to 18 days per year, and the fees increase every year (Lefkowitz and Fant 1992, 208).

Textual Evidence for Apprenticeship Textual references to craft apprenticeship are more common than archaeological evidence and are found in two genres of ancient literature: (1) philosophical works, which consistently use the gradual and incremental process of the potter’s apprenticeship as a metaphor for the steady and patient learning of any other discipline, skill, or trade; and (2) encyclopedias and guidebooks that briefly mention pairs or groups of artists in sculpture and painting who are bound together by ties of apprenticeship. Although artists’ biographies as a distinct literary category proliferate in the Hellenistic period, none has survived to us (Kris and Kurz 1978, 5). Compilations of ancient Greek and Latin sources, either in their original language or in English translation (Blümner 1885–1887; Humphrey et al. 1998; Overbeck 1959; Pollitt 1990; Stewart 1990), provide the beginning point for any study on ancient Greek and Roman crafts. Burford (1971) has authored a milestone study on the Greek and Roman craftsmen that addresses technical, social, and economical issues with few references to apprenticeship. Roebuck (1969) and more recently Ling (2000) have provided short and useful accounts of crafts in Greco-Roman antiquity. These passages include many names but little to no information on the structure of this apprenticeship. Sculpture, architecture, painting, and pottery-making are well represented in these sources, but other crafts are largely ignored. The display settings of the final products may account for their absence in ancient sources; for example, mosaics that decorated mostly private residences rather than public spaces were not easily seen and commented on by travelers like Pausanias.

Philosophical Works It is in an unexpected place that we find the earliest Greek textual references to craft apprenticeship. In the fourth century BCE, the philosopher Plato, although he generally held artisans in low esteem since their occupations involved mainly the body rather than the intellect, often turns to the potter’s world, drawing parallels between a person’s gradual learning

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to become a proper citizen and master oratory skills and the slow learning process required of the potter until he can master the forming of a large storage vessel (Greek pithos) (Richter 1923): “Is not this, as they say, to learn the potter’s craft by undertaking a pithos . . . and does not this seem to you a foolish thing to do?” (Gorgias 514E; also in Laches 187B; Protagoras 324 E). It is clear that a potter’s apprenticeship was primarily associated with trial and error, patience, perseverance, and a gradual accumulation of skills. Plato warns that wise citizens should not skip the first lessons in rhetoric and prematurely take hold of the greatest tasks that are properly the last. As Plato points out (“Did you never observe in the arts how the potters’ boys look on and help, long before they touch the wheel?” Republic 5.476A), the potter’s apprentice must spend an initial period of observation and imitation, and ultimately he has to undergo a long practicum on the wheel in order to master the physical, mechanical, and technical coordination required to fully harness the power of the wheel with the skill of his hands. Since the ancient Greek wheel was not a kick wheel, the potter did all the work, keeping the wheel in motion and shaping the pot, with his hands. Especially for the forming of a pithos (which usually exceeds three feet in height), the potter had to slowly build up the vessel using coils of clay (in the coil-built technique) and ultimately make all the finishing touches on the wheel. The large size and the weight of a pithos posed several difficulties for the potter, who had to wait patiently before adding new coils. Skipping intervening stages of apprenticeship and attempting to form a large pithos on the wheel was considered an absurd pipe dream in antiquity, an example of overreaching that acquired proverbial status among ancient authors. It characterized someone whose impatience with the training process doomed him to failure.

Encyclopedias and Guidebooks Most ancient textual references to Greek craft apprenticeship date from the Roman times and appear in two authors. First is the Roman compiler Pliny the Elder (23–79 CE), who produced in Latin an encyclopedia of his time titled Natural History (abbreviated here HN [Rackham 1969– 1989]). The second author is the traveler Pausanias, who was born in Asia in the second century CE and wrote in Greek a multivolume Description of Greece, a guidebook to several regions of mainland Greece (Levi 1979). As mentioned above, almost all references to apprenticeship by these authors are very brief and repetitive in the type of information they supply, namely, that “x” was the student of “y.” A preliminary survey of relevant passages in these two authors reveals more than 24 references to apprenticeship in sculpture and 16 in painting. With one exception (the Sicyonian potter Boutades, NH 35.151–152),

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Table 9.2. Sequential pairs of teacher-pupils around the Greek sculptor Polykleitos, active in the fi fth century BCE (data from Pliny, Natural History 34.50, 55–56, 72 [Rackham 1969–1989]; Pausanias 5.17.3– 4) Teacher 1

Teacher 2

Teacher 3

Teacher 4

Hageladas, → Polykleitos, → Asopodorus, from Argos from Sikyon from Argos → Alexis → Aristides → Phrynon → Deinon → Athenodorus → Demeas, from Cleitor → Periklytos → Antiphanes → Kleon, from Sikyon

both Pliny and Pausanias are reluctant to identify by name potters or vase painters, let alone apprentices in their workshops, in sharp contrast to the numerous references to named sculptors and panel/wall painters. Most apprenticeship information appears in connection with alreadyfamous artists from antiquity. It seems that an aura surrounded these figures, enhancing the reputation of both teachers and students. Sometimes a famous artist was remembered either for turning out talented students or for living up to the same high standards as his own famous teachers before him. The sources sometimes mention long chains of teacher– apprentice relationships, which usually start with or radiate from a famous ancient sculptor of the caliber of Pheidias, Polykleitos, Praxiteles, or Kritias. The tradition of known apprenticeships for such sculptors can expand to three or five clusters and can include numerous sculptors who share and propagate a certain artistic tradition— anywhere from five sculptors (Kritias) to seven (Pheidias and Praxiteles), up to twelve (Polykleitos, as listed in table 9.2). Pliny (HN 35.50) dryly states: “Polykleitus had as pupils, Asopodorus of Argos, Alexis, Aristides, Phrynon, Deinon, Athenodorus, and Demeas of Cleitor.” These long lists of names, albeit useful for prosopographical and biographical studies, add little to our understanding of the content and structure of apprenticeship. A welcome exception to the monotonous listing of teachers and their apprentices is the information regarding the compensation of master teachers. In the fourth century BCE, Eupompos charged his students 500 drachmas a year, and renowned painters, such as Apelles and Melanthis,

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both paid this price to take lessons from him (Pliny, HN 35.75–77). The fee seems very high, if one considers that a skilled supervisor of buildings (an architect) received approximately 1 drachma per day in Classical Athens (Loomis 1998). Having no comparative information on fees, it is impossible to determine whether this price was high or even whether the anecdote can be considered accurate. It definitely compares well with the steep fees of other star instructors of rhetoric and philosophy in the fi fth and fourth centuries BCE (Joyal et al. 2009, 72–73; Loomis 1998, 62–71). While some artists mastered a single craft, many ancient artists learned and excelled in more than one craft, such as the famous sculptor Pheidias, who also had a painting career (Lapatin 1997, 663– 664). No information exists, however, about the apprenticeship structure for multitalented artists who worked in a variety of media. It is perhaps safe to assume that the learning curve for the first craft is steep and the apprenticeship slow and gradual, while additional, related crafts can be picked up at faster pace since a group of skills is shared among craft practitioners. On rare occasions, a practitioner underwent the longer apprenticeship in a completely different craft from the one that brought him fame in antiquity. Such multicraft expertise among artists is documented throughout history. Vasari in his Lives of the Artists often mentions that Renaissance artists started their apprenticeship in goldsmithing, since that craft would train them to do small clay models, and then they moved to make small bronze figures and finally got involved in marble sculpture (Hinds 1963). This gradual progression within crafts is clearly from the more forgiving (clay and bronze, which can be reshaped and recast) to the less forgiving (stone). For clay and bronze, the techniques employed are mostly additive, while in stone carving they are subtractive, and mistakes are often difficult to correct without altering the overall size or position of the intended composition. Apprenticeship, despite its nebulous presence in the sources, must have been a standard part of the learning process, since few artists who did not undergo this crucial learning stage have been singled out in the sources: the ancient sculptors Silanios (HN 35.49–52), Erigonos (HN 35.145), Lysippos of Sikyon (HN 34.61– 65), Pasiteles (Pausanias 5.20.2), Dionysios, and Glaukos (Pausanias 5.26.2; 6.10.4) were noted to have had no teacher. Also self-taught (Greek autodidaktos) was the painter Agatharchos from Samos (Olympiodoros’s comment; see Overbeck 1959, no. 1119). It was definitely considered an unusual phenomenon for an artist to have so much innate talent that no apprenticeship was needed, and self-taught artists were the exception. The ancient Greek references belong to a more universal topos of self-taught artistic geniuses in the history of world art (Burford 1971, 220; Kris and Kurz 1978, 14–18).

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References to female teachers are rare. Pliny the Elder in his multivolume work dedicates only one paragraph (HN 35.136) to female artists (all painters), among whom we find a certain Olympias (of unknown date and origin) who had Autobulus for a pupil. A few instances in which girls, both slaves and freeborn, were sent for apprenticeship to a female teacher are mentioned in Ptolemaic papyri from the third century BCE (Van Minnen 1998). These limited references to female teachers mirror the scarcity of references to female artists both in our surviving ancient testimonia and in artists’ signatures (for signatures of two female Roman glassworkers, see Stern 1999). The vulgar and banausic world of most craft workshops was perhaps not an appropriate place for females, either free citizens or slaves, who instead opted for skills based in the home, becoming midwives or wet- and dry-nurses (Brock 1994).

Evaluation of Ancient Sources From this conventional division of the available evidence as archaeological and textual, a very patchy chronological picture emerges: from the Bronze Age in Greece (ca. 3000–1200 BCE), a period rich in crafts, no names of artists survive, and we have no direct evidence for apprenticeship with the exception of children involved in production of Linear B tablets, and apprentices perhaps responsible for the making of the Minoan conical cups. Our next surviving body of evidence on apprenticeship dates from almost half a millennium later, in the sixth and fi fth centuries BCE (Archaic and Classical periods), with the signatures of artists on Little Masters Cups, the use of templates on the Caeretan hydriae, and the numerous Athenian and Corinthian depictions of assistants/apprentices. In the fourth century, we have various literary references to the artisans’ world in the works of Plato, and curse tablets that describe the problems of apprenticeship. It is also the time when the treatises (now lost) by established craftsmen become more common. To the Hellenistic and Roman periods belong the apprenticeship contracts and some apprentice pieces from Aphrodisias. The Roman period is also rich in textual references to master–pupil pairs, especially in Pliny and Pausanias. This brief survey of literary, epigraphical, and archaeological sources quickly reveals the limitations of the available evidence. Neither the textual nor the archaeological corpus is varied enough to provide a complete picture of ancient Greek craft apprenticeship. The available scraps of evidence leave us in the dark about the duration, requirements, or any legal status of apprenticeship in ancient Greece. Even if we look more closely at a superficially rich-looking corpus of references to craft apprenticeship,

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only a handful of positive observations can be made, and one is left with more questions than answers about the apprenticeship structure. Scholars of antiquity thus have to deal with two incomplete data sets: on the one hand, they know the names of many panel and wall painters without having examples of their work, and on the other hand, they can study thousands of vases without having any ancient reference to the potter or vase painter, save for the signatures or names placed on the ceramic objects themselves (see “Signatures,” above). Equally elusive is the physical location where the apprenticeship took place. Many teacher–student pairs consist of artists from different cities, so either the master or the student must have had to relocate. Alternatively, one can assume that the master sculptors set up “studios” wherever their commissions took them and took on apprentices who, in their turn, could have traveled to or with the mobile studio. This would also prepare the student for the mobile lifestyle that he would experience in his later career as well. The silence of the sources about craft apprenticeship can be attributed to the general context in which references to craftsmen appear, as well as to the purpose of the written source. Neither Pausanias nor Pliny the Elder mentions the relationships between artists in order to illuminate any aspects of the apprenticeship process itself; instead, they have other aims, from the most obvious, to bestow even more fame on the talented student or inspiring teacher for the contemporary audience, to the most practical, to provide the scholars of antiquity with dating benchmarks for the length of the careers of outstanding artists (e.g., Pausanias 6.4.6 for the dates of activity of the sculptor Lysippos). The textual references to and the imagery of potters at work highlight two stages: first, the potter underwent a long learning process from observation and assistance to wheel throwing actual pots; second, he moved to actual painting, starting with the borders, and later, as he gained increasing responsibility, he was allowed to paint the central scenes. The ethnoarchaeological literature on modern pottery apprenticeship in other cultures can enhance the Greek evidence. For example, the five stages of apprenticeship observed among the Japanese mingei potters are particularly relevant (Singleton 1989): (1) prepractice observation during which the apprentice is kept busy with menial tasks in the workshop and household, (2) tentative experiments at the wheel, (3) assigned regular practice at the wheel, (4) assigned production at the wheel, and (5) a period of work in the shop as repayment for the training received. Although the time and culture are far removed from Greek antiquity, it is not difficult to imagine that an apprentice potter in ancient Greece would have been charged with similar tasks. For the Mediterranean area, Curtis (1962) has published a study of pottery apprenticeship in Bailen, Spain. The gradually increasing com-

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plexity of required tasks in the Spanish workshops resembles the Japanese mingei pottery apprenticeship, with additional information on the duration of each phase and the total duration of the apprenticeship (ages 14–24). A boy wishing to learn pottery production for his future livelihood hires himself out as an apprentice when he is 14 years old, and in ten years he can become a master potter. At age 14 the apprentice does odd jobs such as cleaning, carry ing, hauling fuel, and stacking pots. When the potter goes to the clay bank to collect clay, the apprentices shovel the clay out of the banks and pack it in baskets on the backs of donkeys (see figure 9.8). At approximately age 16, the apprentice is assigned to a specific potter. He then prepares and wedges the clay, hands his teacher material, and takes away the finished products (see figure 9.4). The apprentice is allowed to make simple decorations (see figures 9.4 and 9.5) and is involved in stacking the kiln. He also starts working at the wheel by throwing tall solid cones. The third stage starts at age 19, when the apprentice is assigned a pottery wheel, where he can make handles and spouts for pots, as well as small, simple vessels (see “Philosophical Works,” above). In the fourth stage, the apprentice is able to make all the shapes without supervision. The decoration of pots is the prerogative of older, experienced potters in the ethnographic record (Nicklin 1971), similar to ancient Greek master vase painters. Both ancient representations and ethnographic data allow us to infer that the first stage, which included menial tasks, took up a large portion of the apprenticeship time. These were low-responsibility duties that all apprentices had to master before they could be entrusted with turning, decorating, or firing. The incomplete nature of our sources on craft apprenticeship in Greek antiquity becomes even more evident when one compares them against the Renaissance, for which we have ample evidence about the apprenticeships and production careers of many artists (Cole 1983; McMahon 1956; Thomas 1995; Thompson 1933).

Concluding Remarks The veil of secrecy that surrounded most crafts in antiquity, rooted in intense professional competition, may account for the absence of explicit written sources. A survey of direct evidence, such as artists’ signatures, apprentice contracts, iconography of craftsmen at work, and apprentice pieces, as well as indirect information mostly from later sources, such as philosophers, encyclopedists, travelers, and historians, allows us to draw only a very vague picture about apprenticeship. These sources are concerned primarily with workshops for pottery, sculpture, painting, mosaics, and weaving. The artists’ signatures mostly emphasize the kinship context

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of apprenticeship, whereas apprenticeship contracts are the most illuminating, providing the length of apprenticeship, age of the apprentice, and the fees and duties involved. The philosophers focus on participant observation and the gradual acquisition of skills to master a craft as well as the central role of fathers in instructing their apprentice sons or male relatives. In other written works we have a plethora of names of teachers and their pupils but nothing more substantial. Bowser (2005) observed three main modes and channels for transmission of knowledge in craft workshops: (1) within a nuclear family, (2) within a family of alliance, and (3) selfapprenticeship. In our survey of ancient classical testimonia, we have encountered instances of all three modes. Connoisseurship, especially as it relates to the study of ancient Greek vase-painting studies, merits some discussion in the context of craft apprenticeship. In the absence of long lists of signed works or named vase painters for ancient Greece, John Beazley (1956, 1963; Beazley and Kurtz 1989) in the first half of the twentieth century assigned more than 20,000 vases to “painters” of distinct personal style. Some painters had real names known from signed vessels, while others received “fictional” names. Within this large group of painters, Beazley established ties of collaboration, identified direct or indirect influence, and occasionally detected apprenticeship connections. For example, among the Archaic Athenian black-figure vase painters, he characterizes the “Swing Painter” as the pupil of the “Princeton Painter,” and the “Eucharides Painter” as the pupil of the “Nikoxenos Painter” (Beazley 1956); among the Classical Athenian red-figure vase painters are the “Berlin Painter” and his two pupils, Hermonax and the “Achilles Painter,” and Euthymides and his pupil the “Kleophrades Painter” (Beazley 1963). Vase-painting connoisseurship studies have generated great admiration and great skepticism. Without a well-defined methodology, some early designated “followers,” “imitators,” and “pupils” of master vase painters may not refer to different individuals but may simply reflect the development and the ensuing decline of the master vase painter in his old age. If a single individual’s career phases were mistaken for distinct individuals, then Beazley and his followers may have grossly overestimated the actual number of vase painters active in Archaic and Classical Athens (Osborne 2004). Scholars of pottery from other regions and scholars in other ancient crafts quickly followed his lead, attempting to detect personal artistic styles and to further establish—loosely more often than firmly— apprenticeship ties. In Corinthian vase painting of the Archaic period, for example, Darrell Amyx named one artist, “The Apprentice” (1988, 82), and in his study of Athenian letter cutters of the Hellenistic period, Stephen Tracy (1990, 230) identifies at least four master-apprentice pairs. The strength of connoisseurship studies, regardless of period or culture, lies in the detection of the

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developed, idiosyncratic style of an artist, not his or her initial period of apprenticeship, when external influences blur the individuality of the artist. Ethnography and ethnoarchaeology of modern-day Greek pottery workshops can be especially rewarding in the study of ancient apprenticeship. Such studies can enable us to look at modes of transmission of knowledge, duration, and content of apprenticeship, and the task allocation among the crew members of a pottery workshop. Previous ethnographic works on modern Greek workshops have successfully achieved their goals both to document rapidly vanishing production centers and to better understand aspects of ancient pottery production, such as technology of wheels and kilns, repertoire of vessels, or sources of raw materials. In some ethnographic studies of traditional Greek pottery communities, which overall pay little attention to apprenticeship, scholars have recorded detailed genealogies of workshops and potters, especially for the communities of Thrapsano on Crete and for the island of Naxos (Psaropoulou 1996, 2005). Those lists can be used to emphasize the continuing importance of family tradition in manual crafts, as well as to address issues of career span and overlapping of generations within the workshop. Ioannis Ionas (2000) has provided a brief study of apprenticeship in the traditional pottery communities of Cyprus. An ethnoarchaeological study of contemporary painters of imitations of ancient Greek vases would elucidate the steps of apprenticeship and the increased complexity of tasks and responsibilities entrusted to apprentice potters and painters. The present-day division of tasks may not be very different from that in an ancient Athenian ceramic workshop. Juxtaposing these studies with our knowledge of the organization and labor distribution of ancient Greek workshops allows us to detect the modes of pottery apprenticeship and to reconstruct some stages that are missing from the ancient textual and material evidence. Through ethnoarchaeological studies of other craft workshops (e.g., those of sculptors or bronzesmiths), we can establish a list of tasks that are allocated to a starting apprentice, an advanced apprentice, an assistant, and a fellow master. Different stages of apprenticeship may also require adjusted equipment to fit the smaller size of young apprentices. For example, in the ethnoarchaeological project of traditional pottery in Moknine, Tunisia, it was noticed that young apprentices used a smaller-scale kick wheel to form their first pieces (Hasaki 2005). Such material remains of the different stages of modern apprenticeship will sharpen our analytical tools and help remedy our current inability to “recover” the ancient apprentice in the archaeological record. Outside the world of artisans, whether ancient or modern, much is to be gained by comparing the craft apprenticeship with formal learning methods in Greek and Roman educational systems (Cribiore 2001; Joyal et al. 2009). I’ve already mentioned how the Greek philosophers turned

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to low-status craftsmen to inspire the aristocratic youths to excel in rhetoric, mathematics, and other worthy pursuits by adopting the trialand-error approach, participant observation, sustained focus, repetition, perseverance, and patience of the craft practitioners. By looking more broadly at learning processes, we will be able to contextualize craft apprenticeship within social constructs of cultural transmission in Greek antiquity. In ancient Athens, many craftsmen had the status of a resident alien (Greek metoikos), who could own property but had no voting rights. For them, craft apprenticeship was a structured system through which they could perhaps feel more culturally integrated; more importantly, it could be the main agent for the perpetuation or manipulation of the artistic modes of their recipient culture. Ultimately, our shift of attention to apprentices will require a general shift of paradigm in our studies of ancient Greek craft production: to reach beyond the masters and study the apprenticeship period both of those who went on to become masters and of the innumerable others, less talented or revolutionary, who manned the workshops in the artisanal quarters. The titles of various scholarly works on ancient crafts currently display a fascination with the products of masters [e.g., Masterpieces from the Nicholas P. Goulandris Collection (Renfrew and Taylor 1991)], rather than with the process of becoming a master and the process of production itself. Caught between the ancient fascination with attributing major artistic breakthroughs to a single, first inventor (Greek protos euretes) and the modern passion of archaeologists and art historians to recreate the lives and minds of ancient masters, the ancient apprentice remains unnoticed in the written and archaeological sources. Ancient Mediterranean cultures chose to glorify the leaders of artistic innovation, but they had to rely on the followers, the ordinary artisans, for their everyday needs. The modern scholar of classical antiquity has also been trained to focus on either Meisterforschung, the oeuvre of master artists with innovative distinct style, or on Kopienkritik, the derivative imitation of prominent styles (Donohue and Fullerton 2003). Apprentices seem to have been largely ignored by their employers and their contemporaries, as they are now by scholars, art dealers, and museum directors. Unless we establish methods to reach beyond masters and outline the formative phase, apprentices and their lives will remain in obscurity. Acknowledgments

Many thanks to the editor of this volume, Willeke Wendrich, for organizing the Society of American Archaeology colloquium and for her subsequent patience and encouragement. The stimulating articles in the

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present volume helped me contextualize the ancient Greek craft apprenticeship within larger questions. The final touches were made to the chapter in spring 2010 during my residence at the classics department of the University of Cincinnati, as a Margo Tytus Visiting Scholar. Generous assistance with reproduction fees was provided through the Provost’s Author Support Fund at the University of Arizona. I thank K. Lynch, A. Shapiro, P. Van Minnen, and J. Younger for their helpful comments. My love and appreciation go, as always, to A. May for providing kind guidance and wise direction in all apprenticeship situations. References Amyx, D.A. 1988. Corinthian Vase-Painting of the Archaic Period. Berkeley: University of California Press. Beazley, J.D. 1911. The Master of the Berlin Amphora. Journal of Hellenic Studies 31:276–295. Beazley, J.D. 1956. Attic Black-Figure Vase-Painters (ABV). Oxford: Clarendon Press. Beazley, J.D. 1963. Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters (ARV). Oxford: Clarendon Press. Beazley, J.D., and D.C. Kurtz. 1989. Greek Vases: Lectures. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Bergamasco, M. 1995. Le didaskalikai nella ricerca attuale. Aegyptus 5:95–167. Blümner, H. 1885–1887. Technologie und Terminologie der Gewerbe und Künste bei Griechen und Römern. New York: Arno Press. Boardman, J. 1968. Archaic Greek Gems: Schools and Artists in the Sixth and Early Fifth Centuries B.C. London: Evanston. Boardman, J. 1969. Three Greek Gem Masters. Burlington Magazine 111: 587–596. Boardman, J. 1970. Greek Gems and Finger Rings. London: Thames and Hudson. Boardman, J. 1978. Greek Sculpture: The Archaic Period. London: Thames and Hudson. Bowser, B.J. 2005. Transactional Politics and the Local and Regional Exchange of Pottery Resources in the Ecuador ian Amazon. In Pottery Manufacturing Processes: Reconstitution and Interpretation. A.L. Smith, D. Bosquet, and R. Martineau, eds. Pp. 23–32. BAR International Series, Vol. 1349. Oxford: Archaeopress. Brock, R. 1994. The Labour of Women in Classical Athens. Classical Quarterly 44:336–346. Burford, A. 1971. Craftsmen in Greek and Roman Society. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

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Cohen, B. 1991. The Literate Potter. A Tradition of Incised Signatures on Attic Vases. Metropolitan Museum 26:49–95. Cole, B. 1983. The Renaissance Artist at Work: From Pisano to Titian. New York: Harper and Row. Cribiore, R. 2001. Gymnastics of the Mind. Greek Education in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Crown, P.L. 1999. Socialization in American Southwest Pottery Decoration. In Pottery and People: A Dynamic Interaction. J.M. Skibo and G.M. Feinman, eds. Pp. 25– 43. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Crown, P.L. 2001. Learning to Make Pottery in the Prehispanic American Southwest. Journal of Anthropological Research 57:451– 469. Curbera, J.B., and D.R. Jordan. 1998. A Curse Tablet from the “Industrial District” near the Athenian Agora. Hesperia 67:215–218. Curtis, F. 1962. The Utility Pottery Industry of Bailén, Southern Spain. American Anthropologist 64:486–503. Daumas, M. 2000. La représentation d’ un atelier de potier du Cabirion de Thèbes sur un skyphos béotien? In Agathos Daemon. Mythes et cultes: Études d’ iconographie en l’ honneur de Lilly Kahil (BCH Suppl. 38). P. Linant de Bellefonds, ed. Pp. 117–123. Athens: Ecole française d’ Athènes. Dinsmoor, W.B.J. 1940. The Temple of Ares at Athens. Hesperia 9:1–52. Donderer, M. 1989. Die Mosaizisten der Antike und ihre wirtschaftliche und soziale Stellung. Erlangen: Universitätsbund. Donohue, A.A., and M.D. Fullerton. 2003. Ancient Art and Its Historiography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Dunbabin, K. 1999. Mosaics of the Greek and Roman World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Friedrich, M.H. 1970. Design Structure and Social Interaction: Archaeological Implication of an Ethnographic Analysis. American Antiquity 35:332–343. Gerber, D.E. 1999. Greek Iambic Poetry: From the Seventh to the Fifth Centuries BC. D.E. Gerber, ed. and trans. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Gutzwiller, K.J. 2007. A Guide to Hellenistic Literature. Malder: Blackwell. Hadjidimitriou, A. 2005. Παραστα´ σεις εργαστηρι´ων και εμπορι´ου στην εικονογραφι´α των and αρχαικω και κλασικω´ ν χρο´ νων (Representations of Workshops and Trade in the Iconography of Archaic and Classical Times). Athens: Tameio Archaeologikon Poron. Hasaki, E. 2002. Ceramic Kilns in Ancient Greece: Technology and Organization of Ceramic Workshops. Ph.D. Dissertation. Cincinnati, OH: University of Cincinnati. Hasaki, E. 2005. The Ethnoarchaeological Project of the Potters’ Quarter at Moknine, Tunisia. Seasons 2000, 2002. In Africa, Nouvelle Série des Séances Scientifiques III. N. Kallala, ed. Pp. 137–180. Tunis: Institut National de Patrimoine.

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CHA P TER TEN

Apprenticeship and Learning from the Ancestors The Case of Ancient Urkesh Marilyn Kelly-Buccellati

A topic widely discussed by archaeologists interested in the development of identity in the prehistoric and early historic record is the growth of self-consciousness, a topic that has a long history in Syro-Mesopotamia. It is best exemplified by the exploits of Gilgamesh, a mythical third millennium king ruling the southern Mesopotamian city of Uruk who, through experiencing friendship and death, comes to the realization of his humanity and the need to exercise benevolence and good judgment in carry ing out his responsibilities. In any society, a component of this growing experience of self-consciousness is the awareness on the part of individuals that they belong to a specific group to which they contribute and from which they receive both insights and information. Apprenticeship plays an important role in forming this individual and group identity, in such a way that both the teacher and the apprentice benefit on many levels from the relationship. Apprenticeship is central to the early transmission of cultural practices and social traditions due to its ability to provide a positive setting within which both technical knowledge and behavioral norms are transferred in the formation of identities. This knowledge transfer can take several forms, through direct contact or through the indirect observation of results. In the case I am proposing here, inspiration

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stems from the earlier products of a craft tradition that is in some way still alive in the community of practice. Two lines of investigation are followed in this study. In the first case, I consider a prominent example of the direct transmission from teacher to student, here the transmission of knowledge from scribe to apprentice scribe. Ancient Mesopotamian textual sources give us information on formalized apprenticeship dedicated to the training of scribes; some archaeological evidence bears on the practices of the scribe but not directly on the relationship with the student apprentices. However, archaeology does sometimes provide insight into the more informal types of teaching and learning, often in family groups (Costin 1991, 2001; Costin and Wright 1998; Ingold 2000, 339–372; Kamp 2001; Wallaert-Pêtre 2001). My second case involves the transfer of knowledge by emulation (Bell 2002) and experimentation. In this case, the teacher is not present, only the products produced by the craft. While this is an expansion of the definition of apprenticeship in a strict sense, I think it is valid because it takes into consideration the fact that the archaeological record can at times attest to the desire of the later practitioner to learn from aspects of craft traditions no longer practiced in the community. It is then not a direct transmittal and not a direct social context but rather one of appreciation and respect, shown through emulation, by the “student” of craft products formed within ancient craft traditions— so much so that aspects of these earlier traditions are imitated in some way. This second example studies the more indirect transfer of knowledge, a sort of metaphorical or, we might say, “time-gap” apprenticeship, involving the rediscovery of skills from the past that were lost in the detail but remained alive in the general tradition of a given craft and were revived through the inspiration provided by objects made by previous generations. In the same way that experimental archaeology seeks to replicate methods and techniques of past craft traditions, some ancient potters sought to utilize a model-based approach to establish a similar set of conditions in order to produce similar ceramics. Where there were no teachers, models had to suffice. The teacher is, however, presupposed, even if not physically present, because the emulator-apprentice operates in the same setting as that intervening between a normal apprentice and teacher who goes through the physical steps of a set production sequence (a chaîne opératoire). The reference to experimental archaeology is instructive. While an archaeologist looks from the outside at a broken tradition and seeks to reconstruct primarily a physical object with its typological characteristics, an ancient time-gap apprentice lives within the same community of practice and re-creates an object starting from the experience of procedures and functional use that are shared with the ancestors.

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For both cases, examples are used from the excavations at Tell Mozan the site of the ancient Syro-Mesopotamian city of Urkesh dating from the third and early second millennia (digital copies of most Urkesh excavation publications can be found on www.urkesh.org).

Evidence for Apprenticeships: Scribes and Seal Carvers In ancient Mesopotamia, our information is most abundant concerning the apprenticeship system as it pertains to the training of scribes. The term for scribe in Sumerian, dub-sar, appears for the first time in Ur around 2700 BCE. However, we know most about the training of scribes from the Old Babylonian period about 1800 BCE. In all periods, though, difficulties emerged as a result of the intricate cuneiform system where students had to learn complex sign forms and multiple phonetic readings of individual signs and master the writing of texts in Sumerian and various dialects of Akkadian. Moreover, after about 2000 BCE, they needed to know how to read and write a language, Sumerian, which was no longer commonly spoken but was important for the school tradition. Because of these complexities, the apprenticeship was long and the number of scribes in any one city was relatively small (Pearce 1995; Tanret 2003; Visicato 2000). For example, during a span of approximately fifty years (around 2100 BCE) in the ancient southern Mesopotamian city of Lagash, only about 620 scribes are known to have been active. Apprentice scribes were taught in a school by expert scribes. The first steps included tablet and stylus preparation; students then progressed to practicing the use of the stylus by pressing horizontal, vertical, and diagonal wedges, as can be seen in a school tablet excavated in Urkesh (figure 10.1a), then to writing individual signs, and then to writing words. After the apprentice had learned the signs (an average scribe knew about 620 different ones), they advanced to studying and copying lists. From early school exercise tablets, we see that students learned by copying onto the reverse of clay tablets exercises written on the obverse of the tablet. The obverse of a school tablet excavated in Urkesh contains an excerpt from a list of professions called LU E and gives professions connected with reeds (figure 10.1b) (Buccellati 2003). The grouping by categories is characteristic of Mesopotamian scribal training and made learning easier. The basic list for learning is the sign list, known as the Ea = naqu, that around 1800 BCE included 918 lines. Thematic lists were also fundamental for scribal training. The longest of these lists is the Har-ra = hubullu series, with almost 10,000 entries covering such topics as lists of clays and pottery, trees, wooden objects, reeds and objects made out of reeds, stones, domestic

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Figure 10.1. Urkesh school tablet. a. Reverse showing practice with a stylus. b. Obverse containing part of a Professions List. Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/Urkesh Archaeological Project.

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and wild animals, place names, and kinship terms. It is a compendium of Mesopotamian knowledge like none other (Civil 1995). In this way, the formal school curriculum as well as the informal communication of information within the scribal apprenticeship setting mutually reinforced the transmission of cultural and social knowledge. The scribal school was known in the Old Babylonian period as the “tablet house.” In these schools, an advanced student was called “big brother” and helped the expert scribe by writing the lesson of the day for the students. The lowest level of student was called “son of the tablet house.” The school day consisted in the preparation of the blank tablets, writing, and reading tablets. Colophons at the end of tablets indicate their purpose in the learning cycle. Such notations as “for reading” or “for dictation” indicate some of the instructional methods used in the schools. The method of learning consisted essentially in the copying and memorization of a vast number of lexical lists that constitute a fundamental aspect of the transmission of Mesopotamian culture in all time periods. The physical setting of these schools is not known, but in the excavations at Terqa a workplace for at least one scribe was discovered in a large public building dating to approximately 1800 BCE (Margueron 1991). The setting included a clay work platform, a bin and a jar containing clean clay, and a basket. A number of tablet fragments were excavated in the area surrounding this scribal installation that included a jar with six clay tablets. In the royal palace of King Tupkish in Urkesh, dating to approximately 2200 BCE, a sector of the building has been hypothesized as a scribal area; the setting was a series of rooms around a small courtyard. In this area, a jar was partially buried in the floor of the corner of one room, presumably used for washing or for mixing clay with water. While only two tablets were found in this sector of the palace, the area was set apart from other similar room arrangements in the building in that the same room containing the buried water jar also held a large bin containing clean clay, and furthermore, the bin itself showed several layers of very fine clay, indicating use over a period of time. A major drain with an inlet in the courtyard ran under this area also. In other rooms around this small courtyard, there are indications that other craft activities may have been carried out, possibly including some aspects of cloth treatment. Almost all apprentices in the schools were male, although there are some notable exceptions. For instance, Enheduanna, daughter of Sargon, king of Akkad, was a high priestess in the temple of the Moon god in Ur who composed a long Sumerian poem praising the goddess Inanna (Hallo and Van Dijk 1968). Other royal women scribes probably included two women from the Ur III dynasty: the wives of Ur-Nammu and Shulgi, two important kings. Around 1800 BCE, ten female scribes are known from the Mari texts; they were probably working for other women in the court.

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At Sippar, near Babylon, in the same time period, women scribes are attested as working for other women members of a “cloister,” an institution that had important economic and social activities in the city (Lesko 1989).

Reverence for Traditional or Ancient Knowledge The education of scribes involved the copying of Sumerian literary texts even in much later periods when only a small number of scribes could read these texts. However, the intellectual elites considered this type of training fundamental for the continuity of the culture. In other words, learning from the ancestors and preserving their culture were important parts of Mesopotamian society as long as cuneiform was written. The “tablet house” provides an elite example of apprenticeship. The students learned in the formal setting of a school, but the training took place within the setting of a master/apprentice relationship, as the term “son of the tablet house” implies. The training of scribes is one setting in which the copying of cuneiform tablets allows the student-apprentice to appropriate the knowledge base of the scribe-master. Cutting of cylinder seals was another sphere, typical for SyroMesopotamian culture, yet we know little about the training of seal cutters. However, it is clear that the copying of a cylinder seal design was not a method for the transfer of knowledge because copies of the same design are very unusual in Syro-Mesopotamia iconography. This stems, for the most part, from the fact that the cylinder seal was an important identifier in the social, cultural, and economic arenas and that a copy would invalidate this function. Nevertheless, in Urkesh we have examples of seals that were copied from the royal palace of the Hurrian king Tupkish. Administrative practices at Urkesh are unique in that some seals do have a number of copies with very small variants in each case (Buccellati and Kelly-Buccellati 1998; Kelly-Buccellati 1998). One such seal belonged to a woman, Tulli, identified in the seal inscription as the Hurrian cook of Queen Uqnitum (figure 10.2). In this case, the singular motivation for copying the seal must have been that the original seal was very worn, so much so that the name of the cook was eventually obliterated on the first seal. This must be the impetus for the cutting of an almost identical design in the second seal that contained, in addition to the inscription with her name, her hierarchical position in the palace and her clear connection with the queen. However the style of carving is quite different from that of the original so that it is clear that the carver of this second seal was trained in a different setting than the person who carved the original. In this case, the model was there to copy, but the skill set of the carver was so different that only an approximate copy could be

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Figure 10.2. a. Early seal of the royal cook Tulli. b. Later seal of the same royal cook. Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/Urkesh Archaeological Project.

created. We cannot determine just where the training of these two seal cutters would have taken place but it appears more than likely that it was in Urkesh itself since both the inscription and the iconography are so closely identified with the Urkesh royal court of Tupkish (Buccellati and Kelly-Buccellati 1998, 2002; Kelly-Buccellati 1998). A pertinent example of cultural knowledge transfer can be cited from the various detailed texts pertaining to the production of glass gathered

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in the Assyrian library of Assurbanipal (Oppenheim 1970). In this corpus, there were originally a number of “recipes,” probably forty to sixty, for the production of various types of colored glass. It may be that these initially were not written as one “recipe book” but were all collected in the library for the purpose of the scribes having access to these texts in their collection. To give one example of the level of detail contained in these texts, the craftsmen were given indications of color to determine the heat temperature inside the kiln. The heat was divided into three stages, from lowest to highest: “to glow red,” “to glow green/yellow,” and “to glow golden yellow” (Oppenheim 1970, 73). While no artisan could learn to make glass only from having access to these texts, the fact that they are preserved carefully in the library shows a high level of interest in traditional craft production in the culture. Appreciation of and identification with past generations of the same culture, or even a culture previously existing in the same geographical region, can be a powerful stimulus for group identity (Boardman 2002). For instance, it has been documented in Urkesh during the Akkadian period around 2200 BCE and in Persepolis at the time of the Achaemenid empire (550–330 BCE) that seal cutters created new seals using types of iconography and style prevalent even hundreds of years before (Kelly-Buccellati 1998). Could the “translation” of the iconographic style of previous generations add a new symbolic power to these seals? Whatever new meanings the products of this visual inspiration took on, these would have been concatenated with an appreciation of the antiquity of the design. In addition, it is well known that in Mesopotamia important monuments were kept on display for hundreds of years and that these “antiques” were even taken as booty. The most famous example is the Stele of Hammurapi, originally set up near Babylon but discovered by French excavations at Susa (Harper et al. 1992), so at some time in antiquity, the stele must have been taken from Babylon to Susa, partly in appreciation of the aesthetic qualities (calligraphy and figurative representation) as well as the ancient knowledge it contained. Even on the level of the ordinary craftspersons, not working for an elite clientele, an identification with the past and its ways of production can be observed. How this was specifically carried out can best be documented in the production of pottery.

Evidence for Time-Gap Apprenticeship: The Case of the Urkesh Potters “Time-gap” apprenticeship is not a transfer of knowledge from one generation to the next but rather an acquisition of that knowledge by a later craftsperson based on earlier examples. From the archaeological record,

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it is clear that potters in any community of practice have a number of choices: (1) repeat what is already known and the usual practice in their contemporary culture; (2) introduce various levels of innovation into their contemporary craft practice, for example, a new type of temper, a new method of stacking the kiln, or a new type of decoration; or (3) create something completely new even though it is still within the dominant craft tradition. An example of the latter is the combination of two known vessel forms to produce a new and unique shape. Evidence from the Urkesh excavations shows this to happen most often in the case of burial paraphernalia specifically created for tombs dating about 1800 BCE. Ceramic offerings placed in the tombs from this period vary in the skill level with which they were produced. In some of the poorer tombs, it is clear that vessels are being made by semiskilled individuals who create them by hand (in an overwhelming wheel throw tradition) and fire them poorly. The clay of these vessels is often very heavy and poorly mixed, and the end product appears “lumpy.” In contrast to these vessels, other ceramics found in nearby tombs are formed and fired in new shapes but with a high degree of technical expertise, indicating that they were produced by expert potters. Are both sets of potters part of the same community of practice with different training and skill sets? Or do individuals who are not habitual practitioners with the traditional training of the potters in that community view the craft as one that can be imitated when economic (or perhaps even social) pressures indicate that the products so produced would be acceptable in that particular situation? In our case, we have no way to answer these questions except for calling attention to the general political situation in the city at the time of these burials. While previously in the mid and late third millennium the city had been politically independent, by the period around 1800 BCE the city was being ruled by “governors” appointed by Zimri-Lim, a king from the south with his capital on the Euphrates River at Mari. Letters from these “governors” to the king in Mari indicate that the inhabitants of the city of Urkesh strongly objected to their overlordship, so much so that they were forced to write these reports from another nearby city (Kupper 1998). It is certainly possible that the political disruption in the city had a significant social and economic impact that in turn disrupted some ceramic production and created new options for procuring grave offerings. Turning back to choices Urkesh potters made, another possibility, stimulated no doubt by the abundance of ceramics readily available on the ground surface throughout the city in the form of residual sherds and some whole vessels, would be to recreate ceramics produced in the past, a phenomenon sometimes called archaism or revivalism (Rice 1987, 455– 456, 459). Even if the production technique is part of an ongoing ceramic tradition, a certain degree of reinventing is often necessary, for instance,

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because the skill set of the potters does not exactly match that of the ancient ones or because the exact requisite raw materials are no longer available. In the case of the archaeological evidence from Urkesh, we can ask whether the “expert” has to be physically present for the transmission of knowledge and, further, whether the “apprentices” can acquire knowledge useful for their craft directly from the artefacts produced by ancient experts. Does the practice of engaging in the per formance of the task in congruent ways make the learner an apprentice of the ancient master? In the case of imitations of ancient ceramics, the learning situation is not one where the later potter simply replicates a static model from the outside but rather one where the later potter shares the same basic skill and knowledge as the earlier potter, and thus regenerates a product from within the same historical tradition. Because the knowledge base of a community of practice is encoded in the products of that community, this encoding can be deciphered by others who have the intention of learning, even at a temporal remove from the original. Obviously, these learners must be engaged in an ongoing practice of the craft in order for them to be open to the learning environment provided by the ready availability of vast amounts and varying types of ancient ceramics. In this case, the “apprentice” must be able to decode both the explicit and the tacit information given by a study of the artefacts themselves (see chapter 12 this volume). Two types of imitations of ancient ceramics in Urkesh can be considered: the imitation of earlier decorations and the imitations of earlier wares. During the Ninevite V period in northern Mesopotamia (around 2700 BCE), ceramics were decorated with characteristic incised designs. The shapes included buff fired pottery made in a number of open and closed bowls decorated on the exterior with incisions below the rim and on the widest part of the body. From our excavations at Urkesh, an important city during that period, we have a number of these bowls (figure 10.3). More than 500 years later, a small bowl made from different clay but with the same type of incised design below the rim was created. This is the only example of this type of decoration in the later context. Shown side by side, it is apparent that the clay is different, but the inspiration for the decoration is evident. Differences in clay and temper are obvious from the sections (figure 10.3b). In this case, only the idea of the decoration was copied and carried out with a similar toothed tool. A second example employs incised hatched running triangles for decoration, common in the Ninevite V period (figure 10.4a) but not later. Yet they are found on a jar dating, again, to hundreds of years later (figure 10.4b). Another type of Ninevite V pottery is comb incised with groups of short parallel lines. This decoration is found on larger open bowls on the

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a

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Figure 10.3. a. Ninevite V bowl and later bowl with imitated decoration. b. Sections of Ninevite V bowl (left) and later bowl with imitated decoration (right). Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/ Urkesh Archaeological Project.

upper half of the body (figure 10.5a). Again, a potter about five hundred years later thought this type of decoration appropriate to place on the neck of a jar (figure 10.5b). This type of design can also be seen on the rim of a later wide-rimmed bowl (figure 10.6a). Like the previous examples the clay, temper and firing are quite different, as seen from the two sections (figure 10.6b). While statistically there are very few of these later imitations within the total ceramic inventory, the examples all come from one period around 2100 BC when some potters were interested in this type of emulation. In other words, we are dealing here not with isolated imitations made by a perceptive potter but rather with a wider appreciation of the decorative techniques of “ancient” potters (Boardman 2002, 179–180).

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Figure 10.4. a. Ninevite V hatched triangles from ca. 2700 BCE. b. Later jar from ca. 2100 BCE, with detail of incised triangles. Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/Urkesh Archaeological Project.

Not only is the decoration reproduced, but later imitations can also be found in simulations of the surface color of earlier finely made pottery. This happens in the case of Metallic ware that is usually gray or orange with few inclusions, highly fired, and thin walled with a wet smoothed and sometimes scraped surface (figure 10.7a). Imitations of this pottery

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Figure 10.5. a. Late Ninevite V bowl from ca. 2700 BCE. b. Ninevite V sherd, ca. 2700 BCE, and jar neck dating to ca. 2100 BCE. Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/Urkesh Archaeological Project.

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b

Figure 10.6. a. Bowl rim, ca. 2100 BC. b. Sections: (left) section of Ninevite V sherd, ca. 2700 BCE and (right) section of sherd dating to ca. 2100 BC. Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/ Urkesh Archaeological Project.

include jars with a dark gray exterior covered with an iron-rich slip, partially reduced in the firing (figure 10.7b). While superficially the surface may resemble Metallic ware, the clay, temper, and firing are very different (figure 10.7c). These imitations are more widespread than the imitations of decoration just discussed and are generally thought to be motivated by

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Figure 10.7. a. Small Metallic ware jar. b. Two Imitation Metallic ware jar sherds. c. Sections of Metallic ware (left) and Imitation Metallic ware (right). Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/Urkesh Archaeological Project.

economic choices since the color and even hardness are close to Metallic vessels. While craft traditions in many cultures play an important role in establishing identity and distinguishing various ethnic entities, it is not possible to separate the creators of the ceramics discussed above into clearly delineated groups. We do have evidence from the texts excavated at Urkesh that both Hurrians and Akkadians lived in the city and the surrounding towns. However, on the basis of our present evidence, we  cannot differentiate specific cultural identities through modes of production.

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Transfer of Knowledge: From the Formal to the Vernacular Several authors in this volume have stressed different types of knowledge (see chapters 1, 4, and 12 this volume) and related aspects of social status. An architectural plan, excavated in ancient Urkesh, shows the transfer of abstract knowledge, an idea—in this case the design of the royal palace at Urkesh—into practical knowledge: the plan used by the building crew. Plans of individual buildings or even entire quarters of a city are well known from Mesopotamia; more than fifty of these from all time periods have been found (Dolce 2000). Ongoing excavations in Urkesh have revealed a palace built around 2250 BCE, constructed over a short period of time by the Hurrian king Tupkish mentioned above. Recently, while excavating in one wing of the palace, we found a clay tablet with the plan of three rooms, including their doorways (figure 10.8a). We interpret this as the plan of the three nearby rooms drawn by the master craftsman (i.e., the “architect”) to guide the building team constructing these rooms (figure 10.8b,c). In other words, this tablet is the means of the transfer of the master craftsman’s specialized knowledge of the specifics of the building design to the team of artisans who were building this section of the palace. Here, for the first time in Mesopotamia, we can document this type of transfer of specialized architectural knowledge. It gives us an intermediate step in the production sequence between the specialist and the construction team working in this part of the palace. The division between theoretical and practical knowledge often brings with it an assessment of social status. Scribes and architects in many societies have a higher status than builders, who execute the plans. We do have, however, an interesting piece of evidence for the social position of an Urkesh potter from the Akkadian period (ca. 2240 BCE), which indicates how the elite sector of the society may have viewed pottery production. From the excavation of the palace, a seal impression depicts a potter working in the setting of a ceramic workshop (figure 10.9). The potter is shown kneeling before a tripod stand that seems to have “feet.” Set into this stand is a necked jar with what appears to be a pointed base. The potter is working on the final stages of the production cycle because the jar is evidently fully formed and at least in the “leather hard” stage. Placed above the potter in the scene, probably on a shelf, are two necked jars sitting in stands. The figure has physical characteristics resembling a woman, but the hairstyle can be worn by either sex. The inclusion of this workshop scene is significant because it is a so-called secondary scene placed at the end of a main scene usually containing larger figures. It is in this space, during the Akkadian period in Syro-Mesopotamia, that

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Figure 10.8. a. Clay tablet with architectural plan of three rooms. b. Clay tablet with overlay of rooms. c. Palace plan showing three rooms. Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/Urkesh Archaeological Project.

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Figure 10.9. Seal impression of a ceramic workshop from Urkesh, ca. 2200 BCE. Courtesy of the International Institute for Mesopotamian Area Studies and the Mozan/Urkesh Archaeological Project.

the cuneiform inscription is often inserted that usually identifies the seal owner. The inclusion of the locus for ceramic production in such a scene must indicate that the status of the potter was such that it could be associated with a seal belonging to a person of elite status. Furthermore, it may also be that the individual who owned the seal was connected with this type of activity since in the Urkesh iconographic corpus there is very often a connection between the occupation of the seal owner and the activities depicted on the seal (Kelly-Buccellati 2010).

Conclusion It is often assumed that apprenticeship entails a face-to-face relationship and that these relationships are organized in certain standard ways. My point here is that in an archaeological context, these definitions can be

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expanded to include historical-generative learning situations where they exist. The examples we have are few, but I think that our view of apprenticeship can extend to a form of apprenticeship where ancients study their own ancestors in a system where the creations and inventions of the ancestors were appreciated and learning from them was viewed as an acceptable source of knowledge. While we have little evidence for how the ceramic apprenticeship system worked in practice, the imitation of certain aspects of much earlier pottery does give us a glimpse at the interest of the later potter to engage in the per formance of the tasks of the earlier potters in congruent ways. In other words, they are coparticipating in ways that a contemporary apprentice would, even though this coparticipation spans centuries. Even if social and cultural values are not directly transmitted through this type of apprenticeship, it is not just technical knowledge that is rediscovered through experimentation. The very interest in previous traditions as expressed in products made by the ancient community of practice signals an appreciation of values that are in some way shared. Apart from the direct apprentice– teacher relation, and learning from the ancestors, another type of cross-temporal apprenticeship is one where the study of the technique as such becomes the object of interest, without the intent of actually using the craft, for example, with the texts that describe methods for farming (Jacobsen 1982) or prescriptions for how to make glass (Oppenheim 1970). Here, apprenticeship is reified as an object to be looked at from the outside; clearly, a third millennium farmer is not going to learn farming methods from cuneiform texts! But the almost ethnographic interest of the scribes in describing the details of a craft point to the degree of self-awareness that had developed within the craft itself; the community of practice was ready to provide outside observers with an articulate description of its own production processes. At no time, perhaps, did a cross-temporal community of practice become as fully aware of what it was doing as with the “Renaissance”—a word that by antonomasia refers to learning from the ancestors, to which one of its great practitioners, Benvenuto Cellini, gave the most appropriate expression when he wrote, “I am willing to enter into competition with the ancients and feel able to surpass them” (Cellini 1909–1914 [1558– 1566], section 65). Acknowledgments

I thank Willeke Wendrich for inviting me to contribute to this volume, and Brenda Bowser, Heather Miller, and the various anonymous readers for their comments on earlier drafts of this chapter.

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CHA P TER ELEV EN

Types of Learning in Apprenticeship Heather M.- L. Miller

Different attributes have been used to classify particular types of relationships as “apprenticeships,” especially by archaeologists and anthropologists interested in craft production, as demonstrated in the preceding chapters. Such attributes include the social context of learning, levels of performance skill, the length of time involved in the practice of the craft, and the particular types of learning involved, especially but not exclusively kinesthetic learning. I propose that of these topics, the types of learning involved are the most useful attributes for creating a definition of apprenticeship applicable across different crafts and societies, because it is the use of particular types of learning that seems to be the common attribute in a wide range of situations referred to as apprenticeships. This is not to denigrate the importance of the other variables in describing and understanding the process of apprenticeship and its diverse social implications. Rather, the presence of particular types of learning simply seems the most effective attribute to use in classifying a learning relationship as apprenticeship, allowing the effective comparison of the other aspects in these sorts of learning relationships. I illustrate this definitional utility using the example of archaeological student apprenticeships in university classes teaching experimental archaeology. Like many crafts and practices, archaeology as a discipline employs relationships commonly referred to as “apprenticeships” to teach a significant proportion of the knowledge required in the practice of

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archaeology. I explore what we can learn from these archaeological experiences about apprenticeship in general, especially in terms of the use of an education model based on knowledge transfer and knowledge gain, as well as the types of learning involved. Much of the archaeological literature that discusses apprenticeship and learning defines learning in terms of cognitive abilities, drawing on psychological models from childhood development to mental categories (e.g., articles in the 2001 winter issue of Journal of Anthropological Research on learning and craft production, and several chapters in this volume). An additional body of archaeological literature on learning focuses on stages of increasing cognitive ability throughout the development of the human species (e.g., papers in Renfrew and Zubrow 1994). I take a different approach and examine learning in terms of knowledge transfer and knowledge gain, drawing on education models, which also employ the psychological literature but from a somewhat different perspective. Aspects of this education literature related to cross-cultural education and learning also provide the background for such studies as those of Patricia Greenfield, Ashley Maynard, and Carla Childs (2000) and Patricia Crown (2001) on the social context of learning. Both of these examples of innovation emphasize the importance of the social context of knowledge transfer at the apprenticeship stage, as do many of chapters in this volume.

Social Context of Learning Apprenticeship situations can be compared both through time, as is done by Greenfield et al. (2000), and between different societies, as done by Crown (2001), in order to examine different aspects of learning and innovation in relation to the social context of learning. A change in the methods of teaching and learning used is described by Greenfield et al. (2000) in their long-term study of the changes in textile production and apprenticeship in a Zinacantec Maya community in Chiapas, Mexico, between 1969–1970 and 1991–1993. The earlier period’s teaching methods emphasized interdependent learning, with apprentices learning by observing their teachers, obeying the teachers’ instructions, and frequently receiving direct help. The authors refer to this as the “four-hands on the loom” method of instruction, as the teacher often physically corrected errors in weaving while the apprentice was weaving, resulting in relatively error-free weaving with techniques transmitted by very close assistance. To use the developmental learning models and terminology employed by the authors, this was a scaffolded learning process, emphasizing close guidance by a skilled teacher characteristic of the Vygotskian

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model of learning (Greenfield et al. 2000). By the early 1990s, the social context of apprenticeship had changed dramatically in Chiapas, as had the economic and social situation of the community, from primarily subsistence production and household or close kin consumption to entrepreneurial weaving for market sale. Now, apprentices learned in a much more independent way, employing trial and error to correct problems or learn new techniques. Instead of a close scaffold of instruction, with the teacher actively involved and frequently correcting mistakes, novices had to experiment on their own and request help from more advanced apprentices. Greenfield et al. (2000) characterize this style of learning as the more independent trial-and-error style addressed by Piaget, and it is similar to the type of learning by imitation of objects discussed in chapter 10 in this volume. At the same time as this shift occurred both in the economic and social situation and in teaching and learning styles, there was also a great increase in the variety and innovation of woven designs. Cause and effect between these changes is not clear and probably is a self-perpetuating system. The new consumption system included demand for new styles of woven designs. With economic and social changes, experienced textile workers concentrated on their own production, leaving novice apprentices on their own. The new method of learning encouraged experimentation and innovation, resulting in more diversity of weaving. Whether the new apprenticeship learning systems themselves caused innovative designs (in my opinion, the changing patterns of consumption of the textiles was likely the original cause of design changes), such learning situations almost certainly have resulted in innovations in weaving gestures and production techniques. These innovations occurred because the more independent novices necessarily experimented much more and required much greater creative mental participation to solve their own problems, because they did not have the direct intervention of experienced weavers as an immediate guide. In other words, we see here innovations in technological style (production process, including gesture and technique) and possibly also innovations in style (design of product) (Miller 2006, 191–201). These innovations are directly tied to changes in the social context of learning for these apprentices. Crown (2001) also describes innovation relating to the social context of learning in two different pottery production situations but involving two different societies in the ancient American Southwest rather than change through time in a single community. Potters in these two pottery traditions, the Mimbres and Hohokam, appear to have had very different attitudes toward design innovation. Crown suggests that apprentice children learning Mimbres pottery production began to learn by first painting vessels made by skilled potters, sometimes even painting designs laid

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out for them by their teachers. Innovation in design was allowed or encouraged, and more errors were made, in what looks like a more independent learning system. In contrast, Hohokam apprentice potters appear to have constructed pots themselves but using simpler methods of construction (modeling the clay with hands or in a mold) than the traditional methods of skilled potters (coiling and then thinning with paddle and anvil). Only after they had mastered simpler production steps did Hohokam apprentices progress to more difficult techniques, so error rates were lower than in the Mimbres pottery made by apprentices. Crown (2001, 465) discusses how these differences in the learning environment relate to differences in the rapidity of change in pottery production techniques between these two groups, with the Hohokam characterized by stable technology and slow constant change in design and the Mimbres characterized by much more rapidly changing technology and innovation in design. Again, it is the social context of learning at the apprenticeship stage that plays a large part in innovation, both in design or style and in technological process or technological style. These two examples focus on the structure of the interaction between apprentice and instructor within the social context of learning. The types of social contexts in which the apprenticeships take place are also often classified in terms of the age of the apprentices and the formality of instructional relationship, as is seen, for example, in the variety of “informal” and “formal” apprenticeships described in this volume. Informal apprenticeship usually refers to the involvement of children in learning almost as imitative play, with the exception of anthropologists who also sometimes take on this role (chapter 1 this volume). Informal apprenticeship refers to the involvement of small children in learning almost as play, with the exception of anthropologists who also sometimes take on this role. Informal apprenticeships can be very effective as learning tools, and they may continue as a similarly casual relationship as children grow older, but they do not follow specified training stages. Formal apprenticeship, in contrast, involves children and young adults in a specified relationship with the instructor-master, a relationship that follows a planned progression of steps of practice and correction to achieve specified goals of ability. There is obviously the possibility of relationships falling between informal and formal or incorporating both (e.g., chapter 5 this volume), but I mention this dichotomy to emphasize that learning by playing or imitation is part of the process of what we might define as apprenticeship, just as both tacit and explicit knowledge are usually involved in learning as described below.

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Skill and Time Practicing Craft Other attributes used to describe the nature of apprenticeship include skill and the time spent practicing a task or craft. Most of the situations referred to as “apprenticeship” involve a gradual learning curve, with emphasis on the need for repetitive practice of par ticular motions to acquire physical skills. Willeke Wendrich (2006; see also chapter 1 this volume) discusses body knowledge with a focus on what I call “kinesthetic participation,” in modern and ancient Egyptian basket makers, as well as visual observation by the apprentice and presumably some verbal instruction by the teacher-master. Her emphasis is primarily on the point that transfer of knowledge in apprenticeship is partly through demonstration but primarily through repetition of movements (kinesthetics). This work and other ethnoarchaeological studies focusing on skill provide some excellent examples of the complexity of characterizing “specialists.” Wendrich’s (1999) book describes her extensive studies of basket production in Egypt, particularly her innovative use of video recording and analysis, which led to intriguing finds about the skills held by occasional basket makers producing for their own use versus professional basket makers producing for exchange. The skill of the basket makers was not linked to their professional or nonprofessional status; both could have the “skill” characteristics of steady and economical movements. However, the speed of the professional producers’ work was always fast, and this was not true of the nonprofessional basket makers. Wendrich (1999, 391–393) suggests that the archaeologically detectable mark of a professional basket maker would be signs of haste, in the form of small inaccuracies, but a skill-based regularity to these small inaccuracies. This detailed research adds significant dimensions to the archaeological debate about what characterizes “full-time” versus “part-time” producers, and whether such a distinction is even important for understanding technological systems. Blandine Bril, Valentine Roux, and Gilles Dietrich (Bril et al. 2000; Roux et al. 1995) also used innovative ethnoarchaeological and experimental methods to examine variations in skill but for craftsmen working with hard stone. They carried out psychology-derived task experiments with bead workers who had different levels of experience in knapping and analyzed the resulting products using a pattern-recognition computer program to study the variations. Their work indicated that ten years of practice were needed to become “expert” knappers, capable of producing all types of beads. In this case, the type of bead produced, as well as the quality of production, was a useful indicator of skill level. Along these same lines, different skills would be required for different types of fired clay products. The mass production of fast wheel-thrown vessels would require

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quite different skills from the production of large and/or complex vessels and from the production of hand-formed figurines (e.g., Roux and Corbetta 1989; Shah 1985; van der Leeuw 1993; Wright 1991). As archaeologists, we might expect to find that in complex socioeconomic systems with specialization of production, different individuals or even different workshops made mass-produced items thrown on a fast wheel, larger and/or more complex vessels, and figurines or small ornaments. In smaller-scale socioeconomic systems, it is also possible that various individuals in the household or in the primary potters’ workshop made these small objects, much as the children of modern bead makers in Khambhat make small rough beads from scraps of stone. These divisions relate not only to the relative “skill” of production but also to the producer’s control of a range of types of skills (e.g., fast wheel throwing off the hump vs. use of multiple techniques while working more slowly). Choice of production orientation is also a factor in assessing skill, such as producer’s decisions about the maximization of quantity produced versus the complexity of product desired. Because of all these variables in the par ticular production process, as well as the social context of production, skill is a very difficult yardstick to use when defining apprenticeship per se, although it is an important factor in understanding the nature of lifelong learning, for the process of becoming a master as well as an apprentice.

Types of Learning The attributes described above, and others discussed in this volume, all are needed to classify and relate the diversity of situations referred to as “apprenticeships.” The aspect of apprenticeship I think may be most useful as a definitional standard, though, are the types of learning involved. By “types of learning,” I refer to the variety of processes of knowledge transfer and knowledge gain, those incorporated both in observation (learning from another’s experience) and in direct experience (learning by one’s own experience, sometimes called learning by doing). Figure 11.1 illustrates a classification of various types of learning. For most researchers, an apprenticeship situation necessarily involves direct experience: learning by doing. Observation requires that the knowledge recipient (the apprentice or student) is able to understand communications of each sort—visual, aural, and written— employed in teaching. Written observation is a separate category from visual observation because it requires visualization as well, that is, the visual task of reading a description plus the imaginative task of creating or visualizing the thing, action, or situation described. These

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A. OBSERVATION Learning from another’s experience Understanding communications 1. Visual 2. Aural (hearing verbal communications) 3. Reading written communication B. DIRECT EXPERIENCE Learning by one’s own experience (by doing) Experimentation/copying, practice, correction (by others) 1. Kinesthetic participation Movements, muscle-learning, body knowledge, and other sensory participation, such as smell, taste, and some types of aural observation requiring participation 2. Creative mental participation Learning from another’s and one’s own observation and direct experience Logic, deduction, imagination (problem-solving) Leads to innovation (creation of knowledge rather than only transfer of knowledge)

All of the categories above include BOTH explicit and tacit learning Figure 11.1. Types of learning (knowledge gain, knowledge transfer)

observed perceptions require a number of skills and are used in a variety of teaching situations, some typically perceived as apprenticeships, and some not. For example, chapter 4 in this volume notes that woodworkers use a specialist vocabulary of terms for tools and techniques, which must be learned by the apprentice to understand directions from the master. Barbara Rogoff and colleagues (2003) emphasize the very different levels of (visual) observational skills shown by children from different cultural backgrounds, even when placed in the same classrooms. Such classroom teaching might not be considered apprenticeship, but then where should we draw the line between such a case and that discussed in chapter 8 of

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this volume regarding ancient Egyptian scribes, which most archaeologists would be comfortable calling an apprenticeship situation? In addition to observation, the situations generally referred to as “apprenticeship” in archaeology have in common the need to learn at least some of the necessary knowledge through direct experience. This experience is gained through copying and experimentation and usually involves repeated practice with correction by the knowledge giver if possible. In the vast majority of cases, such “experience” is in the form of kinesthetic participation, the education term for what is variously called muscle learning, body knowledge, or hands-on knowledge—for example, shaping a pottery vessel, chipping a stone tool, weaving a mat, performing a dance movement, or using a trowel to clean an excavation section. Smell, taste, and participatory aural experiences, such as learning to talk and sing, are also usually placed under kinesthetic learning. Thus, apprenticeship is usually defined (by implication) as learning involving kinesthetic participation. I have tentatively placed smell, taste, and certain types of aural practices under direct experience because humans do not usually seem to clearly communicate these sensual experiences to others; they must often be experienced for the knowledge recipient to understand them. The types of aural practices included here, such as music production, are very difficult to understand from communication without direct experience; other aural practices, such as verbal communication using words, are partially learned through observation but seem to also require some degree of participatory experience, as childhood language acquisition studies have demonstrated (Hickerson 2000; for other aspects of observation and participation in childhood learning, see also Rogoff 1990). The apprentice also directly experiences, to greater or lesser extents, what I refer to as “creative mental participation.” This includes both mental creativity in applying known skills for new purposes, for which some literature uses Claude Lévi-Strauss’s term bricolage, and logical problem-solving involving deductive reasoning and imagination.1 Creative mental participation is essential to apprenticeship in all but the most regimented conditions, because only the most basic tasks can be learned by observation and kinesthetic experience alone. As noted in chapter 1 in this volume and discussed under skill above, to progress beyond the apprenticeship level, the apprentice must be able to experience the active, creative mental processes of logic, deduction, and imagination, to apply known skills to new situations or to invent new skills altogether. Therefore, the apprentice needs to learn these mental skills as well as the kinesthetic ones, if he or she is to progress beyond apprenticeship. Chapter 10 in this volume gives a perfect example of this process, where ancient workers are imitating an object made by methods unknown to them, using a combination of (1) observations of these objects; (2) their own kinesthetic skills, learned

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from somewhat similar but not the same types of work; and (3) the use of logic, deduction, and/or imagination to recreate unknown production processes. In fact, this ancient case is very similar to the work of the archaeologist engaged in the study of ancient technologies (e.g., Inizan et al. 1992; Mathieu 2002; Miller 2006). Creative mental participation is also a part of the process of technological innovation, as modeled in a number of different ways by chapters in van der Leeuw and Torrence (1989). If the apprentice is not taught to develop creative mental participation, that is, to develop problem-solving skills as well as observation and copying, there will be no innovation, no change in the practice of a craft. Superficially, this might sound like periods with very stable archaeological traditions must represent periods with decreased attention to creative mental participation in craft apprenticeships. However, this seems unlikely to me; periods with decreased creative mental participation are likely to represent periods where craft knowledge is being lost, not maintained; craftspeople must constantly deal with changing conditions in terms of material availability, environmental conditions (both social and physical), or consumer demand. If there is no change in stylistic traditions, it is often because there are significant social pressures opposing change, or no incentive for innovation on the larger scale. Crown’s (2001) discussion of the different levels of acceptable innovation in Hohokam versus Mimbres learning traditions is a good example of how innovating— or not innovating— can itself be a characteristic of a tradition. All of the categories above include both explicit and tacit learning, as discussed in different ways by a number of the chapters in this volume. I define explicit observation and participation as conscious, deliberate learning, and tacit observation and participation as the unconscious absorption of practices. This division comes from the cultural anthropological observation of tacit “customary behavior,” for example, the appropriate distance one stands from others in conversation, behavior of which people are seldom aware until they encounter other practices (Spradley 1980, 7– 8). The relative degree to which explicit and tacit learning are involved in particular cases of apprenticeship may be a useful comparison among different crafts, societies, or situations. Kinesthetic learning is usually seen as the defi ning characteristic of apprenticeship, that is, learning involving direct experience as well as observation. It is clearly the case that kinesthetic learning is a crucial part of apprenticeship. Even in situations where kinesthetic learning is minimal—for storytellers and bards, for example—similar types of repetitious practice, sometimes involving body movements, seem to often be used in learning and remembering. Repetition is used to improve the quality of all types of learning, both observation and direct experience. And in many historically and ethnographically known situations, formal

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apprentices to crafts not only learned through kinesthetic experimentation with new movements and techniques but also did the simpler, more repetitive work involved in production—which was itself an important component of how they learned, as discussed in chapter 1 in this volume. However, as I have noted, kinesthetic learning is not the only type of direct experience (figure 11.1), and very few types of apprenticeship activities require only kinesthetic types of direct experience; most also require creative mental participation. Thus, in my opinion, kinesthetic experience alone is not sufficient to define a situation as apprenticeship. Therefore, I suggest that we widen the type of learning linked to apprenticeship to include all types of participatory learning (i.e., learning requiring direct experience), both kinesthetic and creative mental participation. In sum, all types of learning involve observation, but apprenticeship also involves direct experience. I would thus like to define apprenticeship as a learning process necessarily involving participatory experience as one of the types of learning employed, both kinesthetic and creative mental participation. The degree to which these various types of learning are emphasized in the apprenticeship process can tell us a great deal about the potential for innovation in a craft or a society, as is well illustrated in the ethnographic and archaeological examples of craft production described in this volume. The same sorts of approaches can be used to examine the process of educational apprenticeships employed in archaeology and many other academic disciplines.

Apprenticeship in Archaeology He said he felt archeology could best be handled by one of the local trade schools. —Kent Flannery, “The Golden Marshalltown” (1982)

Chapter 8 in this volume describes the apprenticeship of scribes in ancient Egypt. Processes of knowledge transfer and gain can also be illustrated with a case study from modern postsecondary education—teaching the process of archaeological research to students through the use of apprenticeship. My own case study of apprenticeship is one that all archaeologists have experienced themselves, because archaeology as a discipline employs relationships commonly referred to as “apprenticeships” to teach a significant proportion of the knowledge required to practice archaeology. This facet of archaeology provides archaeologists with useful experience for understanding apprenticeship from a firsthand perspective. This use of apprenticeship in modern education is not unique to archaeology; the role of apprenticeship is alive and well across several

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modern disciplines, as chapter 12 in this volume discusses. Work in the experimental sciences, including chemistry, physics, and biology, includes instruction in the practice of research, from experimental design to laboratory techniques, particularly beyond the bachelor’s level. Medical sciences demand not only laboratory experience but also a further term of apprenticeship as an intern, under more stressful circumstances than the practitioners are likely to typically encounter. Fine arts classes may have no written and almost no verbal instruction; rather, students learn through observing and imitating the instructor and then further experimenting on their own. In sociocultural anthropology, students are more rarely instructed in close apprenticeships with their teachers (although see the special section in the June 1999 issue of Anthropology and Education Quarterly on field schools for ethnographers). Instead, ethnographers apprentice to the people they study, in learning situations typically involving both observation and participation since participantobservation is one of the hallmarks of sociocultural anthropology. The teaching of archaeology has always included both traditional lecture classes and apprentice-like courses involving “hands-on” or kinesthetic learning. This includes field schools and lab method courses, as well as (more rarely now) courses in experimental archaeology. As with other sorts of apprenticeship, archaeological field schools and classes in experimental archaeology employ participatory experiences, including both kinesthetic and creative mental skills. Students learn to hold a trowel, learn to see (and feel) the sediment changes characteristic of mudbrick or pit houses, develop a feel for the stancing of pottery, and develop an appreciation for the skill involved in the simplest flintknapping. My own teaching experiences have illustrated for me how such classes bridge the gaps between archaeological theory, academic thinking, and the different types of knowledge that come from participatory experiences of both body and mind. Students, our apprentices, find this bridge tremendously helpful, particularly the exposure to participatory experience. Undergraduates are typically fascinated by their first glimpse of the actual practice of archaeological problem solving, whether in the field or the lab, and the development of problem-solving abilities is one of the strongest qualities we develop in our students, no matter what their future careers. Archaeologists highly value these apprenticeship-learned skills, as seen in the fact that archaeologists at a wide range of institutions stubbornly continue to dedicate scarce resources to offering necessarily small laboratory method and field school classes. These classes require continuing, large inputs of time and materials every time they are taught, in comparison to lecture classes. Another sign of the importance and valuing of these skills is that participating in or directing a field or lab project continues to be a major aspect of hiring eligibility for many academic

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positions; the ability to direct a field school is often particularly mentioned in position announcements. Outside of the field itself, these participatory aspects of our discipline are not only recognized but also often seen as archaeology’s defining characteristic by other disciplines and particularly by the public. However, while field schools and lab methods courses have maintained a steady importance in the field, experimental archaeology courses seem to have waxed and waned in popularity. Possible reasons for this variation in the valuing of experimental archaeology courses include changes in archaeological theory, such as the move away from very “processual” experimental archaeology (of course, we are still teaching lab and field methods!); the rising size of classes, making it hard to conduct many smaller lab-type classes beyond our core requirements for field and laboratory methods; and possibly the changing workload and age profiles of faculty, as these sorts of participatory classes definitely require a degree of enthusiasm and additional time commitment that is difficult to maintain with heavy administrative duties, publication requirements, or high course load demands. Despite these difficulties, like other archaeologists I have explored the value of using experimental archaeology as a pedagogical technique with great success, in my case as part of courses on ancient technology in several different teaching environments at four different universities and with different levels of university students, both undergraduate and graduate. My goal for these classes has been to teach research thought (problem solving) not only through observation, but also through direct experience or “doing,” both kinesthetic and mental. This goal is accomplished through class projects, and particularly through each student’s independent project, which can be any kind of experimental archaeology from replication to classic experimentation. My only requirement is that the project must include an experiential, kinesthetic aspect.2 Like students in field and lab methods classes, for a short time these students become apprentices in the first stages of the craft of archaeological research, focusing in this case on problems related to the study of ancient technologies. In my teaching of these classes, I begin with “exploratory” experimental archaeology (Mathieu 2002; Miller 2006). Such research is often the first step in classic experimental archaeology, or is replaced by the use of ethnographic data—the step of outlining the likely production sequence, the variables involved, and the alternative techniques and materials that need to be considered. Students learn to set up a project from beginning to end, anticipating the tools they will need, the stages where they must make records of the process, and the likely problems they might encounter along the way. They learn the need to plan but also must be able to deal with the totally unexpected. They learn to truly observe an action in a video, to think fast, to adjust strategies, and to be

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flexible. They learn to be aware of the possible and also the impossible and be willing to make important insights into questions they were not intending to ask. In other words, they learn to be archaeologists. As an encapsulation of an entire research endeavor, such experimental projects provide a good match with our other apprentice-like teaching methods in archaeology, the field school and the lab methods course. Why are they apprentices and not simply students? First, because they must engage in learning to replicate objects or actions by direct experience, as well as observation. They learn some techniques by visual observation of the instructor or others (especially through videos) or by verbal or written communications of various types, although it is seldom that we are able to access material for direct observation of the exact technologies of interest. They learn some kinesthetic skills, particularly if they continue to pursue these studies beyond the class, and kinesthetic ability is emphasized as a major part of their technology. Most important, to a great extent these students are learning through experimentation and imitation, the best of them using logical deduction and imagination to fill in the many gaps and to supply alternative possibilities for carry ing out different steps of production. This learning situation compares to chapter 10’s case of replication of an object by skilled crafters, chapter 3’s description of an undirected participation group, and the independent trial-and-error learning of the Chiapas apprentice weaver in the 1990s described by Greenfield et al. (2000). The direct learning experience of these archaeology students not only is kinesthetic but also involves the second type of participatory experience characteristic of apprenticeship, the creative mental experiences involved in the practice of archaeological research. They are apprenticing with the instructor to learn how to be creative thinkers and researchers. Especially for undergraduates, the process of devising and carry ing out small “exploratory” experiments of their own generates not only an awareness of the process of research but also great excitement and a strong sense of how much is unknown about the past and how they can contribute to our collective knowledge base. It is not uncommon to have tremendous success with students who struggle with straight lecture classes, at both the undergraduate and graduate level. This is a kind of learning different from observation, and all students benefit from these new skills, both those with strong observational skills of the type of use in traditional academic classroom learning and those who learn better in participatory ways. Several of my undergraduate students have gone on to graduate studies building on these initial projects, and several graduate students have published articles or incorporated these experiments into theses and dissertations. I am not suggesting that most ancient apprenticeships functioned in this way; in fact, most would be the reverse, with more focus on kines-

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thetic learning and less on mental processes until much later stages of mastery. And, of course, in the past apprentices not only learned but also did the lower-value, “easier,” more repetitive work, which was an important component of how they learned (e.g., chapter 1 this volume).3 It might be argued that this particular case of archaeological apprenticeship is only directly comparable to apprenticeships of the past for the training of people whose occupations required frequent changes in interpretations and practices, in order to deal with new situations—religious specialists, perhaps, or rulers. However, Roux et al. (1995) discuss the adaptability required for successful bead knapping at all but the most elementary levels, a good example of the creative mental ability frequently noted for flintknappers, who so often have to change production plans when material flaws appear halfway through a production process. By examining archaeological apprenticeships, it becomes impossible to ignore the creative mental participatory experiences required in all apprenticeships, refining our definition of what it means to be an apprentice. To conclude, while per formance skill, social context of learning, and other attributes studied are all of great importance in understanding the process of apprenticeship and its social context, in my opinion a clear definition of apprenticeship is most effective when grounded on the nature of learning involved. As outlined in figure 11.1, apprenticeship includes both observation and direct experience. Most scholars would agree that kinesthetic participation is a definitional aspect of apprenticeship; I argue that creative mental participation is an equally important part of the direct experience involved in apprenticeship, although often in more advanced levels of mastery of the craft, whether bead makers, potters, or archaeologists. Acknowledgments

This chapter owes a great deal to all the students who have taken my experimental archaeology classes and gone on to better things, burning and slicing fingers to examine cooking pot absorption, ruining good leather skirts on replications of bevel-rim bowl manufacturing, and having weird conversations with butchers in order to get the right bones for spit and pit roasting or for the mummification of chickens (names withheld to protect the pretenured). Thanks for all the insights into apprenticeship, as well as the satisfaction of seeing you learn to become fascinated with the process of research itself. I also greatly appreciate the help provided by Cleo Boyd and especially Tom Klubi of the Academic Skills Centre at the University of Toronto at Mississauga in introducing me to the term kinesthetic and the education literature on learning more broadly.

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1. I do not follow the division made by Lévi-Strauss between bricolage and logical problem-solving, because I think most apprenticeship situations require the use of both types of thinking in a fairly integrated manner for most problems. See Hénaff (1998 [1991], chap. 6) and especially Pace (1983, 134–143) for excellent discussions of how Lévi-Strauss’s use of this term and his discussions of thinking styles have been misunderstood. 2. I make an exception for anyone interested in medicine or shamanistic hallucinatory experiences—in fact, I insist on an exception to it. I might note, however, that the undergraduate at Michigan who did an excellent, nonparticipatory comparison of Mayan and medieval European bloodletting did get into a prestigious medical school with a letter of recommendation detailing this project. 3. However, we might draw a parallel to this in the case of archaeology by noting that having graduate students is more desired in archaeology and the experimental sciences than in some other disciplines, because of the potential for needed labor.

References Bril, B., V. Roux, and G. Dietrich. 2000. Habiletés impliquées dans la taille des perles en calcédoine: caractéristiques motrices et cognitives d’une action située complexe. (Skills Involved in Knapping of Chalcedony Beads: Motor and Cognitive Characteristics of a Complex Situated Action.). In Cornaline de l’Inde. Des pratiques techniques de Cambay aux techno-systèmes de l’Indus. (Includes extensive English translations and a CD in both French and English.) V. Roux, ed. Pp. 211–329. Paris: Éditions de la Maison des sciences de l’homme. Crown, P.L. 2001. Learning to Make Pottery in the Prehispanic American Southwest. Journal of Anthropological Research 57:451– 469. Greenfield, P.M., A.E. Maynard, and C.P. Childs. 2000. History, Culture, Learning and Development. Cross-Cultural Research 34(4):351–374. Hénaff, M. 1998 [1991]. Claude Lévi-Strauss and the Making of Structural Anthropology. M. Baker, trans. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press. Hickerson, N.P. 2000. Linguistic Anthropology. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/ Thomson Learning. Inizan, M.-L., H. Roche, and J. Tixier. 1992. Technology of Knapped Stone. Followed by a Multilingual Vocabulary (Arabic, English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Russian, Spanish). A. Lee, trans. Meudon: Cercle de Recherches et d’Etudes Préhistoriques (CREP) and Centre National de las Recherche Scientifique (CNRS). Mathieu, J.R. 2002. Introduction—Experimental Archaeology: Replicating Past Objects, Behaviors, and Processes. In Experimental Archaeology: Replicat-

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ing Past Objects, Behaviors, and Processes. J.R. Mathieu, ed. Pp. 1–12. BAR International Series, Vol. 1035. Oxford: Archaeopress. Miller, H.M.-L. 2006. Archaeological Approaches to Technology. San Diego, CA: Academic Press/Elsevier. Pace, D. 1983. Claude Lévi-Strauss. The Bearer of Ashes. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Renfrew, C., and E.B.W. Zubrow, eds. 1994. The Ancient Mind: Elements of Cognitive Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rogoff, B. 1990. Apprenticeship in Thinking: Cognitive Development and Social Context. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rogoff, B., R. Paradise, R.M. Arauz, M. Correa-Chavez, and C. Angelillo. 2003. Firsthand Learning through Intent Participation. Annual Review of Psychology 54:175–203. Roux, V., B. Bril, and G. Dietrich. 1995. Skills and Learning Difficulties Involved in Stone Knapping: The Case of Stone-Bead Knapping in Khambhat, India. World Archaeology 27(1):63– 87. Roux, V., and D. Corbetta. 1989. The Potter’s Wheel. Craft Specialisation and Technical Competence. New Delhi: Oxford and IBH Publishing. Shah, H. 1985. Votive Terracottas of Gujarat. New York: Mapin International. Spradley, J.P. 1980. Participant Observation. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. van der Leeuw, S.E. 1993. Giving the Potter a Choice: Conceptual Aspects of Pottery Techniques. In Technological Choices: Transformation in Material Cultures since the Neolithic. P. Lemonnier, ed. Pp. 238–288. London: Routledge. van der Leeuw, S.E., and R. Torrence, eds. 1989. What’s New? A Closer Look at the Process of Innovation. London: Unwin Hyman. Wendrich, W. 1999. The World According to Basketry. An Ethno-archaeological Interpretation of Basketry Production in Egypt. Leiden: Research School of Asian, African and Amerindian Studies, Universiteit Leiden. http://escholar ship.org /uc/cioa _cda Wendrich, W. 2006. Body knowledge. Ethnoarchaeological Learning and the Interpretation of Ancient Technology. In L’apport de l’Égypte à l’histoire des techniques. B. Mathieu, D. Meeks, and M. Wissa, eds. Pp. 267–275. Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale. Wright, R.P. 1991. Patterns of Technology and the Organization of Production at Harappa. In Harappa Excavations 1986–1990: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Third Millennium Urbanism. R.H. Meadow, ed. Pp. 71– 88. Monographs in World Archaeology, No. 3. Madison, WI: Prehistory Press.

CHA P TER T W ELV E

Writing Craftsmanship? Vocabularies and Notation Systems in the Transmission of Craft Knowledge Lise Bender Jørgensen

In Western philosophy of science, academic knowledge is traditionally perceived as fundamentally different from the forms of knowledge embedded in craftsmanship. Theoretical knowledge is viewed as something that can be put into books, and taken out of them. Further, knowledge about something is viewed as qualitatively distinct from the subject; application of knowledge is seen as a separate element. Knowledge mirrors or copies reality, can be formulated in words or in the language of mathematics, and, ideally, is eternal (Molander 2004). Going back to Plato and Aristotle, this has been further developed by the empiricists and rationalists and is generally referred to as the Cartesian dichotomy. According to this view, natural sciences are perceived as an academic ideal. Theoretical knowledge is considered as scientific, in contrast to practical knowledge or skill. Verbalization is regarded as an important defining aspect; knowledge that cannot be transferred into words is generally not accepted as academic knowledge. In recent years, the dichotomy of theory and practice is being queried, by scholars, professionals, and also by craftspeople (Bender Jørgensen 2003, 2007, with further references). It is an international development, started by, for example, the philosophers Gilbert Ryle (1949) and Michael Polanyi (1958, 1966) and the urban planner Donald Schön (1983, 1987).

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Schön opened an inquiry into the epistemology of practice, investigating how professionals think in action and how their skills are transmitted. Anthropologists and archaeologists also have begun deflating the dichotomy between body and mind, led by, among others, Timothy Ingold (2000) and Marcia-Ann Dobres (2000). In Scandinavia, thoughts such as these have gained sizable ground. Delving into Polanyi’s concept of tacit knowledge, Scandinavian scholars distinguish between knowledge based on familiarity and experience, and talk of the practical intellect and an epistemology of professional knowledge (Almevik 2011; Göranzon 1993; Göranzon and Florin 1990, 1991, 1992; Göranzon et al. 2005; Göranzon and Josefson 1988; Molander 1996, 2004; Sjömar 2011). Craftspeople have also made important contributions (Ciszuk 2007; Godal 2001; Hammarlund 2005; Tempte 1990). The idea of a practical intellect is the philosophy behind new institutions such as the Norwegian Crafts Development (www.maihaugen.no) and the Crafts Academy of Stockholm (www.sthf.se), both of which forward the documentation and preservation of crafts and techniques through archives of practicing craftsmen, crafts scholarships and further means (Buggeland 2000; Löfgren 2011; Martinussen 2005; Winbladh and Bengtsson 2003). In 2008, the Vocational College of Craft in Mariestad, Sweden, became Hantverkslaboratoriet (the Craft Laboratory) and is part of Göteborg University (www.craftlab.gu.se). The same year, Sør-Trøndelag University College in Trondheim, Norway, established a Bachelor of Arts program in technical restoration of historical buildings aimed at students with a background in crafts. Both institutions have invested in grants for doctoral students who also have craft backgrounds (Eriksson 2011; Hjort Lassen 2011; Høgseth 2007; Järefjäll and Sjömar 2011). Together with proposals for the establishment of professional universities, such as the University of Borås (www.hb.se), these efforts represent further steps toward academization of craftsmanship, as do the Dialogue Seminars established in 1985 by Professor Bo Göranzon at the Royal Institute of Technology (RIT) in Stockholm (www.dialoger.se). Göranzon created a Division of Work Science within the RIT’s Department of Industrial Economics and Management. A series of doctoral dissertations from Scandinavian universities investigate professional skills of various crafts (e.g., Guttorm 2001; Høgseth 2007; Planke 2001), artists (Ljungberg 2008), or professions such as hairdressers (Gustafsson 2002), assistant nurses (Alsterdal 2001), interpreters of sign language (Raanes 2006), or physiotherapy (Moe 2003; Steinsvik 2008). In 2009, a doctoral dissertation on musical improvisation was accepted at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in the form of a concert (Aase 2009). A vocabulary is beginning to emerge, bridging the gap between theory and practice. Terms such as tacit knowledge, knowing that versus knowing

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how, Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of habitus, and the concept of flow, minted by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and designating the psychology of optimal experience, all help us to discuss nonverbal knowledge in explicit, academic terms (Bourdieu 1986; Csikszentmihalyi 1990 [1985]; Polanyi 1966; Ryle 1949). The concepts of chaîne opératoire, minted by André Leroi-Gourhan (1965), and agency (Dobres and Robb 2000) and actor network theory (Latour 2005) help craftspeople as well as academics better understand practical knowledge. As a subject and object for academic studies, craftsmanship is rapidly becoming more accessible. That, however, still leaves the dichotomy firmly in place. Scholars feel hesitant regarding how to deal with nondiscursive knowledge, and this also applies to craftspeople striving to transmit their knowledge into the academic format of words on paper. How do we proceed?

Tacit Knowledge in Academia I find it fruitful to take a look at science, the highest-status form of academic knowledge, safely on the “right” side of the ontological gap between theory and practice. Is it really so purely theoretical? Science studies by Bruno Latour (1987, 1999) have reminded us that this is far from the case. Academic work requires plenty of practice that easily may be compared to the workings of craftsmanship. A lot of (practical) work must be done, and its results accepted by other scholars, before knowledge is ready to put into books. It is, perhaps, more apt to add “research” to the items to the left of our ontological gap (Figure 12.1).

Figure 12.1. The ontological gap between theory and practice

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Archaeology is an excellent example, requiring the procurement of data through messy fieldwork, further work processes in the recording and archiving of finds, and analyses that allow interpretations to be put forward and tested before they can be put into the proper academic format of words on paper or electronic media (see chapter 11 this volume). Considerable parts of the archaeologist’s knowledge are in fact nondiscursive, such as the ability to recognize artefact types or distinguish the layers of a complicated stratigraphy. Both are important aspects in the production of archaeological data. Learning how to do this is an essential part of the training of archaeology students. Much of it consists of learning to use the senses, sight, hearing, feeling, smell, and taste in order to identify, for example, a pot sherd as that of a Roman amphora of Dressel type 43 or to decide whether a slightly deviant plasticity represents a separate layer. It takes time to learn and can be fully transmitted only by practice. While data are the raw materials of scientists, theories and methods are their tools. The wording of an argument and referencing its empirical foundations are work processes that require considerable skills. How to do that correctly, and to create new knowledge in ways that is accepted by colleagues, is another innate part of the tacit knowledge of academia. That is what students really learn during their sojourn at university, from professors, supervisors, lecturers, and fellow students, although often unconsciously. When science is perceived as a practice, our dichotomy crumbles.

Craft Vocabularies and Skills Norwegian fishermen have up to 200 different words for waves, designating their shape, strength, and behavior (Eldjarn and Godal 1988, 75). This is essential for their ability to assess rough seas, to negotiate them, navigate, and, ultimately, survive. Similarly, carpenters have a rich vocabulary for timbers, smiths for iron and ironworking, and textile craftspeople for fibers, yarns, weaves, tools, and such features as drape, handle, flexibility, and surface texture. Parts of this have been committed to abstract signs on paper or other materials. Examples include cartoons of Greco-Roman weavers making so-called Coptic tapestries (Stauffer 1996) or medieval recipes for weaving tablet braids (Ræder Knudsen 2004). The Deir elMedina ostraca from Pharaonic Egypt believed to be laundry receipts may be seen as another, accounting for garments by pictorial lists (Kemp and Vogelsang-Eastwood 2001; McDowell 1999, 39). With the advent of industrialization and mass production, signifiers such as these were further developed. Examples from the textile area comprise designations

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such as S and Z for spin directions, yarn numbers designating the number of kilometers per kilogram of yarn (Nm) or weight in grams of 1,000 meters of yarn (Tex); color codes such as Pantone or the Natural Colour System; and weaver’s patterns. Although designed for industry, codes and conventions such as these are nowadays employed by craftspeople and artists as a matter of course, serving as useful tools in planning and designing. Other aspects are less easily signified but nonetheless constitute the craftsman’s knowledge basis in much the same way as names or designations for artefacts, structures, or periods make up that of the archaeologist. It follows that craftsmanship cannot be defined by tacit knowledge only. An essential aspect of craftsmanship, skill, is acquired by familiarity, by daily, close contact with a master craftsman, and it is notoriously difficult to put into words. That is why it traditionally is perceived as nondiscursive, that is, not science.1 Norwegian craftsman Jon Bojer Godal compares the transmission of skill with learning a language—the language of craftsmanship—that he perceives as consisting of movements and experience (Godal 2000). This is an apt comparison—but is this language really tacit? The same applies to architects and designers—they call the same phenomenon the language of designing. Minted by Schön, this term designates a metalanguage that combines action (in this case, drawing) and speaking. It describes features or processes while demonstrating them and introduces the student to reflection on the action of designing. Artists transmit their skills the same way, for instance, through master classes (Schön 1987, 175). So do academics, as argued above. Coach and student engage in a dialogue of verbal discourse and performance. By imitating the master, the student learns to master his trade. Imitation is a way of experimenting; in order to copy the master, the student must construct what he takes to be the essential features of his demonstration (Schön 1987, 214). In this way, he acquires the ability to improvise, act independently, and design what he is to do, regardless of whether it is architecture, musical performance, or research. Schön perceives the language of designing as reflection-in-action, with clusters such as names of elements, features, relations, actions, and norms used to assess problems, consequences, and implications. During the design process, the designer spins out a web of moves, consequences, implications, appreciations, and further moves. The action of designing oscillates between intuition and critical rationality, the whole and the unit, experiment and finally to decision (Schön 1987, 44). Investigating creativity among artists and architects, Swedish psychologist Pirjo Birgerstam (2000, 2002) has made similar observations. She adds immersion and distance, subjectivity and objectivity, sharpening and modification to the shifts in stance that both she and Schön view as integral to the design

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process. Investigating the phenomena of intuition and rationality, Birgerstam perceives the creative process as both intuitive and rational. She attempts to explain it as a synecdoche, where the two elements do not stand against each other as opposites but rather are complementary, such as gin and tonic (Birgerstam 2000, 96). In a later paper, she argues that rationality’s greatest value is to be servant, not master, to intuition and that we should learn to use rational thinking within what is intuitive (Birgerstam 2002, 432). Birgerstam views intuition as a subconscious process of cognition, a synthesis following the incubation of a mass of unstructured experience. This is also known as abduction (Birgerstam 2000, 63). We may conclude from this that the language of craftsmanship and professional knowledge is far from tacit; the problem is, rather, that it has not been organized and formulated into systematized vocabularies, and has hardly been put into written form. The latter was not necessary or, indeed, feasible. Two hundred years ago, the great majority of Europe’s population was illiterate. Throughout the 19th century, a series of education acts made attendance to schooling compulsory for children.2 Before that, transmission of knowledge was generally possible only through apprenticeship. Seen in an evolutionary perspective, “tacit” knowledge has been— and is—very successful. The wish and need for verbalization and literacy are quite recent; its potential, hardly explored. Examples do, however, exist, including notation systems. Musical notation designates sound sequences, including their key, tempo, and force, and choreography charts the movements of a dance. Both are also able to transmit moods such as joy or melancholy. Scriptwriting and storyboards are further ways of writing action (and feelings). None of these may be considered the final form of description; modern music demands sounds, rhythms, or punctuations that cannot be transmitted through traditional music notation. To cover these needs, modern musical scores (or action notes) have been created that makes it possible to render “irregular, optional sounds,” “optional notes, as quick as possible,” “knock music rest with bow or chair with frog,” or “blow into the bottle!” (Nordström 1989, 52–53). In such scores, traditional notes only appear occasionally, to indicate the course of the work; the rest is up to individual performers (Sauer 2009). A piece of music never sounds the same, even if played by the same musician. Regarding dance notation, a whole range of systems may be listed, such as Benesh, Laban notation, or Sutton Movement Writing.3 They are used for many purposes other than dance; the Sutton system also covers aspects as varied as signed languages, classic mime and gesture, gymnastics, ice skating, karate, physical therapy, movements of autistic children, body language, and animal movements—why not the transmission of craftsmanship and academic endeavors as well? All these systems leave the degree of skill to individual performers, but as anyone who has assessed

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students’ essays, or the efforts of apprentices, will know, skill can be assessed as well.

Transmitting Skills Studies on professional skills, creativity, and emotional intelligence are creating further methods and vocabularies to describe physical knowledge and how it is learned (Birgerstam 2000; Csikszentmihalyi 1985; Fyhn 2009; Göranzon et al. 2005; Holmberg 2009; Löfgren 2011; Raanes 2006; Rønning 2005; Schön 1983). The doctoral dissertation of Gunilla Andersson Gustafsson (2002) on hairdressing is a good example. She investigates changes resulting from a transformation of crafts education in Sweden from four years of apprenticeship by 1950, to an education consisting of two years of school combined with one year of practice introduced in 1970, to the current system effected by 1995, according to which crafts educations are incorporated in upper secondary school (Gustafsson 2002, 32– 42). A hairdresser’s training now consists of one year (40 weeks) of compulsory courses, two years (80 weeks) of specific courses such as hairdressing techniques, and only 15 weeks of practice. Gustafsson’s work is based on interviews with hairdressers of several generations. The first interviewee started as an apprentice in a barber’s shop in 1949 (Gustafsson 2002, 61– 69). At that time, most of the trade consisted of shaving. The apprentice learned primarily from watching attentively while handing his master his tools, listening, and assisting with all kinds of menial tasks. The master rarely explained anything explicitly but transmitted his knowledge by enacting it. An older apprentice had an important role in explaining what the master took for granted, such as the daily routines of the salon. One day a week spent at vocational school added further training, for instance, by serving patients at the local hospital in the morning. Evening courses added theoretical knowledge on hygiene and health, Swedish language, mathematics, and technical drawing. Social competence such as knowing how and when to speak to customers was an important part of the training. Two years into the apprenticeship, a new customer turned up at the end of the day, just as the master was about to leave. After a quick assessment, the master told the apprentice: “This is your first customer!” Then he left, leaving the young man to prove his worth. It went very well; two years of attention had worked its magic. The apprentice made his own assessments, deviating slightly from those of the master, and put his knowledge and skills to good use. The customer left in a happy mood and returned many times, asking for the same employee to serve him (Gustafsson 2002, 64).

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New techniques such as those developed by Vidal Sassoon and the American firm Pivot Point created a revolution in hairdressing by the 1970s, by supplying explicit methods, including a terminology, a vocabulary for how to cut hair. What earlier was described as “cutting a straight line” now was described as “sculpting a horizontal design line at a projected angle of 0°, with a 90° angle of inclination, transporting the hair in a perpendicular distribution.” Older hairdressers disliked this, but younger ones were delighted: finally hairdressers had a professional terminology, just like doctors and dentists. From now on, hairdressers’ professional language was split into two: one directed at other hairdressers, and one for communication with customers (Gustafsson 2002, 49–53, 174–179). The introduction of a technical vocabulary coincided with the educational reform that reduced Swedish crafts educations from four to three years and presumably helped young hairdressers to keep up standards of professional skill. Two full years spent at school also meant a much stronger focus on what and how the pupil was to learn. A year of practice added sufficient training of necessary skills; most students managed to qualify for their journeyman’s certificate at the end of their schooling. The second educational reform, introduced in 1995, however, led to a marked decline in the number of crafts graduates that qualified for journeyman’s certificates (Gustafsson 2002, 40– 41). Only 25% passed at first attempt; many ended by renouncing a certificate. The limited practice meant that young hairdressers did not acquire familiarity with the daily routines of the trade. To remedy this, the trade has now introduced an additional placement of 1,500 hours (41). Gustafsson quotes an example from the 1990s where a student was seconded to a hairdresser’s for training (177– 179). The only boy in his class, he was rather pampered, thought a lot of himself, and expected the placement to offer an opportunity to earn a bit of extra money in his spare time. Instead, however, the owner of the salon began by asking him to do routine chores such as cleaning or filling up supplies. This is normal practice on a Monday morning, usually the quietest part of the week. The student did not understand this, was offended, and left the placement after a few hours. We may deduce from this that while tacit, nondiscursive transmission of practical knowledge is fully feasible, it takes time; that the introduction of theory and terminology makes it possible to reduce the time of learning without renouncing on quality; but that the removal of time for practice makes the whole exercise void.

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Writing Apprenticeship? How can we employ this in our endeavors to investigate ancient apprenticeship? Deflating the dichotomy of theory and practice allows us to leave a lot of theoretical deliberations behind and go on to accept practice and craftsmanship as valid forms of knowledge, and craftspeople as capable of possessing knowledge. In ontological terms, the difference between craftspeople and academics is no greater than that between carpenter and weaver, or archaeologist and botanist. Within their chosen field, each is knowledgeable as well as skillful. We do not need to be constrained by the assumption that craftsmanship represents a form of knowledge that is beyond the pale of science. Instead, we may concentrate on finding ways to verbalize it and make it literate. In doing that, we can enlist the help of skilled craftspeople, engage them in conversation and experiments, and draw on their vocabularies, concepts, and signs and notation systems. A form of “apprenticeship,” this will also inform us of how craft skills were transmitted. We may also look for aid and ideas among performative arts such as music, dance, and acting, or among engineering and other technical sciences, in par ticular, the wonderful new world of digital science. Ultimately, we may activate our own creativity to invent what may still be needed. Some attempts have already been made. Willeke Wendrich has used video recordings to document how modern Egyptian basketmakers produced baskets, string, and mats similar to those recovered in archaeological excavations. Simple symbols and a running tally of time make it possible to use the video as reference for observations of movements, timing, and a wide range of other aspects of the craft discussed in the book that formed the discursive part of her doctoral thesis (Wendrich 1999). As another example, Harald Bentz Høgseth, a carpenter as well as an archaeologist, has craft knowledge that allows him to distinguish between timbers of high and low quality and relate them to how the inhabitants of medieval Trondheim used them in their buildings. By establishing that the best timbers derived from artificially aged pine trees, he also produced important knowledge on medieval forestry. In order to understand toolmarks in the timbers, he worked with the inventor of the Sutton Movement Writing System, charting the movements of a modern carpenter to compare with the traces left by a medieval one. His analysis examined how the medieval timbers had been selected, harvested, transported, and processed (Høgseth 2006, 2007; see also chapter 4 this volume). Another craftsperson whose knowledge has proved fruitful is Sandy Budden, a potter turned archaeologist who uses her craft knowledge to assess different levels of skill involved in the production of Bronze Age pottery (Bud-

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den 2008; Budden and Sofaer 2009). Handweaver Lena Hammarlund (2005) has used her craft knowledge to characterize visual groups among archaeological textiles. These are fragments of fabrics that appear clearly distinct to the naked eye yet elude traditional methods of description. Hammarlund’s method has made it possible to classify them according to texture and visual appearance in addition to technical details of fiber, yarn twist, weaves, and so forth. Her classification has proved applicable to other bodies of archaeological textiles, ranging from the Bronze Age to the Middle Ages (Grömer 2007; Hammarlund et al. 2008). Craft knowledge also contributes toward better definitions of criteria for the identification of loom types used in the production of various groups of archaeological textiles (Ciszuk and Hammarlund 2008). Høgseth’s, Budden’s, and Hammarlund’s methods all deal with characterization. Ever since the Enlightenment, many generations of scholars have grappled with the characterization of everything from botanical species to how to describe touch (Paterson 2007). Deceptively simple, characterization is a fundamental tool in the academic toolbox, a prerequisite for discussing similarities, dissimilarities, changes, or causes. Analysis of video-based studies of social interaction is promising to become another important tool, as indicated by the works of Wendrich (1999) and Høgseth (2007). Sociologists use video recordings as a kind of high-powered microscope to investigate anything from the unconscious movements of a draughtsman at work to exchanges of opinions at the annual business meeting of an association of deaf-blind people (Heath and Luff 2000; Kissmann 2009; Knoblauch and Schnettler 2006; Raanes 2006). The rapid development of digital technology now also includes haptics, or the technology of touch. It allows the simulation of touch and opens entirely new vistas for the documentation and analysis of craftsmanship and the transmission of craft knowledge. The 2003 UNESCO convention of the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage includes practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, and skills, as well as the instruments, objects, artefacts, and cultural spaces associated therewith, that communities, groups, and, in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their cultural heritage. It means recognition of the importance of protecting traditional craftsmanship and is already being used by Scandinavian institutions to forward the processes begun by the Norwegian Crafts Development, the Crafts Academy of Stockholm, the Sør-Trøndelag University College, and the Craft Laboratory of Göteborg University (Åberg 2011; Palmsköld 2011). It also means an increased international awareness of this as a field of research and the importance of understanding how the knowledge embedded in craftsmanship is transmitted.

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1. In 2005–2007 a research project at the Royal Institute of Technology, titled “Training in Analogical Thinking,” led by Prof. Bo Göranzon, investigated, among other things, the qualitative aspects of artistic work processes and elsewhere (see www.dialoger.se/download.asp?id=253&Research _Programme.pdf). 2. In Denmark, this happened in 1814; in Norway, after 1860; in Britain, it took two Acts of Parliament in 1870 and 1880. In France, free, compulsory and nonreligious schools were introduced by Jules Ferry (1880–1883), although the principle of compulsory schooling had existed since 1698 for Catholic schools (Staugaard 1997). 3. On Benesh, see www.benesh.org; Laban notation, www.ickl.org; and Sutton Movement Writing, www.movementwriting.org.

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Göranzon, B., and I. Josefson, eds. 1988. Knowledge, Skill and Artificial Intelligence. New York: Springer. Grömer, K. 2007. Bronzezeitliche Gewebefunde aus Hallstatt—Ihr Kontext in der Textilkunde Mitteleuropas und die Entwicklung der Textiltechnologie zur Eisenzeit. Doctoral dissertation. Vienna: Universität Wien. Gustafsson, G.A. 2002. Den inre teatern i lärandet. En studie om kunskapsväxandet inom handverk (The Inner Theatre in Learning. A Study on Vocational Education and the Growth of Knowledge within Craft). Doctoral Dissertation. Stockholm: Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan. Guttorm, G. 2001. Duoji bálgát— en studie i duodji : kunsthåndverk som visuell erfaring hos et urfolk. Doctoral dissertation. Tromsø: University of Tromsø. Hammarlund, L. 2005. Handicraft Knowledge Applied to Archaeological Textiles. Nordic Textile Journal (2005):86–119. Hammarlund, L., H. Kirjalainen, K. Vestergaard Pedersen, and M. Vedeler. 2008. Visual Textiles: A Study of Appearance and Visual Impression in Archaeological Textiles. Medieval Clothing and Textiles 4:69–98. Heath, C., and P. Luff. 2000. Technology in Action. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hjort Lassen, U. 2011. Praktisk stolpverksforskning— en teoretisk udfordring. In Hantverkslaboratoriet. E. Löfgren, ed. Pp. 214–225. Mariestad: Göteborgs universitet. Høgseth, H.B. 2006. Å skrive håndverk. In Håndverk og kunskap. A.K. Børresen and B. Molander, eds. Trondheim: Tapir akademisk forlag. Høgseth, H.B. 2007. Håndverkerens redskapskasse: en undersøkelse av kunnsapsutøvelse i lys av arkeologisk bygningstømmer fra 1000- tallet. Doctoral dissertation. Trondheim: Norges teknisk vitenskapelige universitet. Holmberg, A. 2009. Hantverksskicklighet och kreativitet. Kontinuitet och förändring i en lokal textillärarutbildning 1955–2001. Doctoral Dissertation. Uppsala: Uppsala Universitet. Ingold, T. 2000. The Perception of the Environment. Essays in Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill. New York: Routledge. Järefjäll, P., and P. Sjömar. 2011. Skärande handverktyg för träbearbetning— en projektbeskrivning. In Hantverkslaboratoriet. E. Löfgren, ed. Pp. 276–283. Mariestad: Göteborgs universitet. Kemp, B.J., and G.M. Vogelsang-Eastwood. 2001. The Ancient Textile Industry at Amarna. London: Egypt Exploration Society. Kissmann, U.T., ed. 2009. Video Interaction Analysis. Methods and Methodology. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Knoblauch, H., and B. Schnettler. 2006. Video Analysis. Methodology and Methods. Qualitative Audiovisual Data Analysis in Sociology. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Latour, B. 1987. Science in Action. How to Follow Scientists and Engineers through Society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

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Latour, B. 1999. Pandora’s Hope. Essays on the Reality of Science Studies. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Latour, B. 2005. Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-NetworkTheory. New York: Oxford University Press. Leroi-Gourhan, A. 1965. La Geste et la parole II. La Memoire et les Rythmes. Paris: Albin Michel. Ljungberg, R. 2008. En resa från det ordlösa. Doctoral Dissertation. Stockholm: Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan. Löfgren, E., ed. 2011. Hantverkslaboratoriet. Mariestad: Göteborgs universitet. Available: www.craftlab.gu.se. Martinussen, A.O. 2005. Vidareføring av handlingsboren kunskap, Maihaugen 100 år— evig ung 1904–2004. Lillehammer: Maihaugen. McDowell, A.G. 1999. Village Life in Ancient Egypt: Laundry Lists and Love Songs. New York: Oxford University Press. Moe, S. 2003. Bevegelse, arbeid, kunnskap: om kroppsbevegelse ved anvendelse av ulike former for teknologi. Tromsø: University of Tromsø. Molander, B. 1996. Kunskap i handling. Göteborg: Daidalos. Molander, B. 2004. The Meaning of “Knowledge” in the History of Knowledge. In Science, Crafts and Ignorance: Perspectives on the History of Knowledge. A.K. Børresen, ed. Pp. 13–24. Trondheim: Tapir akademisk forlag. Nordström, S. 1989. Så blir det musik. Lund: Dialogos. Palmsköld, A. 2011. Hantverkskunskap som immaterielt kulturarv. In Hantverkslaboratoriet. E. Löfgren, ed. Pp. 97–104. Mariestad: Göteborgs universitet. Paterson, M. 2007. The Senses of Touch: Haptics, Affects and Technologies. New York: Berg. Planke, T. 2001. Tradisjonsanalyse: en studie av kunnskap og båter. Oslo: University of Oslo. Polanyi, M. 1958. Personal Knowledge. Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Polanyi, M. 1966. The Tacit Dimension. Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith. Raanes, E. 2006. Å gripe inntrykk og uttrykk. Interaksjon og meningsdanning i døvblindes samtaler. Trondheim: Doctoral dissertation, Norges TekniskNaturvitenskapelige Universitet. Ræder Knudsen, L. 2004. Written Patterns in Early Tablet Weaving. In Priceless Invention of Humanity—Textiles. J. Maik, ed. Pp. 121–128. North European Symposium for Archaeological Textiles, Vol. 8. Lodz: Lódzkie Towarzystwo Naukowe Instytut Archaeologii i Etnologii Polska Akademia Nauk. Rønning, B., ed. 2005. FLYT. En nøkkel til kreativitet og innovasjon. Trondheim: Tapir akademisk forlag. Ryle, G. 1949. The Concept of Mind. London: Penguin Books. Sauer, T. 2009. Notations 21. New York: Mark Batty. Schön, D.A. 1983. The Reflective Practitioner. How Professionals Think in Action. Aldershot: Ashgate Arena.

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Schön, D.A. 1987. Educating the Reflective Practitioner. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Sjömar, P. 2011. Hantverkares kunskap. In Hantverkslaboratoriet. E. Löfgren, ed. Pp. 63– 86. Mariestad: Göteborgs universitet. Stauffer, A. 1996. Cartoons for Weavers from Graeco-Roman Egypt. Journal of Roman Archaeology Suppl. 19:223–230. Staugaard, H.J. 1997. Hovedtendenser indenfor voksenuddannelserne i Frankrig. Aalborg: Aalborg University. Steinsvik, K. 2008. Kunnskap om kroppen mellom grep og begrep. Doctoral Dissertation. Stockholm: Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan. Tempte, T. 1990. The Chair of Tut Anch Amon. In Dialogue and Technology: The Working Memory. B. Göranzon and M. Florin, eds. New York: Springer. Wendrich, W. 1999. The World According to Basketry. An Ethno-archaeological Interpretation of Basketry Production in Egypt. Leiden: Research School of Asian, African and Amerindian Studies, Universiteit Leiden. Winbladh, A., and C. Bengtsson. 2003. Vem väver kejsarens nya kläder? En antologi om det praktiska lärandets konst. Available: www.hantverkarna.se/ Files.aspx?f_id=54433 (accessed 29 June 2012).

CHA P TER THIRTEEN

Recognizing Knowledge Transfer in the Archaeological Record Willeke Wendrich

The chapters in this volume provide a broad overview of theoretical and practical aspects of knowledge transfer and apprenticeship, but how can we, as archaeologists, recognize transmission of knowledge with all its inherent aspects of explicit and tacit training, body knowledge, identity, cultural practice, and communication? Sometimes excavation reports will list a particularly badly made object as being the work of an apprentice. Chapter 8 rightly asks how poor an object has to be to merit consideration as an apprentice piece by the modern scholar. Poor quality (a troublesome category at best) is an indication of a low-skilled producer, and the argument can be made that it actually most probably is not the work of an apprentice, because in a structured apprenticeship the student would not have been allowed to produce an object unless he or she was ready for that particular phase in the learning process. Furthermore, as pointed out in chapter 9, if an apprentice creates a low-quality product, in most cases the materials will be reused—the failed but unfired pot will be thrown back into the clay pit; a faulty textile will be rewoven— and thus the work of the clumsy student would probably not find its way into the archaeological record. Exceptions are perhaps techniques that take away or transform materials. Learning how to make stone tools requires experimenting and raw material spoiling, even though a first trial by an

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apprentice can be reshaped and made functional by the tutor (Grimm 2000; see also chapter 7 this volume). As is evident from the contributions in this volume, ethnoarchaeology and experimental archaeology are important methods in understanding ancient apprenticeship. Experiments vary from understanding materials and methods to more specific questions, such as the differentiation of skill levels. This is based partly on a vibrant modern apprenticeship among mostly amateur enthusiast flintknappers and partly on systematic research (e.g., Bodu et al. 1990; Carr and Bradbury 2010; Fischer 1990). The approach has been criticized for a number of biases related to the modern experimental context (Finlay 2008). Designing well-controlled tests for experimental archaeology is important but has a crucial weakness: the criteria test for a very specific set of suppositions that disregard that fact there are many ways of teaching and learning, as outlined in the chapters in this volume. Studying present-day learning situations provides information on the cognitive aspects of technology and the development of dexterity, skill, and endurance (Stout 2002, 2005; Wendrich 2006). As with all ethnoarchaeological study, the present does not simply inform us on what the ancient transfer of knowledge would have entailed. The research depends mostly on explicitly formulated analogies based on specific research questions. These vary from narrowly focused to more broadly defined, or even mostly undefined, as providers of a broad range of ideas and possible interpretations of what potentially could have been (David and Kramer 2001; Hodder 1982a, 1982b). The use of specific tools in the past can be inferred from a comparison of ancient tool marks with those made by present-day producers. This provides information on the type of tools used, but not directly on the wielding of the tools, the gestures and engrained body movements of which the importance has been demonstrated by the anthropological tradition of Marcel Mauss (1936), André Leroi-Gourhan (1964) and Pierre Lemonnier (1986, 1992, 1993b). Similarly, the study of wear marks allows for understanding repetitive use and might enable the interpretation of the range of uses of multipurpose artefacts such as wooden sticks or flint tools. Often this type of research is combined with experimental archaeology (van Gijn 2010). Broader research questions take into account the role of material culture in social complexity, cultural identity, style, and meaning, as well as questions of agency. As is clear from the chapters presented here, these are extremely important matters, which bring us to the heart of what we need to understand about ancient society if we want to avoid deterministic or simplistic approaches. Leroi-Gourhan (1964), who wrote in a period when objects were considered mostly as works of art rather than the result of a technological

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process, developed the concept of chaîne opératoire. This provides a useful framework for outlining agency by enabling a method to determine the choices made by producers at every stage of the production process and thus the variation that occurs. Leroi- Gourhan’s background as primarily an archaeologist is clear throughout his approach to material culture, even when his emphasis is on gestures and body movements. Lemonnier, whose studies in technology and style are fi rmly in the tradition of Leroi-Gourhan and Mauss, criticizes archaeological studies and especially the approaches of symbolic and structural archaeologists for being too narrowly focused when they embark on ethnoarchaeological research (Lemonnier 1992, 96–103). Studies of social aspects or meaning should take into account not only the shape or decoration of an object but also the role of technological system(s) to which artefacts belong. They should not be “reduced either to the study of the effects of technological systems on culture and society or to a search for what human groups communicate when they make and use artefacts” (1993a, 2). The habitus as envisioned by Pierre Bourdieu (1977) encompasses all experience, not just what is related to the production of objects. It is much broader and less directed than Leroi-Gourhan’s chaîne opératoire and is very apt when we discuss ancient apprenticeship. In many learning situations, especially if we think of learning as taking place in an ongoing participation in a community of practice, there would probably not have been a difference in learning and living environment. Even in our own society with its regulated, formal education system, “live and learn” is an ongoing process. Archaeologists rarely find intact workshops, homes, settlement quarters, or landscapes. Instead, we are dealing with the practice of discard and the subsequent taphonomic processes that require a long chain of interpretations and reconstructions. Archaeologists face an extremely difficult task in fi nding and recording information that is sufficiently rich and geographically and temporally circumscribed to do more than “keep in mind” the complexities of the social production of techniques. The embodiment of practices, communication, and experience is something that archaeologists might sidestep, because the bodies we deal with are deceased, buried, and often disturbed or mostly destroyed. How, then, do we link Bourdieu’s (1977) concepts of habitus and hexis, which have a strong emphasis on how history, personal or shared experience, change, and social systems are reflected in the body, to the archaeologically discoverable remains? Likewise, Lemonnier (1992) and Jean-Pierre Warnier (1999, 2007) put great emphasis on the embodiment of technological practice and the role of the body in communication and social practice. It should be noted that Bourdieu and Lemonnier are sociologistsanthropologists, with living infor mants whose interactions with the

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researcher, each other, and their (material) environment are at the forefront of the research. In studying the transfer of (technological) knowledge, the considerations of bodily attitudes and gestures are very relevant, as illustrated in chapter 1 in this volume—whether it concerns a working position, the specific use of particular tools, or the straightening of the back while at work (Wendrich 1999). In a living society, it may be possible to interpret the almost involuntary movements. If a producer straightens up during work, this might be an attempt to relax the muscles, or it might indicate pride in one’s work, or an almost subconscious defensive posture against expected criticism from the observer. These movements are undoubtedly part of the prior experience and expectations of the producer and thus of the production process. They are shared and conveyed in a community of practice and are therefore an integral part of apprenticeship, but how do we deal with these aspects of embodied communication as archaeologists? Fortunately, archaeologists have a broad spectrum of research through which a community of practice can be studied, ranging from material culture and the ancient landscape to human remains. Even though what once were bodies are now skeletons, without skin, musculature, and bodily fluids, they can still provide us with evidence for their sex, age, health, strength, and years of hard work or crippling overburden (Agarwal and Glencross 2011; Hawkey and Merbs 1995). Landscape, provenance, and character of raw materials, for example, an area with abundant good-quality stone, can be used to argue the locality of learning (chapter 7 this volume). In this final chapter, I am not presenting a consistent method of defining apprentices’ work, and perusing this book, it is clear that it is not really possible to develop one, because the context and purpose of apprenticeship worldwide and through time vary considerably, and the identification of “bad-quality” products as the work of apprentices is debatable. The discussion should therefore not be what characterizes the work of an apprentice, let alone what kind of “stages” in apprenticeship we could discern in archaeological remains or material culture. That presupposes too many similarities with our own expectations, experiences, and educational system. It also disregards the very likely possibility that a highly skilled specialist for very practical reasons may decide to create an object very quickly with minimal expenditure of time, effort, or material. What we find instead is that there are methods to defi ne communities of practice, shared environments, in which we can discern change and development, as well as continuous traditions. A promising avenue of research to understand communities of practice in the past is the study of microstyles and microvariables, as potential material reflections of knowledge sharing and transmission. Style certainly is an important and telling feature of cultural differences and

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transmission (Lemonnier 1992; Wobst 1999), but the small, often hardly discernible technological details and variations are what provide the microvariables that relate to social contexts of learning and practice, as well as changes in skill through time (see chapters 1 and 3 this volume). Among the case studies described in the previous pages and in Minar and Crown (2001), Stark et al. (2008) and Coy (1989a), we have a collection of approaches to study the archaeological traces, focusing on learning practices, knowledge sharing, and the resulting cultural transmission within a community of practice. Sander Van der Leeuw (1993) has attempted to study pottery within the complex system of techniques used in society as defi ned by Lemonnier, by using the chaîne opératoire as an organizing principle to define moments of choice. Using ethnoarchaeology to understand what possible material correlates we might use to defi ne a community of practice is good practice. In addition, apprenticeship as an ethnoarchaeological research method has proven to give very important insights in the technological sequences and where we might find most variability (Coy 1989b). When learning with Egyptian basketmaker Mohamed Abd el-Na’im, I started out with just observing his work. He would regularly slow down to point out what the problematic areas and instances were in making the baskets. These coincided with elements of the ancient basketry in which I found most diversity, such as the center of the so-called sewn-plait baskets, for which a quite stiff plait had to be coiled into an ill-fitting narrow circle. The solutions found for technological difficulties are manifold but often akin in a tradition, the string of knowledge from master to pupil, within a par ticular community of practice. Similarly, during work with other basket makers, it appeared that the start of the basket, the insertion of new lengths of raw material, and the finishing off at the rim were instances in which the basket maker followed a very par ticular and consistent method, while the archaeological material showed much variation, pointing at microstyles that identify particular communities of practice. Variability/consistency, microstyles, and abundance of raw materials are therefore better indicators of the transfer of knowledge than are badly executed specimens. As early as the 19th century ceramics were used to date archaeological contexts (Petrie 1899). For an archaeological specialization that has for a long time mainly been used as a dating tool, change over time is an essential premise. To understand the variability that underlies change requires thinking about knowledge transfer. The results of archaeological research can be linked to apprenticeship, knowledge transfer, or technological traditions only if the context is well defined and sufficiently datable. There is a danger of circular reasoning where differences in style are used as a dating tool and also figure in the interpretation of different

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traditions in the same region or same period. Variability over time needs to be discerned from contemporary style differentiation and its role in the systems of technology, social interaction, and meaning (see also chapter 5 this volume). The explanation of why regional, intrasite, or temporal differentiation occurs should be found in the complex of natural, economic, and social aspects of technology within society: type, availability and properties of the raw materials, supply and demand, the role of producers and users in society, and the broader importance of the artefacts as material and social products all converge in the decisions made in communities of practice. In the first chapter of this book, apprenticeship was defined as the transmission of knowledge through a formal or informal teacher–pupil relation, in which developing dexterity, skill, endurance, memory, consideration, properness, and receiving knowledge, inspiration, and motivation are the major driving forces. The teacher–pupil relationship is not a oneon-one connection, because those who teach and those who learn are part of a larger community of practice. The roles can be very rigid, as in formal apprenticeships with a famous master (see chapters 4 and 9 this volume), or fluid, when the teaching is informal (chapter 5 this volume). Change through innovation is not integrally linked to the rigidity of the teacher– student role but a very different mechanism within the community of practice that may or may not be open to inventions by younger members of the group. Whether new ideas are easily adopted or not, in both cases the community of practice strongly determines the learning procedures and outcome. A person can belong to one or several communities of practice. It is through the many circles of practitioners within society that material culture is formed and defined and the social production of techniques takes shape. It may be clear that, rather than looking for the signature of apprentices, we should be tracing the broader social context of which they were a part. This enables archaeologists to go beyond singular indications of learning that are merely anecdotal and provides a method to understand the material reflection of communities of practice. References Agarwal, S.C., and B.A. Glencross. 2011. Social Bioarchaeology. Oxford: WileyBlackwell. Bodu, P., C. Karline, and S. Ploux. 1990. Who’s Who? The Magdalenian Flintknappers of Pincevent, France. In The Big Puzzle: International Symposium on Refitting Stone Artifacts, Monrepos, 1987. E. Cziesla, S. Eickhoof, N. Arts, and D. Winter, eds. Pp. 143–163. Bonn: Holos Studies in Modern Archaeology. Bourdieu, P. 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Carr, P.J., and A. Bradbury. 2010. Flake Debris and Flintknapping Experimentation. In Designing Experimental Research in Archaeology. J.R. Ferguson, ed. Pp. 71–91. Boulder: University Press of Colorado. Coy, M.W., ed. 1989a. Apprenticeship. From Theory to Method and Back Again. Albany: State University New York Press. Coy, M.W. 1989b. Being What We Pretend to Be: The Usefulness of Apprenticeship as a Field Method. In Apprenticeship. From Theory to Method and Back Again. M.W. Coy, ed. Pp. 115–136. Albany: State University New York Press. David, N., and C. Kramer. 2001. Ethnoarchaeology in Action. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press. Finlay, N. 2008. Blank Concerns: Issues of Skill and Consistency in the Replication of Scottish Later Mesolithic Blades. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 15:68–90. Fischer, A. 1990. On Being a Pupil of a Flintknapper of 11,000 Years Ago. In The Big Puzzle: International Symposium on Refitting Stone Artifacts, Monrepos, 1987. E. Cziesla, S. Eickhoof, N. Arts, and D. Winter, eds. Pp. 143– 163. Bonn: Holos Studies in Modern Archaeology. Grimm, L. 2000. Apprentice Flintknapping: Relating Material Culture and Social Practice in the Upperpalaeolithic. In Children and Material Culture. J.R. Sofaer Derevenski, ed. Pp. 53–71. New York: Routledge. Hawkey, D.E., and C.F. Merbs. 1995. Activity-Induced Musculoskeletal Stress Markers (MSM) and Subsistence Strategy Changes among Ancient Hudson Bay Eskimos. International Journal of Osteoarchaeology 5:324–338. Hodder, I. 1982a. The Present Past: An Introduction to Anthropology for Archaeologists. London: B.T. Batsford. Hodder, I. 1982b. Theoretical Archaeology: A Reactionary View. In Symbolic and Structural Archaeology. I. Hodder, ed. Pp. 1–16. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lemonnier, P. 1986. The Study of Material Culture Today: Toward an Anthropology of Technical Systems. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 5:147–186. Lemonnier, P. 1992. Elements for an Anthropology of Technology. Ann Arbor, MI: Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan. Lemonnier, P. 1993a. Introduction. In Technological Choices. Transformation in Material Cultures since the Neolithic. P. Lemonnier, ed. Pp. 1–35. New York: Routledge. Lemonnier, P., ed. 1993b. Technological Choices. Transformation in Material Cultures since the Neolithic. New York: Routledge. Leroi-Gourhan, A. 1964. Le geste et la parole I. 2 vols. Paris: Albin Michel. Mauss, M. 1936. Les techniques du corps. Journal de Psychologie 32(3– 4). Minar, C.J., and P.L. Crown. 2001. Learning and Craft Production, an Introduction. Journal of Anthropological Research 57(4):369–380. Petrie, F.W.M. 1899. Sequences in Prehistoric Remains. Journal of the Anthropological Institute 29:295–301.

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Stark, M.T., B.J. Bowser, L. Horne, and C. Kramer. 2008. Cultural Transmission and Material Culture: Breaking Down Boundaries. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Stout, D. 2002. Skill and Cognition in Stone Tool Production. An Ethnographic Case Study from Irian Jaya. Current Anthropology 43(5):693–722. Stout, D. 2005. The Social and Cultural Context of Stone Knapping Skill Acquisition. In Stone Knapping: The Necessary Conditions for a Uniquely Hominin Behaviour. V. Roux and B. Bril, eds. Pp. 331–340. Cambridge: McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research. van der Leeuw, S.E. 1993. Giving the Potter a Choice: Conceptual Aspects of Pottery Techniques. In Technological Choices: Transformation in Material Cultures since the Neolithic. P. Lemonnier, ed. Pp. 238–288. London: Routledge. van Gijn, A. 2010. Flint in Focus—Lithic Biographies in the Neolithic and Bronze Age. Leiden: Sidestone Press. Warnier, J.-P. 1999. Construire la culture matérielle. L’homme qui pensait avec ses doigts. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. Warnier, J.-P. 2007. The Pot-King. The Body and Technologies of Power. Leiden: Brill. Wendrich, W. 1999. The World According to Basketry. An Ethno-archaeological Interpretation of Basketry Production in Egypt. Leiden: Research School for Asian, African and Amerindian Studies. http://escholarship.org /uc/cioa _cda Wendrich, W. 2006. Body Knowledge. Ethnoarchaeological Learning and the Interpretation of Ancient Technology. In L’apport de l’Égypte à l’histoire des techniques. B. Mathieu, D. Meeks, and M. Wissa, eds. Pp. 267–275. Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale. Wobst, H.M. 1999. Style in Archaeology, or Archaeologists in Style. In Material Meanings: Critical Approaches to the Interpretation of Material Culture. E.S. Chilton, ed. Pp. 118–132. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

Harry Allen is an associate professor of archaeology in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Auckland. His teaching and research range from the history and archaeology of northern Australia and New Zealand to heritage conservation. He has extensive experience in public and applied archaeology as a trustee of the New Zealand Historic Places Trust. He is editor of Australia: William Blandowski’s Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Aboriginal Australia (2010) and, with Caroline Phillips, Bridging the Divide: Indigenous Communities and Archaeology into the 21st Century (2010). Lise Bender Jørgensen is professor of archaeology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway. She is an internationally regarded expert in prehistoric textiles. A Danish national, she studied archaeology at the University of Copenhagen. Before moving to Norway, she taught archaeology at University of Gothenburg in Sweden, and in recent years she has held a professorship in textile science at the University of Borås in Sweden, teaching philosophy of science and research methodology to students of handloom weaving, textile and fashion design, and textile engineering. She has excavated in Scandinavia and Egypt and traveled widely in Europe, recording archaeological textiles in almost 100 museums. She is the author of two monographs on Scandinavian and Northern European textiles from the beginnings up to 1000 AD. A founding member of the North European Symposium for Archaeological Textiles, she has organized several conferences on archaeological textiles and edited the proceedings. She has directed and participated in research projects on Roman textiles from Egypt and wool sails for Viking ships and is currently engaged in a project on creativity in craft production in Bronze Age Europe. Kathlyn M. Cooney is assistant professor of Egyptian art and Architecture at UCLA in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures.

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She earned her Ph.D. in Near Eastern studies from Johns Hopkins University in 2002. She has also taught at Stanford University (2003–2006) and Howard University (2000) and headed the Villa Scholars Program at the Getty Research Institute from 2006 to 2008. In 2005, she was cocurator at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art for Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs. A native of Houston, she received her B.A. from the University of Texas at Austin. She is author of The Cost of Death: The Social and Economic Value of Ancient Egyptian Funerary Art in the Ramesside Period (2007) and is working on a number of projects related to gender issues in ancient Egypt, coffin theft and reuse, and funerary behaviors during socioeconomic crisis. John L. Creese received his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Toronto in 2011. His doctoral work involved a comprehensive study of the spatial development of Iroquoian longhouses and settlements during a critical period of initial village formation in eastern North America. This research explored how architectural arrangements influenced the development of social power in contexts of household alliance building. He currently holds a postdoctoral fellowship at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge. His project, titled, “The Corporeal Politics of Belonging: An Archaeology of Power and Personhood in the Eastern Woodlands,” investigates relationships between embodied practices—including aspects of gesture and motor performance in craft production— and the social construction of personhood in late precontact and early contact Iroquoian societies. Eleni Hasaki is an Associate Professor of Anthropology and Classics at the University of Arizona. Her publications focus on the craft technologies of Classical antiquity, the spatial organization of workshops, craft apprenticeship, and representations of craftspeople in material culture. In addition to archaeological fieldwork in Greece, Hasaki is the director of an ethnoarchaeological project in Tunisia and of an experimental pyrotechnological project in Tucson, Arizona. Her book, The Penteskouphia Pinakes and Potters at Work at Ancient Corinth, is being published by the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. Harald Bentz Høgseth is an associate professor in technical building, protection, and restoration at the Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Technology, South-Trøndelag University College, Norway, developing and establishing a new interdisciplinary educational program incorporating building protection, architecture, and archaeology. He started his career as a skilled carpenter (1984–2004), was the director of the Lofotr Viking Museum in Lofoten, Norway, from 2001 to 2002, and used this

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carpenter’s experience in his studies of archaeology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Department of Archaeology and Religious Studies, gaining the title Doctor of Art in 2007 with a thesis titled “The Craftsman’s Toolbox. An Investigation of Embodied Knowledge as Reflected in Archaeological Timbers Dated to the 11th Century AD.” The overall aim of his research is the development of methods for documentation and analysis of toolmarks and body movements, charting the cognitive as well as technical and physical tools in the medieval carpenter’s toolbox. His work has concentrated especially on the perception of tacit knowledge and knowledge in action and how these have been transmitted from one generation of craftsmen to the next. Simon Holdaway is professor of archaeology at the University of Auckland. He completed his Ph.D. at the University of Pennsylvania in 1991, specializing in stone artefacts from the Paleolithic Age in France. He taught first at La Trobe University in Melbourne, working on Pleistocene stone artefacts from Tasmania and the Holocene surface archaeological record from western New South Wales. He moved to the University of Auckland in 1999. His latest projects include the coastal archaeology of western Cape York, Australia, and the early Neolithic in the Fayum, Egypt, as well as historical archaeology in New Zealand. He has written extensively on Australian stone artefacts, including A Record in Stone: The Study of Australia’s Flaked Stone Artefacts (2004), with Nicola Stern. His research interests include human– environmental interrelationships and climate change, mobility, geoarchaeology (Geoarchaeological Investigation of Aboriginal Landscape Occupation [2006], with Patricia Fanning and Justin Shiner), and theories of time in archaeology (Time in Archaeology: Time Perspectivism Revisited [2008], with LuAnn Wandsnider). Marilyn Kelly-Buccellati has been the director of the Mozan/Urkesh excavations in northeastern Syria since 1984. From 1976 to 1984 she was codirector of the Terqa excavations along the Euphrates River in southeastern Syria. She has also done fieldwork in Turkey and the Caucasus. Her numerous publications have centered on stratigraphic analysis, especially the identification of the necromantic pit excavated in Urkesh, the iconography and style of cylinder seals and their impressions, typological analysis of objects, and functional and statistical analysis of SyroMesopotamian ceramics from the fourth through the second millennium. She also has numerous publications on third millennium contacts between the Caucasus, Anatolia, and Syro-Mesopotamia. She received her Ph.D. in Near Eastern archaeology from the University of Chicago and has taught and lectured widely in the United States, Europe, and the Near East. She is currently a fellow of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology

266

About the Contributors

at UCLA and Emerita Professor of Art History at California State University Los Angeles. Heather M.-L. Miller is an associate professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Toronto, specializing in South Asian archaeology, complex societies, and ancient technology. She continues to research social, political, and technological aspects of the Indus civilization (third millennium BCE), but her current field project, the Caravanserai Networks Project, focuses on travel routes and amenities in northern Pakistan and beyond, dating to the medieval/Islamic period (second millennium CE/AD). Her technology-oriented publications include Archaeological Approaches to Technology (2007) and articles on the production, organization, and social importance of various high-temperature crafts of the Indus civilization. S. Brooke Milne is an archaeological anthropologist specializing in the analysis of northern latitude stone tool-using hunter-gatherer cultures. Since 1996, she has investigated archaeological sites located throughout the Canadian Arctic. Her more recent research has principally focused on Paleo-Eskimo terrestrial occupations found in the deep interior of southern Baffin Island, Nunavut. She received her Ph.D. from McMaster University in 2003. Her field of expertise is lithic technology, with a special focus on debitage, and her theoretical interests include technological organization and mobility, skill acquisition, social organization, enculturation, gender, and landscape learning. Marcy Rockman is the climate change adaptation coordinator for cultural resources with the National Park Ser vice in Washington, DC. In 2009– 2011 she was a Science and Technology Policy Fellow with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), through which she was placed with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s National Homeland Security Research Center, also in Washington, DC, and she is now a fellow with the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA. Her long-term research focus is the landscape learning process: how human populations gather, share, and remember environmental information. She has conducted fieldwork across the American West and in Europe and the Middle East and prior to her AAAS fellowship worked in cultural resource management in California and Arizona. Her current role addresses impacts of climate change on cultural resources across the nation and translation of archaeological information into forms useful for federal- and partnership-level planning regarding adaptation and resilience. She is lead editor of two edited volumes on archaeology and has published multiple scholarly chapters and journal articles. She has a B.Sc. in

About the Contributors

267

geology from the College of William and Mary and an M.A. and Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Arizona. Hélène Wallaert started her ethnographic career in 1995 with a short fieldwork session in North Dakota interviewing Sioux bead workers through to a scholarship given by the Rotary Club. She participated in research in Cameroon from 1996 to 2001. Her study on apprenticeship procedures was part of a larger project, the Ceramic and Society Project, under the supervision of Pierre de Maret at the Free University of Brussels. She pursued her research with New Mexico Pueblo peoples in 2004 and 2005 at the invitation of the University of New Mexico and the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology and with the help of the Fulbright Foundation. She had the privilege during that period to give several lectures at the invitation of Marquette University, the University of Arizona, and different Pueblo cultural centers. Since 2006, she has collaborated as a free researcher with the Musée du Cinquantenaire, Musées royaux d’Art et d’Histoire, Section Amériques, Brussels, and returned to interviewing craft people in North Dakota. In 2011 she started a project of ethnographic research on apprenticeship procedures for hunting among the Hadzabe of Lake Eyasi area in Tanzania. Her main area of research remains teaching and learning procedures and their interaction with social boundaries. Willeke Wendrich is a professor of Egyptian archaeology and digital humanities at UCLA, affiliated with the Department of Near Eastern Studies and the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology. She received her Ph.D. from Leiden University, the Netherlands, in 1999. She has extensive fieldwork experience, working for more than twenty years in Egypt, at Amarna and Qasr Ibrim, and codirecting excavations at Berenike with Steve Sidebotham from 1994 to 2002. She also participated in the Çatalhöyük excavations in Turkey and directed a field survey in the Yemeni highlands. From 2003 onward she codirected, with René Cappers from the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen (the Netherlands) and Simon Holdaway (University of Auckland, New Zealand), a large survey, excavation, and site management project in the Fayum, Egypt. As part of this project, she taught several field schools for inspectors of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities. She has published extensively on subjects ranging from ethnoarchaeology, archaeological basketry, and ancient apprenticeship to the archeology of nomadism (edited volume with Hans Barnard). She is the editor-in-chief of the online UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology (www.uee. ucla.edu), co-principal investigator on the Digital Karnak project (dlib.etc. ucla.edu/projects/Karnak) and the Ancient Egyptian Architecture Online (AEGARON) project (dai.aegaron.ucla.edu/), and editorial director of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press.

INDEX

Aboriginal mythology, 84 society, 80, 84, 94 abstraction, 13, 61–68, 72–75 abundance of raw materials, 86, 90–91, 119, 126–128, 141, 205, 258 academic culture, 6 adulthood, 22, 81, 84, 107, 111 agency, 2–5, 16, 44, 84, 242, 256–257 Akkadian, 205, 210, 217, 218 Alaska, 103, 123, 124 Alyawara, 106, 107 Amadjuak Lake, 127, 128 Ammaaq Lake, 128 ancestors learning from 12, 203–221 ancestral beings, 81, 84, 89 powers, 80, 84 rights, 88 song lines, 86–89 tracks, 83 Andersson Gustafsson, Gunilla, 246 anthropological archaeology, 21 apprenticeship ages, 128, 129 approaches to, 7 archaeological evidence for, 174, 255 bad conditions of, 185, 186 basketry, 228 ceramic, 221 contracts, 172, 173, 186, 191, 194

cross-temporal, 221 definition of, 2, 224, 229, 237, 260 duration of, 10, 28, 34, 187, 193, 196, 246 environmental, 111, 113 formal, 11 girls and women, 191 in archaeology, 6, 224, 231, 233, 237 in modern education, 233 informal, 11 kinship, 194 landscape, 139 medical, 234 objective of, 7 of the researcher, 2 payment for, 189 pottery, 192, 193, 195 references to, 188 sculpture, 173 secondary, 38 social context of, 226 sources for, 173 stages, 7–11, 29, 35, 46, 68, 71, 100, 109, 153, 176–179, 188, 192, 195, 210, 218, 225, 227, 235, 237, 258 system, 79, 126, 205 textile, 225 textual evidence for/reference to, 187, 209 traces in archaeology, 2 weaving, 186 appropriateness, 3, 4, 6, 9, 30, 36, 48, 73, 82, 157, 191, 213, 232

270 archaeological record, 2, 11, 85, 86, 90, 94, 99–101, 111, 172–175, 195, 204, 210, 255 archaeological traces of landscape learning, 113 of limitational knowledge, 112 of locational knowledge, 112 of social knowledge, 112 archaeologist, 32, 61, 103, 204, 243, 244, 248, 257 archaeology practice of, 224 archaism, 211 architecture, 171, 172, 218, 244 Arctic Small Tool tradition, 124 barn building, 70 basket makers, 228, 248, 259 basketry, 12, 259 bead working, 228 Beazley, John, 171, 194 Beckett, Jeremy, 83 Berndt, Catherine, 81 Berndt, Ronald, 81 Binford, Lewis R., 103 Bird. Douglas, 108 Bliege Bird, Rebecca, 108 Bloch, Maurice, 79 Blue Corn, 36 Blurton-Jones, Nicholas, 105 boat building, 73 body knowledge, 4, 13, 15, 47, 228, 230, 231, 255 body-as-machine perspective, 44 botanist, 248 Botswana, 108 Boulko, 27, 31, 38 Bourdieu, Pierre, 3, 69, 242 bricolage, 231, 238 Bril, Blandine, 228 Bronze Age, 73, 75, 176, 191, 248, 249 burial, 45, 86, 88, 211 Calabaza-Jenkins, Diane, 37 Cameroon, 10, 20, 23–28, 33 Canadian Arctic, 120

Index carpenters and carpentry, 61–63, 71–73, 243, 248 ceramic production, 211, 220 ceremonial sites, 86–89, 91, 94 chaîne opératoire, 3, 9, 11, 20–24, 33, 204, 242, 257, 259 chert, 122, 127–129 childhood, 22, 24, 34, 47, 103, 111, 225, 231 children, 7, 9, 15, 24, 31, 36, 82, 104–113, 129, 139, 159, 164, 175, 176, 191, 227–230, 245 choice, 4, 20, 22, 105, 211, 217, 257 Clark, John, 126 climate change, 123 cognition, 3–9, 13, 22, 23, 62, 68, 82, 108, 145, 146, 164–166, 175, 225, 256 cognitive map, 86 cold society, 83 color codes, 244 community of practice, 5, 6, 11,16, 146, 166, 174, 204, 211, 212, 221, 257–260 competence, 66, 70, 246 complex societies, 101 Connerton, Paul, 81 consistency, 259 conventions, 13, 38, 244 corporal punishment, 29, 185 Costin, Cathy, 15 Craft Laboratory, 249 craft specialization, 15, 45, 46 Crafts Academy of Stockholm, 241, 249 craftsmanship, 3, 11–14, 63, 65, 69, 74, 241, 242 in scientific research, 242 language of, 245 craftsmen representation of, 177 creativity, 13, 14, 147, 164, 166, 231, 244, 246, 248 Crown, Patricia, 2, 175 Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly, 242 cultural heritage (intangible), 249 identity, 1, 20, 38, 256

Index practice, 255 technology, 22 transmission, 2, 21, 174 cylinder seals, 208 Cyprus, 195 David, Bruno, 93 David, Nicholas, 21 decoration, 9–11, 21, 27, 30, 31, 37, 38, 49, 159, 178, 180, 193, 211–216, 257 Deir el-Medina, 11, 12, 146, 147, 154, 158–167 design, 4, 12, 21, 27, 33–38, 43–47, 57, 61, 67, 72, 73, 80–84, 145, 159, 180, 208, 210–213, 218, 226, 227, 244 dexterity, 3, 10, 13, 65, 67, 147, 256, 260 Dietler, Michael, 24 Dietrich, Gilles, 228 discourse, 4, 69, 70, 244 Dobres, Marcia-Anne, 21 Dowayo, 10, 25–37 Dreaming, The, 84–87, 92–94 economic, 2, 12, 15, 22, 25, 37, 38, 80, 100, 120, 139, 182, 208, 211, 217, 226 Egypt, 11, 12, 145–149, 150, 151, 155, 158, 164, 166, 167, 186, 228, 23, 1233, 243 enculturation, 3, 4, 13, 15, 63, 123, 139, 140, 145 endurance, 3, 13, 108, 139, 256, 260 environmental change, 100, 103, 123 Ethiopia, 125 ethnoarchaeology, 12, 45, 123, 173, 178, 192, 195, 228, 256, 257, 259 Ewé, Guy William, 25 experience, 2, 4, 5, 8, 46, 48, 58, 62–70, 80–85, 91–94, 105, 113, 126, 192, 204, 228–245, 257, 258 experimental archaeology, 204, 224, 234, 235, 256 experimentation, 9, 128, 138, 165, 204, 221, 226, 231, 235, 236

271

expert, 66, 75, 119, 124–128, 135, 138, 205, 207, 211, 212, 228 field schools, 6, 234, 235 first inventor, 171, 196 fishermen, 243 flintknapping, 119–126, 129, 133, 138, 140, 141, 234 foraging, 94, 108, 109–111 Gachupin, Candelaria, 35 Gardner, Howard, 8 gender, 11, 12 generation, 1, 11, 12, 21, 24, 37, 61–69, 73, 74, 85–93, 102–105, 112, 141, 147, 184, 195, 204, 210 geography, 83 gesture, 4, 13, 29, 30, 36, 64, 226, 245, 256–258 glass production, 209 goanna lizard, 108 Godal, Jon Bojer, 62, 244 Göranzon, Bo, 241, 250 Gosselain, Olivier P., 25 Greece, 10, 11, 16, 171–174, 182, 188, 191–194 Greenfield, Patricia, 225 Greenland, 124 guilds, 11, Guilford, Joy Paul, 8 habitus, 3, 21–24, 30, 38, 66–70, 242, 257 Hadza, 107, 108, 111 hairdressing, 246, 247 heirloom, 4 Herbich, Ingrid, 24 Hiatt, Lester Richard, 80 Hill, James N., 43–57 human remains, 258 hunter, 10, 11, 100, 103, 105, 107, 111, 113, 119, 139 hunter gatherer, 79, 99, 103 burials, 88, 89 formal training, 110 landownership, 80 landscape learning, 99, 103

272

Index

hunter gatherer (cont.) resources, 85 society, 86 hunter- trapper, 104 Hurrians, 217 identity, 1, 5, 12, 16, 21, 23, 45, 57, 139, 184, 203, 210, 217 imitation, 5, 9–12, 23, 30, 36, 38, 47, 65–68, 74, 99, 101, 188, 196, 212, 221, 226, 227, 234, 236, 244 of ancient ceramics, 212 initiation, 9, 10, 15, 27, 82, 93 innovation, 23, 30, 226 inspiration, 3, 4, 12, 160, 203, 204, 210, 212, 260 instructor, 11, 22, 23, 29, 30, 35, 37, 48, 49, 227, 234, 236 intellectual, 62, 85, 208 intelligence, 8, 9, 246 interpretation, 44, 68, 69, 81, 86–91, 137, 159, 160, 256, 259 intuition, 105, 244, 245 Inuit, 106, 122–128, 138, 140 Irving, William, 124 journeymen, 11, 247 Kenya, 24, 31 kinesthetics, 228 kinship, 193, 207 Klamath, 109 know-how, 61, 62, 65, 67, 106, 136 knowing how, 62, 64, 246 knowing what, 62, 64 knowledge academic, 240 control of, 83 discursive, 5, 14 environmental, 100 explicit, 5, 14, 227 from objects, 212 hunting, 105 landscape, 104 limitational, 102, 112 locational, 102, 105, 111, 113 practical, 14, 67, 218, 240, 242, 247

procedural, 5, 14 public, 82 secret, 16, 33 social, 102 tacit, 5, 14, 61, 67, 241, 244 technical, 21, 29, 203, 221 theoretical, 14, 218, 240, 246 through action, 61, 67 transfer of, 1–4, 11, 13, 62, 63, 81, 88, 91, 203, 209, 225, 229–233, 255, 259 transmission of, 43, 63, 65, 66, 68, 74, 194, 195, 204, 212, 245, 255, 260 types of, 6, 9, 14, 101, 102, 218, 234 verbalization of, 14, 240 Konner, Melvin J., 105 Konso, 125 Kramer, Carol, 21 !Kung, 10, 104, 111 Kutchin, 104, 105 Kutenai, 109 landscape, 2, 5, 13, 72, 82–87, 91–94, 100–104, 109–112, 123, 128, 138–141, 258 landscape learning model, 101 language, 2, 3, 13, 14, 25, 30, 38, 61–68, 187, 205, 231, 240, 244, 246, 247 of craftsmanship, 244 Lave, Jean, 5 learning ability for, 9 academic, 6 age, 108, 109, 110 archaeological practice, 243 context of, 145, 259 direct, 236 environmental, 100, 107, 110, 113 explicit, 230 for oneself, 106 formal, 5, 11, 79, 195 from an object, 12, 208 from ancestors, 208, 221 independent, 226 informal, 10, 11, 79, 106

Index interdependent, 225 kinesthetic, 224, 231–233, 237 landscape, 100–103 lifelong, 110 location of, 258 objective of, 6, 11, 15 participatory, 229 period of, 102 potential for, 6 practical, 2 practical skills, 5 scaffolded, 225 situations, 10 social context of, 2, 43, 46, 58, 224–226 structured, 94 tacit, 230, 232 theory of, 3 through observation, 140 through practice, 146 traces of, 145 types of, 2, 7, 9, 224, 229, 232, 233 learning process, 15, 65, 100–113, 188, 192, 233 learning time reduction of, 247 Lemonnier, Pierre, 4, 256 Leroi-Gourhan, André, 3, 256 Lévi-Strauss, Claude, 83, 231 lithics, 90, 102, 111, 119–129, 135, 138–141 Little Masters Cups, 183, 184 MacEachern, Scott, 21 marriage, 26 Martinez, Maria, 32, 34 Martu, 108, 109, 111 mason, 72 master, 3, 4, 11–13, 16, 30, 57, 66–69, 75, 79, 101, 110, 126, 140–147, 157, 162, 166, 168, 171–173, 177–196, 205, 208, 212, 218, 227–230, 244–246, 259, 260 material culture, 1, 4, 257–260 matting, 9 Mauss, Marcel, 3 Maynard, Ashley, 225

273

medieval, 11, 72, 73, 76, 81, 243, 248 memory, 3, 4, 13, 22, 46, 47, 82, 91, 92, 112, 165, 166, 260 cognitive, 13 collective, 3 embodied, 81 habit, 13 inscribed, 81 spatial, 81 memory consolidation, 46, 47 menstrual period, 34 Mesopotamia, 203, 205, 208, 210, 212, 218 microstyles, 24, 30, 31, 37–39, 47, 56, 258, 259 microvariables, 43–49, 52, 56, 57, 258 statistical analysis of, 43, 51 Mikea, 108, 109, 110 Minar, Jill, 2 Molander, Bengt, 67 mongongo nuts, 108 Morphy, Howard, 82 mother-in-law, 11, 15, 24, 31, 33, 35–38 motivation, 3, 13, 22, 25, 29, 35, 140, 208, 260 motor performance, 43, 44, 55, 57, 58 motor skills, 7, 8, 9, 44, 46 Movement Writing System, 248 multicraft expertise, 190 muscle learning, 231 musical notation, 245 myth, 83, 85, 87, 92, 93, 203 names of masters and pupils, 189 Namibia, 108 Nettilling Lake, 121, 127 New Archaeology, 21 New Kingdom, 145–158, 167 New Mexico, 10, 20, 31–33, 37 Ninevite V, 212–216 nonprofessional, 228 Norway, 61–63, 72, 241, 250 Norwegian Crafts Development, 241, 249

274 novice, 4, 119, 121–138, 146, 226 Nunamiut, 103, 104, 110, 112 hunting age, 104 observation, 4, 5, 9–12, 23, 29, 30, 36, 38, 57, 68, 70,74, 81, 99, 105, 109, 140, 188, 192–196, 203, 225, 228–237, 259 occupation continuous, 89 discontinuous, 89, 90, 93 ostracon, 145–165 Pacific Northwest, 109 Palaeo-Eskimos, 120, 122–124, 129, 141 Papua New Guinea, 83 papyri, 186, 191 participation, 26, 74, 81, 83, 109, 226–237, 257 pattern books, 158, 159 pedagogy, 63, 185 persistent places, 86 personhood, 58 Piaget, Jean, 7 pithos, 10, 188 Plato, 10, 187, 188, 191, 240 play, 4, 9, 68, 107, 111, 163–165, 217, 227 Polanyi, Michael, 65, 240 posture, 258 potter-blacksmith, 25 potters, 248 pottery, 9, 20, 23–37, 145, 152, 175–179, 187, 192–195, 205, 210, 212, 214, 218, 221, 226, 227, 231, 234, 248, 259 blackware, 33, 36 bonfi ring, 33 fi ring, 27, 28, 30, 34, 179, 184, 213, 216 polychrome, 32, 33, 35 Povinelli, Elizabeth A., 82 practical intellect, 15 production process, 3, 5, 12, 24, 29, 30, 62, 226, 229, 237, 257, 258

Index professional, 228 time, 10 properness, 3, 260 properties, 9, 13, 14, 48, 62, 64, 65, 75, 260 protos euretes, 171, 196 psychology, 3, 7–9, 23, 164, 228, 242 pueblo, 10, 31–38 radiocarbon dates, 89 raw materials, 3, 4, 9, 10, 62, 73–75, 102, 119–121, 127, 134, 195, 212, 243, 258, 260 abundance of, 259 reflection, 44, 62, 68, 258 renaissance, 11 repetition, 4, 6, 9, 13, 25, 47, 99, 145, 147, 157, 158, 164, 165, 181, 182, 196, 228, 233, 237, 256 revival, 32, 33, 35 revivalism, 211 rhythm, 14, 62, 68, 69, 75 ritual, 10, 25–27, 34, 36, 37, 80–82, 87, 148 Roux, Valentine, 228 Ryle, Gilbert, 240 San Idelfonso, 31–37 Scandinavia, 2, 15, 241, 249 Schön, Donald, 240 school exercises, 158, 162, 163, 205 school tablet, 205, 206 scientists, 6, 164, 243 scrapers, 124, 125, 129, 130, 136, 137 scribes, 5, 67, 84, 154, 185, 204–210, 221, 231, 233 female, 207, 208 seal impression, 220 seasonality, 71, 102, 120, 122, 124, 139 self-taught, 190 Sigaut, François, 79 signature, 11, 62, 111, 119–124, 138, 172, 173, 182–186, 191–193, 260 signifier, 243

Index skill assessment of, 132, 135 changes in, 259 degree of, 245 display of, 166 increase of, 135, 188 indications of, 149 lack of, 255 level of, 128, 133, 137–139, 146, 152, 158, 211, 256 low, 126, 133–137 quantification, 126 technological, 139 skills communication, 13 increase of, 194 kinesthetic, 13, 231 motor, 12 observational, 236 organizational, 12 physical, 228 problem-solving, 232 professional, 241, 246 transmission of, 241 slave apprentice, 183 social boundaries, 21, 31, 57 disorder, 29, 30 reproduction, 81 socialization, 11, 13, 24, 31, 35, 36, 164, 166 Society of American Archaeologists, 2 Southern Baffin Island, 120, 123, 127–129, 137–141 Spain, 192 specialization, 12 standardization, 45–47, 55, 57, 166 status, 6, 12–15, 26, 35–38, 69, 87, 93, 139, 177, 188, 196, 218, 220, 242 Stele of Hammurapi, 210 Sternberg, Robert J., 8 stone working, 228 style, 3, 4, 12, 16, 21–24, 30, 31, 36–38, 44, 45, 57, 68, 72, 145, 164–167, 171, 173, 194, 196, 208, 210, 226, 227, 256–260

275

ceramic, 20 in archaeology, 33, 44 material, 21 variation, 21 San Idelfonso, 37 Sumerian, 205–208 Sutton, Peter, 82 Sweden, 246 symbol, 2, 25, 27, 36–38, 210 synecdoche, 245 tablet house, 207, 208 taboo, 29, 33, 138 tacit, 3, 5, 14, 61, 65–70, 212, 227, 247, 255 Tamisari, Franca, 82 Tanzania, 108 Taylor, Luke, 81 techniques, 3, 4, 13, 20, 23, 29, 33, 45, 62, 64, 74, 75, 87, 89, 104, 105, 113, 190, 204, 213, 225– 236, 241, 246, 247, 255, 257–260 technology, 4, 22, 232, 235, 236 terminology, 225, 247 Thebes, 145–168 theory and practice ontological gap, 242 theory of mind, 113 timbers, 62, 64, 71–74, 243, 248 timing, 3, 13, 47, 248 tool, 4, 51, 61–67, 74, 106, 119–135, 138, 140, 212, 231, 248, 249, 259 marks, 62, 73, 76, 256 stone, 15, 122, 139, 255 use of, 4, 9, 62, 65 toolstone, 119, 126, 128, 129, 138 tradition, 1–4, 11, 14, 16, 21–27, 30, 34, 37, 38, 44, 57, 61, 62, 66, 68–76, 80, 84, 85, 92, 101, 146, 160, 173, 184, 189, 195, 203–205, 210–212, 217, 221, 226, 227, 232, 236, 245, 249, 258–260 travel, 82, 86, 108, 121, 138–141 trial and error, 23, 38, 188, 226 Tse Pe, Dora, 34, 35, 37 Tulli, 208, 209 Tunisia, 195

276 Tupkish, 207–209, 218 tutor, 11 United States northwestern, 109 Uqnitum, 208 Urkesh, 203–220 values, 4, 6, 22, 29, 37, 38, 44, 47, 48, 139, 221 Van der Leeuw, Sander, 259 Vander Linden, Marc, 25 variability, 44–48, 51, 55, 57, 88, 103, 107, 124, 127, 138, 259, 260 vase painters, 16, 183, 189, 193, 194 video, 13, 228, 235, 248, 249 Vygotsky, Lev, 8

Index walkabout, 110 Warnier, Jean-Pierre, 5 wear marks, 256 weaver, 248, 249 weaver’s patterns, 244 Weedman, Kathryn, 125 Wenger, Etienne, 5 Witter, Dan, 86 Wobst, H. Martin, 44 women access to knowledge, 82 working rhythm, 14 workshop, 87, 145, 174, 178, 186, 189, 191–196, 257 workshop scene, 186, 218 Yates, Frances, 81