The papers in the volume are aligned with the object biography approach. The organisation follows the path of the life cycle and draws out issues at each stage.
Brunning tackles the experiment and experience dichotomy of planning and executing a project. He focuses on the lessons learnt over 25 years from maintaining structures such as roundhouses, logboats and trackways and how these informed the planning of new reconstructions. Included in the discussion are the compromises that have to be made in relation to health and safety and the public interaction with the reconstructions. The introduction has outlined the way in which putting up structures is underpinned by ethnographic and craft traditions and that these skills and traditions are increasingly rare. Caruso and Speciale offer a key example of the way in which these rare skills can inform our understanding of aspects of the archaeological record. The ‘living memory’ provides a useful and timely piece of research in its own right as well as offering this ethnographic contribution to the experiment, experience and ethnography links of assembling materials and skills to make a building. The different elements all need to work into a composite structure.
Thinking through structures presents four very different articles in which each contributes in a different way towards extending ideas about structures beyond the better-known houses. Hurcombe and Emmerich Kamper emphasise the perishable elements of structures and present the diversity of plant and animal resources which can contribute as rooves, doors and walls to substantial but archaeologically ephemeral buildings, as well as form short-lived structures. The longevity of materials in the soil should not prevent archaeologists considering the importance of the ‘missing majority’. They make the point that storage areas and space for drying materials can be important both within a building and outside as extra storage or drying or working spaces. Cunningham’s article takes this further still by focussing on the structures built for food storage. In temperate regions with marked seasonal resources ethnographic evidence suggests a range of potential solutions. The need for stored food can vary from a safety-net in hard times to being part of an annual round of activity. As storage, both in pits and above ground, makes an important contribution to the success of any community, actively considering
30 the life cycle of structures in experimental archaeology
storage and the structures associated with this need enriches the way archaeologists think about structures and sites.
Many Archaeological Open-Air Museums (AOAMs) feature boats and these present special challenges. In this volume they are considered as another variation in the ‘structures’ category. Hurcombe and Cumby present some of their collaborative projects. Cumby offers the skills and insights of a shipwright on archaeological and present day issues of building and maintaining boats. The range of experiments and experiences offers a chance to consider the variety of materials used and the composite nature of some boats such as the full-scale replica of a Bronze Age boat built with stitches of yew withies – an example of a skill which had to be relearnt in the present day. The final contribution to this section is a different kind of missing skill relating to structures. Birch tar has to be distilled and in preceramic periods this has to be achieved by some form of structure. The archaeological evidence exists, but it is in the form of the product not the structure which allowed the distillation process to work. Pfeifer and Claußen present two structures which have allowed birch tar to be extracted. In both cases the structures are small, short-lived, and likely to prove difficult for archaeologists to identify, but these experiments offer up ideas for the interpretation and recognition of these essential structures.
The papers themed on the construction phase offer five different experiences of large buildings and furnace structures. Nieminen presents her experiences of learning to thatch as part of house building activites in Kierikki Stone Age Village (Finland), with a clear sense of reflection on the compromises and learning aspects of thatching. This contrasts with Lobisser’s discussion of wood working techniques within the reconstruction of a massive timber structure from the Bronze Age Terramara culture at Parco Montale in Northern Italy. Karjalainen and Vattulainen, and Cañamero, Gutiérrez and Vallès similary offer contrasts. The latter use furnace structures for experiments in making and working with iron focused on Celtic Iberian iron practice. Whereas the former try to understand the slab furnaces of the Finnish Iron Age which uses bog iron and the authors assess whether such structures are reusable. Process and product are both part of the assessment of the structures. In this section the experiment and experiences are intertwined with skills being developed alongside the scientific aspects of the projects. Van Gijn and Pomstra offer another approach to construction. A Neolithic style house is built using a range of period-relevant tools with the function history of each individual tool documented as part of a joint experiment.
In many cases the maintenance of the building is a crucial factor in its longevity. Strategies for dealing with repairs and storm damage in a timely way prevent more rapid deterioration. In all cases and throughout the OpenArch experience the role of a fire to drive off damp has been emphasised. The air quality issues of gas and particles caused by the fire are balanced against the lack of fire allowing cold and damp conditions and the growth of mould. Considering living standards within structures offer insights and opens up new questions especially as the structures in AOAMs are also workplaces for staff and volunteers with health and safety responsibilities in the modern world. Christensen tests the indoor environment in a reconstructed Viking Age houses (Denmark) during the winter to offer a different view on how elements such as hearth and roof work together in a living
environment. Ambient heat and overnight conditions are as important as day time ones. Muurimäki’s experiences are a contrast as they are the result of many years of experimentation in the construction and roof design of buildings relevant to Finland’s archaeological past. The long-term nature of Muurimäki’s reflections adds to archaeological understanding alongside the targeted scientific data collection of Christensen’s work.
The decline of structures features another highly contrasting pair of articles. Bradley takes a whole biography approach to his reconstruction of a North American ancestral Pueblo style structure. As a subterranean structure, the access routes, fall of light, the wall and roof deterioration are all covered. All these factors offer potential insights into the way archaeologists have to decide whether the evidence is due to deliberate acts or abandonment, and the way the building may take on other roles over time is part of the object biography approach to understanding them and their social context. Sørensen’s article builds on these themes using the case study of the deterioration and collapse of roundhouses. The failure of the roof by ‘sitting down’ i.e. slumping and twisting, meant the building switched use, not that it died. In all her discussions the building is personified making ‘the day the house sat down’ a fitting closing chapter for the object biography approach to the life cycle of structures.
Bibliography
Arnold, B. 1990. Cortaillod-Est et les villages du lac de Neuchâtel au Bronze final: Archéologie
Neuchâteloise 6, Sainte Blaise: Ed. du Ruau.
Beck, A.S. 2011.Working in the borderland of experimental archaeology: on theoretical perspectives in recent experimental work. In Petersson, B. and Narmo, L.E. (eds.)
Experimental Archaeology: between enlightenment and experience. Acta Archaeologica
Lundensia Series 8:62: Lund University: Norway. pp. 167-194.
Bell, M., Fowler, M.J. & Hillson, S.W. 1996. The Experimental Earthwork Project,
1960-1992. Council for British Archaeology: York.
Burrow, S. 2015. From Celtic village to Iron Age Farmstead: Lessons learnt from twenty years of building, maintaining and presenting Iron Age roundhouses at St Fagans National History Museum. Exarc Journal Digest 2: 6-11. (Full article available at http://journal.exarc.net/issue-2015-4/aoam/celtic-village-iron-age-farmstead-lessons- learnt-twenty-years-building-maintaining-and-presenting).
Coles, B.J. 1992. The wetland revolution in prehistory. The Prehistoric Society and WARP: Southampton.
Cunningham, P., Heeb, J. and Paardekooper, R. (eds.) 2008. Experiencing archaeology by
experiment. Oxbow Books: Oxford.
Dant, T. 2001. Fruitbox/toolbox: biography and objects. Auto/Biography 9 (1 & 2):11-20. Demant, I. 2009. Principles for reconstruction of costumes and archaeological textiles. In
Alfaro, C., Tellénbach, M. and Ferrero, R. (eds.) Textiles y Museologia: Aspects of study,
analysis and exhibition of ancient textiles and textile tools. Clothing and textiles, new perspectives on textiles in the Roman Empire. pp. 143-153.
32 the life cycle of structures in experimental archaeology
Drury, P.J. 1982. Structural reconstruction: approaches to the interpretation of excavated
remains of buildings. BAR British Series 110: Oxford.
Gosden, C. and Marshall, Y. 1999. The cultural biography of objects. World Archaeology
31(2): 169-178.
Gómez Gutiérrez, M. 2015. Archaeological Open-Air Museums and the dialogue with
the museum community. OpenArch (handbook available at http://openarch.eu/
work-packages/products/wp6-publication-aoams-and-dialogue-museum-community). Hurcombe, L. 2004. Experimental Archaeology, in Renfrew C. and Bahn, P. (eds.)
Archaeology: The Key Concepts, London: Routledge. pp. 110-115.
Hurcombe, L. 2007. Archaeological Artefacts as Material Culture. London: Routledge. Ilić, O., Tapavički-Ilić, M., Ćirić, Đ. 2014. The OpenArch Project: archaeological
experiment of planting grapevine in Viminacium. Archaeology and Science 9:127-134. Ilić, O., and Nikolić, N. 2015. Archaeological Park Viminacium: Cultural-historical
heritage in the Jubilee year of Christianity. Archaeology and Science 10: 231-244. Jakobsen, B. and Burrow, S. 2015. Handbook: Management of Open-Air Museums.
OpenArch: (Handbook available at http://openarch.eu/work-packages/products/ management-open-air-museums).
Jewell, P.A. (ed.) 1963. The experimental earthwork on Overton Down, Wiltshire 1960. The British Association for the Advancement of Science: London.
Kelm, R. 2015. The Stone Age Park Dithmarschen (Steinzeitpark Dithmarschen) – concepts and development of a visitor orientated educational centre for sustainable development. In Kelm, R. (ed.) Archaeology and Crafts: experiences and experiments of traditional skills and
handicrafts in archaeological open-air museums in Europe. Proceedings of the VI. OpenArch
Conference in Albersdorf, Germany, 23-37 September 2013. Husum. pp. 13-25.
Kelm, R. (ed.) 2015. Archaeology and Crafts: experiences and experiments of traditional skills
and handicrafts in archaeological open-air museums in Europe. Proceedings of the VI.
OpenArch Conference in Albersdorf, Germany, 23-37 September 2013. Husum. Kelterborn, P. 2005. Principles of experimental research in archaeology. euroREA 2: 120-122. Klompmaker, H. 2014a. Reconstruction/Building an Iron Age house. (http://OpenArch.eu/
work-packages/activities/reconstructionbuilding-iron-age-house).
Klompmaker, H. 2014b. Reconstruction/Building an Bronze Age house. (http://OpenArch. eu/work-packages/activities/reconstructionbuilding-bronze-age-house).
Nikolić, E. 2013. Contribution to the study of Roman architecture in Vimincium construction materials and building techniques, Archaeology and Science 8: 21-48. Nikolić, E., Anđelković, J., and Rogić, D. 2011. Archaeological Parks as production of
emotional design: Design organisation of a park based on the exploration of visitors’ emotions. Archaeology and Sciences 6: 259-270.
Nikolić, E. and Bogdanović, I. 2012. Study of mortar from the Viminacium amphitheater as the basis for its future conservation and restoration. Archaeology in Serbia: Projects
Nikolić, E. and Bogdanović, I. 2012. Proučavanje maltera iz viminacijumskog amfiteatra kao osnova za njegovu buduću konzervaciju i restauraciju / Viminacium Amphitheatre Mortar Research as a Basis for its Conservation and Restoration. In V. Bikić, S. Golubović, D. Antonivić (eds.). Arheološki institut Godišnjak, 2011. godina. Beograd: Arheološki institut, 2012, pp. 58-61.
Nikolić, E., Rogić, D., and Milovanović, 2015. Role of brick in hydraulicity of Viminacium mortars: Decorative mortars of thermae. Archaeology and Science 10: 71-92.
Outram, A. 2008. Introduction to experimental archaeology. World Archaeology 40:1: 1-6. Paardekopper, R. 2012. The value of an Archaeological Open-Air Museum is in its use:
understanding Archaeological Open-Air Museum and their visitors. Sidestone Press: Leiden.
Petersson, B. and Narmo, L.E. (eds.) 2011. Experimental Archaeology: between enlightenment
and experience. Acta Archaeologica Lundensia Series 8:62: Lund University: Sweden.
Rasmussen, M. 2007. Iron Age Houses in flames: Testing house reconstructions at Lejre. Studies in technology and Culture 3: Lejre.
Rasmussen, M. 2011. Under the same roof: experimental research and interpretation with examples from the construction of house models. In Petersson, B. and Narmo, L.E. (eds.) Experimental Archaeology: between enlightenment and experience. Acta Archaeologica Lundensia Series 8:62: Lund University: Sweden. pp. 167-167.
Reynolds, P.J. 1999. The nature of experiment. In archaeology Harding, A.F. (ed.)
Experiment and design: archaeological studies in Honour of John Coles. Oxbow Books:
Oxford. pp. 156-162.
Schmidt, M. 2000. Fake! Haus-und Umweltrekonstruktionen inarchäologischen Freilichtmuseen. In Kelm, R. (ed.) Vom Pfostenloch zum Steinzeithaus. Archäologische
Forschung und rekonstruktion jungsteinzeitlicher Haus-und Siedlungsbefunde im Nordwestlichen Mitteleuropa. Heide: Ärchaeologisch-Ökologisch Zentrum Albersdorf.
pp. 169-177.
Schöbel, G. 2004. On the responsibility of accurately interpresting prehistoric life in full scale. EuroREA 1:150-160.
Tapavicki-Ilic, M. and Mrdic, N. 2015. Roman burial rite in Viminacium: the latest discovery. In Zerbini, L. (ed.) Culti e religiostià nelle province danubiane, Atti del II
Convegno Internazonale Ferrara 20-22 Novembre 2013, Bologna: pp. 483-495.
Van de Noort, R., Cumby, B., Blue, L., Harding, A., Hurcombe, L., Hansen, T.M., Wetherelt, A., Wittamore, J. and Wyke, A. 2014. Morgawr: an experimental Bronze Age‐type sewn‐plank craft based on the Ferriby boats. International Journal of Nautical