Among many other voices, Neema Begum and Rima Saini (2019: 200) have called for a decolonisation of education: “decolonising academia requires meaningful recognition of alternative perspectives embedded in analysis of power relations”. Archaeology is no exception and has suffered particularly from Eurocentric, colonial approaches. This NBC considers a collection of volumes that take a post-colonial standpoint to reconsider approaches to archaeology and recognise the importance of what have often been considered subaltern voices. These volumes take us from the beginnings of archaeological curation in sixteenth-century Rome, with its focus on material remains, to post-colonial approaches that give equal value to intangible heritage and to indigenous voices, and deconstruct traditional narratives of asymmetrical contact.
We begin with Benjamin Anderson and Felipe Rojas's volume, which challenges stereotypes of antiquarians as eighteenth-century dilettantes or nineteenth-century clergymen, before turning to Barbara Furlotti's book, which focuses our attention on the objects themselves and traces the biography of antiquities from the peasant's field to the collector's shelves. Stephen Dyson's volume reveals how archaeology and antiquarianism have influenced the ideologies that shaped urbanism in the city of Rome.
Defining antiquarians as “people who are interested in and knowledgeable about the material traces of the past” (p. 1), Anderson and Rojas aim to expand notions of the ‘antiquarian’ by moving away from the traditional dichotomies, such as indigenous vs colonial. In so doing, they recognise the complexity of connections and social contexts that shaped individual antiquarians and the contact between types of antiquarianisms that meant they influenced each other. Anderson and Rojas present a collection of ten papers that approach the complex question of antiquarianism in a variety of ways.
Rojas sets out to demonstrate the “heterogeneity of human interactions with the past” (p. 8). His model asks three questions of the individual specialist including: who they are, what they consider to be archaeological evidence and how they relate this archaeological material to themselves. Approaching the subject from the perspective of his own specialist area—the classical Mediterranean—Rojas seeks out unusual examples of antiquarianism to demonstrate that there is a pluralism in archaeological and antiquarian thought that has tended to be overlooked. Proposing the term ‘archaeophilia’ as a descriptor for those expressing “an urge to explain the past by identifying, interpreting, and manipulating things that are (or are imagined to be) old” (p. 11), he goes on to address his three questions in the context of Greek and Roman Mediterranean archaeology. His conclusion is that the dominant voice of archaeology today has “presentist biases” (p. 25), which risks falsely determining how the past was perceived in other times and places by viewing them through a Western lens; other traditions should not be drowned out or banished simply because they are in tension with our own. Roja ends with an appeal to attend to radically different ideas so that a truly comparative understanding of archaeological and antiquarian thought is possible.
Alfredo González-Ruibal takes a very different view in his chapter on antiquarianism—or rather, the lack thereof—in Africa. He deconstructs the post-colonial framework within which antiquarianism is considered. This framework assumes that non-Western communities did practice archaeology and antiquarianism, and that we need to find ways to access that, rather than accepting the narratives of communities who claim to be ahistorical. González-Ruibal begins by asking whether antiquarianism can be seen as universal. Citing a case study focused on the Samburu people of Kenya, he notes that despite apparent enthusiasm to cooperate with the excavation of a burial site, the community, especially the elders, professed to dislike and disapprove of the excavations. González-Ruibal concludes that in spite of the younger generation showing an interest in the burials, there were sometimes traditions rejecting antiquarianism of this nature. It is not a case, then, of subaltern communities being unaware of their history and its material remains: “they do know consciously or intuitively […] and have often chosen to reject them” (p. 38). This does not deny the existence of antiquarianism in small-scale societies, but suggests that it may be the exception rather than the rule. González-Ruibal argues that “postcolonial concern with finding historical practices in non-Western communities may unwittingly end up recapitulating colonial epistemic imperialism by ultimately using modern values as the measuring rod for all humanity” (p. 31).
This volume also explores antiquarianism in Europe and the Americas, focusing on Castile and Spanish America (Byron Ellsworth Hamann), the Inca Empire (Steve Kosiba) and Mexican tradition (Giuseppe Marcocci); the Ottoman Empire, including modern Greece (Emily Neumeier and Benjamin Anderson); and the Middle East (Eva-Maria Troelenberg). It concludes with a response by Peter Miller who reflects on the possibilities and legitimacy of comparing antiquarianisms. Miller suggests that despite the problems of hegemonising societies in the comparison process, if we ensure that each comparison is bi-directional, by centring non-Western societies as the norm and understanding how European antiquarianism diverged from them, these assessments can be fruitful.
Barbara Furlotti's volume shifts the focus from antiquarians to antiquities, as she charts the movement of objects, their restoration, sale, economic value and meaning. She argues that for too long studies of antiquities have been approached in a top-down manner, viewing the whole through the lens of the elite collector. Furlotti aims to tell the missing parts of the story in this richly illustrated book. From a bottom-up perspective, she considers the other agents involved in the collection and trade of antiquities, from the poorly paid local diggers, to the shipper, the restorer, the salespeople and collectors as the objects travel the market chain, gaining layers of meaning and value at every stage, from ancient object to sought after collectibles. The volume focuses on Rome as an established centre for exporting finds, and concentrates on the later sixteenth century, a time when collecting Roman antiquities was considered the pinnacle of taste and a reflection of expertise.
Beginning with the discovery of artefacts as part of the seasonal harvest cycle, where ploughing would release objects from the soil, the journey of artefacts is charted through the exchange-and-barter system of the peasants, on to the more savvy landowners who would take artefacts to the city to sell, to the cultured collector. This ultimately led to attempts to regulate the trade in antiquities. These took the form of papal bulls, which variously imposed excommunication on anyone stripping churches of antiquities, forbade destruction and exploitation of ancient marbles—these were frequently sold to kilnmen to make lime—and regulated the exploitation of antiquities out of the ground. As Furlotti notes, the fact that the regulations were reinvented so many times reveals their efficacy.
Furlotti reflects on the one-sided phenomenon of collections of antiquities, noting that we only ever see the respectable angle, carefully veneered by a façade of cultured learning and the preservation of heritage. Behind that façade, however, are the shadowy processes of acquisition that rely on a host of anonymous actors who negotiate the status of objects and their movement from the site of discovery to the collector's cabinet. The book effectively challenges the notion of a civilised antiquarian by revealing the lengths that people would go to find, trade, transport and ultimately own antiquities. Indeed, it is a timely reminder that we should perhaps reflect on the contemporary trade in antiquities and its social and ethical issues.
From the pillaging of Rome to its increasing emphasis on heritage protection, this volume by Stephen Dyson echoes some of Furlotti's sentiments about the way that Rome was exploited in terms of its antiquities. It follows this process from the eighteenth century, when the city became a destination for the Grand Tour, through the fascist appropriation of classical imagery in its propaganda in the early twentieth century, to the modern movement of the late twentieth century to protect and preserve the eternal city.
The volume opens with reflections on eighteenth-century Rome as a city where the papacy was facing the rise of powerful Protestant states across Europe and the intellectual challenges of the Enlightenment. Beginning with Clement XI, the popes began to use the classical arts as a common language to overcome differences when dealing with foreign emissaries. This ultimately led to the protection of antiquities, while the growing number of antiquarian tourists and demand for antiquities to export led to papal attempts to control the antiquities market, which included papal bulls banning the removal of marbles from ancient monuments, particularly the Colosseum, and several bans on excavation. These, as Barbara Furlotti noted in her volume, were not always successful. It also led to the first major museum in Rome, the Museo Capitolino, founded in 1733 by Clement XII and opened to the public in 1734. This was closely followed in 1740 by the establishment of the first archaeological society in Rome, the Accademia della Storia e Antichità Romana. Eighteenth-century Rome was still a fruitful place for the agents of antiquarianism identified by Furlotti in Antiquities in motion; the excavators, artists, dealers and restorers whose trades had begun tentatively in the sixteenth century were now part of a major Roman industry.
Dyson follows the fortunes of Rome through the French occupation when many antiquities were shipped to Paris (although some were subsequently returned in 1816), and through the period of the waning power of the papacy and the ultimate unification of Italy in 1870. In post-unification Rome, the papal archaeological administration was abolished and replaced with the Sopraintendenza per gli scavi di antichità e per la custodia dei monumenti della provincia di Roma (a ministry for the excavation of antiquities and for the preservation of the monuments of Rome), which would be instrumental in the modernising cultural agenda for Italy. New developments for the urban fabric of the city included plans to draw on the republican past and reclaim Rome from an urban landscape dominated by architectural expressions of papal rule. Plans included full excavation of the Forum and restoration of areas and architecture that evoked the great orator of the Roman Republic, Cicero. The re-emphasis on republican Rome was designed to dampen memories of the papal years and bolster the legitimacy of the unification. The conversion of Rome into the national capital resulted in much wider changes to the city; in Chapter 5, Dyson outlines how archaeology and ideology coalesced to change the urban fabric of Rome. This included the “purification of monuments” (p. 101) to make them more visible and restore their ‘Romaness’, and the strategic linking of new structures such as the Victor Emmanuel Monument with monuments evoking the classical past. At the same time, however, it also led to uncontrolled development, which had a major impact on the archaeological record. Significant ancient structures such as the Ara Pacis and the Mausoleum of Augustus were renovated or resituated to reflect better the glory of Rome.
Chapter 7 details the impact of fascism on the fabric of the city from 1922–1943. The Fascist movement identified with the ideology of ancient Rome, but also drew inspiration from the Futurist movement, which celebrated the technological triumph of humanity over nature, so that architecture of the period was a blend of modernity and classical. There was an emphasis on change and modernisation, with only selective retention of imagery from Rome's past.
Dyson concludes that in Italy, archaeological heritage, its curation and preservation, has always been in crisis (no less so in more recent years under the Berlusconi governments), but he highlights the efforts of individuals and institutions who have accomplished much in terms of preserving the archaeological record. In an engaging narrative, Dyson uses Rome as a case study to demonstrate the relationship between archaeology, ideology and the creation of urban space, revealing how the ideology of certain sectors of society has shaped the townscapes of today.
Our final volumes continue the theme of post-colonialism and decolonising archaeology drawn out by Anderson and Rojas, by applying them to specific case studies. Matthew Beaudoin deconstructs not only existing colonial approaches, but also post-colonial perspectives, through the lens of the colonial narratives that are pervasive in Great Lakes archaeology. Meanwhile, in their volume, Peter Schmidt and Alice Kehoe ask us to listen, with humility and patience, in order to decolonise indigenous archaeology.
Beaudoin begins with the premise that despite efforts to decolonise, and because the discipline is practised largely by “white, middle- to upper-class individuals who are legitimized by the established academic or political processes” (p. 5), archaeology is embedded within a political and colonial system. Following White (1991) and Gosden (Reference Gosden2004), Beaudoin aims to deconstruct the dichotomous approach to the archaeology of colonialism, which often sees a clear divide between the colonisers and the colonised. His study involves exploring multigenerational coloniser and colonised sites dating to the nineteenth century, to understand the blurred distinction between these two conventional definitions. Beginning with a deconstruction of traditional paradigms, Beaudoin goes on to consider the experiences of Mohawk communities in southern Ontario as colonised peoples, and the experiences of the colonisers of these communities through archaeological assemblies associated with two settler families, the McKinneys and the Odlums. Interpretations of the data are then brought together to test whether assumptions of difference on both sides have any validity.
Using ceramic and faunal assemblages from the nineteenth-century sites, he reveals that there is no clear difference between ‘coloniser’ and ‘colonised’ communities. Although there is some distinction between settler and indigenous culture, the majority of the sites have ceramics that reflect a point of convergence with households—regardless of their status as indigenous or settler—using similar tableware. This suggests that we need to think differently about the coloniser vs colonised divide, and recognise that identities, whether of gender, ethnicity or social, are simultaneously present and are expressed or contested, revealed or denied, in everyday choices.
Key to Beaudoin's solution is recognising the ways in which people lived through, or adapted to, colonisation, persecution or being perceived as the ‘other’. The evidence for clashes of peoples is perhaps more evident: genocide, slavery, tragic persecutions, but there also exist negotiated contingencies that allowed for survival, discourse and sometimes assimilation—and not only assimilation of the weaker with the strong—it is here, in this evidence, that we are likely to find ways to bridge the conceptual divide.
Beaudoin concludes that the lack of materially distinct patterns between coloniser and colonised sites suggests that the traditional colonial dialogue is limiting in terms of interpreting archaeological evidence. He proposes that “starting from commonalities of existence, we can better explore the nuanced manners in which individuals navigated the complex realities of their time rather than transposing our sensibilities of the present onto the past” (p. 134).
Schmidt and Kehoe begin their edited volume with a similar plea to not forget the individual in our archaeological endeavours. Their introduction outlines how ‘archaeologies of listening’ encourage a post-colonial perspective. Hierarchies of knowledge have, in colonial archaeology, echoed the hierarchy of power, while the voices of indigenous people have been ignored. Archaeologies of listening comprises 13 papers that demonstrate why this is a missed opportunity, and how listening to those voices can make both the archaeologist and the peoples we study, fully human.
Listening in the context of this volume goes beyond the aural experience and extends to a more immersive sensory experience. It involves experiencing the landscape, the climate, the tactile nature of material culture and encourages an empathetic approach to studying the past. The volume is divided into three parts that respectively deal with ‘listening with patience’, ‘reaching for epistemic humility’ and ‘biographies of archaeologies of listening’. In part one, Kathryn Weedman Arthur reveals the difficulties of listening even for the willing apprentice as she recounts her realisation during fieldwork in Ethiopia that, despite listening, she was still approaching what she heard from within a Western framework. In his chapter focusing on the alternative histories inscribed on the landscape of the Zimbabwe plateau, Innocent Pikirayi considers how a rich tradition of oral histories can elucidate the broader context for the demise of Great Zimbabwe in ways that archaeology alone cannot. In a similar way, Billy Ó Foghlú cites the advantage of listening to indigenous experience in the study of earth mounds in Australia, concluding that in order to learn about past peoples who were deeply connected to the landscape, it makes sense to listen to those living now who are also deeply connected to that same landscape. Foghlú acknowledges that listening will not reveal an absolute past, but suggests that it can reveal the sort of questions we should be asking to approach a fuller understanding of the past.
The papers in part two theorise and problematise archaeologies of listening, beginning with George Nicholas's reflections on the politics of listening and why heritage is problematic. Focusing on the Troubles in Northern Ireland, Audrey Horning considers the role of archaeology in conflict transformation. She investigates how identity relates to narratives of conflict and dispossession, and reflects on the ethics of correcting misrepresented historical narratives, concluding that archaeologists have a moral obligation to tread lightly when dealing with contested histories, especially in conflicted or post-conflict societies.
Part three focuses on the biographies of individuals who pioneered archaeologies of listening, spotlighting anthropologist and self-professed ‘bedside ethnologist’ Frank Speck who conducted ethnographies among socially marginalised communities in North America (Kehoe); Harlan Smith and Franz Boas who undertook fieldwork in nineteenth-century British Columbia as part of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition (Catherine Carlson with commentary by Kehoe). The volume emphasises the value of respectful engagement with local communities and the rewards that are to be reaped in return for patience and humility.
The books in this issue of NBC cover a broad range of geographic areas and take a variety of different approaches, but all highlight the agency of the individual in the past and the diversity of ideologies that can be concealed in the archaeological record. Whether we are looking for the past curators of archaeology, tracing the antiquities themselves or attempting to understand contact between disparate societies, there are inherent difficulties in identifying and understanding these multiple pasts that need to be approached respectfully and negotiated carefully; these volumes warn that archaeologists ignore this at our peril. It behoves us to reconsider continually the impact of past colonial narratives on our paradigms and our teaching.
This list includes all books received between 1 September 2019 and 31 October 2019. Those featuring at the beginning of New Book Chronicle have, however, not been duplicated in this list. The listing of a book in this chronicle does not preclude its subsequent review in Antiquity.
