1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910777378603321

Titolo

The archaeology of drylands : living at the margin / / editors, Graeme Barker, David Gilbertson

Pubbl/distr/stampa

London ; ; New York : , : Routledge, , 2000

ISBN

1-134-58264-1

1-134-58265-X

0-415-23001-2

1-280-02108-X

9786610021086

0-203-16573-X

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (xxviii, 372 pages) : illustrations, maps

Collana

One world archaeology ; ; 39

Altri autori (Persone)

BarkerGraeme

GilbertsonD. D

Disciplina

930.1

Soggetti

Social archaeology

Landscape archaeology

Human ecology

Deserts - History

Land settlement - History

Land settlement patterns, Prehistoric - History

Arid regions agriculture - Social aspects - History

Climatic changes - History

Climatic changes

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Book Cover; Half-Title; Title; Copyright; Contents; Figures; Tables; Contributors; Foreword; Preface; Part I  INTRODUCTION; 1  Living at the margin: themes in the archaeology of drylands; 2  The dynamic climatology of drylands; Part II  SOUTHWEST AND CENTRAL ASIA; 3  The decline of desert agriculture: a view from the classical period Negev; 4  Farmers, herders and miners in the Wadi Faynan, southern Jordan: a 10,000-year landscape archaeology; 5  Differing strategies for water supply and farming in the Syrian Black Desert



6 Irrigation agriculture in Central Asia: a long-term perspective from Turkmenistan; Part III  SAHARA AND SAHEL; 7 Conquests and land degradation in the eastern Maghreb during classical antiquity and the Middle Ages; 8 Success, longevity and failure of arid-land agriculture: Romano-Libyan floodwater farming in the Tripolitanian pre-desert; 9 Twelve thousand years of human adaptation in Fezzan (Libyan Sahara); 10 Farming and famine: subsistence strategies in Highland Ethiopia; Part IV  EASTERN AND SOUTHERN AFRICA; 11 Engaruka: farming by irrigation in Maasailand c.AD 1400-1700

12 The agricultural landscape of the Nyanga area of Zimbabwe; 13 Fifteenth-century agropastoral responses to a disequilibrial ecosystem in southeastern Botswana; 14 Islands of intensive agriculture in African drylands: towards an explanatory framework; Part V  NORTH AND CENTRAL AMERICA; 15 Prehistoric agriculture and anthropogenic ecology of the North American Southwest; 16 The role of maguey in the Mesoamerican tierra fría: ethnographic, historic and archaeological perspectives; Part VI  EUROPE; 17 Traditional irrigation systems in dryland Switzerland; 18 Desertification, land degradation and land abandonment in the Rhône valley, France; Index

Sommario/riassunto

Many dryland regions contain archaeological remains which suggest that there must have been intensive phases of settlement in what now seem to be dry and degraded environments. This book discusses successes and failures of past land use and settlement in drylands, and contributes to wider debates about desertification and the sustainability of dryland settlement.