Chiefdom Societies In Prehistoric Malta

As is well known, years ago C. Renfrew adopted the social model of chiefdom to explain the emergence of outstanding megalithic centres in the Maltese archipelago in the mid-4th millennium BC. This represented a pioneering attempt to apply to a Prehistoric Mediterranean context the model, advanced by Neoevolutionary American anthropologists, that exemplifies unequal societies with an established hierarchy based on birthrights. Since then, the concept of chiefdom has been widely debated among scholars. In order to test the actual applicability of the chiefdom model in a real case study, which appears more fruitful than an abstract speculation, the authors reconsider the specific prehistoric context of Malta between the 3500 and the 1500 BC. As for the Temple period, a central question is posed: are the megalithic centres the materialised traces of an early emergence of social inequality in the central Mediterranean? Moreover, the possible reasons behind the collapse of Temple period society are discussed, as well as the socio-ideological transformations occurred during the Early Bronze Age. | Come è noto, diversi anni fa C. Renfrew utilizzò il modello sociale del chiefdom per spiegare l’affermazione di imponenti centri megalitici nell’arcipelago maltese intorno alla metà del IV millennio a.C. Questo tentativo pionieristico si proponeva di applicare a un contesto preistorico mediterraneo tale modello (formulato da alcuni antropologi neoevoluzionisti statunitensi), che esprime la connotazione specifica di società disuguali con una gerarchia stabile basata su diritti di nascita. Da allora il concetto di chiefdom è stato ampiamente dibattuto tra gli studiosi. Per cercare di verificare l’attuale applicabilità del modello del chiefdom a un caso di studio reale, gli autori riprendono in esame il contesto maltese tra il 3500 e il 1500 a.C. Per quel che riguarda il Periodo dei Templi, si pone un quesito principale: i centri megalitici rappresentano le tracce materializzate di una precoce insorgenza della disuguaglianza sociale nel Mediterraneo centrale? Inoltre sono discusse le possibili ragioni alla base del collasso della società del Periodo dei Templi, così come le trasformazioni avvenute durante il Bronzo antico.

One of the principal characteristics of the European Neolithic is the development of monumentality in association with innovations in material culture and changes in subsistence from hunting and gathering to farming and pastoralism. The papers in this volume discuss the latest insights into why monumental architecture became an integral part of early farming societies in Europe and beyond. One of the topics is how we define monuments and how our arguments and recent research on temporality impacts on our interpretation of the Neolithic period. Different interpretations of Göbekli Tepe are examples of this discussion as well as our understanding of special landmarks such as flint mines. The latest evidence on the economic and paleoenvironmental context, carbon 14 dates as well as analytical methods are employed in illuminating the emergence of monumentalism in Neolithic Europe. Studies are taking place on a macro and micro scale in areas as diverse as Great Britain, Denmark, Sweden, Poland, Germany, the Dutch wetlands, Portugal and Malta involving a range of monuments from long barrows and megalithic tombs to roundels and enclosures. Transformation from a natural to a built environment by monumentalizing part of the landscape is discussed as well as changes in megalithic architecture in relation to shifts in the social structure. An ethnographic study of megaliths in Nagaland discuss monument building as an act of social construction. Other studies look into the role of monuments as expressions of cosmology and active loci of ceremonial performances. Also, a couple of papers analyse the social processes in the transformation of society in the aftermath of the initial boom in monument construction and the related changes in subsistence and social structure in northern Europe. The aim of the publication is to explore different theories about the relationship between monumentality and the Neolithic way of life through these studies encompassing a wide range of types of monuments over vast areas of Europe and beyond.

The Maltese archipelago is a unique barometer for understanding cultural change in the central Mediterranean. Prehistoric people helped reshape the islands' economy and when Mediterranean maritime highways were being established, the islands became a significant lure to Phoenician colonists venturing from their Levantine homeland. Punic Malta also sat at the front line of regional hostilities until it fell to Rome. Preserved in this island setting are signs of people's endurance and adaptation to each new challenge. This book is the first systematic and up-to-date survey of the islands' archaeological evidence from the initial settlers to the archipelago's inclusion into the Roman world (c.5000 BC–400 AD). Claudia Sagona draws upon old and new discoveries and her analysis covers well-known sites such as the megalithic structures, as well as less familiar locations and discoveries. She interprets the archaeological record to explain changing social and political structures, intriguing ritual practices and cultural contact through several millennia.

This 1982 collection of eight original anthropological essays provides an exciting synthesis of theory and practice in one of the key issues of contemporary cultural evolutionary thought. The contributors ask why complex, highly stratified societies emerged at several locations in the New World at the same point in prehistory. Focusing primarily on the initial centers of civilization in Mesoamerica and the Andean region, they consider the sociopolitical, environmental and ideological factors in state formation. The essays discuss the prehistoric conditions and processes that simulated the development of the first state-level societies in Mesoamerica and Peru, and explore the difficulties archaeologists must face in their direct analysis of physical remains. In general, the contributors recognize a growing need for better archaeological solutions to the question of state origin and for more sensitivity to the problems as well as to the possibilities of ethnographic analogy.