Göytepe: Neolithic Excavations in the Middle Kura Valley, Azerbaijan

Description

Göytepe: Neolithic Excavations in the Middle Kura Valley, Azerbaijan, publishes the first round of fieldwork and research (2008-2013) at this key site for understanding the emergence and development of food-producing communities in the South Caucasus. Situated close to the Fertile Crescent of Southwest Asia, where Neolithisation processes occurred earlier, research in the South Caucasus raises intriguing research questions, including issues of diffusion from the latter and interaction with ‘incoming’ Neolithic communities as well as the possibility of independent local Neolithisation processes. In order to address these issues in the South Caucasus, a joint Azerbaijan–Japan research programme was launched in 2008 to investigate Göytepe, one of the largest known Neolithic mounds in the South Caucasus. The results of the first phase of the project (2008-2013) presented here provide rich archaeological data from multi-disciplinary perspectives: chronology, architecture, technology, social organisation, and plant and animal exploitation, to name a few. This volume is the first to present these details in a single report of the South Caucasian Neolithic site using a high-resolution chronology based on dozens of radiocarbon dates. Table of Contents Preface – Yoshihiro Nishiaki and Farhad Guliyev Chapter 1: Introduction – Yoshihiro Nishiaki and Farhad Guliyev Part I: Field Investigations Chapter 2: Geomorphological settings of Göytepe – Yuichi Hayakawa Chapter 3: Stratigraphy and architecture in the main excavation area of Göytepe – Yoshihiro Nishiaki, Farhad Guliyev, Fuad Hoseynov, and Kazuya Shimogama Chapter 4: Excavation, stratigraphy, and architecture of Square 4B at Göytepe – Seiji Kadowaki, Yui Arimatsu, and Yoshihiro Nishiaki Chapter 5: Soundings at the edges of Göytepe – Yoshihiro Nishiaki, Yui Arimatsu, and Saiji Arai Chapter 6: Mud-bricks in Neolithic architecture at Göytepe – Yoshihiro Nishiaki, Farhad Guliyev, and Emmanuel Baudouin Chapter 7: Geoarchaeological investigation of storage space at Göytepe: Phytolith, dung spherulite, and micromorphological analyses – Seiji Kadowaki, Lisa Maher, Marta Portillo, and Rosa M. Albert Chapter 8: Archaeological reconnaissance survey around Göytepe, Tovuz-Qovlar region – Kazuya Shimogama and Valeh Alakbarov Part II: Technology and Subsistence Chapter 9: Neolithic flaked stone assemblages from Göytepe – Yoshihiro Nishiaki Chapter 10: Use-wear analysis of chipped stone artifacts from Göytepe – Katsunori Takase Chapter 11: Fracture wing analysis for identification of obsidian blank production techniques at Göytepe – Jun Takakura and Yoshihiro Nishiaki Chapter 12: Neolithic ground stone typology and technology at Göytepe – Seiji Kadowaki Chapter 13: Neolithic pottery from Göytepe – Yui Arimatsu (with an Appendix by Takahiro Odaka) Chapter 14: Neolithic figurines from Göytepe – Kazuya Shimogama Chapter 15: The Neolithic bone and antler industry from Göytepe – Saiji Arai Chapter 16: Plant remains from Göytepe – Chie Akashi and Ken-ichi Tanno Chapter 17: Faunal remains from Göytepe – Saiji Arai