Auditory Archaeology

Understanding Sound and Hearing in the Past

Steve Mills

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781315433394
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Ciencias sociales
• Subtopic: Arqueología

Auditory archaeology considers the potential contribution of everyday, mundane and unintentional sounds in the past and how these may have been significant to people. Steve Mills explores ways of examining evidence to identify intentionality with respect to the use of sound, drawing on perception psychology as well as soundscape and landscape studies of various kinds. His methodology provides a flexible and widely applicable set of elements that can be adapted for use in a broad range of archaeological and heritage contexts. The outputs of this research form the case studies of the Teleorman River Valley in Romania, Çatalhöyük in Turkey, and West Penwith, a historical site in the UK.This fascinating volume will help archaeologists and others studying human sensory experiences in the past and present.

PART I

Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION TO AUDITORY ARCHAEOLOGY

MĂGURA

In the yard the dogs, wildly tugging at their leads and with teeth bared, bark and yelp their misgivings about my presence; even though I have been to the farmstead several times before I am still a stranger to them. Amidst the wooden and mudbrick buildings surrounding the yard the family’s fowl scuttle, flap and peck, bickering amongst themselves with a continuous clucking, quacking and squawking. Grunts and squeals from the shed in the corner signal the pigs as they scratch, root and scramble amongst the swill and mud. The fruit trees, just beyond the yard in the garden plot, are alive with wild birds singing, warbling, chirping and chattering. Above, the creaking of the wings of doves mingles with their cooing as they fly over the farmstead. Swinging thuds, creaks and cracks announce wood being chopped behind me in the barn. The high-pitched, slightly melodic voice drifting from the main house most likely belongs to mother busy in the kitchen. After an hour, well fed on cakes, I leave the yard and its enclosed, polyphonic intensity and walk down the track towards the open meadows surrounding Tell Măgura.

As ever, the meadows are busy with the densely interwoven and lively fabric of crows cawing and squawking overhead, insects forever buzzing, gaggles of geese squabbling for territorial advantage over the best places along the Clăniţa River, the more occasional bellow from cattle, and a light breeze. I can still hear wood being chopped in the farmstead. Earlier in the day, when here with Cristi, I heard the bell by the church on the tell ringing and a gathering of people singing. Or was it wailing? It is early evening now and the cattle, water buffalo and horses that grazed here all day are being gathered and led back to the village. The geese return on their own with processional honks to rivals as they go, but the chickens and turkeys require coaxing and their owners whistle and make other enticing vocal sounds. As I am enveloped by this sonic melange my attention is nevertheless drawn to the west, to the grasslands of the open valley floor, by a murmur of something different. Tremulous at first, with only faint calls and barks, at an ambling pace it gains volume and fidelity. Now bleating and bells accompany shouts and whistles as the herders with their sheep and dogs make their way towards the village.

ÇATALHÖYÜK

Somewhere beyond the trees to the west of the mound calling and whistling reveals the presence of herders and their animals, but they remain hidden from sight as they pass by.

It is early morning and from on the roof of the replica house the dawn chorus is vibrant, especially the contribution of sparrows. It can also be heard from inside the house. Earlier, from the northern edge of the mound, the call to prayer from Küçükköy was audible together with the barking and howling of dogs, probably also from Küçükköy. By 06:30 hrs team members can be heard around the dig house waking and preparing for work. Then, from 07:00 hrs, conversations disperse around the site and new industrious sounds emerge as people begin work in the laboratories and other spaces around the dig house, the flotation area and up on the mound.

The cafe opens, visitors start to arrive and the site entrance, replica house and the visitor centre are infused with and punctuated by voices, and sometimes music from the cafe. Groups of school children with teachers arrive and their enthusiastic voices, interspersed with periods of listening to guides or teachers, accompany them as they progress on their guided tours around the site and when they engage in activities outside the replica house and in the prepared excavation area on the mound. From inside one of the storage spaces in the replica house the children’s voices are clearly audible as they make clay models outside, but those of some of the accompanying adults are more muffled, and there are occasional booming sounds.

We are in the main room and rhythmic ringing tones and some laughter can be heard as Ruth and Rebecca use a stone pestle and mortar to grind pigment outside on the roof. From on the roof they can also hear us inside as we work to prepare the house; sounds giving presence but sources not seen. In the days before, under Mira’s supervision, we replastered the west platform, oven and roof entrance and these tasks were replete with interesting, and sometimes amusing, slopping and squelching sounds, followed by the harder work of polishing, with all accompanied by much banter.

At 19:00 hrs dinner is signalled by the bell. Conversations dispersed variously around the dig house, usually concentrated around the courtyard area and on the terrace, pervade the evenings. On Thursday evenings this extends vibrantly to the campfire area and often includes music and dance. As evening progresses the chirping of crickets begins to dominate whereas the contribution of birds lessens, except for the occasional owl.

WEST PENWITH

With map showing character areas and target recording locations, and with a GPS, sound recorder and camera, we head across the coastal rough ground towards Levant and Geevor. It is very foggy and there is light rain. Below, waves are pounding and smashing against the cliffs, booming as they crash into the zawns, relentlessly exercising their right to batter this coastline. Wherever we go today we will be buffeted by the wind, there is no escaping it. Although its whistling, hissing and howling will inevitably distort the sound recordings and mask many other sounds it is very much part of this place, part of its character.

Using field boundaries to guide us, we arrive at Levant engine house and, being winter, the whim engine is not in steam and is quiet. Ahead of us extend the dressing floors, also now inoperative; no active stamps now pound and crush the ore night and day with their clattering travelling for miles around. As we approach Geevor there are streams flowing, trickling in vivid colours, and splashing down to the zawn. While there are some sounds of running water inland the leats no longer flow and the ponds are empty. Inside Geevor there is the clanking and grating of shaking tables in the mill and we occasionally hear the warning signal of the Victory Shaft bell, triggered by visitors.

The day before, with Adam guiding, we went into an adit and underground to experience, and record, the ever-present sounds of water dripping and swishing underfoot, the echoic and muffled sounds of our voices and the booming ricochets of rocks falling down the main shaft. Back on the surface, as we continue to explore the tangible and more intangible aspects of landscape character, amidst the wind there is the regular sonic beacon of the Pendeen Watch foghorn widely broadcasting the potential perils of the coastline and, hopefully, safeguarding the passage of mariners. To us, on land and bound in the fog, the sound of the foghorn provides an auditory point of reference helping us to orient ourselves and continue on our journey.

INTRODUCTION TO AUDITORY ARCHAEOLOGY

The above are narrative versions of notes from field journals completed while making sound recordings during fieldwork at the three locations that provide case studies presented in the second part of this book. Măgura village is in the Teleorman River Valley in south central Romania and is surrounded by evidence for a range of human activities dating to the fifth millennium cal BC. Çatalhöyük is a settlement mound in the Konya Plain, Turkey, with evidence of habitation dating to between 7400 and 6000 cal BC. West Penwith is at the western end of Cornwall, United Kingdom, and has extensive surface and below-ground evidence of mining for copper and tin dating from around AD 1700 through to the late twentieth century. The three case studies provide examples of the application of auditory archaeology at locations that are geographically diverse and that have archaeological contexts with different kinds of material evidence dating to different periods in time. The reason for presenting three contrasting case studies is to demonstrate the broad applicability of an auditory archaeology and to emphasise the need for flexibility in approach tailored to the specific geographical and archaeological contexts encountered during fieldwork.

The above narratives are attempts to put into words some of what happened and could be heard by the author at the time, but not everything. They fall a long way short of being there (Whittle 2003). If the reader were to be present or to listen to the sound recordings made at the time their auditory experiences would likely be far broader and more dynamic than that conveyed in the words above. Two of the case studies concern prehistoric archaeology. The case study in Cornwall is concerned with archaeology dating to the historic period but many of the surviving written accounts convey little of the experience of living and working in a mining landscape and are more concerned with finances and accounting, of the outputs and productivity of mines. One aim of this book is to explore ways in which sound and the experience of sound, both in the present and in the past, can be conveyed, acknowledging that text alone, while often evocative, can fall short.

The approach is called an auditory archaeology because it concerns attentiveness to contemporary sounds in research contexts to stimulate alternative ways of thinking about engagement with and relationships between places, people and animals as well as considering how sound and hearing may have contributed to past understandings of them. This is not to suggest that a fuller appreciation of contemporary sounds provides the key for understanding the significance of sound in the past. Rather, that through greater attentiveness to contemporary sound scholars may become better informed on the many different ways in which sound and hearing pervade places, architectural spaces, social interactions, material engagements and human-animal relationships that may be relevant for thinking about the past. Auditory archaeology is concerned with hearing sound and how different levels of attentiveness to sound are variously implicated in people’s everyday engagement with their surroundings, other people and animals across contexts of study that are diverse in their spatial, temporal and material characteristics. It aims to complement research that is directed towards identifying the acoustic properties of particular archaeological spaces or that consider particular kinds of material evidence related to sound such as ancient sound-producing devices. (See Appendix 1 for definitions of terms related to sound and hearing as they are intended to be understood in the book.)

This book does not argue that there is something special about sound and hearing relative to the other senses, neither is any form of hierarchy of the senses assumed with, for example, vision and hearing considered in some ways superior to taste, touch and smell (or other senses). There is now much literature concerning relationships between the senses, of intersensoriality, and of the need for multisensory research agendas that recognise that a focus on any one of the senses will always be limiting and likely reflect recent Western thinking since the Enlightenment. To best pursue multisensory research in any discipline requires a deep understanding of the senses (individually and combined) and of the breadth of existing knowledge and literature about any one of the senses and of the known cultural variability assigned to its significance. Another aim of this book is to contribute to sensory research in archaeology by specifically considering sound and hearing and to raise awareness of the diversity of related studies from within a wide range of disciplines.

The book relates to broader themes within archaeological research regarding the senses and senses of place and it is appropriate to briefly introduce these here before discussing sound and hearing in more detail in subsequent chapters. This also provides the opportunity to promote the timeliness of an auditory archaeology that is concerned with everyday experiences of sound and hearing in the past.

RECENT APPROACHES IN ARCHAEOLOGY TO THE SENSES AND SENSE OF PLACE

It is now widely acknowledged that in all times and places sentient bodies are knowledgeable about their surroundings through engagement involving the whole body, the contents and configuration of their surroundings and cultural and historical contingency. The ecologically structured and dynamic sensoria essential to daily life in the past no longer remain. The challenge is in exploring ways to attend to the archaeological record that help us to understand how people, in the processes of their daily lives, may have engaged with and understood their surroundings in the past.

Sensory Research in Archaeology

Particularly from the 1990s onwards, studies considering sensory attitudes in the past have been promoted and embraced in archaeology (e.g. Bartosiewicz 2003; Bender et al. 2007; Boivin et al. 2007; Cummings 2002; Frieman and Gillings 2007; Goldhahn 2002; Hamilakis 2002; 2011; Hamilton and Whitehouse 2006; Houston and Tuabe 2000; MacGregor 1999; Ouzman 2001; Rainbird 2002a; 2008; Skeates 2010). Research on the ways that people engaged with their surroundings in the past have considered vision and frequently adopt theoretical perspectives based on phenomenology (e.g. Cummings 2008; Cummings et al. 2002; Cummings and Whittle 2003; 2004; Thomas 1993; 1996; Tilley 1994; 2004; 2008; 2009). The relationship between the body and its surroundings resides in the main phenomenological concept of Being-in-the-world. This is the ontological process that enables people to know their surroundings by inhabiting them and experiencing them through their bodily intentions, actions, movements, senses and perceptions. Sue Hamilton and Ruth Whitehouse (2006), for example, have applied phenomenological exercises that include sound at the Neolithic settlement sites in the Tavoliere Plain, Italy. At the sites Hamilton and Whitehouse experimented to discover ‘sentient landscapes’ by determining the distances over which the human voice and other everyday sounds can be heard, the human body can be seen and smell phenomena can be detected. Approaches of this kind are highly innovative, continue to be inspiring and have been widely discussed and referenced, but their application is not without critique arising from the often unavoidable emphasis on the individual and frequent predominance of the visual (e.g. Barrett and Ko 2009; Brück 1998; 2005; Fleming 1999; 2005; 2006).

Robin Skeates (2010) provides a valuable and timely summary of recent sensual culture studies from across a range of disciplines and of research into the human senses by archaeologists. In the book Skeates offers new interpretations of prehistoric Malta (5200–700 BC) that emphasise temporal variation in the significance of the senses and diversity in sensual cultures. He suggests five approaches that can be variously adopted and adapted to develop and advance sensory research (Skeates 2010: 5–8).

1. Reflexivity (reflecting on th...