3 - Historical archaeology and time

Summary

The concept of time in archaeology has, until recently, been relatively under-theorised and discussed. In the past few years, however, a number of volumes dedicated to the topic have emerged (Karlsson 2001; Lucas 2005; Murray 1999), while time-related issues such as social memory in the past have also been the subject of research (e.g.Van Dyke and Alcock 2003).On the whole, this work has focused upon prehistoric and medieval periods, although the first theoretical critique of time in archaeology was by an American historical archaeologist, Mark Leone. Leone (1978) raised the importance of both past people's perception of time and the archaeologist's view of time, and in many ways these two strands have remained at the heart of all subsequent discussion. In particular, Leone's own work has exposed the ideological nature of the archaeological presentation of the past at places such as Colonial Williamsburg (Leone 1981a). While recognising the importance of these twin strands, they are to a great extent inseparable so I have preferred to organise this chapter in terms of several connected themes. Accordingly, this chapter addresses five key aspects of time in historical archaeology.

The first is chronology. Historical archaeology is distinct insofar as it can utilise historical dates in archaeological research, not only at a general level but also at a methodological level – from the dating of makers' marks on pottery to quantitative techniques of ‘mean ceramic dating’ (cf. Barker and Majewski this volume). Historical archaeologists have developed unique methods of dating deposits and sites, integrating historical records with archaeological data, and this section will discuss these approaches and the role of chronology in general in historical archaeology, highlighting problems as well as advantages. The second issue concerns change: how historical archaeologists can explore – partly due to the chronological capabilities just mentioned – shifts over both long-term and everyday scales of time. Historical archaeologists can examine the relations between events at very close timescales and larger-scale processes, although these have often been studied independently. Thirdly, debates on historicity and critiques of ‘totalising’ narratives will be discussed, outlining various alternative approaches such as genealogies and biographies.