Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: The Construction of Monumental Architecture

博士论文改进补助金：纪念性建筑的建造

• 批准号: 2032113
• 负责人: Tristram Kidder
• 金额: $ 3.15万
• 依托单位: Washington University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-08-01 至 2023-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2032113&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Improvement; Grant; Construction

This project investigates how the nature of coalescence and emergence of social complexity results in the creation of monuments and artificial landscapes. Multidisciplinary scholars have approached the emergence of social complexity, particularly in early urban centers, as a phenomenon conditioned by process and agency, whereby monuments are built conspicuously as representations of the social order. Archaeology is well positioned to examine the social conditions that gave rise to early urban centers and explain how monumental construction was undertaken with respect to social organization, material resources, and mobility of surplus labor. To what extent does the charismatic authority of prominent leaders or longstanding adherence to tradition shape the increasingly artificial landscapes of the world’s earliest cities and how? For US moundbuilding societies the creation of earthworks held both religious and socio-political significance, as a means of creating a common identity at the place where monuments were built. As such, the energetics of their construction and organization of their internal architectures provide critical insights into their social environments. This project will focus on the largest US Pre-Columbian ceremonial center, by examining the nature and pace of monumental earthwork construction within the site’s central precinct. Existing interpretations of the site’s development into an urban center are divided between models that emphasize rapid or slow-paced monumental construction. Rapid pace models claim that hegemonic authority was exercised within a highly stratified social order at the site to direct monumental construction projects, while slower pace models portray such monumental architectures as byproducts of community nucleation and aggregation that carried over extended time periods. With the aid of accelerated mass spectrometry dating and Bayesian statistical models that reference exposed earthwork contexts, this project will assess what labor investments and construction strategies were employed for plaza and mound building at the site. Excavations into a suspected plaza compound with previously undocumented earthworks will be undertaken to acquire datable samples and record new forms of architecture. In this way, the pace and nature of moundbuilding as an expression of the existing social order will be more effectively interpreted. Consequently, the material history of this early urban center can be framed within the larger narratives about incipient urbanism and society at a global scale.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

该项目研究了社会复杂性的融合和出现如何导致纪念碑和人工景观的产生，多学科学者将社会复杂性的出现（特别是在早期城市中心）视为一种受过程和代理（因此纪念碑）制约的现象。考古学非常适合研究产生早期城市中心的社会条件，并解释纪念性建筑是如何在社会组织、物质资源和剩余劳动力流动方面进行的。程度确实杰出领导人的魅力权威或对传统的长期坚持塑造了世界上最早的城市日益人工化的景观，对于美国土墩建筑协会来说，土方工程的创建具有宗教和社会政治意义，作为创造共同身份的一种手段？因此，其建筑的能量学和内部建筑的组织提供了对其社会环境的重要见解，该项目将通过研究其性质和节奏来关注美国最大的前哥伦布仪式中心。遗址中心区域内的纪念性土方建筑现有的解释是强调快速或慢速纪念性建筑的两种模式。快速模式声称霸权权力是在高度分层的社会秩序中行使的。现场指导纪念性建筑项目，而较慢节奏的模型将此类纪念性建筑描绘为在加速质谱分析的帮助下在较长时间内进行的群落成核和聚集的副产品。通过参考暴露的土方工程背景的约会和贝叶斯统计模型，该项目将评估该地点的广场和土墩建筑采用了哪些劳动力投资和建设策略，将对先前未记录的土方工程进行挖掘以获取可数据的样本和数据。通过这种方式，土丘建筑的节奏和性质作为现有社会秩序的表达将得到更有效的审视，这个早期城市中心的物质历史可以在更大的叙事中得以框架。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。