Contact and Exchange in the Ancient World

Published by University of Hawaii Press 2006

Contact and Exchange in the Ancient World

Edited by: Victor H. Mair

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780824841676

Overview
Contents

About this book

Do civilizations independently invent themselves or are they the result of cultural diffusion? The contributors to this volume do not attempt to provide a definitive answer to this contentious question, one of the most debated issues of the past century. Instead, they shift the focus from theory to reality by presenting empirical evidence on a wide range of cultural phenomena in history and prehistory, thereby demonstrating the processes whereby cultural traits are acquired and modified—the dynamics of transmission and transformation.

The range of topics covered in this volume is of extraordinary breadth: the distribution of belt hooks and belts from the steppes to North and Central China; textile exchange in the third millennium B.C.; the spread of bronze metallurgy across Asia; the adaptation of complicated technologies by distant peoples; the mechanisms whereby bronze implements were used to convey political messages in East Asia; the ethnogenesis of the Turks; the complex interrelationships among migratory and settled peoples in western Central Asia during the Bronze Age; the origins of the enigmatic Chinese goddess known as Queen Mother of the West; an account of hunting with trained cheetahs; and the use of abundant botanical and zoological evidence to affirm that the Old World and the New World must have been in contact long before the fifteenth century. Rounding out the volume is a survey of the problem of modernocentrism.

Author / Editor information

Mair Victor H. :

Victor H. Mair is professor of Chinese language and literature at the University of Pennsylvania.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Preface Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Introduction: Kinesis versus Stasis, Interaction versus Independent Invention Victor H. Mair Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. Beyond Modernocentrism: Toward Fresh Visions of the Global Past Jerry H. Bentley Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	17
2. The Trans-Eurasian Exchange: The Prehistory of Chinese Relations with the West Andrew Sherratt Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	30
3. The Queen Mother of the West: A Study of the Influence of Western Prototypes on the Iconography of the Taoist Deity Elfriede R. Knauer Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	62
4. Natural History and Cultural History: The Circulation of Hunting Leopards in Eurasia, Seventh–Seventeenth Centuries Thomas T. Allsen Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	116
5. Some Thoughts on the Origins of the Turks and the Shaping of the Turkic Peoples Peter B. Golden Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	136
6. Early Loan Words in Western Central Asia: Indicators of Substrate Populations, Migrations, and Trade Relations Michael Witzel Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	158
7. Textiles as a Medium of Exchange in Third Millennium B.C.E. Western Asia Irene Good Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	191
8. Cultural and Political Control in North China: Style and Use of the Bronzes of Yan at Liulihe during the Early Western Zhou Yan Sun Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	215
9. Biological Evidence for Pre-Columbian Transoceanic Voyages John L. Sorenson and Carl L. Johannessen Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	238
Contributors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	299
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	301

Language: English
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 384

eBook

Published: May 31, 2006
ISBN: 9780824841676