The Dirt Podcast

It's here! Spooktober is here! Your (g)hosts kick off the month with an exploration of things that go bump in the woods, and discuss what anthropology has to say about Bigfoot. Turns out, a whole lot. There’s skepticism, mild skepticism, and then there's theory that may finally break Anna altogether.

LinksIs Bigfoot Real? The Long Strange Story of Our Search for Bigfoot (Popular Mechanics)People Have Been Chasing Bigfoot for 60 Years—Here's How It Began (History.com)Bigfoot 411Them + UsHomo heidelbergensis (Smithsonian Museum of Natural History)Bigfoot Culture and Belief of Sasquatch in the United States (Esri)The Science Behind Bigfoot an Interview With Dr. Jeff Meldrum (BYU-Idaho Radio)Are Other Hominins (Hominoids) Alive Today? (Relict Hominid Inquiry)Bigfoot DNA (Monster Talk)We Burn as Many Calories as Hunter-Gatherers, So What Makes Us Fat? (Time)How many humans would it take to keep our species alive? One scientist's surprising answer (NBC News)Bigfoot Skepticism (Monster Talk)ContactEmail the Dirt Podcast

This week, Anna and Amber welcome Very Special Guest Ken Feder (Central Connecticut State This week, Anna and Amber welcome Very Special Guest Ken Feder (Central Connecticut State University) to talk all things archaeological and pseudoarchaeological. Amber and Anna ask Ken about teaching strategies! Hot takes from critics! The real impact of archaeological research on living communities! The proper way to say 'Thames!' And more! Plus, why you should buy all of Ken’s books.

LinksAncient America: Fifty Archaeological Sites to See for Yourself“Outcasts” Build Their Own Village in 18th-Century Barkhamsted (Connecticut History)Building in Egypt: Pharaonic Stone MasonrySteph Halmhofer and Bones, Stones, and BooksArchaeological Fantasies Kenneth Feder’s Faculty BioContactEmail the Dirt Podcast

This week, Anna and Amber sing you a little tune about musical instruments in the archaeological record, and the ways that we can access ancient music today. From the discoveries of the earliest known flutes, to jamming out with Homer, to some mind-blowing takes on sound and silence, consider it our first movement in this composition.

Links

Scales from Around the World (How Music Really Works)

A Biological Rationale for Musical Scales (PLOSOne)

A Voice from the Past (The New Yorker)

The European Music Archaeology Project Recreates Instruments of Old (New York Times)

Ice and Longboats: Ancient Music of Scandinavia (European Music Archaeology Project, Volume 2)

Ancient Greek music: now we finally know what it sounded like (The Conversation)

8 Oldest Musical Instruments in the World (Oldest.org)

Brookhaven Lab Expert Helps Date Flute Thought to be Oldest Playable Musical Instrument (Brookhaven National Laboratory)

Oldest Greek Fragment of Homer Discovered on Clay Tablet (Smithsonian)

Sing like you mean it! - the Linguistics of Tonal Languages

Listen to Sappho Read By Stephen G. Daitz (The New Yorker Podcast)

Hear What Homer’s Odyssey Sounded Like When Sung in the Original Ancient Greek (Open Culture)

Homer Multitext Project

We can tell where a whale has travelled from the themes in its song (New Scientist)

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Snuggle on down in your jimjams with a mug of your favorite warm beverage, as Anna tells Amber a bedtime story about a great moment in archaeological discovery. This week, we travel back to 17th century Sweden, where a professor named Olof Rudbeck changed the world with his research. No spoilers, so check out thedirtpod.com for this week's show notes and recommended reading.

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This week, Anna and Amber tackle some questions submitted from you, the listener! It's a lightning round of stories about ghost puppers, citizen archaeology, glimpses of what happens behind closed doors, Stone Age musicians, and much more!

LinksArchaeology, folklore, and the skeletal remains of a hellhound (Strange Remains)Leiston: Are these the bones of devil dog, Black Shuck? (East Anglia Daily Times)What To Do If You Find A Site (Archaeological Society of Virginia)Moundville Archaeological ParkSwimming in the Sahara (Discover Magazine)How Climate Change May Have Shaped Human Evolution (Smithsonian Magazine)Earliest music instruments found (BBC News)A Vest Pocket Guide to Brothels in 19th-Century New York for Gentlemen on the Go (New York Times)A Guide to Houses No Gentleman Would Dare to Frequent (New York Times)Pre-Incan Civilizations in Peru (Kuoda)ContactEmail the Dirt Podcast

Anna and Amber talk about animal bones and what you can learn from them about domestication! Learn about how selective breeding affects animals' bodies (and also learn that Amber is very afraid of pigs). We also take a detour into Spookytown with some bizarre Iron age animal burials, and top it off with a lovely story about a kitten.

LinksTop Signs of Animal Domestication (ThoughtCo)Early Date for Horse Domestication in Kazakhstan (Current World Archaeology)The boneyard of the bizarre that rewrites our Celtic past to include hybrid-animal monster myths (The Independent)Ritual and Burial: The Strange and Elaborate Ways Humans Prepared Animals for the Afterlife (Ancient Origins)Ancient bobcat buried like a human being (Science)ContactEmail the Dirt Podcast

This week, we’re talking ceramics! Anna and Amber explain how bits of pottery aren’t called shards, but do hold lots of secrets (and sometimes blood!), the role of ceramics in archaeology, evidence for amateur and student potters, and how Amber clearly didn’t miss her calling as a ceramic artist.

LinksBasic Concepts: Pottery in the Archaeological Record (Archaeology Review)

[https://ahotcupofjoe.net/2007/01/basic-concepts-pottery-in-the-archaeological-record/]Ancient Chinese pottery confirmed as the oldest yet found (The Guardian)

[https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/jun/28/ancient-chinese-pottery-oldest-yet]Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis (INAA) in the Study of Archaeological Ceramics (Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Ceramic Analysis)

[https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199681532.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780199681532-e-24]Thule tradition (University of Waterloo)

[http://anthropology.uwaterloo.ca/ArcticArchStuff/thule.html]Ceramic Technology of Arctic Alaska: An Experimental and Adaptive Craft (Teal Sullivan)

[http://www.tealsullivan.com/ceramics/arcticpottery/]How to Make an Unfired Clay Cooking Pot: Understanding the Technological Choices Made by Arctic Potters (Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory)

[https://www.jstor.org/stable/25653111?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents]Muweilah (Universes in Universe)

[https://universes.art/en/art-destinations/sharjah/archaeological-sites/muweilah]Prehistoric Children Working and Playing: A Southwestern Case Study in Learning Ceramics (Journal of Archaeological Research)

[https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/jar.57.4.3631354]The Dirt Book Club!

When Clay Sings (via WorldCat) [https://www.worldcat.org/title/when-clay-sings/oclc/340283]ContactEmail the Dirt Podcast

Hey everyone! We're experiencing some technical difficulties with one of our computers. We'll be back with regular weekly episodes just as soon as we figure that out. In the mean time, check out the other great episodes in our back catalogue and on the Archaeology Podcast Network.

This week, Anna and Amber take their inspiration from an archaeological news story and dive into some hidden treasures!

LinksSamuel Pepys’ 1666 diaries about his beloved parmesan [http://www.pepys.info/1666/1666sep.html] (Pepys.info)Grave of 'real-life Asterix' who fought Caesar found amid trove of weapons and possessions in West Sussex [https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/07/22/real-life-asterix-fought-caesar-found-amid-trove-weapons-possessions/] (The Telegraph)Archaeologists find richest cache of ancient mind-altering drugs in South America [https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/05/archaeologists-find-richest-cache-ancient-mind-altering-drugs-south-america] (Science)Clovis-era Tool Cache 13,000 Years Old Shows Evidence Of Camel, Horse Butchering [https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090225132355.htm] (Science Daily)Under Maryland Street, Ties to African Past [https://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/21/science/21arch.html] (The New York Times)A Cache of 18th-Century Rockets Discovered in India [https://www.archaeology-world.com/a-cache-of-18th-century-rockets-discovered-in-india/] (Archaeology World)A Dog Named Monty Has Dug Up a Rare Cache of Bronze Age Artifacts in the Czech Republic [https://news.artnet.com/art-world/dog-archaeologist-czech-republic-1351412] (ArtNet)ContactsEmail the Dirt Podcast

It’s all about mounds and moundbuilders on this week’s episode with Anna and Amber.

LinksCahokia: The Great Native American Metropolis (via WorldCat)Cahokia MoundsWatson Brake, a Middle Archaic Mound Complex in Northeast Louisiana (American Antiquity)12th-Century Cahokia Was a “Melting Pot” (Archaeology)Cahokia and the Excavation of Mound 72 (Lithics Casting Lab)The Ancient Mounds of Poverty Point: A Place of Rings (via WorldCat)Moundbuilders (Newberry)Early pottery: Technology, Function, Style, and Interaction in the Lower Southeast (via WorldCat)White Settlers Buried the Truth About the Midwest’s Mysterious Mound Cities (Smithsonian)Check out KenFeder’s take on the myth of the moundbuilders over on Archaeological Fantasies. He’s also the author of this week’s Dirt Book Club entry, Frauds, Myths, and Mysteries: Science andPseudoscience in Archaeology.ContactEmail the Dirt Podcast