Economies of Destruction; How the Systematic Destruction of Valuables Created Value in Bronze Age Europe, c. 2300–500 BC; First Edition

"Why do people destroy objects and materials that are important to them? This book aims to make sense of this fascinating, yet puzzling social practice. It does so by focusing on a period in history in which such destructive behavior reached unseen heights and complexity: the Bronze Age in Europe (c. 2300-500 BC). This period is often seen as the time in which the first 'familiar' Europe took shape due to the rise of a metal-based economy. But it was also during the Bronze Age that massive amounts of scarce and recyclable metal were deliberately buried in the landscape and never taken out again. This systematic deposition of metalwork sits uneasily with our prevailing perception of the Bronze Age as the first 'rational-economic' period in history - and therewith - of ourselves. Taking the patterned archaeological evidence of these seemingly un-economic metalwork depositions at face value, it is shown that the 'un-economic' giving-up of metal valuables was an integral part of what a Bronze Age 'economy' was about. Written as an extended essay and based on case studies from Bronze Age Europe, this book attempts to reconcile the seemingly conflicting political and cultural approaches that are currently used to understand this pivotal period in Europe's deep history. Using theories from economic anthropology, this book argues that -paradoxically - giving up that which was valuable created value. It shows that to achieve something in society, something else must be given up"-- Provided by publisher Cover 1 Half Title 2 Title Page 4 Copyright Page 5 Dedication 6 Table of Contents 8 List of figures 9 List of tables 14 Acknowledgments 15 Preface 17 1. Systematic irrationalities? The Bronze Age ‘destructive economy’ 20 Selective deposition: recognizing a logic in un-economic behaviour 22 Bronze Age economies and the rise of the first ‘familiar’ Europe 26 Destructive economies and the ‘unfamiliar’ face of the European Bronze Age 28 Political economy models: a Bronze Age ‘other’ as economic ‘same’? 29 Metalwork deposition as ‘moral’ acts: Bronze Age as cultural ‘other’ 30 Short-term and long-term logic: breaking the political–moral deadlock? 31 Outline of this book 35 Notes 36 Bibliography 36 2. Selective deposition – what does it entail and how can it be studied? 41 How important were things people deposited? 41 Seeing depositions as part of a bigger, relational whole 43 Selective deposition as ‘average behaviour’ 43 Selective deposition as ‘the right way to act’ 45 Average behaviour with a logic that tends to be exclusive 48 ‘Think locally, act globally’ 52 Many different practices, one relational logic? 53 Conclusion 58 Notes 58 Bibliography 59 3. The value conundrum: What common things and splendid items share and why their deposition is selective 63 Introduction 63 The significance of things and the distinction between alienable and inalienable things 66 Why inalienable things require specific treatment 68 Why alienable things require special treatment as well 70 What alienable and inalienable things share and how they are linked 71 Graeber’s theory: value as practice 74 Deposition – the paradox of total alienation and ultimate inalienability 77 Summing up 79 Note 79 Bibliography 79 4. Pre-Bronze Age selective deposition 82 Late Mesolithic and Neolithic Europe – the west, c. 5600–beginning of the fourth millennium BC 83 Copper Europe – the east, c. 5000–2900 BC 89 How TRB depositions worked to keep stone, jade and copper valuables apart 92 Selective deposition: different societies, same solutions? 94 The disruptive third millennium BC – did landscape-bound deposition disappear? 95 The legacy of the Corded Ware world view for Bronze Age depositional practices 97 Conclusion 98 Notes 99 Bibliography 99 5. Trade hoards: The un-economic nature of the Bronze Age metal economy 105 Introduction 105 What makes a thing a commodity? 106 Example 1 – Early Bronze Age Central Europe: rings, ribs and axes as convertibles 108 Example 2 – palstave hoards in the Middle Bronze Age North Sea and Channel zone (c. 16th–13th century BC) 113 Example 3 – axe hoards in the Late Bronze Age Iberian northwest 117 Example 4 – deposition of axes and token axes in Early Iron Age northwest Europe 117 Conclusion: deposition as ‘objectifying’ spheres of exchange 122 A ‘sacrificial economy’ 123 Notes 125 Bibliography 126 6. Gifts to familiar gods? 131 Introduction 131 Bronze Age ‘pantheons’ and the notion of functional gods 134 The problem with historical comparison 135 The Bronze Age gods delusion 135 Giving, keeping and ‘keeping-while-giving’ in depositions 136 Deposition: dissolution and construction of personhood and social wholes 139 Other-worldly or ‘transgressive’ objects 142 Impersonating the supernatural? 144 An imagistic mode to convey religiosity 146 Conclusion: what archaeologists observe is deposition, not religion 148 Notes 148 Bibliography 149 7. The receiving landscape 154 Landscapes instead of places 154 A depositional location as a place category 155 Why a concept of place category does not make sense 159 Depositional landscapes as relational 162 What constituted a deposition place? 163 Episodic and semantic memory 164 Landscape as an imagined reality 165 Depositional landscapes as ‘other places’ 166 Conclusion: an unfamiliar but predictable logic? 168 Notes 168 Bibliography 169 8. Economies of destruction: ‘keeping-while-destroying’? 172 Introduction 172 How bronze things make abstract concepts of value conceivable 174 ‘Keeping-while-destroying’? 175 Political vs. moral economies: how deposition links short-term to long-term transactions 178 Social potential: how concealing valuables may create a ‘capacity to act’ 180 Was deposited material also ‘kept’ in a more practical way? 181 The potential of depositional acts to produce ‘truths’ and still allow for change 183 ‘Sacrificial’ vs. ‘archival economies’ 184 Back to Ommerschans – when Bronze Age things return, do values become ‘price’ again? 188 Bronze Age deposition and us 189 Notes 191 Bibliography 191 Index 196 Why do people destroy objects and materials that are important to them? This book aims to make sense of this fascinating, yet puzzling social practice by focusing on a period in history in which such destructive behaviour reached unseen heights and complexity: the Bronze Age and Early Iron Age in Europe (c. 2300–500 BC). This period is often seen as the time in which a ‘familiar'Europe took shape due to the rise of a metal-based economy. But it was also during the Bronze Age that massive amounts of scarce and recyclable metal were deliberately buried in the landscape and never taken out again. This systematic deposition of metalwork sits uneasily with our prevailing perception of the Bronze Age as the first ‘rational-economic'period in history – and therewith – of ourselves. Taking the patterned archaeological evidence of these seemingly un-economic metalwork depositions at face value, it is shown that the ‘un-economic'giving-up of metal valuables was an integral part of what a Bronze Age ‘economy'was about. Based on case studies from Bronze Age Europe, this book attempts to reconcile the seemingly conflicting political and cultural approaches that are currently used to understand this pivotal period in Europe's deep history. It seems that to achieve something in society, something else must be given up.Using theories from economic anthropology, this book argues that – paradoxically – giving up that which was valuable created value. It will be invaluable to scholars and archaeologists interested in the Bronze Age, ancient economies, and a new angle on metalwork depositions.