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Technological transition and complexity reflected in bronze and brass objects from the medieval site in the Aral Sea region

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Abstract

The medieval period in the region near the Aral Sea must have been the era of significant sociopolitical changes and notable transitions in material culture. This prediction was tested with a metal assemblage consisting of numerous bronze and brass objects, mostly small items for personal use, excavated from the medieval (ca. 800–1000 AD) site near the Aral Sea in Kazakhstan. A technological transition driven by the growing reliance on brass was noted in the remarkable complexity in alloy recipes, in which recycled bronze and cementation brass served as the key materials along with elemental copper, tin, and lead. Different combinations of these materials were found to have resulted in the establishment of a dual technological tradition based on both bronze and brass. The notable transition and complexity as observed in the metal assemblage under consideration are interpreted as a reflection of the dynamic political settings in which both mobile pastoralist and sedentary farming groups were incorporated to form a dual social structure.

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Acknowledgements

This work would not have been possible without the generous support of the late Dr. Karl Baipakov, the former director of the Margulan Institute of Archeology in Almaty, Kazakhstan and Dr. Christoph Baumer, the president of the Society for the Exploration of Eurasia. The analysis and research presented was financially supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF- 2017R1A2B4002082). The archeological investigations were financially supported by the Society for the Exploration of Eurasia.

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Correspondence to Jang-Sik Park.

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Park, JS., Voyakin, D. Technological transition and complexity reflected in bronze and brass objects from the medieval site in the Aral Sea region. Archaeol Anthropol Sci 13, 27 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12520-021-01271-x

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