Salt is an invisible object for research in archaeology. However, ancient writings, ethnographic studies and the evidence of archaeological exploitation highlight it as an essential reference for humanity. Both an edible product and a crucial element for food preservation, it has been used by the first human settlements as soon as food storage appeared (Neolithic).
As far as the history of food habits (both nutrition and preservation) is concerned, the identification and the use of that resource certainly proves a revolution as meaningful as the domestication of plants and wild animals. On a global scale, the development of new economic forms based on the management of food surplus went along an increased use of saline resources through a specific technical knowledge, aimed at the extraction of salt from its natural supports.
Considering the variety of former practices observed until now, a pluralist approach based on human as well as environmental sciences is required. It allows a better knowledge of the historical interactions between our societies and this 'white gold', which are well-known from the Middle-Ages, but more hypothetical for earlier times.
This publication intends to present the most recent progresses in the field of salt archaeology in Europe and beyond; it also exposes various approaches allowing a thorough understanding of this complex and many-faceted subject. The complementary themes dealt with in this book, the broad chronological and geographical focus, as well as the relevance of the results presented, make this contribution a key synthesis of the most recent research on this universal topic.
Author(s): Robin Brigand, Olivier Weller (eds.)
Publisher: Sidestone Press
Year: 2015
Language: English
Pages: 228
City: Leiden
Foreword 7
Techniques of salt making: from China (Yangtze River) to their world context / Pierre Gouletquer and Olivier Weller 13
Pre-Columbian salt production in Colombia – searching for the evidence / Marianne Cardale Schrimpff 29
The salt from the Alghianu beck (Vrancea County, Romania): a multifaceted ethnoarchaeological approach / Marius Alexianu, Felix Adrian Tencariu, Andrei Asăndulesei, Olivier Weller, Robin Brigand, Ion Sandu, Gheorghe Romanescu, Roxana-Gabriela Curcă, Ștefan Caliniuc and Mihaela Asăndulesei 47
First salt making in Europe: a global overview from Neolithic times / Olivier Weller 67
A complex relationship between human and natural landscape: a multidisciplinary approach to the study of the roman saltworks in 'Le Vignole-Interporto' (Maccarese, Fiumicino-Roma) / Maria Cristina Grossi, Sandra Sivilli, Antonia Arnoldus-Huyzendveld, Alessandra Facciolo, Maria Lucrezia Rinaldi, Daria Ruggeri and Cinzia Morelli 83
Ancient salt exploitation in the Polish lowlands: recent research and future perspectives / Józef Bednarczyk, Joanna Jaworska, Arkadiusz Marciniak and Maria Ruiz Del Arbol Moro 103
Prehistoric salt production in Japan / Takamune Kawashima 125
New data and observations related with exploitation and transport of salt in Transylvanian prehistory (Romania) / Gheorghe Lazarovici and Cornelia-Magda Lazarovici 139
Spatial analysis for salt archaeology: a case study from Moldavian Neolithic (Romania) / Robin Brigand and Olivier Weller 157
The salt of Rome. Remarks on the production, trade and consumption in the north-western provinces / Ulrich Stockinger 183
Competing on unequal terms: saltworks at the turn of the Christian era / Thomas Saile 199
Salt in Roman Britain / Isabella Tsigarida 211
Authors info 221
