ch9 steve mills

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9. Sensing the place: sounds and landscapeperception

Steve Mills

Introduction

Based on recent research in the Teleorman River Valley

(southern Romania) this paper promotes the significance

of sound as a source of information integral to prehistoric

daily life in the fifth millennium cal. BC. I make reference

to a recent film to emphasise the importance of sound as

a medium that contextualises peoples lives and to demon-

strate the power sound has to convey information integral

to the communication of ideas, narratives, drama,

character identities and entertainment. Next, I discuss

research in the Romanian study area and provide

examples of the results and their significance. I suggestthat sound (or more appropriately acoustic information)

signalled the proximity and co-presence of animals and

people and that its ecological structure contributed to

peoples successful engagements with their surroundings.

Familiarity with acoustic information variously dis-

tributed in different topographic and vegetation zones

provided people with an implicit working knowledge of

local resources; the association of acoustic information

with different tasks heralded the ability and success of

practising agents. Acoustic information associated with

occupied tell settlements contributed to their monu-

mentality, and this would have been particularlyimportant in their earliest phases of use. Finally, acoustic

information originating from mammals and birds is

proposed as a new approach for considering their value

to people who were embracing ideas of domesticity in the

Neolithic.

Matrices and tapestries

In the conference version of this paper I referred to the

film The Matrix: Reloaded (Ellis et al. 2003) to

emphasise the integrated relationship between sound and

vision. This relationship is essential for contextualising

the sets, the characters, the drama, the action and the

narrative of the scenes in the film. Beyond the world of

film and along side other modes of communication and

information transfer (e.g. touch, smell, taste and kin-

aesthetics), the integration of sound and vision is

fundamental to the way people live their daily lives

knowledgeably within their surroundings.

There is a scene in The Matrix: Reloaded in which

one of the main characters is being interrogated and he is

in great pain; his expression and screams vividly convey

that he is very unsettled. There is tension in the scene;

you can feel it and sense it when watching the film. If the

sound is removed, however, there is tension of a different

kind because certain details, certain information, are

missing, bracketed off when you know they should bethere. There is no scream, there is no soundtrack and the

story does not quite work. Watching the film with no

soundtrack is frustrating; it is unsettling and leaves you

wanting more. There is more going on than meets the eye

and without the extra detail the narrative seems frozen.

The Neolithic likewise requires a soundtrack, and it is

this feeling of always wanting more that has led me to

study the significance of sound in the fifth millennium

cal. BC.

The concept of a matrix is a useful one; it suggests

that there is more that lies beneath. Underneath there is

a different world. If we acknowledge and enter the matrixthen we get a little closer to that world. What is seen on

the surface may be only a faade; it may be superficial.

By including other senses perhaps we can unravel a little

more of the Neolithic matrix.

The idea of a matrix is useful for thinking about sound,

for appreciating that powerful phenomena in the world

can come into being, be substantiated and be maintained

through a medium which is often transient, ephemeral

and continuously changing. The idea of a matrix also

implies that when one can see beneath the surface,

something that appears stable and settled is anything but.

While the world presented before our eyes may seem

stable (even timeless), this sense can be illusionary. By

studying sound we may be better able to appreciate the


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Steve Mills80

dynamism of past ways of life and understandings of the

world. Like the ever-streaming sequence of apparently

random numbers in the matrix, the continuously chang-

ing world of acoustic information in our surroundings

combine and constitute one attribute of what we think of

as place, of landscape, and of modes of dwelling. Life ofany period is always immersed in a matrix of acoustic

information.

Threads of acoustic information interweave like a

tapestry or, in musical terminology, a composition (Fig.

9.1). This is not a single rigid entity; it comes into being

through rhythm, proximities, co-presence, similarities

and continuities. To understand acoustic information, we

need to discover its fabric (texture) and form (structure/

rhythm); how it is interwoven at different times and

places. I suggest that the definition of a place in auditory

terms is the complexity of the composition/matrix/

tapestry of that location.It is the nature of the world that things are always

happening, changing, transforming, beginning and

ending, in cycles of life, death, seasons and rhythms. We

must embrace this in our investigations; instability, the

unsettled nature of the world is often the norm. In the

apparent chaos, however, there are patterns. That is how

we make sense of sound, by isolating those segments of

acoustic information amongst many others that have the

same origin.

It is an epistemological challenge to search out sound

in the data, a challenge which has been embraced by

other disciplines such as anthropology, ethnomusicology,

geography, acoustic ecology and soundscape studies (e.g.Feld 1996; Jackson 1968; Needham 1967; Pocock 1989;

1993; Porteous 1986; Rodaway 1994; Schafer 1973; 1977;

1985; Stoller 1989; 1997; Truax 1984). Archaeologists

have studied past sounds by examining, for example,

musical instruments, the correlations between rock art

and echoes, as well as the acoustic properties of caves,

rock shelters and prehistoric monuments (e.g. Dams

1984; Devereux and Jahn 1996; Lawson et al. 1998;

Lund 1981; Waller 2000; Watson and Keating 1999;

2000). My own research aims to contribute to studies ofthis kind by placing particular emphasis on the sounds

that are associated with daily practice in contexts relevant

to the Neolithic in southeast Europe. It is necessary to

think in multisensory terms, for that is how life operates.

In an ever-changing, unsettled world, the temporary

stability of the visual can seem comforting. The visual

can give the impression that some things are timeless,

are monumental, whereas other components of the world

(sound, touch, taste, smell for example, and social

interaction, daily/seasonal rhythms, river systems) are

continuously changing. It is only by bringing these

various attributes of the world together that there can besuch things as world-views.

Life can change in an instant. An event, a sound, a

glance can profoundly alter ones understanding of the

world, and very often such happenings can change the

course of ones life. There are occasions when you hear

something which should not be heard, or you do not hear

something you were expecting to hear. The same applies

to information gathered through the other senses or by

other means. Such times can be very unsettling or,

conversely, they can be very stimulating and inspirational.

We must explore ways that allow us to add this kind of

flux to our archaeological enquiries, because, very often,

it is just such instances that make life worthwhile. Soundis a way of getting to grips with such aspects of past ways

of life, because, by its very nature, sound is dynamic. For

there to be sound, something must be happening, moving,

vibrating. Sound provides information about the dyna-

Figure 9.1 Weaving Mgura, a tell in the Teleorman River Valley, southern Romania.


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Sensing the place: sounds and landscape perception 81

mism of the world; it is not reducible to mere stimuli

because it is always ecologically structured, and our

auditory systems have evolved to understand ecologically

structured acoustic information (Bregman 1994; Gibson

1968; 1979).

There is a fundamental relationship between soundand the rhythms of life and the world; Ingold (1993) has

referred to this in his concept of taskscapes. I suggest we

take on board this concept at a simpler level and study

how rhythms in the world/life and sound operate together

and how they can aid our understanding of the past. If, as

perception psychologists have done, we accept that sound

is a conveyor of information about the world, then we

know that its study will further our enquiry of how people

come to understand and effectively (or ineffectively) act

within that world.

Agency

Sound can provide an important new dimension for

thinking about agency and the consequences of past social

interaction. Sounds associated with particular places,

architecture and the production and use of material

culture influence people in ways that are not necessarily

conscious. Although people create and hear sounds

through their daily activities and social interactions, they

need not be entirely aware of how those sounds mediate

those activities and engagements. Sound can alert a

person immediately to the presence of other individuals,

or of resources. On hearing a sound, a person knows that

something is happening and, probably, where it is

happening; this may encourage them to go there or avoidgoing there. Sound communicates information and can

initiate response. Through familiarity, people become

knowledgeable about their surroundings, in part, via the

distribution and content of acoustic information.

Auditory archaeology

Auditory archaeology developed during my doctoral

research (Mills 2000; 2001). Research aimed to determine

the significance of sound as a source of information

integral to prehistoric daily life in the fifth millennium

BC, and with particular reference to the emergence andhistories of tell settlements in a 10 10km study area in

the Teleorman River Valley, southern Romania. Further-

more, research aimed to demonstrate that sound, in

general, is a recoverable category of information critical

to understanding past ways of life.

Auditory archaeology has four key elements. First, it

acknowledges and studies the role of the human auditory

system in gathering acoustic information that informs

and facilitates people in their daily activities. Second, it

acknowledges that the acoustic information so gathered

structures and is structured by peoples surroundings and

that there is an intrinsic interrelationship between the

human body, acoustic information and the places in which

people choose to dwell. Third, it proposes that in their

daily activities, people generate acoustic information that

is integral to creating, maintaining and contesting social

relations. Fourth, it recognises that the apprehension of

acoustic information need not be entirely conscious

(although there are many instances in which it is) and

that its production and comprehension can be anunintended consequence of particular modes of dwelling.

Auditory scene analysis

The foundation of auditory archaeology is the concept of

auditory scene analysis developed in perception

psychology (Bregman 1994). An auditory scene rep-

resents all the sounds a person can hear at one given

place and time; as individuals move, their auditory scenes

move with them. Auditory scene analysis is ecological

and draws on the work of Gibson (1968; 1979) and it is

contextual; it considers how sound is encoded with

information about the world that surrounds individuals.It recognises that people are, at all times and in all places,

immersed in an array of ecologically structured sounds

that are integral to their successful engagement with their

surroundings, and with other people and animals. It

acknowledges that the human body is the basic measure

of auditory phenomena.

When fragments of acoustic information display

sufficient proximity, continuity and similarity in space

and/or time they can be grouped together as most probably

having a common origin. Such grouping is how the

auditory system works; it groups together acoustic

information into coherent auditory streams (such as a

series of footsteps) that when combined, provide thecontents of auditory scenes.

Teleorman river valley case study

The 10 10km Lceni-Mgura reach of the Teleorman

River is located in the Romanian Plain 85km south-west

of Bucureti and 6km north-east of the modern town of

Alexandria (Fig. 9.2). The Teleorman River, a Danube

tributary, flows in a south-easterly direction across the

reach and is joined by the Clania River; before the

confluence there is an area of higher ground, referred to

as the middle terrace, which separates the two rivers.In the Lceni-Mgura reach the Teleorman valley floor

is approximately 2km wide and reaches a maximum of

3km at the confluence of the Teleorman and Clania

Rivers. The rivers have sinuous courses with occasional

large meanders. Today, the study area is a stable

geomorphological zone with no major flooding events

and no lateral movement of the river. To the west and

east, the valley floor is bounded by higher ground,

referred to as the west and east terraces, which reaches a

height of 90 masl.

The valley floor has three topographical zones: the

eastern valley edge zone, the open valley floor zone, and

the river zone. There are three vegetation zones within

the study area: the meadow zone, the grassland zone and


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Steve Mills82

the woodland zone. The eastern valley edge zone has a

meadow/marshland vegetation cover. The open valley

floor zone is a largely dry area with vegetation consisting

of herbaceous low-lying grassland intersected by sandy

areas having little if any vegetation cover. The river zone

has a narrow band of meadow/marshland on the banks

either side of the Teleorman and Clania Rivers. There

are pockets of woodland within the reach. Up on the

terraces there are large areas under cultivation with crops

including sunflowers, maize and cereals with smallerplots in the eastern valley edge zone.

Fifth millennium cal. BC archaeology

Field walking, surface collections and limited excavations

carried out between 1998 and 2000 revealed seven

concentrations of Boian culture material located on raised

sandy areas on the valley floor and dated to the early to

middle fifth millennium BC (Bailey et al. 1999; Bailey et

al. 2001; Bailey et al. 2002; Bailey et al. 2003; Mills

1999a; 1999b; Fig. 9.3). Boian material included

ceramics, building material, worked flint and bone as

well as a number of small finds such as fragmentary

figurines and flint implements (Andreescu and Mirea

1999; 2001).

People dwelt in short-lived structures on a temporary

basis in close association with rivers, practised animal

husbandry, hunted wild animals, and grew and tended

crops (Blescu 2001; Bogaard 2001; Hait 2001a;

2001b). The commitment to any particular place on the

valley floor appears short-lived, a situation which was

probably as much to do with river and floodplain

dynamics as it was with a desire to maintain mobility as

a significant component in the lifestyle.

During the second half of the fifth millennium cal. BCpeople dwelt and built structures at the eastern edge of

the valley. When new structures were built, they were

superimposed on earlier ones resulting in the emergence

of tells. The presence of tells documents a greater

commitment to place than was evident on the valley floor

during the first half of the fifth millennium cal. BC.

There are three tells in the study area: Vitneti, Mgura

and Lceni (Fig. 9.3). Material culture associated with

the tells includes Gumelnia ceramics from phases A1 to

B2 and structures made of a substantial wooden frame-

work and covered with clay or mud daub (Andreescu

1999; 2000). Mammal bones from Vitneti show that a

similar range of domesticates and wild species were

exploited in the second half of the fifth millennium cal.

Figure 9.2 Location of the study area showing major rivers.


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BC as were during the preceding 500 years. Analyses of

charred plant remains suggest that a similar range of

plants were cultivated during the earlier and later periods

(Bogaard 2001).

There was considerable continuity in the ways that

people were living their lives between the first and second

halves of the fifth millennium cal. BC. People continued

to cultivate barely, wheat and legumes, to husband

domesticated species of cattle, sheep, goat and pigs, and

to hunt similar ranges of wild animals. People alsocontinued to build and dwell in structures on former

gravel bars surrounded by wetlands (Neumann and Hait

1999). The significant difference in the second half of

the fifth millennium cal. BC is that people chose to build

and dwell at the same places over many generations.

Human activities in the study area during the

present

Today, people build and dwell in permanent farmsteads

at the eastern valley edge in the modern villages of

Vitneti and Mgura. The commitment to place is

greatest at the eastern valley edge because of the proximity

of fertile land for grazing animals and cultivating crops.

Most activities occur within and around farmsteads and,

in their yards, people keep their livestock including pigs,

horses, goats, chickens, geese and turkeys. In addition,

most farmsteads have one or two cattle that are taken out

to graze on the meadows during the day and led back to

farmsteads at night. Adjacent to the meadows, plots of

cultivated land are maintained by individual farmsteads

for growing maize and melons.

Out on the open valley floor, in the areas of grassland,

people build only temporary structures that usually last

for only one year or a single season. Between 1998 and2000 no single temporary structure lasted more than a

year; returning for subsequent fieldwork seasons, it was

clear that the previous years temporary structures had

gone and new ones had appeared at different locations on

the valley floor. The structures are usually made almost

entirely of wood although some have corrugated iron

panels. Most structures occur on their own and are

considerably isolated although, on occasion, there may

be two or three structures spaced approximately 100m

apart. Structures are used by shepherds and pig herders

and enable them to remain with their animals at night.

There is a clear distinction between the ways in which

people use different zones of the valley today, as most

activities take place at the eastern valley edge. In the

Figure 9.3 Detail of the study area showing 5th millennium cal. BC sites and sound recording stations.


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Steve Mills84

present, as in the past, it appears that people favour the

meadows and marshland zones for long-term commit-

ments to place. People do not dwell on a permanent basis

on the valley floor. For the most part, only shepherds and

herders are to be found on the grasslands which are

reserved solely for the grazing of herds of sheep andgoats or of cattle and water buffalo.

Today, the study area is a stable geomorphological

zone; the Lceni-Mgura reach is understood to have

had similar conditions in the second half of the fifth

millennium cal. BC. This correlation provides the basis

for collecting primary data in the study area in the

present.

Research methodology

Research identified 16 Global Positioning System geo-

referenced recording stations based on Neolithic activity

areas, variation in topography, geomorphology andvegetation, and modern human activities. Using sound

recording equipment I collected primary data at each

recording station. Each sound recording was of standard

600-second duration to allow comparison; to assist

descriptive attribution, additional information was

collected on accompanying record sheets. Using

computer-based technologies and the principle of auditory

streams, I identified and quantified the auditory content

of the sound recordings. I integrated the content of the

recordings with topographic, geomorphological and

archaeological data sets in a Geographical Information

System (GIS) and then identified spatial relationships

amongst variables.

Based on variation in sound, topography, vegetation

cover and the geographic distribution of human andanimal activities, I identified a number of auditory

character areas. The process of identification was a

mixture of prescriptive and descriptive methods. Pre-

scriptive methods involved the attribution of topography,

vegetation cover and human activity data within the study

area (e.g. woodland, grassland, meadows, open valley,

rivers, valley edge, permanent structures, temporary

structures, tracks and river crossings); descriptive

methods involved the attribution of auditory data. All

auditory streams identified in recordings were included

in subsequent analysis. Auditory character areas include

the eastern valley edge, the open valley floor and theriver zone.

Eastern valley edge/meadow zone. The fabric or

texture in any given zone (or place) is an indicator of the

density and complexity of activities, of how different

kinds of acoustic information interweave in that zone.

The fabric of the composition is determined by, and

provides details of, the relationship between different

resources. This is of particular significance with respect

to birds, mammals and the activities of people. The

Figure 9.4 The eastern valley edge at Tell Mgura.


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eastern valley edge (Fig. 9.4) is an area of meadows where

permanent dwellings are located with many people,

animals and insects in close proximity. There are many

different sources of acoustic information, often occurring

at the same time; auditory scenes are consistently busy.

The fabric of the composition in this zone is dense andcomplex because the different kinds of acoustic infor-

mation are tightly woven; it is polyphonic. Where the

fabric is polyphonic, people are immersed in much and

varied acoustic information (complex auditory scenes)

informing them of the close proximity of resources, of

animals and of the activities of other people.

The form, or structure, of the composition indicates

how the distribution of acoustic information is related

temporally in different zones (or places); it provides a

sense of temporal dynamics. The form of the composition

in the eastern valley edge/meadow zone has much

variation and contrast; it is often lively and fast. There isa sense of belonging through co-presence which is

signalled through the dynamism of the acoustic infor-

mation. The eastern valley edge is a sound trap.

Open valley floor/grassland zone. The open valley

floor/grassland zone (Fig. 9.5) has fewer and disparate

sources of acoustic information, and has a fabric which is

loosely interwoven. It is simpler and more porous

compared to that in the eastern valley edge/meadow zone.

In this zone the fabric is sometimes polyphonic but often

monophonic (single source) or homophonic (pre-

dominately a single source but accompanied occasionally

by others). A fabric of this texture informs people that

there is often little happening in the immediate

surroundings; there are few birds, animals and other

people nearby and therefore few resources and fewopportunities for interaction. Acoustic information

dissipates easily. The form of the composition is generally

monotonous and slow. It has a low complexity. Besides

shepherds and herders moving and communicating with

their mammals, there are few other people on the open

valley floor and there can easily be a sense of isolation

and solitude.

River zone. An intermediate or heterophonic textured

fabric occurs in the river zone (Fig. 9.6), where, on some

occasions, it is polyphonic (particularly when people and

their animals are present), at others it is mono- or

homophonic. The river zone is one of medium com-plexity. In the river zone the form is more flexible,

punctuated, and disjointed. For much of the time there is

little variation; it is slow and then intermittently there

are sudden or short bursts of acoustic information when

people and their animals are present. There is often much

acoustic information when rivers are used as resting/

watering places. River-crossings are places of transition

between topographic and vegetation zones, between

meadows and grassland.

Figure 9.5 The open valley floor near the Boian sites.


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Steve Mills86

Discussion

The concept of auditory scenes provides a new way to

conceptualise how acoustic information was integral to

peoples daily lives and to understand these peoples

surroundings in the fifth millennium cal. BC. Changes

in a persons auditory scene as he or she moves from one

place to the next are dependent on, and configured by,

the distribution of topography, flora, fauna and the

activities of other people. Thus the composition of

auditory scenes is specific to particular places providing

people with information enabling them to engage

knowledgeably with their surroundings.As acoustic information is temporally dynamic, the

composition of a persons auditory scene at a given place

and time is changeable in the short-term. When returning

to particular places repeatedly, however, certain acoustic

information recurs. Over time, a person or group of people

will come to associate particular places with certain

auditory scene compositions. As people become familiar

with places in the world around them, so they become

knowledgeable about the range of auditory scenes in that

world. Moreover, the acoustic information in auditory

scenes informs people of the kind and configuration of

resources in their surroundings. When hearing a par-

ticular auditory scene, people can gauge the resource

potential of places.

The association between acoustic information andresources need not be conscious; with familiarity, people

become implicitly knowledgeable. As people move

between and dwell in different places, so the familiar

acoustic information of those places becomes embodied

in their understanding of the world around them. This

embodiment is a consequence of having heard it all

before; people become in-tune with the places they

frequent and the more they frequent those places, the

more tuned-in they become. Being knowledgeable about

the association between acoustic information and the

configuration of the surroundings is thus an unintended,

but nonetheless important, consequence of having heardit all before. Through incorporation into particular modes

of dwelling over time, auditory scenes and acoustic

information become embedded in personal and cultural

memories.

As people associate places with particular com-

binations of acoustic information, so, reciprocally,

auditory scenes contribute to personal identities. Con-

sciously or otherwise, people associate certain auditory

scenes with their own ways of life. For example, people

who live for long periods of time in close association

with domesticated mammals (cattle, sheep, pigs, goats

and dogs) or in an area of meadows with many birds, will

identify themselves, in part, with the kind of acoustic

information originating from those animals and a

Figure 9.6 The river zone along the banks of the Teleorman River.


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meadow zone. Again this need not be directly conscious;

it will arise as an unintended consequence of a particular

kind of dwelling. This applies equally to the built

environment. Constructing and living in temporary and

permanent architectures are different modes of dwelling

and the kind of auditory scenes and identities associatedwith each will vary. A similar process extends to the

different kinds of activities people engage in. Shepherds

and herders for example, who spend considerable time

alone with their animals and away from the main areas of

settlement, will identify with and be identified by, a

different range of auditory scenes than people who spend

most of their time at permanent structures on a tell. With

time and familiarity, acoustic information and auditory

scenes contribute to knowledgeable engagement with the

world and the constitution of individual and group

identities.

The fabric of auditory scenes is significant in providinga sense of the acoustic complexity of different zones and

of the proximity of different physical happenings. The

fabric of auditory scenes informs people of the con-

centration and proximity of different resources, of the

potential for exploiting those resources and for interacting

with other people. Variation in the fabric is not rigid and

unchanging; it ebbs and flows with the movements and

activities of people, animals, water and the weather.

While for the most part the eastern valley edge/meadow

zone has the most tightly interwoven polyphonic fabric,

on occasion this is matched in the other zones. A similar

fabric occurs in the river zone when people and animals

congregate at river crossings/watering places, at placesalong tracks where people and their animals rest, and at

places in the open valley floor/grassland zone when

people, such as shepherds and herders, dwell for longer

periods of time and perhaps build temporary structures.

The distribution of acoustic information demonstrates

the importance of the contribution of birds and mammals

in particular; they are fundamental to the auditory

dynamics of the study area. I suggest that the acoustic

contribution of birds and mammals is an important,

hitherto undervalued, dimension in their role as

resources. Alongside their role in providing food and

secondary products, the acoustic contribution of animalsis an important resource in itself, and, on occasion, may

have been their principal value. I suggest that for much

of the time, people place a high premium on birds and

mammals with respect to their contribution to the fabric

and form of places. On hearing many birds, people are

alerted to the presence of nearby places with good access

to water and meadows and thus plentiful resources. The

continuous contribution of birds has a significant impact

on the composition of auditory scenes at places in the

eastern valley edge; they are very much integral to how

those places are acoustically defined. Variation in the

contribution of birds during the day is likely to be

unconsciously embedded in understandings of daily

cycles. Perhaps variation in the acoustic contribution of

species at different times of the year is significant in

heralding changes in seasonal cycles. Although only a

minor element in the archaeological record, birds may

have been of major significance in the past for under-

standing the distribution of key resources, daily and

seasonal cycles and in the formation of place identities.As mammals are heard less often than birds, the value

of their acoustic contribution may have been regarded

more highly. Acoustic information associated with the

returning of herds or perhaps with animals in distress,

contains important signals and initiates responses. The

contribution of mammals is particularly relevant for

thinking about the domestication of animal species. With

domestication, people develop close relationships with

animals; people and animals are in continuous close

proximity. People come to understand their animals in

part through the acoustic information they generate and

come to define themselves in relation to that acousticinformation. In the open valley floor/grassland zone much

acoustic information is about domesticated animals;

herders and shepherds understand and communicate with

their animals acoustically. I suggest a similar situation in

the past.

People are very tolerant of the acoustic contribution of

birds and mammals in the present and it is possible to

suggest that a similar situation existed in the past. As

domesticated animals were most likely highly valued,

their acoustic contribution would be, at least tolerated,

and more probably valued. Perhaps the acoustic con-

tribution of many animals was significant as a signal of

success, of wealth or of ownership. While you may nothear the person, hearing that persons animals would

signal how successful that person was. This might have

applied particularly to shepherds and herders. The more

acoustic information from their sheep, goats and cattle,

the bigger the herd and thus the more successful the

person. That different domesticated species produce

different kinds of acoustic information may have been

significant. As a herd of cattle is larger and requires a

greater investment in management, hearing it return from

the grazing lands may be more significant than hearing

a herd of sheep and goats.

The topography at the eastern valley edge of theTeleorman/Clania is important as it contains sound and

creates a sound trap. The containment and close proximity

of acoustic information inform people of places where

there is much going on, where there are concentrations

of resources and therefore high potential for successful

living. With time, the acoustic information of these places

becomes associated with previous success encouraging

people to return repeatedly. As the acoustic information

of valley edge meadows gathers people in the first

instance, so the presence of people contributes to and

amplifies that acoustic information. With time, people

associate the eastern valley edge with acoustic

information originating from animals and repeated

generations of human activities.


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Steve Mills88

In the short-term, the localised acoustic form at tells

varies according to daily and seasonal cycles. It is likely

that there would have been longer-term variations in form

as tells went through phases of use and abandonment. It

can be suggested that, specifically because of its intensity,

acoustic information associated with a new phase of telluse and occupancy was significant in constituting part of

the conceptual rebirth of the settlement, heralding the

new phase. Conversely, a lack of acoustic information

may have been synonymous with, and symptomatic of, a

long abandoned and conceptually dead tell.

Tells do not start out as tells; they begin as agglomera-

tions of structures and only through repeated phases of

dwelling and the superimposition of architecture do

mounds emerge. In the earliest phases of a tell the acoustic

information originating and propagating from an

occupied tell (or more appropriately labelled dwelling

place at such a stage in its history) was perhaps a moresignificant measure of the presence and activities of

people than were other more visual clues. Only in the

more developed stages of its history, when a mound had

formed, would the visual component of a tell have

provided a significant contribution. Therefore, as a

measure of monumentality, acoustic information may well

have been highly significant at different (particularly the

early) phases of tell histories.

Conclusion

I hope to have conveyed some idea of how sound can add

a new layer to our thinking about the Neolithic in

southeast Europe. Based on an understanding of the

significance of modern-day auditory character areas

following three years research in the study area, I

concluded that sound was an important component that

gave prehistoric individuals/communities an implicit

knowledge of their surroundings and the activities of

other people and animals. For the Romanian case study,

the association of sounds with Neolithic settlement tells

is a significant component of understanding their use

and location in the landscape; it is an important new way

of reconstructing Neolithic life. Furthermore, my research

concluded that particular sounds (e.g. those associatedwith animals) allow previously unavailable under-

standings of the past.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to the AHRB for funding my doctoral

research; to the directors and team members of the

Southern Romania Archaeological Project and to the staff

at the Teleorman County Museum for the opportunity to

conduct fieldwork in the Teleorman and Clania valleys

and for much needed and valued background information;

and to my colleagues at the School of History and

Archaeology, Cardiff University, for their continued

support, critical comments and encouragement. I would

like to extend personal thanks to Douglass Bailey and

Alasdair Whittle for inviting me to participate in the

(un)settling conference.

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