Marko Porčić

Radiocarbon test for demographic events in written and oral history

Significance Indigenous oral traditions remain a very controversial source of historical knowledge in Western scientific, humanistic, and legal traditions. Likewise, demographic models using radiocarbon-based simulation methods are controversial. We rigorously test the historicity of indigenous Tsimshian oral records (adawx) using an extended simulation-based method. Our methodology is able to detect short-duration (1–2 centuries) demographic events. First, we successfully test the methodology against a simulated radiocarbon dataset for the catastrophic European Black Death/bubonic plague (Yersinia pestis). Second, we test the Tsimshian adawx accounts of an occupational hiatus in their territorial heartland ca. 1,500–1,000 years ago. We are unable to disconfirm the oral accounts. This represents the first formal test of indigenous oral traditions using modern radiocarbon modeling techniques. We extend an established simulation-based method to test for significant short-duration (1–2 centuries) demographic events known from one documented historical and one oral historical context. Case study 1 extrapolates population data from the Western historical tradition using historically derived demographic data from the catastrophic European Black Death/bubonic plague (Yersinia pestis). We find a corresponding statistically significant drop in absolute population using an extended version of a previously published simulation method. Case study 2 uses this refined simulation method to test for a settlement gap identified in oral historical records of descendant Tsimshian First Nations communities from the Prince Rupert Harbour region of the Pacific Northwest region of British Columbia, Canada. Using a regional database of n = 523 radiocarbon dates, we find a significant drop in relative population using the extended simulation-based method consistent with Tsimshian oral records. We conclude that our technical refinement extends the utility of radiocarbon simulation methods and can provide a rigorous test of demographic predictions derived from a range of historical sources.

Demography of the Early Neolithic Population in Central Balkans: Population Dynamics Reconstruction Using Summed Radiocarbon Probability Distributions.

The Central Balkans region is of great importance for understanding the spread of the Neolithic in Europe but the Early Neolithic population dynamics of the region is unknown. In this study we apply the method of summed calibrated probability distributions to a set of published radiocarbon dates from the Republic of Serbia in order to reconstruct population dynamics in the Early Neolithic in this part of the Central Balkans. The results indicate that there was a significant population growth after ~6200 calBC, when the Neolithic was introduced into the region, followed by a bust at the end of the Early Neolithic phase (~5400 calBC). These results are broadly consistent with the predictions of the Neolithic Demographic Transition theory and the patterns of population booms and busts detected in other regions of Europe. These results suggest that the cultural process that underlies the patterns observed in Central and Western Europe was also in operation in the Central Balkan Neolithic and that the population increase component of this process can be considered as an important factor for the spread of the Neolithic as envisioned in the demic diffusion hypothesis.

Effects of Residential Mobility on the Ratio of Average House Floor Area to Average Household Size Implications for Demographic Reconstructions in Archaeology

The aim of this article is to test the hypothesis that mobile or predominantly mobile societies have a lower ratio of average house floor area to average household size. The analysis is performed on a cross-cultural sample consisting of 11 mobile and 35 sedentary cases. The research hypothesis is supported by the data, and the result is significant in two ways. First, it contributes to general anthropological understanding of relationships between cultural variables. Second, it has implications for demographic reconstructions in archaeology as it provides more specific information for converting observed house floor areas into population size and average household size estimates.

House Floor Area as a Correlate of Marital Residence Pattern: A Logistic Regression Approach

The goal of this article is to reflect on the relationship between average house floor area and marital residence pattern.This article brings three novel elements to this research problem: (a) it combines cases from the previous studies thus creating a larger empirical base, (b) logistic regression is used as an analytical technique which can test the significance and strength of the correlation between variables and establish explicit classification criteria with corresponding error rates, and (c) the effect of subsistence mode on the correlation between house floor area and residence is taken into account. New results confirm previous findings that there is a statistically significant correlation between house floor area and marital residence but not strong enough to warrant the use of floor area as a sole indicator of residence. Subsistence mode has a large influence on the correlation—goodness of fit of the logistic regression model and its predictive power are significantly higher in agricultural societies, whereas the correlation between house area and marital residence is not significant in the nonagricultural group of cases.