Abstract
Research on the archaeology of the continental shelf has made slow and intermittent progress over the past 40 years amidst an ongoing mood of scepticism in the wider scientific and archaeological community, but with a marked acceleration of interest and investment of new resources during the past decade. The chapters in this volume demonstrate that relevant evidence is now being retrieved and systematically examined across the world in all the major continents and in deeper as well as shallower water, and that new ideas and new data are now providing the momentum for future development. This chapter draws on examples from the other chapters in the volume to reflect on the history of developments in this field and the shifts in the climate of opinion that have led to increasing acceptance of its importance; the research questions that are now coming more clearly into focus and the directions they suggest for the future; and the challenges of developing purposeful strategies of exploration and discovery of new material.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Andersen, S. H. (1985). Tybrind Vig. A preliminary report on a submerged Ertebølle settlement on the west coast of Fyn. Journal of Danish Archaeology, 4, 52–59.
Anderson, A. (2012). Review of ‘submerged prehistory’. International Journal of Nautical Archaeology, 41(2), 427–428.
Bailey, G. N. (2011). Continental shelf archaeology: Where next? In J. Benjamin, C. Bonsall, K. Pickard, & A. Fischer (Eds.), Submerged prehistory (pp. 311–331). Oxford: Oxbow.
Bailey, G. N., Flemming, N. C., King, G. C. P., Lambeck, K., Momber, G., Moran, L., Al-Sharekh, A., & Vita-Finzi, C. (2007). Coastlines, submerged landscapes and human evolution: the Red Sea Basin and the Farasan Islands. Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology, 2(2), 127–160.
Bailey, G. N., King, G. C. P., Devès, M., Hausmann, N., Inglis, R., Laurie, E., Meredith-Williams, M., Momber, G., Winder, I., Alsharekh, A., & Sakellariou, D. (2012). Disperse: Dynamic landscapes, coastal environments and human dispersals. Antiquity, 86(334). http//antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/bailey334/. Accessed on 24 July 2013.
Bailey, G. N., Sakellariou, D. & Members of the SPLASHCOS network (2012). Submerged prehistoric archaeology & landscapes of the continental shelf. Antiquity, 86(334). http://antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/sakellariou334/. Accessed on 24 July 2013.
Bailey, G. N., Williams, M. G. M., & Alsharekh, A. (2013). Shell mounds of the Farasan Islands, Saudi Arabia. In G. N. Bailey, K. Hardy, & A. Camara (Eds.), Shell energy: mollusc shells as coastal resources (pp. 241−254). Oxford: Oxbow.
Benjamin, J. (2010). Submerged cultural landscapes and prehistoric underwater site discovery: Reevaluating the ‘Danish model’ for international practice. Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology, 5, 253–270.
Benjamin, J., Bonsall, C., Pickard, K., & Fischer, A. (Eds.). (2011). Submerged prehistory. Oxford: Oxbow.
Day, J. W., Gunn, J. D., Folan, W. J., Yáñez-Arancibia, A., & Horton, B. P. (2012). Influence of enhanced post-glacial coastal margin productivity on the emergence of complex societies. Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology, 7, 23–52.
Fischer, A. (Ed.). (1995a). Man and sea in the mesolithic: Coastal settlement above and below present sea level. Oxford: Oxbow.
Fischer, A. (1995b). An entrance to the Mesolithic world below the ocean. Status of ten years’ work on the Danish sea floor. In A. Fischer (Ed.), Man and sea in the mesolithic: Coastal settlement above and below present sea level (pp. 371–384). Oxford: Oxbow.
Fischer, A. (1997). People and the sea—settlement and fishing along the Mesolithic coasts. In L. Pedersen, A. Fischer, & B. Aaby (Eds), The danish storebaelt since the ice age—man, sea and forest (pp. 63–77). Copenhagen: Storebaelt Publications.
Galili, E., Weinstein-Evron, M., Hershkovitz, I., Gopher, A., Kislev, M., Lernau, O., Kolska-Horwitz, L., & Lernau, H. (1993). Atlit-Yam: A prehistoric site on the sea floor off the Israeli coast. Journal of Field Archaeology, 20, 133–157.
Lambeck, K., Purcell, A., Flemming, N., Vita-Finzi, C., Alsharekh, A., & Bailey, G. N. (2011). Sea level and shoreline reconstructions for the Red Sea: Isostatic and tectonic considerations and implications for hominin migration out of Africa. Quaternary Science Reviews, 30(25–26), 3542–3574.
Larsson, L. (1983). Mesolithic settlement on the sea floor in the Strait of Oresund. In P. M. Masters & N. C. Flemming (Eds.), Quaternary coastlines and marine archaeology: Towards the prehistory of land bridges and continental shelves (pp. 283–301). London: Academic Press.
Lericolais, G., Bulois, C., Gillet, H., & Guichard, F. (2009). High frequency sea level fluctuations in the Black Sea since the LGM. Global and Planetary Change, 66, 65–75.
Masters, P. M., & Flemming, N. C. (Eds.). (1983). Quaternary coastlines and marine archaeology: Towards the prehistory of land bridges and continental shelves. London: Academic Press.
Mellars, P., Gori, K. C., Carr, M., Soares, P. A., & Richards, M. B. (2013). Genetic and archaeological perspectives on the initial modern human colonization of southern Asia. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1306043110
Raban, A. (1983). Submerged prehistoric sites off the Mediterranean coast of Israel. In P. M. Masters, & N. C. Flemming (Eds.), Quaternary coastlines and marine archaeology: Towards the prehistory of land bridges and continental shelves (pp. 215–232). London: Academic Press.
Ryan, W. B. F., Pitman III, W. C., Major, C. O., Shimkus, K., Moskalenko, V., Jones, G. A., Dimitrov, P., Gorür, N., Sakinç, M., & Yüce, H. (1997). An abrupt drowning of the Black Sea shelf. Marine Geology, 138, 119–126.
Turney, C. S. M., & Brown, H. (2007). Catastrophic early Holocene sea level rise, human migration and the Neolithic transition in Europe. Quaternary Science Reviews, 26, 2036–2041.
Walter, R. C., Buffler, R. T., Bruggemann, J. J., Guillaume, M. M. M., Berhe, S. M., Negassi, B., Libsekal, Y., Cheng, H., Edwards, R. L., von Gosel, R., Neraudeau, D., & Gagnon, M. (2000). Early human occupation of the Red Sea coast of Eritrea during the Last Interglacial. Nature, 405, 65–69.
Yanko-Hombach, V., Mudie, P., & Gilbert, A. S. (2011). Was the Black Sea catastrophically flooded during the Holocene? In J. Benjamin, C. Bonsall, K. Pickard, & A. Fischer (Eds), Submerged prehistory (pp. 245–262). Oxford: Oxbow.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to the editors for assembling a group of thought-provoking chapters, to Nic Flemming, in particular, for first stimulating my interest in submerged prehistory at La Jolla and for persevering in provoking me into engaging more seriously with underwater research, albeit with a delay of some 20 years, and to fruitful discussion with my colleagues on the DISPERSE and SPLASHCOS projects, funded respectively by the European Research Council (ERC Advanced Grant 269586), and by EU COST Action TD0902: ‘Submerged Prehistoric Archaeology and Landscapes of the Continental Shelf’. This is DISPERSE publication number 0007.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2014 Springer Science+Business Media New York
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Bailey, G. (2014). New Developments in Submerged Prehistoric Archaeology: An Overview. In: Evans, A., Flatman, J., Flemming, N. (eds) Prehistoric Archaeology on the Continental Shelf. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9635-9_16
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9635-9_16
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4614-9634-2
Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-9635-9
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawSocial Sciences (R0)