Pages: 17-60
The author of the article argues that in order to determine the role of armed violence in the life of a particular society in a particular period of time we should first of all investigate resilient, persistent behavioral stereotypes, attitudes and spiritual values of people belonging to that particular society. The article studies ethnographical data on two types of hunter-gatherer societies: 1) the societies characterized by egalitarian social relations and cultural traditions which tend to eliminate any violence, 2) societies which have developed institutionalized forms of social inequality and social norms tolerating, culturally shaping armed violence. None of the two models could be projected into the deep past of Europe or any other part of the world, but we have to admit that the Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic hunters could develop egalitarian and peaceful social systems, as well as non-egalitarian social relations and militant or warlike cultures. We also are to assume that egalitarian and non-egalitarian systems, as well as peaceful and militant cultures in quite diverse cultural contexts, in different natural environments and various geographical locations of Oecumene were coming and going innumerable number of times throughout many millennia of prehistory. The author would like to hope that such ethnographical approach will be of some use for archaeologists.
Keywords: archaeology, social anthropology, ethnography, hunters and gatherers, peaceful societies, warfare, armed violence, egalitarianism, monopolization of knowledge, social inequality, social evolution, art, religion
Information about author:
Olga Artemova (Moscow, Russian Federation). Doctor of Historical Sciences. N. N. Miklukho-Maklai Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Leninsky Ave., 32A, Moscow, 119334, Russian Federation; Center of Social Anthropology at the Russian State University for Humanities. Miusskaya Sq., 6, corpus 2, Moscow, 125993, Russian Federation
E-mail: [email protected]