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Fourteen papers explore a range of issues relating to prehistoric extraction sites, including ethnography, geochemical signatures, the application of neutron activation analysis, exploitation of erratics, excavation, survey and conservation. Topics include quernstone extraction, use of hammers, stages of extraction, geographical and social contexts, changing social regimes, the ritualised nature of journeys to quarry sites, study of petrofabrics, and the effects of joint and cleavage on quarrying practice. Two contributions are in French with extended summaries in English.

For the last twenty years, a team of Greek and Canadian archaeologists have been excavating Argilos, the earliest known Greek colony in the area of the mouth of the Strymon river. An overview of research on what was one of the four colonies founded by Andrians after the abandonment of Zagora allows discussion of questions related to the origin of the settlers, the choice of location, the foundation date, and the reasons for the settlement. First occupied by Thracians, Argilos was settled by Greeks no later than the mid-7th cent. B. C. Some of these Greeks came from Andros ; however, one should not eliminate the possibility that Argilos may have been a joint venture between Andrians and Chalcidians. Cohabitation between Greeks and Thracians lasted until the mid-6th cent., when it is believed a wave of immigrants arrived, some of whom were from east Greece. Argilos remained affluent until the foundation of Amphipolis in 437, after which it suffered decline. Its capture by Philip II in 357 and the deportation of its inhabitants to Amphipolis put an end to its existence.

This paper utilizes the stable carbon and nitrogen isotopic composition of bulk animal bone collagen to better understand animal management practices in Archaic and Classical period Argilos in northern Greece. The results from Argilos are compared with data from other sites in northern Greece to provide new insights into herd management in the region over time. Our results reveal some changes in cattle and pig diets at Argilos between the Archaic and Classical periods. Throughout both periods cattle and caprines exhibit evidence of having consumed C4 vegetation, likely obtained from the nearby salt marshes in the Strymon river delta. This dietary regime is similar to that observed at other north Aegean sites dating back to the Neolithic, suggesting that the long tradition of animal herding in the marshes was an environmentally specific practice in the region.

IN THE SPRING OF 1959, the UN press service and Canada's Department of External Affairs (DEA) announced that the "rivers, forests, cities and industries of western Canada and northwestern United States [would] serve as a laboratory in economic and social development for a new-type training center." (1) The Regional Training Centre for United Nations Fellows at the University of British Columbia would "enable trainees from underdeveloped countries to study and observe activities in fields such as hydroelectric power, water development, mining, forestry, land management, cooperatives, credit unions, social welfare, and public administration." (2) Press reports explained that the "unique international venture," involving the UN, the Canadian government, and UBC would be located in the Pacific Northwest because "in the past 50 years this area has experienced a most remarkable expansion of population and of economic development." (3) Infused with the postwar optimism associated with Canada's economic progress, British Columbia's resource boom, and international development, the announcement simultaneously highlighted and obscured a history and ongoing reality of settler colonialism and, more broadly, the extent to which Canadian participation in development assistance rested upon a foundation of Indigenous dispossession. This article explores how settler colonialism intersected with the UN's training centre at UBC, which is built on the territory of the Musqueam people. It uncovers what the Centre's origins and activities say about understandings of development after 1945, especially the Canadian dimension of this global history. Specifically, it interrogates development's pedagogical dimension. Situating "technical assistance" and efforts to identify best practices into the literature on imperialism and settler colonialism, it highlights how, notwithstanding progressive motivations, Canadian academic involvement in development efforts rested upon and reified settler colonialism at home and abroad. (4)

This article addresses one of the central questions that has animated the field of children's history in recent years: how to go beyond the paradigm of agentivity in the interpretation of the evidences left by children? What interpretative schemes are proposed to replace it? Before addressing this issue and the archival and methodological challenges inherent to it, we propose an overview of the field of children's history. The goal is to offer a French-speaking readership an overview of some of the epistemological reflections that animate this branch of the historical discipline. Exploring themes such as the relationship between voice, experience, emotion and agentivity, the process of constructing the narrative of childhood through archives, and the benefits of transnational perspectives, this text is a plea for a renewal of children's history in the francophone world.

We know that the settler societies known as Quebec and Canada were imperialist during the "new imperialism" era, but do we really know the process through which they became imperialist? During this period, schools provided the geographic knowledge and emotional place-attachment necessary for the consolidation of settler-colonialism. At the same time, youth imagined their future life in an interconnected world geography that they believed belonged to them. My article aims to understand how geographical knowledge—imperial, missionary, and literary—was transmitted to young people through the school system and how they integrated and appropriated this geographical imagination.

An article from Études d'histoire religieuse, on Érudit.

The revival of cultural history, and religious history is obviously concerned, is likely to incur an ill-considered rejection of some of the fundamental principles of social history: the will to include the totality of historical actors, the practice of a critical history, the question of the changing nature of the social link. Thus, the return to the "text", a promising means of renewal, carries the danger of a simple updating, or re-legitimization, of what the Power said of its doings. Hence, the work of a cultural historian implies a certain theoretical effort in order to invent new ways of linking discourses with the social practices in history. This is why a revival of the dialogue among disciplines is needed. It is this step which I followed, during a research project dealing with religious rites in 18th and 19th century Quebec, by setting up a link with a sister discipline: anthropology.

The novel L'influence d'un livre by Philippe Aubert de Gaspé junior, published in 1937, blurred the “modern” categories of science, religion, and superstition, and in so doing constituted a critique of the establishment of a social hierarchy based in part on the domination of official scientific and religious culture. The author’s questioning of authority extended to pushing other limits in validating a religious culture existing outside the formal institution. The novel presents an untidy image, without clear boundaries between what belonged to the religion of the church and what to makeshift, invention, appropriation, word of mouth, or popular acceptance. One must consider L'influence d'un livre as a valid indicator of various apsects, practices, and representations, but especially of the social dynamic that is usually inherent in culture and that is so difficult for the historian to grasp. The novel allows us a better perception of a “religion” with much wider horizons than can be presumed from clerical sources.

Is it possible to write a history of the “popular” ways of telling one’s story in periods prior to the democratization of writing ? Due to a scarcity of source material, this is no easy task. However, there are sophisticated self-representations available to the historian, produced by certain literate individuals from modest backgrounds. An analysis of part of the literary output of a representative of this category, Antoine Gérin-Lajoie, may be used to follow the process of shifting from an autobiographical narration to a sociological reflection. This reveals that the very fact of experiencing the problems involved in acquiring a scholarly culture, and in social mobility, provides part of the foundation for these writings on oneself and on the world.

À partir de la bipolarisation méticuleuse introduite par la liturgie rigoriste québécoise dans l’espace paroissial s’élabore une construction de l’espace social marquée par la ségrégation. Il s’agit, dans le cadre de cette contribution, le poser quelques balises en vue d’une étude systématique de la distribution des corps dans l’espace durant les événements cultuels et d’évaluer la portée heuristique, pour l'histoire sociale, d’une telle étude. On pose en premier lieu les structures culturelles, matérielles et symboliques qui donnent sens à l’espace liturgique paroissial : il est divisé (sacré/profane) et orienté par la présence du saint sacrement. Puis on prend appui sur quelques espaces religieusement connotés pour dégager la construction sociale produite par l'usage : le choeur comme lieu masculin, la nef comme représentation de la société paroissiale, le cimetière comme dispositif de construction de l'altérité. Les lieux sacrés permettent une répartition des individus dans l'espace et contribuent à représenter et instituer les appartenances, les positions et les exclusions. L’analyse historique des positions spatiales est donc en ce contexte le moyen d’une microhistoire sociale.

An article from Revue d'histoire de l'Amérique française, on Érudit.