Global Markets, Local Practice: Ottoman-period Clay Pipes and Smoking Paraphernalia from the Red Sea Shipwreck at Sadana
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Global Markets, Local Practice: Ottoman-period Clay Pipes and Smoking Paraphernalia from the Red Sea Shipwreck at Sadana Island, Egypt Cheryl Ward1 and Uzi Baram2 Published online: 13 June 2006
Shipwreck archaeology provides unique evidence for trade, commercial relationships, and the day-to-day existence of occupational communities defined by residence and employment within the industrial space aboard a ship. These concerns are addressed particularly well by finds of utilitarian items such as a small assemblage of 21 clay pipes and three other smoking-related artifacts recently excavated from the ca. 1765 Sadana Island ship which sank at anchor while loaded with coffee, porcelain, qulal, and other goods. Analysis of the assemblage specifically contributes to questions of chronology and typology and presents new evidence for regionalism, style, and the impact of far-reaching trade routes on markets with a global perspective. KEY WORDS: clay pipes; Ottoman Empire; Sadana Island shipwreck; maritime archaeology.
INTRODUCTION A number of recent publications (Flatman, 2003; Gibbins and Adams, 2001; Gould, 2000; Ward et al., 1999) argue explicitly or implicitly for greater integration of terrestrial and maritime approaches to the study of shipwreck sites by using material culture to approach social relations and behavior. Ships sunk while engaged in trade present unique opportunities to address questions relevant to technology and to the movement of goods from place to place with the result that these topics consequently receive most attention, yet shipwreck archaeology enables us to investigate the lives of those living and working aboard. Many archaeologists who excavate maritime sites refer to shipboard life as an important 1 Department
of Anthropology, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, 32306-7772; e-mail: [email protected]. 2 Division of Social Sciences, New College of Florida, Sarasota, FL, 34243; e-mail: [email protected]. 135 C 2006 Springer Science+Business Media, Inc. 1092-7697/06/0600-0135/1
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category of knowledge in their research plans, and while a few studies exist to demonstrate how living conditions reflect cultural interaction at levels of hierarchy, power, authority and discipline, almost all focus on European examples (for example, Boxer, 1963; Castro, 2005, pp. 64–69; Einarsson, 1997; Gardiner, 2005; Rediker, 1987). In this article, we consider a historic ship’s final voyage in the Red Sea in about 1764 CE (Ward, 2000, 2001) and examine its assemblage of artifacts related to smoking for clues to the lives of people working and living aboard the vessel within the context of the wide-ranging market economy the ship’s cargo and its utilitarian objects represent. The Sadana Island ship, like every ship, limited the physical environment of sailors, created working and social groups, and placed every aspect of their lives within an industrial context. The ship, as Rediker (1987) and Flatman (2003, pp. 148–149) have pointed out, also circumscribed social relationships, producing su
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