| Abstract: |
Southeast Asia is anomalous in that a hierarchical type of social order does not appear to have developed with the onset of the Bronze Age, as was the case in the rest of the world. Two sites in Northeastern Thailand, Ban Non Wat and Ban Lum Khao, were chosen to test whether hierarchical structures were present in the early Bronze Age through a comparative analysis of one of the most common mortuary ceramic vessels, form 5E according to the classification system developed by OReilly (1999
2004) and Barribeau (2007) for Ban Lum Khao and Ban Non Wat, respectively. The lip, neck and body diameters of this broad trumpet-rimmed and slender-necked form were recorded and converted into lip to neck and body to neck ratios for further analysis. Scatter plots indicated that the vessels from two early and very wealth Bronze Age phases at Ban Non Wat (Ban Non Wat BA2 and Ban Non Wat Ba3) were very similar to those from the relatively poor mortuary phase of Ban Lum Khao. This similarity was confirmed using ANOVA and post hoc Scheffe tests. It is proposed that the similarity in these vessels indicates that they were manufactured roughly contemporaneously. This indicates that a very rich group of people were living at or around the same time as a very poor group of people. The evidence at Ban Non Wat for wealth and status differentiation would undoubtedly have affected the social organisation of Ban Lum Khao, which, due to its much smaller excavation area, may still yield evidence of hierarchical structures.
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