Vol:.(1234567890) Biol Theory (2017) 12:262–274 DOI 10.1007/s13752-017-0285-3 1 3 THEMATIC ISSUE ARTICLE: SYMBOLS, SIGNALS AND THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL RECORD II Seeking Speaker Meaning in the Archaeological Record Marilynn Johnson 1   Received: 16 April 2017 / Accepted: 6 July 2017 / Published online: 6 October 2017 © Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research 2017 Introduction Archaeological interpretation is a sweeping project involv- ing analysis of everything from movements of people across lands as a result of climate change, to hierarchies of power in large groups, to analysis of remains of cities, to visualization of entire sites otherwise obstructed but which are revealed using advanced scientific tools (Renfrew and Bahn 2012). In certain circumstances we shift from these broader goals to the more intimate consideration of what the intentions of some individual were on some occasion. We might be drawn in by the refined character of an exquisite biface (Hiscock 2014), struck by the beauty of a set of beads found on a skel- eton (Stiner 2014), or hold up our hand in wonder to com- pare it to a negative hand stencil on a cave wall, wondering why the creator chose to place it there (Pettitt et al. 2014). In such circumstances we cannot help but feel a closeness to the creators of these artifacts that seems to cut across time, as we consider what they intended at the moment they cre- ated this artifact. The process of recognition of intentions of others is an important part of archaeological interpretation of certain objects. The first way this procedure manifests itself is in the classification of certain objects as artifacts—that is, we deem certain objects as having been the product of some human intention (Renfrew and Bahn 2012, p. 49). Of those things that are artifacts, we can isolate those that were used with some communicative intention to send a message to some other agent. There is a further distinction that must then be made between the sorts of communicative intentions one can have with respect to some artifact—that is, between those communications that can be fully understood within a code-like system, and those that deviate from the code in a way that requires interpreters to recognize this deviation and consider the particular creator’s intention. This second Abstract Communication in archaeological artifacts is usually understood in terms of signs or signals, fleshed out under many guises. The notions of signs or signals that archaeologists employ often draw from Saussurean or Pei- rcean semiotic theories from philosophy and linguistics. In this article I consider the consequences of whether we understand archaeological signals in terms of the Saussurean or Peircean framework, and highlight the fact that archaeolo- gists have not always been precise in their use of relevant philosophical machinery. I will argue further that interpreta- tion of archaeological artifacts should be supplemented by a notion of meaning that goes beyond signals and leads us to understand meaning in terms of a specific creator’s com- municative intention—which may deviate from how some signal was ordinarily used. This is what I call speaker mean- ing, drawing from philosophy of language. I then present specific examples from Egypt circa 1300 BC and 3500 BC and from France circa 12,000 BC that I argue are best treated with the proposed notion of speaker meaning. In the course of this discussion I consider questions that arise for current accounts of signals and metaphor in archaeology. Finally, I conclude by considering how my proposal relates to our understanding of decoration and style, humor, the advent of spoken language, and the nature of art. Keywords Archaeological interpretation · Communicative intention · Metaphor · Pierce · Saussure · Signals * Marilynn Johnson marilynnjohnson1@gmail.com 1 The Graduate Center, City University of New York, New York, NY, USA