ABSTRACT
Early modern archaeology investigates the globalization process during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Archaeological research, through its multidisciplinary method of linking excavation with historical research – in addition to its overt interest in the material conditions of daily life – is especially well suited to investigate the earliest manifestations of modern globalization. One advantage of archaeological research is that analysis can be conducted on numerous scales at once (see Orser 2009, 2010: 116-20). On the micro level, people engage in face-toface relationships based on personal decisions, societal and legal regulations, and the overarching programmes established and mandated on the macro level (Castells 2009: xxxvi). Excavation exposes the micro-scale on the site level, and when the scale is broadened beyond the site, archaeologists can obtain unique insights into the macro-scale connectivities that compose an entire system of interaction (e.g. Feinman this volume, Knappett this volume).
