Aqar Quf

Berelekh

The most northern Palaeolithic site in the world, at 71? N in northeastern Siberia, containing a bed of 8000+ mammal bones, including woolly mammoth, of c 14,000-12,000 years ago. There is also an Upper Palaeolithic level dating to 13,400-10,600 bp and assigned to the Dyuktai culture.

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Berelekh

Semna

A fortified town erected on the west bank of the Nile at the southern end of a series of fortresses founded during the 12th Dynasty (1985-1795 BC) in the second cataract area of Lower Nubia. The town was established in the reign of Senusret I (1965-1920 BC) and the forts were probably built to de...

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Semna

Suberde

Small aceramic Neolithic settlement in the Konya plain of southern Turkey, dated to the later 7th millennium BC. Two occupation levels were recognized, the earlier with traces of hut floors, the latter with building of mudbrick and plastered floors. Thousands of animal bones have been found - she...

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Suberde

Open-Area Excavation

A type of excavation in which large horizontal areas are opened, esp. where single-period deposits lie close to the surface.

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Open-Area Excavation

Absolute Dating

The determination of age with reference to a specific time scale, such as a fixed calendrical system or in years before present (B.P., BP), based on measurable physical and chemical qualities or historical associations such as coins and written records. The date on a coin is an absolute date, as ...

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Absolute Dating

Data Acquisition

A stage in archaeological research design in which data are gathered, normally by three basic procedures - reconnaissance, surface survey, and excavation.

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Data Acquisition

Unit

An artificial grouping used for describing artifacts.

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Unit

Huánuco Pampa

An Inca provincial capital in the Peruvian Andes. The main town included a high-status residence, military garrison, and a compound probably for the 'Chosen Women'. A Spanish census report allowed the archaeologists to identify the villages occupied by the various conquered groups who paid tribut...

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Huánuco Pampa

Temple Mound

A large flat-topped earthen structure, artificially made of earth and stone, designed as a mountain upon which to set a temple above the landscape. In Mesoamerica, these structures are terraced or stepped. Some temple mounds also served as tombs and formed the symbolic centers of theocratic gover...

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Temple Mound

Scavenging

The nonscientific or amateur removal of archaeological materials from a site by later inhabitants or visitors to a site.

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Scavenging

Wairau Bar

Archaic Maori burial ground and midden site in the northern South Island, New Zealand, at the mouth of the Wairau River. The site is remarkable for its rich grave goods, including adzes, necklace units, and fishhooks - similar to those from contemporary sites in the Marquesas and Society Islands....

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Wairau Bar

Technomic Artifact

Tool used primarily to cope with the physical environment

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Technomic Artifact

Xinzheng

Area in central Honan province, China, with an Eastern Zhou (Chou) tomb which was ransacked. More than a hundred bronze ritual vessels and bells said to belong to the find are now divided among museums in Beijing and Taibei. The vessels, of the 8th-6th centuries BC, show a change to more elegant ...

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Xinzheng

Muskenum

One of the three classes of people in Hammurabi's Code, probably a servant of the state; the other two were awilum and wardum. The muskenum were, under King Hammurabi at least, persons employed by the palace who could be given land to work without receiving it as property. The classes awilum and ...

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Muskenum

Beaker People

A widespread Late Neolithic European people of the third and second millennium BC named after the characteristic bell-shaped beakers found buried with their dead. These people spread a knowledge of metalworking in central and western Europe from c 2500-2000 BC. They first came to Britain between ...

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Beaker People

Garcel, El

A Middle Neolithic hilltop settlement in Almeria, southeast Spain, the type site of the earlier phase of the Almerian culture, c 5th millennium BC. Excavations have produced evidence of wattle-and-daub round houses, storage pits, undecorated round- and pointed-based pottery and, before the end of...

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Garcel, El

Baton

A soft hammer used to strike flakes from a stone core often made of antler bone or wood.

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Baton

Patu

A Polynesian/Maori short clublike weapon, made of a variety of materials including wood, bone, stone, and whalebone (paroa). Finds on the Society Islands that are similar to the Maori patu suggest they may have been part of the Early Eastern Polynesian assemblage of New Zealand's first settlers.

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Patu

Pict

An ancient people who lived in eastern-northeastern Scotland, known as the "Painted People" probably referring to a custom of body painting or tattooing. Probably descendants of pre-Celtic aborigines or from the Bay of Biscay where they had helped Caesar defeat the Veneti the Picts were described...

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Pict

Lasithi

A plain on Crete which has been occupied since the Neolithic and which was intensively used by the Minoans.

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Lasithi

Flocculation

The agglomeration or coming together of particles in a suspension, such as a slip, forming 'flocs' and causing the suspension to thicken or settle

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Flocculation

Cultural Intervention

The introduction of new cultural forms to a society, by either accident or design.

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Cultural Intervention

Turret

Towers of great height in proportion to their diameter, often with staircases and crowned with small spires. Two were placed between each milecastle on Hadrian's Wall as lookout posts and signal stations.

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Turret

Biome

A complex (biotic) community of plants and animals established over a large geographic area and characterized by the distinctive lifeforms of certain species which live in harmony together and have a certain unity. The biome is a plant-plus-animal formation that is composed of a plant matrix toge...

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Biome

Liao Dynasty

A dynasty formed by the nomadic Khitan tribes (907-1125) in much of present-day Manchuria (Northeast Provinces) and Mongolia and the northeastern corner of China proper. There were elaborate chambered tombs.

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