Categories - Archaeologs

Ancient Pottery

Sacred Ceremonies

Ancient Languages

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Ivolga

A settlement site in southern Siberia belonging to the Hsiung-nu state of the last few centuries bc and first few centuries ad. The settlement covered c7 hectares and was defended by four lines of walls and ditches, showing clear evidence of Chinese influence. The community seems to have been bas...

EnglishPlace Names

Ivolga

archaeologsPlace Names

Itazuke

[Itatsuke]. An early agricultural village site in Fukuoka, Japan. Rice paddies outlined with wooden boards, over 100 grains of charred rice, wooden hoes and semilunar stone harvesting-knives were associated with Final Jomon pottery of Yuusu type. Above them was another set of paddy fields associa...

Isturitz

[Isturits]. One of the longest sequences of Palaeolithic strata yet known was excavated in the Isturitz cave in the west Pyrenean area of southwest France. Several Mousterian levels were overlain by a long sequence of Upper Palaeolithic levels. Human remains were found and very numerous art objec...

Istallosko

A cave in the Biikk mountains of northern Hungary that has revealed two layers with early Upper Palaeolithic bone tool types. The stone tool assemblage is poor, but radiocarbon dates indicate that the lower level with split based points is earlier than 40,000 bc, contemporary with the earliest kn...

Istallosko

archaeologsOthers

Israelites

Although there exists a wealth of documentary evidence for the Israelites in the Bible, they are difficult to identify in the archaeological record. They appear to have been a Semitic people of nomadic origin and are said to have been led by Moses from Egypt to the Promised Land of Palestine. How...

Isotopic Replacement

Source of inaccuracy when determining radiocarbon dates from fossil shells. If the ancient material has been buried in sediments subject to percolation of modem rainwater, there may be some interchange of carbon between the calcium carbonate of the shell and the carbon dioxide dissolved in the ra...

Isotopic Fractionation

One of the central assumptions of the radiocarbon dating method is that 12C, 13C and l4C are passed around the carbon cycle at similar rates. The three isotopes are indeed chemically very similar, but slight differences between them may cause them to be taken up at different rates by some plants ...

Isostasy

A state of balance maintained by the earth’s crust. Continental crust behaves like a body ‘floating’ on the denser underlying layers. Loading of one area may cause downwarping of the crust, which is compensated by uplift elsewhere. Removal of the load causes the crust to readjust to its former st...

Isimila

A site in southern Tanzania. The most distinctive tools are hand axes and cleavers of African Acheulian type, but two other assemblage types are found, one with picks and the other with small retouched tools. Isimila may have been occupied about a quarter of a million years ago.

EnglishPlace Names

Ishango

Located in eastern Zaire on the northwestern shore of Lake Edward, Ishango has a long sequence of occupation and represents the southernmost known manifestation of the so-called African aquatic civilization. A crude stone industry with rare backed microliths was accompanied by bone harpoon heads:...

Isfahan

The second city of Iran, Isfahan stands on a fertile plain, watered by the Zayandeh Rud. An Achaemenid palace, known to Strabo as Gabai, may have existed here. By the early 3rd century, Isfahan was a Parthian provincial capital and we presume that it was occupied throughout the Sassan-ian period;...

Îsânapura

[Sanskrit: ‘City of Lord Siva’]. Capital of king Isanavarman of Chenla, now Cambodia, (c616-c635) to whom the effective conquest of Fun an is attributed. It has been identified with some probability with the group of ruins at Sambor Prei Kuk, north of Kompong Thom.

Îsânapura

archaeologsOthers

Isakovo

See Baikal Neolithic.

Isakovo

archaeologsOthers

Iron Pan

See podzol.

Iron Pan

archaeologsOthers

Iron And Steel (China)

The earliest iron artefacts known from China are a few blades forged from meteoritic iron (see Beijing, Gaocheng, Xincun). Iron does not seem to have been smelted until about the 6th century bc, at which time wrought iron and cast iron appear more or less simultaneously. The iron artefacts of thi...

EnglishArchitectural

Iron And Steel (China)

archaeologsArchitectural

Iron And Steel

Since the Iron Age, iron has been the most commonly used metal. Iron ores are widely available: the most common as rocks are siderite, haematite and limonite. Iron may also be obtained from the ‘bog iron ore’ precipitated underwater or in boggy waterlogged ground. Although iron is much more abund...

Iron And Steel

archaeologsOthers

Iron Age

Third age of the Three Age System, defined by the use of iron as the main material for making tools. The term is still widely used in West Asiatic, European and African prehistory. In Western Asia the Iron Age begins in the later 2nd millennium bc, in Europe during the earlier 1st millennium bc, ...

Ipswich Ware

Proficiently made type of pottery produced between the 7th and 9th centuries in Ipswich, Suffolk, where kiln debris has been found. The cooking pots and undecorated pitchers were distributed widely around East Anglia, while stamp-decorated pitchers were traded as far as York and Richborough. This...

EnglishAncient Pottery

Ipswichian

A group of British interglacial deposits — lacustrine muds, river terraces, estuarine and marine sediments. They exist as patches of material containing fossils indicating warm conditions, overlain by Devens-ian deposits and also underlain by sediments indicating cold conditions. Individual patch...

Ipiutak

The most recent variant of the Norton tradition, beginning cl AD and persisting in some areas to as late as c800. Its major characteristic is a highly developed art style, similar to Old Bering Sea, which is most commonly expressed in the working of ivory. Projectile points and other stone implem...

Ionic

(1) One of the principal regional dialects of ancient Greece, closely related to Attic, and characteristic of the so-called ‘Ionian’ cities of Asia Minor. (2) In classical architecture, the Ionic order, which emerged after Doric (perhaps from about 570 bc) in the context of Aegean and eastern Gre...

EnglishArchitectural

Ionic

archaeologsArchitectural

Iona

A small island off the west coast of Scotland. In 563 St Columba and a group of his followers left their Irish homeland to found a monastery on the island; from here they ministered to the spiritual welfare of the Picts and the Irish settlers of Dalriada, and also directed missions to other parts...

Inyanga

An area of the Zimbabwe eastern highlands, adjacent to the border with Mozambique, which retains evidence for a prolonged sequence of Iron Age occupation. Early Iron Age settlement, related to that at Gokomere, is attested at several sites around Ziwa Mountain. Between the 16th and 18th centuries...

Involution

A structure that develops within the active layer of the periglacial zone. Cryoturbation causes movement within the layer and sorting of its constituents. Involutions formed by this process may consist of tongues or pillars of fine material which extend into overlying sand and gravel, or they may...

Intihuasi Cave

Site of long occupation and clear chronological continuity which evidences a way of life similar to the Desert Tradition of North America. Located in northwest Argentina, its lowest level (Intihuasi IV) contains willow-leaf points (see also Guitarrero, Ayampitin and Lauricocha) and other hunting ...

Interstadial

A short period of warmer climate during a glaciation (cold stage). See Devensian, Weichselian, Wisconsin; see also Tables 5-7, pages 418-20.

Intermediate Periods

Part of a chronological construction used in Peruvian archaeology. There are two clearly separate Intermediate Periods (see Table 9, page 552). The Early Intermediate Period (200 bc-ad 600) is characterized by the rise of the first great city states, such as Moche and Nasca. The Late Intermediate...

Intermediate Periods

archaeologsOthers

Interlace

A form of pattern that intertwines parallel strands and ribbons, passing them over and under one another alternately. In the 7th and 8th centuries interlace ornament was refined and used to great effect by Celtic and Anglo-Saxon metalworkers, sculptors, and manuscript illuminators in intricate co...

Interglacial

Term commonly used to describe the periods of generally warm climate which occurred at intervals during the Quaternary period, interspersed between colder periods (see glacial). See Tables 5-7, pages 418-20.

Integration Period

The most recent period in the chronological continum Formative, Regional Development, Integration. Formulated for use in Ecuadoran archaeology by Betty Meggers, it covers the period from ad 500 to 1550 and has been applied to other areas of northwestern South and Central America. Sometimes known ...

Intaglio

[Italian: ‘carving’]. (1) The process of cutting or engraving a design, usually into a (gem)stone or precious metal; or (2) the artefact so created, which was then characteristically set into a finger-ring, and used as a personal seal.

Insula

[Latin: ‘island’]. In Roman architecture, either (1) an area of a town, typically enclosed by four streets, and probably corresponding to a smaller subdivision on the familiar CARDO/decumanus grid; or (2) a large ‘tenement’-type house, or apartment block, as well-illustrated at Roman Ostia. An in...

Initial Period

One of a seven-period chronological construction used in Peruvian archaeology and sometimes employed in other Andean areas. Covering the period 1800-900 bc, its beginning is marked by the first appearance of pottery and its close by the occurrence of Chavin materials. Many of the traits that make...

Ingot

Mass of unwrought metal resulting from smelting or other extraction processes.

Ingombe Ilede

Located on the north bank of the Zambezi, a short distance downstream of the modem Kariba, Ingombe Ilede was initially an Iron Age settlement of the late 1st millennium ad. Around 1400, however, it was reoccupied by people who were evidently engaged in extensive trade in both copper and gold. It ...

Ingaladdi

A sandstone rock shelter in the northwest of the Australian Northern Territory between the Victoria and Daly Rivers. The site is notable for two well-separated stone industries and for art. Lower levels dating between 3000 and 5000 be contained a typical Australian Core Tool and Scraper assemblag...

Industry

Set of artefacts, made of a single material, that is thought to represent the products of a single group. An industry may represent one of a group of industries making up a culture. For instance, the Linear Pottery culture has a distinctive stone industry and pottery industry, as well as characte...

Industrial Archaeology

The study of the material remains of past industrial activities, covering ways of making, transporting and distributing things. It can apply to material of any age, but the term is most often applied to post-medieval archaeology, and especially to the archaeology of the Industrial Revolution in B...

Indus Civilization

See Harappan Civiliza-

Indrapura

[Sanskrit: "City of Indra’] (1). In Cambodia, Indrapura was the first capital of the future king Jayavarman II upon his return from Java before he founded the kingdom of Angkor in 802. It has not been identified with certainty, but corresponds probably to the site of Bunteay Prei Nokor, in the pr...

Indonesia

Prehistory. In political terms, Indonesia is the most southerly and largest portion of Island Southeast Asia. It is divided by the Huxley/Wallace Line into westerly Sundaland and easterly Wallacea, the former being settled by Homo erectus (especially Java man) by almost two million years ago. Lat...

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