Others - Archaeologs

Others

Discover other things about archaeology.

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Recently Added: Others

Fufeng

[Fu-feng], District just north of the Wei River in central Shaanxi province, China. The Zhouyuan region, comprising Fufeng and neighbouring Qishan, is exceptionally rich in Western Zhou remains; this area was the centre of Zhou power for several generations preceding the founding of the Zhou dyna...

Fuegian Tradition

A tradition based on the exploitation of marine resources and operative on the southern coast and offshore islands of southern Chile. Although a shell-midden site at Englefield Island has provided radiocarbon dates in the range 7200-6500 be (± 1500 years) they are generally thought to be too earl...

Frying Pan

A special type of shallow pottery bowl found in the Cycladic Early Bronze Age. It is characterized by low sides, a highly decorated base and a handle split into two knob-like projections. The resemblance to a frying pan is superficial and certainly misleading. The vessels were probably used for r...

Froth Flotation

A method of flotation.

Frost Marks

The features of an archaeological site may be revealed on an aerial photo graph by the differential retention of frost in hollows and over different types of material.

Frost Marks

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Fromms Landing

A rock shelter on the banks of the lower Murray River, South Australia, 16 km from Devon Downs. Human occupation lasted about 2000 years from c3000 be. Stone artefacts included Pirri points and microliths in the same layers down to the earliest levels. A well preserved dingo skeleton was dated to...

Fraser River Sites

Complex of sites centred on the Fraser River system in southern British Columbia, Canada. Three culturally distinct areas (the Canyon, the Plateau and the Delta) contain evidence of the differing influences which ultimately coalesced into the Northwest Coast tradition. Artefacts from the Plateau ...

Fraser River Sites

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Franks

A Germanic tribe who crossed the Rhine in the later 3rd and 4th centuries. The Salian Franks settled in Flanders around the Gallo-Roman centre of Toumai, while the Ripurian Franks penetrated the central Rhineland and Cologne, Bonn and Mainz. Both tribes rose to dominate early medieval politics. T...

Franchthi Cave

A cave in the Argolid, southern Greece, with a long stratigraphy covering the period which saw the transition from hunting and gathering to farming as the basis of life. A late Palaeolithic occupation of the 10th millennium be was followed by an 8th-millennium be Mesolithic deposit, when obsidian...

Fox

(1882-1967). British archaeologist who made important contributions to the development of field archaeology in the 1920s and 1930s. He also contributed to theoretical archaeology, especially in introducing geographical approaches. The concept of a division of Britain into Highland and Lowland Zon...

Fox

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Foumeau Du Diable

A cave in the northern part of the Dordogne, southwest France, occupied during the Upper Palaeolithic, with Perigordian, Solutrian and Magda-lenian deposits. It is one of only two sites where Solutrian art is well-exemplified, in the form of a fine limestone bas-relief of wild oxen.

Foumeau Du Diable

archaeologsOthers

Fosse Way

Roman road in England stretching from Exeter to Lincoln. The road marks the line originally chosen by the invading Romans as frontier (limes") for the new province. A service road was needed to link a line of forts. The line, however, rapidly proved unsatisfactory, and the frontier was soon pushe...

Fosseilone Cave

See Monte Circeo.

Fosseilone Cave

archaeologsOthers

Forum

Generally, any large open space in a Roman town. Often used specifically of the main square which, like the Greek agora, served as commercial, social, legal and political centre. It was usually rectangular, colonnaded, and lined with public buildings, including typically a temple and a basilica. ...

Fort Rock Basin Sites

A cluster of associated sites with a long sequence of occupation, located in an ancient Pleistocene lake basin in south-central Oregon, USA. Deposits of pumice from an eruption of nearby Mount Mazama in c5000 be have provided excellent chronological control for these sites. The earliest date, 11,...

Fort Rock Basin Sites

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Formative Period

A term used in many chronological constructions in New World archaeology. The Formative Period is characterized by the appearance of traits that indicate a sedentary way of life and have the potential for the development of civilization. Chief among these traits are the development of agriculture...

Formative Period

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Fontechevade

A cave in Charente, westcentral France, where in 1946 a small piece of human frontal bone and a skull cap were found in ‘Tayacian’ levels, believed to be earlier than the Mousterian or classic Neanderthal period, and now thought to precede the last interglacial. According to Vallois, the Fonteche...

Fontechevade

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Font De Gaume

A painted cave close to Les Eyzies in the Dordogne region, southwest France. Recent excavations have revealed archaeological levels deep in the interior spanning several earlier Upper Palaeolithic phases, but the polychrome paintings of bison and other animals almost certainly date from the late ...

Folsom

A kill site discovered in the plains area of New Mexico, USA, in 1926. Distinctive man-made weapons found in assocation with the remains of the now extinct Bison antiquus established beyond doubt the antiquity of the native American. Based on this association, further sites were designated Folsom...

Fogou

[fougou]. Name for an Iron Age structure found in Cornwall, southwest England, constructed like a gallery partially or mostly under ground, usually covered by a mound of earth and stones. They are generally found near settlements and may have been used as storerooms or as refuges, or both.

Foederati

Roman technical term (from Latin foedus, ‘treaty’) denoting tribes external to the Empire who were under a treaty relationship with Rome. The conditions usually involved co-existence and military help to Rome in time of need. Sometimes also used of mercenaries in general.

Foederati

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Fiuxgate Magnetometer

See magnetometer.

Fiuxgate Magnetometer

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Fluorine Dating

One of the methods of bone dating. Fluorine-containing groundwater percolates through deposits, its fluorine becoming absorbed onto the crystal lattice of the mineral component of buried bones (in the same way that fluorine is adsorbed into the surface layers of teeth from repeated brushing with ...

Flotation

A method of extracting fossil plant remains (especially seeds), shells, small bones and insects from ancient soils and sediments. At its simplest, the method involves mixing the material with water and skimming off the organic fragments that float to the surface. Organic remains may be rendered m...

Florisbad

A spring deposit in the Orange Free State, South Africa, which preserved a human cranium attributed to an early form of modern man, Homo sapiens sapiens. Its brow ridges, while pronounced, are markedly less prominent than those of the (presumably earlier) skull from Broken Hill in Zambia. The Flo...

Florentine Valley

See Tasmania.

Florentine Valley

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Florence

[Roman Florentia, modem Italian Firenze]. City in Tuscany, central Italy, a rich and important town since later Roman imperial times. Little is known of earlier settlement on this favourable site on the junction of the Arno and the Mignone, but recently discovered Villanovan material suggests occ...

Flood

‘Flood stories’ appear in the literature of many of the civilizations of western Asia. The discovery by George Smith in 1872 of a Babylonian version among the tablets of Ashurbanipal’s library in Nineveh aroused great public interest because of its similarity to the biblical account. In this vers...

Flint Mine

During the Neolithic and Copper Age of Europe, flint workers recognized that flint from beds below ground was of much superior quality to surface flint, especially for the manufacture of large tools such as axes. These beds were exploited by sinking shafts and then excavating galleries outwards. ...

Flint Mine

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Flint

See chert.

Flemish Blackwares

Later medieval Flemish pottery is well-known from paintings of the Renaissance period. Some of these wares were especially well-decorated, such as the so-called Aardenburg type, which has applied floral decorations. However, the majority of the Flemish wares were coarse black wares with pinched b...

Flemish Blackwares

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Flandrian

A group of British Quaternary interglacial deposits. The Flandrian can be dated by radiocarbon, and ranges from 10,000 bp (the end of the Devensian) up to the present day (seeTable 6, page 419). These deposits represent the latest Quaternary interglacial stage, equivalent to the Holocene epoch. A...

Five Dynasties Period

The period of Chinese history between the fall of the Tang dynasty in 907 and the founding of the Song dynasty in 960. The name refers to a series of dynasties that ruled North China; in the same period the south was divided among the Ten Kingdoms.

Fission Track Dating

Radiometric dating method for mineral materials. Principle. One of the isotopes of uranium, 238U, spontaneously undergoes nuclear fission to produce two heavy ‘fragment’ nuclei. This happens at a very slow, but known, rate. The fission fragments are released with great energy and create tracks of...

Fishing

Fishing probably did not become a major source of food until quite late in man’s evolution, although fish remains are occasionally found on early Palaeolithic sites, such as Olduvai. Fish and other sea food were a more important part of the diet for coastal peoples and in the poleward latitudes. ...

Fishbourne

Town in Sussex, southeast England, best known for its Roman-style villa/ palace of the 1st century ad, a four-hectare extravaganza, possibly put up for and by the British king (of the tribe of the Regni) Cogidubnus, a noted Romanophile. The site lies near to Chichester, which was first fort and t...

Fish Bones

Fish have a markedly different skeleton to mammals. Many of the bones are very small and thin, and so do not survive very well on archaeological sites. However, some bones are commonly preserved, notably the jaws and some other head bones, otoliths and the centra of vertebrae. They usually accumu...

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