Zhob

Choga Mish

A site in southwest Iran occupied in the 6th millennium BC. The earliest layers have painted pottery related to that from Muhammed Jaffar, followed by pottery of Tepe Sabz and Susiana A.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Choga Mish

Otzaki

An Aceramic Neolithic-Early Bronze Age tell (or magoula) settlement in Thessaly, Greece. Early Neolithic pre-Sesklo occupation with Impressed Ware was succeeded by Middle Neolithic Sesklo painted pottery. Houses were of mud-brick and rectangular, some having stone footings and internal buttresses...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Otzaki

Altun Ha

A Classic Maya site in Belize, about 35 mi (56 km) north of Belize City which dates to the Middle Pre-Classic Period. It is known for caches of obsidian and jade. The land was poor for agriculture, but marine resources were exploited and the small center was quite wealthy. There is evidence of lo...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Altun Ha

Hohmichele, The

A rich Hallstatt grave near the Heuneburg hillfort on the Danube in southern Germany. The barrow was one of the satellite graves around the hillfort and covered a central grave and 12 secondary burials of the 6th century BC Iron Age. The central grave was robbed in antiquity, but it had been an i...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Hohmichele, The

Ollantaytambo

Inca site in Urubamba Valley, near Cuzco, Peru. It was a planned, trapezoidal town with ceremonial and domestic architecture. It was a royal estate for Inca Pachacuti and then used as a fort when the Spanish arrived. Architecturally, the Incas surpassed all others in their use of intricately cut,...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Ollantaytambo

Beycesultan

A tell on the upper Meander River of southwestern Anatolia (western Turkey) which has yielded evidence from the Chalcolithic to Late Bronze Age and of a culture contemporary with the Hittite empire. It is thought to have been the capital of the 2nd-millennium BC state of Arzawa. From the Chalcoli...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Beycesultan

Marzabotto

An Etruscan occupation site, 25 km from Bologna, northern Italy, in the Reno valley. It was probably set on an important Etruscan trade route. Its 6th-century BC phase was characterized by plain, primitive dwellings and had evidence of metalworking. In a 5th-century BC stage, the city appears to ...

archaeologsEnglishAncient Cities, Place Names

Marzabotto

Chokurcha

Middle Palaeolithic cave sites in the Crimea, Ukraine. One had three occupation levels associated with woolly mammoth, steppe bison, and wild ass and the artifacts were sidescrapers and bifacial foliates. The other cave had wild ass, sidescrapers, and some mobiliary art.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Chokurcha

Zvejnieki

Mesolithic and Neolithic cemetery in Latvia next to a settlement. Perforated elk teeth pendants, bone points, and ochre have been found.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Zvejnieki

Argos

City in the northeastern Peloponnese of Greece, just north of the head of the Gulf of Argolis. The name was applied to several districts of ancient Greece but it is most often used to describe the easternmost part of the Peloponnesian peninsula and the city of Argos was its capital. Homer describ...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names, Ancient Cities

Argos

Bampur

A site in southeastern Iran with a series of prehistoric mounds and a medieval fort. There is a pottery sequence from the mid-3rd millennium to c 1900 BC which exhibits links to pottery from Afghanistan and Umm an-Nar Island on the Persian Gulf.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Bampur

Kültepe

(Kultepe) A tell site in Cappadocia, central Turkey (Anatolia), a center of Assyrian merchant colony, or karum, of Kanesh (Kanish). It was a Bronze Age city at which a colony of Assyrian merchants set up the trading organization, the karum, to control and foster the trade, especially of metals, b...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Kültepe

Daimabad

A site in western India with five phases from the 3rd and 2nd millennia BC known for copper hoards.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Daimabad

Capelitti

A cave site in the Aures Mountains of eastern Algeria which has evidence of early North African pastorialism by a 'Caspian Neolithic' population. Sheep and/or goats appear to have coincided with the beginning of pottery-making from the 5th millennium BC. By the 3rd millennium, small domestic catt...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Capelitti

Marib

Site in northern Yemen on the Wadi Dhana that is associated with Sabaean kingdom of the South Arabian civilization. It was the capital of the kingdom of Saba'. A dam was built across the wadi in the mid-1st millennium BC and used until the mid-1st millennium AD. The temple of Haram Bilqis (Awwam)...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Marib

Shovel Test

A subsurface detection technique using either posthole diggers or shovels to quickly determine the density and distribution of archaeological remains. Samples of soil from carefully selected test pits that are sieved for artifacts. Also, a shovel-sized sample taken at various intervals across a s...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Shovel Test

Ventana Cave

Rock shelter and stratified site in southwest Arizona occupied from over 11,000 years ago. The stratigraphy starts with remains left by hunters of extinct species of horse, bison, and ground sloth, who also had stone tools - including Clovis/Folsom-like projectile points. It may have been contemp...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Ventana Cave

Period Interface

The composite interface of a number of units of stratification which make up the surface of a period.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Period Interface

Willendorf

Upper Palaeolithic site on the River Danube near Krems, Austria with five Willedorfian or Eastern Gravettian levels (c 32,000 bp) and lower levels of the Aurignacian (c 41,700-39,500 bp). The Gravettian yielded art objects, including a famous Venus figurine. Willendorf II had an early Aurignacian...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Willendorf

Peristeria

Early Mycenaean settlement, c 1550-1400 BC, in Messenia, Greece. It was one of the most prosperous and powerful settlements. Four tholos tombs contained rich offerings; the East House may have been a palace.

archaeologsEnglishAncient Cities, Place Names

Peristeria

Rupar

A site in east Punjab, Pakistan, at the foot of the Simla Hills with vestiges of two phases of the Indus Valley or Harappan civilization. It is stratified below an occupation with Painted Grey Ware, which was itself by a level with Northern Black Polished Ware.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Rupar

Thebes

Principal city of Upper Egypt, on the east bank of the Nile, which was the capital of the fourth nome of Upper Egypt and, during much of the Middle and New Kingdoms, of the whole country. Its importance lay in its being the seat of Amon (Amun) and the surviving remains include the impressive temp...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Thebes

Kheit Qasim

Three sites in east-central Iraq. Kheit Qasim I has a large Early Dynastic cemetery of brick tombs with multiple inhumations, unusual for southern Mesopotamia. Kheit Qasim III was a small 'Ubaid site.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Kheit Qasim

Sarnate

A settlement site of the Late Mesolithic Narva culture, located in the southeast Baltic province of Latvia. The single culture level has radiocarbon dates of 2950-2250 BC and contains a rich collection of Narva pointed-base pottery and bone implements. A variety of wooden artifacts have been foun...

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names

Sarnate

Jebel Irhoud

A site in northern Morocco where Levalloiso-Mousterian artifacts were recovered in association with fossil human remains of Neanderthal type. ESR dates range from over 80,000-150,000 BP.

archaeologsEnglishPlace Names