Archaeology Wordsmith

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Results for Kas:

Akashi: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A site near Kobe City, Japan, where fossil Homo bones were found in 1931. The bones have been dated to the Holocene.
Kas: SYNONYM: Kas-Ulu Burun
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Site of a Bronze Age shipwreck off Cap Uluburun, Turkey, which was probably going to the Aegean when it sank in the 14th century BC. Objects found in 1982 in the shipwreck include the first known gold scarab of the Egyptian queen Nefertiti. Other items are copper, tin and glass ingots, bronze tools and weapons, jewelry for the Near East, Egypt, and the Aegean; and pottery from Cyprus, Canaan, and Mycenae. The ship's contents reveal a tight web of interconnections in the later 14th century among Mycenaean Greece, Cyprus, Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Africa.
Kasori: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A Middle or Late Jomon plaza-type shell midden village in Chiba prefecture, Japan. There were at least 47 pit houses in a circular plan, with shell deposits around the rim. It is the type site for Kasori Jomon ceramics.
Kassala: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A cultural phase of eastern Sudan including the Butana, Gash, and Mokram groups.
Kassites: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A people of the central Zagros mountains who occupied Babylon after the Hittite raid c 1595 BC and who had a distinctive culture and language. Their occupation ended with the city's conquest by Assyria and Elam c 1157 BC. The Kassites may or may not have been Indo-Europeans, but their rulers were probably Indo-Aryan aristocracy who taught them horsebreeding and riding, which they introduced into Mesopotamia. One important source of information on the Kassites was the Amarna correspondence on foreign relations of 14th century BC. The Kassites used distinctive boundary stones called kudurru. The Kassite rule represents the longest episode of political integration in the history of southern Mesopotamia. Important sites are Aqar Quf, Warka, and Nippur.
Kastri: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A site on the island of Kythera, Greece, of an Early Helladic settlement later colonized by the Minoans in c 2500 BC. Kastri prospered from trade between Crete and Laconia. The site of Delphi was occupied by the modern village of Kastrí until 1890, when the village was moved to a site nearby and renamed Delphi. There is another Kastri on the island of Syros.
Kastritsa: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An Upper Palaeolithic cave site in northwest Greece with occupation beginning c 22,000-11,000 bp. Artifacts include backed blades, shouldered points, bone points, and decorated pebbles.
Langkasuka: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: An early Indianized state in the Pattani region of peninsular Thailand. The name of first appears (as Lang-ya-hsiu) in a Chinese source of the 6th century AD, asserting that it was founded 400 years earlier; its name reappears in later Malayan and Javanese chronicles. Langkasuka was the most important of the Indianized states and controlled much of northern Malaya. Malaya developed an international reputation as a source of gold and tin, populated by renowned seafarers. Between the 7th and 13th centuries many of these small, often prosperous peninsular maritime trading states may have come under the loose control of Shrivijaya, the great Sumatra-based empire.
Levkas: SYNONYM: Leucas
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: One of the Ionian Islands off the west coast of Greece, which was once believed to be Homer's Ithaca, home of Odysseus. Mycenaean remains at Nidhrí on the east coast testify to early occupation and convince some scholars that Leucas, not Ithaca, was the home of Odysseus.The cave of Chirospilia has yielded Neolithic material, but more important are the Early and Middle Bronze Age cemeteries. The former included the rites of jar burial and partial cremation under barrows. Two groups of tombs of the Middle Bronze Age contained some Minyan Ware, and show some links with the shaft graves of Mycenae, as also with burial mounds in Albania. In the mid-7th century BC, Corinthian colonists established themselves just south of the present capital and dug a canal through the isthmus. Under Roman rule in the 2nd century BC, a stone bridge, of which there are some remains, was constructed to the main island. In 167, the Romans made Levkas a free city.
Maa-Palaekastro: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Site of a fortified settlement on the west coast of Cyprus, first occupied in the 13th century BC, possibly by the Sea Peoples. An ashlar structure may have been their sanctuary. In the 12th century BC, the settlement was destroyed by fire, then taken over for a period by the Mycenaean Greeks.
Palaikastro: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Minoan settlement site on the island of Crete, a Neopalatial town with no palace yet discovered. Palaikastro in eastern Crete was an important town with blocks of houses marked by colored stone foundations, narrow streets with drains, and pottery of exceptional quality.
Sakas: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: Iranian steppe people from central Asia organized into a confederacy which, like that of the Scythians (to whom they were related), brought together tribes of agriculturists and of nomadic herdsmen. They took part in the great movement of peoples which swept away the Greek kingdom of Bactria in the mid-2nd century BC. After being repulsed by the Parthians, the Sakas settled in Drangiana (Seistan) and in the Indus Valley. They also held Kandahar for a short time.
Sankisa: SYNONYM: ancient Samkashya
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Famous Buddhist pilgrimage center in the upper Ganges Valley, India, where the Buddha is said to have descended from heaven. It was visited by the emperor Asoka in his pilgrimage of 249 BC and retains the commemorative pillar with its elephant capital erected on that occasion.
Aqar Quf: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The settlement site of the Kassite city of Dur-Kurigalzu in northern Babylonia (Iraq) dating c 1400-1150 BC. There was a ziggurat and temple complex.
Aramaean: SYNONYM: (fr Greek Aramaios, Syria") adj. Aramaic"
CATEGORY: culture; language
DEFINITION: A branch of the confederacy of Semite tribes who moved out of the Syrian desert and who conquered the Canaanites and established themselves in their own series city-states in c 16-12 BC. The foremost of these states was Aram of Damascus, a large region of northern Syria, which was occupied between the 11th-8th centuries BC, and also Bit-Adini, Aram Naharaim, and Sam'al (Sinjerli). In the same period some of these tribes seized large tracts of Mesopotamia. By the 9th century BC, the whole area from Babylon to the Mediterranean coast was occupied by the Aramaean tribes known collectively as Kaldu (also Kashdu), the biblical Chaldeans. Assyria, nearly encircled, attacked the armies of the Aramaeans and one by one the states collapsed under the domination of Assyria in the succeeding centuries. The destruction of Hamath by Sargon II of Assyria in 720 marked the end of the Aramaean kingdoms of the west. Those Aramaeans along the lower Tigris River remained independent somewhat longer and in 626 BC, a Chaldean general (Nabopolassar) proclaimed himself king of Babylon and joined with the Medes and Scythians to overthrow Assyria. Thereon in the Chaldean empire, the Chaldeans, Aramaeans, and Babylonians became one group. Their North Semitic language, Aramaic, became the international language of the Near East by the 8th century BC, replacing Akkadian. Aramaic was written in the Phoenician script and was the diplomatic and vernacular speech of the Holy Land during the time of Christ. It was replaced by Arabic after the Arab Conquest, but is still spoken in some remote villages of Syria. In the Old Testament the Aramaeans are represented as being related to the Hebrews and living in northern Syria around Harran from about the 16th century BC. Few specifically Aramaic objects have been uncovered by archaeologists.
Babylon: SYNONYM: Bab-ilu (Babylonian), Bab-ilim (Old Babylonian), Bavel or Babel (Hebrew), Atlal Babil (Arabic)
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: One of the most famous cities of antiquity, the capital of southern Mesopotamia (Babylonia) from the early 2nd millennium to the early 1st millennium BC and capital of the Neo-Babylonian (Chaldean) Empire in the 7th and 6th centuries BC. It was located about 80 km south of Baghdad, Iraq on the Euphrates River. Babylon was occupied from the 3rd millennium BC, but it first reached prominence under King Hammurabi (reigned 1792-1750 BC), who made it the capital of his empire. (Hammurabi is best known for his code of laws.) Babylon was destroyed by the Hittites c 1595 BC and ruled by the Kassites until c 1157 BC. The city had frequent wars with Elam and Assyria during several short-lived dynasties until the 11th and last dynasty (626-539 BC), when the city was at its highest development and largest size. This last dynasty -- that of Nebuchadnezzar -- was instrumental in destroying Assyria and it conquered lands from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean before being overthrown by Cyrus in 539 BC. It continued in existence through the Achaemenid period, though with much reduced importance, until its abandonment in 641 AD after the Muslim conquest. The city itself covered around 200 hectares and had a population of about 100,000. Excavations beginning at the turn of the 20th century revealed the city's plan and scanty remains of the ziggurat, the original Tower of Babel. The high water table, which has risen in the last few millennia, allowed those excavators (R. Koldewey from 1899-1917) access to only buildings of the Neo-Babylonian period. The ruins, including temples (some for Marduk, the city's patron deity), fortifications, palaces, and the substructure of the Hanging Gardens, have not held up well over time, especially due to brick-robbing. The finest surviving monument is the Ishtar Gate and Procession Street. Important buildings excavated include Nebuchadnessar's palace, close to the Ishtar Gate, a huge building with many rooms arranged around five different courtyards. Another huge palace of Nebuchadnezzar's reign (605-562 BC) -- the 'Summer Palace' -- was constructed to the northwest of the Inner City and was enclosed by a triangular outer wall.
band: CATEGORY: term
DEFINITION: A term in cultural anthropology describing the simplest type of human social organization consisting of a small number of nuclear families (30-50 people) who are informally organized for subsistence and security purposes. Bands are egalitarian and based mainly on kinship and marriage and the division of labor is based on age and sex. Bands may also be integrated into a larger community, usually called a tribe. Bands exist in sparsely populated areas and use primitive technologies (and are often hunters and gatherers) -- ranging from the desert-dwelling Australian Aborigines, the Pygmies of the Congo rain forests, and the Kaska Indians of the Yukon. Bands often moved seasonally to exploit wild (undomesticated) food resources.
Burzahom: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A Neolithic site in the Vale of Kashmir with phases of occupation dating from c 3050 BC to the 3rd-4th centuries AD. Deep pit dwellings are associated with ground stone axes, bone tools, and coarse gray burnished pottery. These characteristics plus the absence of blades, use of pierced rectangular knives, and association of dog skeletons with human burials, all seem to point to connections with central and northern Asia, as Mongolia, rather than with the rest of the Indian subcontinent. Hunting seems to have been the main basis of the economy. Phase II has houses of mud and mudbrick and Phase III has a group of large stones arranged in a rough semicircle.
Butana: CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: Seven sites in eastern Sudan, dating to 5500-4500 BP, with ceramics and stone artifacts. The cultural group belonged to the Kassala phase.
chariot: CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: A light vehicle of war, usually carrying two people, a warrior, and a driver. Examples have been found from the Uruk period in Mesopotamia and the chariot was on the standard of Ur. It first appeared in the Near East in the 17 century BC, associated with the immigrant peoples who became the Hyksos, Kassites, and Hurri. Its arrival in Egypt can be fairly reliably dated to the Second Intermediate Period (1650-1550 BC). The Aryans carried it to India, and in China it formed the core of the Shang army. The Mycenaeans introduced it to Europe, where it spread widely and rapidly. It revolutionized warfare by allowing warriors to be transferred rapidly from one part of a battlefield to another. It was mainly for aristocrats, which explains its popularity as a funeral offering. Burials of complete chariots with horses and charioteers have been excavated in Shang China (1200 BC), in Cyprus from the 7th century BC, and among the La Tène Celts. The earliest Celt chariot burials are in the Rhineland and eastern France with dates around 500 BC, and later burials are in east Yorkshire and Europe as far east as Hungary, Bulgaria, and southern Russia. The chariot was replaced by the mounted warrior or knight when horses of sufficient strength had been bred in the late and post-Roman periods.
Dörpfeld, Wilhelm (1853-1940): CATEGORY: person
DEFINITION: A German archaeologist who excavated many important prehistoric and classical sites in the Greek world. He worked first under Ernst Curtius on the excavations of Olympia and then assisted Heinrich Schliemann on his third and fourth seasons at Troy, bringing to this work the careful digging and recording techniques worked out at Olympia. After Schliemann's death he continued work at Troy, then later worked on the Ionian island of Leukas, off the west coat of Greece which, contrary to most other authorities, he believed to be Homer's Ithaca, home of Odysseus.
Elam: SYNONYM: Elamite
CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: An ancient kingdom of southwest Iran with its capital at Susa and other centers at Anshan and Dur-Untash. This broad valley of the Karkeh and Karun rivers was geographically an extension of the southern plain of Mesopotamia. Early on, it adopted writing and devised its own pictographic script (proto-Elamite) to suit its language; later it used Akkadian cuneiform. Politically the two regions were usually bitterly opposed and the Elamites overthrew the 3rd dynasty of Ur shortly before 2000 BC and raided as far as Babylon in the later 13th century BC. The Golden Age of Elamite civilization was c 1300-1100 BC, reaching its peak under Untash-Gal (c 1265-1245 BC), the builder of Choga Zambil. Raids into Mesopotamia brought the downfall of Kassite Dynasty in 1157 BC. The period was also remarkable for glass technology and bronze casting (cire perdue). Elam was absorbed into the Achaemenid empire in the 6th century BC, after falling to the Assyrians when Ashurbanipal sacked the city of Susa. Little is known about the Elamite language, which is not related to any known tongue and still not fully deciphered.
Ghirshman, Roman (1895-1979): CATEGORY: person
DEFINITION: Ukrainian/French developer of archaeological work in Afghanistan and Iran who led a rescue mission in Luristan and carried out excavations at Tepe Sialk near Kashan. After World War II, he headed the French excavations at Susa in southwestern Iran. He also worked at Tello, Giyan, Sialk, and Choga Zanbil.
Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC): SYNONYM: Hammurapi
CATEGORY: person
DEFINITION: The sixth king of the first Amorite dynasty of Babylon and one of the best known of the Mesopotamian kings. In c 1783 BC he began the series of campaigns which extended his empire from Mari and Nineveh to the Persian Gulf. He is best remembered for his Code of Laws which had an emphasis on retaliation and an eye for an eye, but which marked a considerable advance. The Code of Hammurabi also yield detailed evidence on the structure of contemporary society. His 43-year reign saw the final extinction of Sumer as a political power. His empire declined soon after his death, until taken by the Hittites and Kassites c 1595 BC. The lasting achievement of Hammurabi's rule was that the important part of Mesopotamia, which had been in the south from the beginning of the 3rd millennium BC, was shifted to the north, where it remained for more than 1,000 years.
Helgö: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A small island in Lake Malaren in Sweden which was a migration period trading and industrial post in the 1st millennium AD. There are several important artisans' (brooch, bead) houses spanning of the 5th-6th centuries up to the 9th century. Exotic finds include a 7th-century Buddha from Kashmir, a Coptic ladle, a number of gold coins, and Rhenish pots. The molds and debris from the brooch-making provide a great deal of new information about the development of this craft up to the beginning of the Viking period. Helgö was probably abandoned before the end of the 9th century.
horse: CATEGORY: fauna
DEFINITION: A large solid-hoofed herbivorous mammal domesticated since prehistoric times and used as a beast of burden, a draft animal, or for riding. During ancient cold periods, horses also occupied the open vegetation which then existed in northern and western Europe. At some sites, horse bones formed a major part of Palaeolithic hunters' diet. It was widespread in temperate regions during the Pleistocene. With the end of the last glaciation, they disappeared from northwest Europe and became restricted to the temperate grassland and dry shrubland of Central Europe and Asia. In America it was hunted to extinction, to be reintroduced only in recent centuries. In the steppes, the horse was domesticated much later than cattle, sheep, etc. The first evidence for possible manipulation of horse by man occurs in the 4th and 3rd millennia BC in sites of the Tripolye culture and related cultures of the Ukraine. It spread rapidly through the Near East with northern peoples like the Hurri, Hyksos, Kassites, and Aryans, particularly after the invention of the chariot in Syria. The domesticated horse was introduced into Egypt from western Asia in the Second Intermediate Period (1650-1550 BC) at roughly the same time as the chariot. Only later, as a heavier stock was bred, did the practice of riding become important. Its use for commercial draft and general agricultural purposes came much later still. Today's horses all seem to represent one species, Equus caballus.
Isin: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An ancient Mesopotamian city, probably the origin of a large mound near Ad-Diwaniyah, in southern Iraq. An independent dynasty was established at Isin about 2017 BC by Ishbi-Erra, who founded a line of Amorite rulers of whom the first five claimed authority over the city of Ur to the south. The fifth of the rulers of Isin, Lipit-Ishtar (reigned 1934-24 BC), is famous as having published a series of laws in the Sumerian language anticipating the code of Hammurabi by more than a century. About 1794 BC, Isin lost its independence, to Larsa and later to Babylon. The city revived between about 1156 and 1025 under its 2nd dynasty, a number of whose kings exercised authority over Babylonia (southern Iraq) after the Kassite period.
Kandahar: SYNONYM: Qandahar
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A site near the crossing of the Arghandab in southern Afghanistan. The city was included in the Achaemenian empire by Darius I, was taken by Alexander the Great in 329 BC, was surrendered by Seleucus I to Candra Gupta in 305 BC and dignified by a rock inscription in Greek and Aramaic by his grandson Ashoka, and thereafter was successively held by Greco-Bactrians, Parthians, Sakas, Kushans, and Sasanians. The town seems to have been occupied continuously until the 18th century and a large barrow cemetery belongs to the Islamic period.
Kar-Tukulti-Ninurta: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A city across from Assur on the Tigris River that was a cult and royal residence of Middle Assyrian king Tukulti-Ninurta I (1238-1197 BC). This king asserted Assyrian supremacy over King Kashtiliash IV, ruler of the Kassites to the southeast, and subjugated ancient Armenia to the northeast and, for a time, Babylonia. After constructing this new capital, he was slain by his son. There is a large palace complex, a temple of Assur, and domestic architecture.
kudurru: CATEGORY: term; artifact
DEFINITION: An Akkadian term meaning frontier or boundary" for a type of boundary stone used by the Kassites of Mesopotamia. It was a stone block or slab which served as a record of a grant of land made by the king to a favored person. The original kudurrus were kept in temples while clay copies were given to the landowners. On the stone were engraved the clauses of the contract the images or symbols of the gods under whose protection the gift was placed and the curse on those who violated the rights conferred. The kudurrus are important not only for economic and religious reasons but also as almost the only works of art surviving from the period of Kassite rule in Babylonia c 16th-12th centuries BC. The word also means son as in personal names such as Nabu-kudurri-usur (Nebuchadnezzar). The term also applies to the 3rd millennium cuneiform documents in southern Mesopotamia that record land transfers."
Luristan: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A region of the central Zagros mountains on the border of west-central Iran, where a distinctive bronze-working industry flourished 2600-600 BC. It is characterized by horse trappings, utensils, weapons, jewelry, belt buckles, and ritual and votive objects of bronze -- which became most distinctive around 1000 BC. Scholars believe that they were created either by the Cimmerians, a nomadic people from southern Russia who may have invaded Iran in the 8th century BC, or by such related Indo-European peoples as the early Medes and Persians. The immigrants grafted onto a population of Kassites who had already developed a bronze industry around 2000 BC. Important Luristan sites are Tepe Giyan and Tepe Djamshidi, Tepe Ganj Dareh, Tepe Asiab, Tepe Sarab, Tepe Guran, and especially Tepe Sialk. Many bronzes were placed into museum collections as a result of persistent looting of tombs from the 10th-7th centuries BC. Iron also appears at an early date in the Luristan tombs.
Mesopotamia: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Term meaning land between the (two) rivers" the area between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in western Asia (modern Iraq) which encompasses various ancient kingdoms. This land was the home of the world's earliest civilization that of the Sumerians and of the later Babylonian Akkadian and Assyrian civilizations. The chronology of the prehistoric periods is based on radiocarbon dates; the historical periods' chronology is based on a combination of documentary sources and calendrical information. The area was the focus of the development of complex societies until the collapse of Mesopotamia at the end of the 1st millennium BC. The geography of the area allowed the development of husbandry agriculture and permanent settlements. Trade with other regions also flourished irrigation techniques were created as well as pottery and other crafts building methods based on clay bricks were developed and elaborate religious cults evolved. The birth of the city took place in the 4th millennium BC and the invention of writing occurred about 3000 BC -- both in Sumer. Excavations of Sumerian cities (Eridu Kish Uruk Isin Lagash Ur) have yielded thousands of clay tablets inscribed with cuneiform writing. Sargon the king of Akkad fought wars of conquest from the Mediterranean to the Zagros and ruled over history's first empire. The Akkadians were a Semitic people and their Akkadian language became the common vocabulary. The Akkadian rule only about two centuries. After that Ur (c 2112-2004 BC) the parallel dynasties of Isin and Larsa (to c 1763 BC) and then Babylon were the powers. The outstanding ruler of Babylon was Hammurabi (c 1792-1750 BC) who is best known for the code of laws he had inscribed on a great stela. From about 1600-1450 BC Babylonian culture declined as the Hurrians and the Kassites migrated into Mesopotamia and established themselves as rulers. Some time after 1500 BC the Mitanni kingdom extended its rule over much of northern Mesopotamia. The language of the kingdom was Hurrian but its rulers may have been of Aryan origin. Toward the end of the 15th century BC the city of Ashur in northern Mesopotamia a region that came to be known as Assyria began its rise. By 1350 BC the Assyrian empire was well-established and its kings conquered large areas from the Mitanni kingdom the Kassites and the Hittites. Another Babylonian dynasty known as the 2nd dynasty of Isin revived the greatness of the Old Empire under Nebuchadrezzar I (c 1119-1098). Assyria reached new heights of power under Tiglath-pileser I (c 1115-1077) and Ashurnasirpal II (883-859). Between 746-727 BC the Neo-Assyrian empire formed and subdued the Aramaeans who had settled much of Babylonia and then conquered Urartu Syria Israel and other areas. The empire reached its after conquering Egypt in 671 and then the reign of Ashurbanipal (668-627) but its rapid decline came soon after attacks by the Medes Scythians and Babylonians. The Assyrian empire was crushed in 609. Babylon's Nebuchadrezzar II (605-561) is best known for his destruction of Jerusalem in 588/587 and his forcing of thousands of Jews into the "Babylonian exile." The Neo-Babylonian empire ended in 539 when Nabonidus surrendered to Cyrus II of Persia. Under the Persians and Alexander the Great Babylon was a rich capital. The Seleucid kings ruled Mesopotamia from about 312 BC until the middle of the 2nd century BC. In the 2nd century BC Mesopotamia became part of the Parthian empire. Human occupation of Mesopotamia began some time around 6000 BC. The prehistoric cultural stages of Hassuna-Samarra' and Halaf succeeded each other here before there is evidence of settlement in the south (Sumer). There the earliest settlements such as Eridu appear to have been founded around 5000 BC in the late Halaf period. From then on the cultures of the north and south move through a succession of major archaeological periods that in their southern forms are known as Ubaid Warka Protoliterate and Early Dynastic at the end of which -- shortly after 3000 BC -- recorded history begins. The historical periods of the 3rd millennium are in order: Akkad Gutium 3rd dynasty of Ur; those of the 2nd millennium: Isin-Larsa Old Babylonian Kassite and Middle Babylonian; and those of the 1st millennium: Assyrian Neo-Babylonian Achaemenian Seleucid and Parthian."
Middle Assyrian: CATEGORY: culture; chronology
DEFINITION: A period in the history of the Assyrian empire extending from the 14th-12th centuries BC. In the Late Bronze Age, Assyria was dominated by the Mitanni state, but in the 14th century BC, Assyria became dominant. Ashur-uballit I created the first Assyrian empire and initiated the Middle Assyrian period. With the help of the Hittites, he destroyed the dominion of the Aryan Mitanni (a non-Semitic people from upper Iran and Syria) and ravaged Nineveh. Later, allied with the Kassite successors in Babylonia, Ashur-uballit ended Hittite and Hurrian rule. By intermarriage he then influenced the Kassite dynasty and eventually dominated all of Babylonia, thus paving the way for the Neo-Assyrian mastery during the Sargonid dynasty (12th to 7th century). The succeeding Assyrian kings expanded the empire through northern Mesopotamia and the mountains to the north and briefly occupied Babylonia. Several kings weakened Assyria, but then others brought back its dominion. Middle Assyrian is also the name of a form of cuneiform that was used extensively in writing law code and other documents. Middle Assyrian laws were found on clay tablets at Ashur (at the time of Tiglath-pileser I, 1114-1076 BC).
ox-hide ingot: CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: Type of ingot either of copper or tin circulating in the Mediterranean in the early Bronze Age. It was shaped like a stretched ox-hide: roughly rectangular with a projection at each corner. The copper examples weigh about 27kg each and probably come from mines in Cyprus. More than 200 of them were found together with a wealth of other traded objects in a shipwreck dating to the 14th century BC near Kas off the south coast of Turkey.
Qala'at al Bahrain: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Tell site on the northern coast of Bahrain with an archaeological sequence for the central Persian Gulf region from the mid-3rd millennium BC to medieval times. The Barbar culture had seals, sealings, Indus weights, and cuneiform texts. It was followed by a Kassite period settlement and towns of the 1st millennium BC, including a Sassanian fortress.
Satingpra: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Area on the east coast of Thailand with sites from the later 1st and early 2nd millennia AD, including Kok Moh, possibly associated with Langkasuka.
Sialk, Tepe: SYNONYM: Siyalk
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Important tell site near Kashan on the plateau of Iran with a six major phases from the Neolithic to the Iron Age. They are: I, dating to the 6th-5th millennia BC, a simple village of recently settled farmers who used pottery painted with basketry designs and copper only in the form of hammered ornaments; II, a village of mudbrick architecture with very fine pottery elaborately painted with stylized animals; III, pottery made by wheel and kiln and more use of copper; IV, around 3000 BC, the site fell under the influence of Susa and Mesopotamia, the painted ware replaced by monochrome gray or red, much jewelry, and the introduction of proto-Elamite writing. This phase was followed by a break in occupation and the resettlement -- represented in cemetery A -- is often attributed to intruders from the northeast, who are thought to have been responsible for the introduction of Indo-European languages to this area. The final occupation of Tepe Sialk, represented in cemetery B and dated to the late 2nd-early 1 millennium BC, saw the first use of iron. Around 9th-8th century BC, the site was destroyed and abandoned.
Sundaland: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The enlarged Southeast Asian continental area which was created when sea levels dropped in periods of glaciation. Much of western Indonesia was then connected to the mainland. Until about 7000 BC, the seas were some 150 feet (50 m) lower than they are now, and the area west of Makassar Strait consisted of a web of watered plains that is called Sundaland. These land connections may account for similarities in early human development observed in the Hoabinhian age, which lasted from about 13,000-5000/4000 BC. The stone tools across Southeast Asia during this period show a remarkable degree of similarity in design and development.
Susa: SYNONYM: Susiana, Shushan, Seleucia
CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: Major city of western Asia, in Khuzistan, Iran, with its first four phases paralleling those of Mesopotamia (Ubaid, Uruk, Jemdet Nasr, and Early Dynastic). It was the capital of Elam in Akkadian times (3rd, 2nd, 1st millennium BC) and again in the first as a capital of the Achaemenid empire. Susa controlled important east-west trade routes and was the end of the Achaemenid Royal Road from Lydian Sardis. Darius built the citadel c 500 BC. The tell is made up of four separate mounds: 1) the acropolis, which has produced most of the prehistoric material from the site; 2) the Royal City which has important Elamite remains of the 2nd millennium BC; 3) the Apadana, with a large, impressive Achaemenid palace; and 4) the Artisans' Town, of the Achaemenid period and later. It continued under the name of Seleucia after being captured by Alexander the Great in 331 BC; it later passed to the Parthians and Sassanians. Susa's characteristic fine ceramic ware had geometric motifs painted in dark colors onto a light background. Among the more important finds of Susa are the victory stela of Naram-Sin (Akkadian period), many Kassite kudurru, and the law code of Hammurabi (Old Babylonian period), which had been brought to Susa from Babylon after an Elamite raid. Susa was traditionally associated with Anshan (Tepe Malyan) in Fars.
Tshikapa: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A mining area and village in Zaire on the Kasai River where Early Iron Age pottery vessels of Urewe type were found in an undated context and without further archaeological associations. The discovery has been used as evidence for an early spread of Early Iron Age industries along the southern fringes of the equatorial forest.

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