Archaeology Wordsmith

Results for Orange:

Fine Orange Pottery: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: fine orange pottery
CATEGORY: ceramics
DEFINITION: A high-quality orange ware, often decorated with incised, molded, or black-painted patterns; a late Classic (and post-Classic) pottery type of the lowland Maya area of Mesoamerica. Found at sites under the influence of Teotihuacán, it comes from the Tabasco-Campeche region (Usumacinta drainage).
Orange: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Roman Arausio
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A colonia in southern France, established under Augustus' rule (27 BC-14 AD) which became a prosperous city. In the pre-Roman period, the area was occupied by rich, powerful Celtic tribes who appreciated its strategic position on the Rhône River. The semicircular theater, probably built during the reign of Augustus, is the best preserved of its kind. The tiered benches, which rise on the slopes of a slight hill, originally seated 1100. The magnificent wall at the back of the theater is 334 feet (102 m) long and 124 feet (38 m) high. An imposing statue of Augustus, about 12 feet (3.7 m) high, stands in the wall's central niche. Orange also has the Triumphal Arch of Tiberius (c 20 AD) that is one of the largest built by the Romans; standing c 61 feet (19 m) high, its sculptures show the victories of Julius Caesar. A lime kiln near the theater has produced fragments which document various local land surveys and, in particular, describe the terms of confiscation and redistribution that were applied at the time of the original founding of the colonia. In the 5th century, Arausio was pillaged by the Visigoths.
Thin Orange Pottery: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Thin Orange ware
CATEGORY: ceramics
DEFINITION: A thin-walled, orange-fired ware with a distinctive mica schist temper and a decoration of incised and dotted patterns of Mesoamerica. It was introduced in the late Pre-Classic Period and widely traded in Mesoamerica during the Classic period. It has been found in Colima, Jalisco, Nayarit, Kaminaljuyú, Copán, Monte Albán, and Teotihuacán. It is regarded as evidence of central Mexican influence, although its probable point of origin is the Valley of Puebla. It should not be confused with the early Post-Classic Fine Orange ware.
amber: CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: Fossilized pine resin, a transparent yellow, orange, or reddish-brown material from coniferous trees. It is amorphous, having a specific gravity of 1.05-1.10 and hardness of 2-2.5 on the Mohs scale, and has two varieties -- gray and yellow. Amber was appreciated and popular in antiquity for its beauty and its supposed magical properties. The southeast coast of the Baltic Sea is its major source in Europe, with lesser sources near the North Sea and in the Mediterranean. Amber is washed up by the sea. There is evidence of a strong trade in amber up the Elbe, Vistula, Danube, and into the Adriatic Sea area. The trade began in the Early Bronze Age and expanded greatly with the Mycenaeans and again with the Iron Age peoples of Italy. The Phoenicians were also specialist traders in amber. The soft material was sometimes carved for beads and necklaces.
Apollo 11 Cave: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A cave in southern Namibia near the confluence of the Orange and Great Fish Rivers which has a long sequence of industries dating from the Middle Stone Age. There is a series of detached rock slabs with rock paintings dating between 28,450-26,350 years old, among the oldest dated paintings in the world and the oldest dated rock art of southern Africa. Later horizons in the Apollo 11 Cave show a scraper-based industry in the 13th-8th millennia BC that is related to the Albany industry of southern Cape Province. Microlithic findings begin in the 8th millennium.
Aztec: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Mexica, Tenochcas
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: The last pre-Columbian civilization to enter the Valley of Mexico after the collapse of the Toltec civilization in c 12 AD, who built a magnificent capital at Tenochtitlán and were later conquered by the Spaniards (1521). They called themselves the Mexica or Tenochca and were the dominant political group of the Late Post-Classic Period. The people spoke Nahuatl. Their origin is obscure, partly because of the deliberate destruction of their own records, but tradition says that in 1193 AD the last of seven Chichimec tribes left Aztlan , a mythical birthplace somewhere north or west of Mexico, and filtered south. For a while they lived around Lake Texococo, but in 1345 they were allowed to found Tenochtitlán (under present-day Mexico City) on some unoccupied islands. By 1428 Tenochtitlán, Texococo, and Tlacopan formed an independent state which controlled most of present-day Mexico from the desert zone in the north to Oaxaca in the south, with extensions as far as the Guatemalan border -- all through military expansion. By inclination and training the Aztecs were militaristic, and a person's status depended on his success as a warrior. The chief god of the Aztecs, Huitzilopochtli, was a war god who required the blood of sacrificial victims, and only constant warfare supplied the altar of the god. Human sacrifice was necessary also to ensure the daily rising of the sun. Other major deities were Huitzilpotchtli (the warrior god and chief deity of Tenochtitlan), Texcatlipoca (god of night, death and destruction), Xipe Totec (god of spring and renewal), and Quetzacoatl, the plumed serpent (god of self-sacrifice and inventor of agriculture and the calendar). Tenochtitlán became a great imperial city, so large that it could not be self-sufficient but had to rely on tributes from its provinces. Luxury goods and necessities were brought to the city, and craftsmen produced jewelry, turquoise mosaics, featherwork, and carved stone. Mold-made clay figurines were common, and the black-on-orange pottery was decorated with geometrical designs and stylized creatures. Little architecture or painting survived the Spanish conquest of 1521. Copies of several books have been preserved (as the Dresden Codex). Aztec society was set in a clearly defined hierarchical class system. At the top was the ruling class (pipil) from whom and by whom the emperors were chosen. The mass of the population were freeman (machuale) and under them were the serfs (mayeques) and then at the bottom the slaves. Most people were of the landholding group called the calpulli, which had its own internal hierarchy. Change of social class was possible through state service in the military and sometimes through merchant activity. The merchants (pochteca) served as early-reconnaissance and espionage groups. The arrival of the Spaniards and the fall of Tenochtitlán after a 90-day siege marked the end of Aztec dominance.
Bambata Cave: CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: A large cave of southwestern Zimbabwe, where excavations have revealed a long sequence of occupation over the past 50,000 years. The site gives its name to a stone industry and pottery type, but they are widely separated periods. There are rock paintings on the cave walls and sheep bones, found in the same archaeological levels as pottery, have been dated to 150 BC. The Bambata industry, dated between the 50th-20th millennia BC, used prepared cores to produce (unretouched) flakes for scrapers and slender unifacial or bifacial lances or spear points. Its distribution extended north to Zambia and south to the Orange Free State and perhaps the Cape. Bambata pottery ware is known only from contexts of the 1st millennium ad in Zimbabwe. It is elaborately decorated with stamped designs.
Ch'ü-chia-ling culture: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: Neolithic culture of central China in the middle and lower Yangtze River valley in the 4th and 3rd millennia. It followed the Yang-Shao culture and preceded the Lung-Shan culture and shared a significant number of traits with the Ta-hsi culture. There was cultivation of rice, flat polished axes, ring-footed vessels, goblets with sharply angled profiles, ceramic whorls, and black pottery with designs painted in red after firing. Characteristic Ch'ü-chia-ling ceramic objects include eggshell-thin goblets and bowls painted with black or orange designs; double-waisted bowls; tall, ring-footed goblets and serving stands; and many styles of tripods. The whorls suggest a thriving textile industry. The chronological distribution of ceramic features suggests a transmission from Ta-hsi to Ch'ü-chia-ling, but the precise relationship between the two cultures is not known.
Cucuteni-Tripolye: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A Neolithic culture of southeastern Europe, distributed throughout the Ukraine (Tripolye culture) and Moldova and Romania (Cucuteni culture), which arose about 3000 BC. The type site of the Cucuteni is in the Siret valley of Romania and the type site of the Tripolye is near Kiev in Ukraine. The Cucuteni is divided into stages: Pre-Cucuteni, Cucuteni A, AB and B, dating c 4200-3000 BC. Tripolye is divided into five phases -- A, B1, B2, C1 and C2 -- the latest dating to the full Early Bronze Age in the 3rd millennium BC. The late Cucuteni-Tripolye phase is regarded as the local climax of Neolithic cultural development. They produced fine wares (red or orange and was decorated with curvilinear designs painted or grooved on the surface) on a large scale and long chipped stone blades. They also mastered metallurgical techniques such as alloying, casting, and welding. There was a subsistence economy depending on fruits and the earliest recorded domestication in Europe of the horse. The villages consisted of long, rectangular houses, though the Tripolye people practiced shifting agriculture and frequently moved.
elouera: CATEGORY: lithics
DEFINITION: A backed flake with triangular sections, like orange segments, which have polish from worked wood along the straight edge. These artifacts are part of the Australian Small Tool Tradition.
Florisbad: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A spring deposit in the Orange Free State, South Africa, which preserved a human cranium of 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 Florisbad specimen is dated to c 50,000 bc (late Middle Pleistocene) and appears to be associated with a Middle Stone Age industry of Pietersburg type.
Gallinazo: CATEGORY: ceramics; culture
DEFINITION: A pottery style and culture of the first phase of the Early Intermediate Period, flourishing c 200 BC-200 AD on the north central coast of Peru (Virú Valley). Together with the slightly earlier Salinar, the Gallinazo culture is seen as transitional from Chavin-associated groups, such as Cupisnique, to the rise of the Moche state. It is related to the contemporary Recuay style of the highlands. The best-known Gallinazo pottery is black-on-orange negative resist decorated ware. The type site appears to have been a ceremonial center with a nucleus of adobe mounds and walled courtyards. Residential apartment complexes are scattered over an area around the center; it was abandoned some time after the rise of Moche.
Gaul: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Gallia
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A Roman province formed by modern-day France and parts of Belgium, western Germany, northern Italy, and Switzerland. Cities were Nimes, Autun, Arles, Orange, Trier, and Frejus. Caesar's conquests (58-51 BC) and Augustus's organization (30 BC-14 AD) resulted in four Gallic provinces: southern or 'senatorial' Narbonensis, the 'imperial' Aquitania, Lugdunensis, and Belgica. The region was inhabited by the ancient Gauls, a Celtic race, who lived in an agricultural society were divided into several tribes ruled by a landed class.
Glevum ware: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Severn Valley ware
CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: Burnished wares mainly in the form of bowls, jars, and tankards in a color range from creamy-buff to orange-red made at various centers along the Severn. Kiln sites are known at Malvern and Shepton Mallet, Somerset. It was at one time known as Glevum ware, since it was first recognized at Gloucester. It is found all over the Severn Valley and small quantities reached the western part of Hadrian's Wall.
Kamares Cave: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Kamares
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A sacred cave of the Minoans on the slopes of Mount Ida overlooking Phaestos in Crete. The artifacts include Middle Minoan polychrome pottery, 2000-1550 BC, painted in red, orange, and white on black ground, called Kamares ware.
Mazapan ware: CATEGORY: ceramics
DEFINITION: A ceramic style developing out of Coyotlatelco and first appearing in association with major architecture at Tula, Mexico in the post-Classic Toltec phase (9th-12th century AD). The orange-on-buff (or red-on-buff) pottery was decorated by straight or wavy parallel lines produced by multiple brushes.
Monte Albán: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A major ceremonial center of the Zapotec people in Oaxaca, Mexico, built around 900 BC on top of an artificially flattened mountain. Monte Albán (I = 900-300 BC) was probably created to serve as the capital of the entire valley, which had previously been divided among several states. It was an immense complex of monumental construction, with a huge plaza (300 x 200 m) dominated by three central mounds. The plaza was flanked on the east and west by temples, pyramids, and platform mounds; on the northern and southern extremities are more complexes of monumental building, including a ball court. There are also underground passageways. By the end of Period I, the city had between 10,000- 20,000 inhabitants living in houses on hill slope terraces around a nucleus of ceremonial and governmental buildings. Hieroglyphic writing was in use, with bar-and-dot numerals, and dates were expressed in terms of the calendar round. More than 300 carved slabs ('danzantes') depict naked and contorted figures who may be captives, and inscriptions definitely recording conquests occur soon afterwards. In Late I/Early II, the city was surrounded by a defense wall. Period I includes the appearance of Grey Ware and Olmec-influenced monumental art. Period II is characterized by contact with Maya lowland centers and later, by the increasing influence of Teotihuacán. Period IIIA (the 3rd-5th centuries AD) is marked by increased contact with Teotihuacán, reflected in pottery (thin orange ware, cylindrical tripod vases), tomb frescoes, Talud-Tablero architecture, and stela inscriptions. Monte Albán reached the height of its power in Period IIIB, 500-900 AD, during which elaborate funerary urns in Grey Ware make their appearance and when the site reached its peak population of 50-60,000 people. Most of the surviving buildings belong to this time. During Monte Albán IV, 900-1521 AD, building ceased. After 900, the centers of power moved elsewhere and Monte Albán was considerably depopulated. It was essentially abandoned. In Period V, Monte Albán was of only secondary importance as a city and a political force. Mixtec art styles make their appearance in the valley and Monte Albán was used as a cemetery, with earlier Zapotec tombs reused for the Mixtec dead. One of the richest discoveries in ancient Mexico was Tomb 7, with over 500 precious offerings in Mixtec style gold and silver ornaments, fine stonework, and a series of bones carved with hieroglyphic and calendrical inscriptions.
ochre: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: ocher
CATEGORY: geology
DEFINITION: Soft varieties of iron oxide (hematite, limonite, goethite)which were ground and used with other materials in prehistory to make pigment. Ochre occurs naturally and was much used for coloring matter, as in cave art, pottery painting, and personal decoration. Red ochre was certainly used ceremonially to give an impression of life to the corpse during funerary rites. There are many records from the Upper Palaeolithic onwards of ochre staining of skeletons. It was mixed with earth, clay, blood, or grease to make the paint. Ochre was used as crayons or powder in Aurignacian period for paintings on walls of caves or on bone or stone artifacts. It was mainly yellow, brown, black, orange, and red (hematite).
Orangia: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Middle Stone Age site in the Orange River valley in the extreme south of the Orange Free State, South Africa. The artifacts are analogous to those of the Pietersburg complex to the north. It is the type site of an early Middle Stone Age Pietersburg-like flake-blade industry. It is now inundated by a dam.
oxidizing atmosphere: CATEGORY: ceramics
DEFINITION: A term used in relation to pottery technology, describing certain firing conditions involving a gaseous atmosphere in which an oxidation reaction (the oxidation of solids) occurs. If a kiln is being fired with good, dry fuel and with plenty of draft, the carbon in the fuel is converted into carbon dioxide, and there is oxygen in the atmosphere. This is the oxidizing atmosphere which causes pottery to be fired to a red or orange color whether it has a slip or not. The opposite phenomenon, a reducing atmosphere, produces black pottery. Much pottery, however, varies in color over its surface caused by changing conditions during the firing process.
Patch Grove ware: CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: Kind of pottery with a rough grey core and an orange or brown surface, found mainly in northwest Kent and Surrey, usually in the form of wide-mouthed storage jars and with notched decoration on the shoulder. It is in a native British tradition that lasted into the 2nd century AD.
Pevensey ware: CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: The products of a small local factory near Pevensey, Sussex, which made imitations of Oxfordshire and New Forest type pottery in a very hard orange-red fabric and a deep red color coat.
Qujialing: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: [Ch'ü-chia-ling]
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Type site in Jingshan Xian, Hubei province, China, of a rice-growing Neolithic culture of the middle Yangtze region. Radiocarbon dates from various sites range from c 3100-2650 BC. Qujialing's closest affiliations seem to be with the east-coast Neolithic cultures of the lower Ynazi. During the 4th and 3rd millennia BC, the Ta-hsi and Ch'ü-chia-ling cultures shared a significant number of traits, including rice production, ring-footed vessels, goblets with sharply angled profiles, ceramic whorls, and black pottery with designs painted in red after firing. Characteristic Ch'ü-chia-ling ceramic objects not generally found in Ta-hsi sites include eggshell-thin goblets and bowls painted with black or orange designs; double-waisted bowls; tall, ring-footed goblets and serving stands; and many styles of tripods. There are indications of a thriving textile industry. The chronological distribution of ceramic features suggests a transmission from Ta-hsi to Ch'ü-chia-ling, but the precise relationship between the two cultures has been much debated.
red polished ware: CATEGORY: ceramics
DEFINITION: A fine red ware with red or orange slip that is highly burnished. It was made in southern Asia in the first three centuries AD. It is often thought to be an imitation of the Roman Arrentine ware. The characteristic and most widely dispersed type of pottery of the Roman Empire was the red, polished Arretine ware. Most Inca pottery is also red polished ware.
San Lorenzo Tenochtitlan / San Lorenzo: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The oldest-known Olmec center, located in Veracruz, Mexico, and revealing information on Olmec origins. It was a large nucleated village flourishing during the Early Formative. The first phase of occupation (Ojochi, c 1800-1650 BC) left no architectural traces, but during the next period (Bajío, 1650-1550 BC) a start was made on the artificial plateau with lateral ridges forming the base of most subsequent structures. The Chicharras phase (1550-1450 BC) foreshadows true Olmec in its pottery, figurines, and perhaps also in stone-carving. The San Lorenzo phase (1450-1100 BC) marks the Olmec climax at the site, whose layout then resembled that of La Venta. The principal features of the site are a large platform mound and a cluster of smaller mounds surrounding what may be the earliest ball court in Mesoamerica; more than 200 house mounds are clustered around these central features. A system of carved stone drains underlying the site is a unique structural feature. Around 900 BC, the stone monuments were mutilated and buried upon the center's collapse. La Venta then came to power. The monuments weighed as much as 44 tons and were carved from basalt from the Cerro Cintepec, a volcanic flow in the Tuxtla Mountains about 50 air miles to the northwest. It is believed that the stones were somehow dragged down to the nearest navigable stream and from there transported on rafts up the Coatzacoalcos River to the San Lorenzo area. The amount of labor involved must have been enormous, indicating a complex social system to ensure the task's completion. Most striking are the colossal heads human portraits on a stupendous scale, the largest of which is 9 feet high. After a short hiatus, the site was reoccupied by a group whose culture still shows late Olmec affinities (Palangana phase, 800-450 BC), but was again abandoned until 900 AD when it was settled by early post-Classic (Villa Alta) people who used plumbate and fine orange pottery. The collapse of San Lorenzo c 1150/1100 BC was abrupt and violent. The population was forced to do its agricultural work well outside the site, which may have contributed to the center's collapse.
Severn Valley ware: CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: Burnished wares mainly in the form of bowls, jars, and tankards in a color range from creamy-buff to orange-red made at various centers along the Severn. Kiln sites are known at Malvern and Shepton Mallet, Somerset. It was at one time known as Glevum ware, since it was first recognized at Gloucester. It is found all over the Severn Valley and small quantities reached the western part of Hadrian's Wall.
Southern Highveld Settlements: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Iron Age farms of the early 2nd millennium AD in Orange Free State and Transvaal, South Africa. There are extensive grasslands on which stone walls enclosed cattle barns and courtyards around houses. They are classified as types (N, V, Z) and associated with the Moloko Complex.
Teotihuacán: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Very important site north of Mexico City, at its peak c 450-650 AD the largest and most powerful city in Mesoamerica. It had its beginnings as one of a number of small agricultural settlements around the shores of ancient Lake Texcoco. Teotihuacán flourished by c 300/200 BC and by 100 AD, it had about 40,000 inhabitants. Archaeological work has provided more information about Teotihuacán than about any comparable Mexican site. Teotihuacán maintained extensive political and trade contacts with lowland Mexico, and is famed for its enormous public buildings and pyramids. At its heart is a complex of magnificent architecture including the massive Pyramid of the Sun and Pyramid of the Moon, the Cuidadela (probably an administrative center), and the Great Compound (probably a market place); there are no ball courts. The structures are distributed along a central roadway known as the Street of the Dead. After the destruction of Cuicuilco, Teotihuacan expanded and people were housed in apartment compounds which exhibit some social differentiation. Many of the inhabitants were craftsmen, and some 500 workshop sites have been identified. Four-fifths of those sites were devoted to obsidian working. Teotihuacán controlled the central highlands of Mexico, and was in contact with all the principal centers of civilization (Monte Albán, Tikal, etc.) as far as Belize. The influence of Teotihuacán during the Early Classic was considerable and most major centers have some Teotihuacán forms. Characteristic of Teotihuacán influence are Talud-Tablero architecture, images of Tlaloc, cylindrical tripod vases, Thin Orange Ware, murals, and stylized human face masks. There is very little massive stone sculpture except as architectural embellishments. The end of Teotihuacan came fairly suddenly. A decline in its influence at other sites was evident by c 600, but the city itself was not destroyed until 750. There is much evidence of burning from that time, indicating that the city may have been sacked --possibly by the Chichimecs. The city was never rebuilt, but a small population remained in the ruined city for more than a hundred years.
theater: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: theatre
CATEGORY: structure
DEFINITION: Building or space in which a performance is given to an audience, an important adjunct of most Greek and Roman towns. In ancient Greece, where theatre began in the 5th century BC, the theatres of the classical period were constructed between two hills (essentially D-shaped) so that the audience sat in a tiered semicircular arrangement facing the orchestra circle, in which most of the action took place. (The name amphitheater should be used only of a circular or oval structure in which the seating completely surrounds the stage, as in the Colosseum). Greek theater consisted of two main elements: the orchestra, a space for acting and dancing which was usually circular; and the auditorium, a spectators' area, which was probably no more than a hillside or slope originally. Later, the skene (originally perhaps only a temporary structure for the convenience of performers) was added. Well-preserved examples survive at Epidaurus, Pompeii, and Orange.

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