Archaeology Wordsmith

           

Results for aging:

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aging

CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: Storing prepared ceramic material (as a wet plastic clay body) to improve its working properties by thorough wetting of particles, slow compression, bacterial action (souring), and other processes

aging of skeletal material

CATEGORY: technique
DEFINITION: The age at death may be estimated from ancient skeletal material in a number of ways. (1) Epiphyseal fusion. A growing bone consists of a central part (diaphysis) and the ends (ephiyses). At adulthood, the epiphyses fuse to the diaphysis and the average at which this occurs is known for man and most domestic animals. The stage of epiphyseal fusion may therefore be used as a guide to the age at death. (2) Dental eruption. The average age for each stage of the eruption of teeth in man and most domestic animals is well-established. The state of dental eruption may therefore be used to estimate the age at death. (3) Dental attrition. Given a standard diet, teeth wear roughly at the same rate and tables of rate of wear have been established for man. For other animals, this method must be calibrated by dental eruption. (4) Dental microstructure. The counting of incremental structures in teeth may allow estimation of age at death. (5) Pubic symphysis. In man, the joint surfaces of the pubic symphysis change progressively with age and can be used to determine the age of men at death. (6) Antlers. In deer, the development of antlers is roughly related to age.

foraging system

CATEGORY: term
DEFINITION: The movement of people to search for resources.

optimal foraging theory

CATEGORY: term
DEFINITION: The theory that an animal's efficient foraging behavior should maximize an animal's net rate of food intake. It is a theoretical perspective used in evolutionary biology that attempts to develop a set of models to apply to a broad range of animal species based on theories of optimal net rates of energy gain.

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caravanserai

SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: khan; caravansary
CATEGORY: structure
DEFINITION: In the Middle East, a public building that served an unfurnished inn or staging post for sheltering caravans and other travelers. It was usually constructed outside the walls of a town and was a quandrangular enclosure with massive walls with small windows near the top and small air holes near the bottom. A heavy-doored gateway was the entrance and it was secured from within by massive iron chains. Refreshments were available to the travelers.

Cheops (fl early 26th c BC)

SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Kheops, Khufu, Khufwey, Khnomkhufwey
CATEGORY: person
DEFINITION: The second king of the 4th Dynasty (c 2575-2465 BC) of Egypt who erected the Great Pyramid of Giza. It is the largest of the three pyramids, the length of each side at the base averaging 755 3/4 feet (230.4 m) and its original height being 481 2/5 feet (147 m). Cheops/Khufu reigned c 2570 BC. His sons, Djedefre (Redjedef) and Chephren (Khafre), succeeded him.

chinampa

SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: chinampas; floating garden
CATEGORY: geography; term
DEFINITION: A system of cultivation on small, stationary, artificial islands made of vegetation and mud in shallow freshwater lakes, created in the Valley of Mexico (Xochimilco). These very fertile fields were created by massive Aztec reclamation projects and consisted of little islands, each averaging 6 to 10 m (19.7 to 32.8 feet) wide and 100 to 200 m (30.5 to 656.2 feet) long, with fertilization from the organic wastes in mud and aquatic life. Periodic renewal of this mud layer created a permanent supply of fertile soil so that as one crop was harvested it could be immediately replaced with another. Much of Aztecs' Tenochtitlan utilized such intensively farmed, reclaimed land. The champas were normally separated by a system of canals which allowed both access and water circulation.

ecotone

CATEGORY: flora
DEFINITION: A transition zone between habitats of two different plant communities, such as forest and grassland; the dividing line between two different ecological communities. It has some of the characteristics of each bordering community and often contains species not found in the overlapping communities. An ecotone may exist in a broad or narrow area. The influence of the two bordering communities on each other is known as the edge effect. An ecotonal area often has a higher density of organisms of one species and a greater number of species than are found in either individual community. Some organisms need this transitional area for activities such as courtship, nesting, or foraging for food.

fishbone analysis

CATEGORY: technique
DEFINITION: The study of the remains of fish on archaeological sites, in the form of bones, otoliths, and scales. The latter only survive occasionally in anaerobic conditions, while otoliths have not, to date, been frequently recorded. Fish have markedly different skeletons from mammals. Many fishbones are so small that they appear only in sieving and the bones commonly preserved are the jaws and some other head bones, and the vertebrae. They usually accumulate in refuse deposits and may be interpreted in terms of diet and fishing on the site or in the area that supplied it. Identification of species through comparison with modern fishbones is becoming easier as larger collections of comparative material are built up. When a species has been identified it can lead to evidence for the hydrological conditions around the site; also, the occurrence of the remains of marine species on an inland site has implications for the movement of groups or a trade in fish. A combination of species identification and aging of fish through study of the otoliths can lead to assumptions about the seasonal occupation of certain settlement sites and the subsistence economy of the associated groups.

Kel'taminar

SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Kel'teminar
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: Culture complex at Khoresmia and Kyzyl Kum in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenia. The foraging-herding culture made pottery, some worked copper and turquoise, and existed c 5th-3rd millennia BC (Mesolithic to the early Bronze Age). The culture may have affected the subsequent Srubnaya and Andronovo cultures.

palette

CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: A small slab of stone for grinding and mixing substances like paint or cosmetics. A series from early Egypt, as that of Narmer, is important since the relief decoration provides valuable evidence on the art and history of the country at the beginning of Dynastic times, c 3000 BC. The term is also used to describe scribal palettes. Cosmetic/ceremonial palettes were usually of siltstone (greywacke) and are found in grave goods as early as Badarian period (c 5500-4000 BC). Scribal palettes, long rectangular pieces of wood or stone (averaging 30 cm long, 6 cm wide), had a shallow central groove or slot to hold reed brushes or pens and circular depressions for cakes of pigment. The order of colors was white, then yellows, reds, blues, to black.

papyrus

SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Cyperus papyrus
CATEGORY: flora; language
DEFINITION: A reed of the sedge family growing in Mediterranean lands, particularly Egypt along the banks of the Nile. It is the flexible writing material produced from the plant. By splitting and opening out its stems, laying them together in two layers at right angles to each other, then beating them together, activating the plant's natural starch to form an adhesive -- an inexpensive writing material was created. Examples preserved by the dry climate of Egypt and other regions in tombs, caves, etc., have yielded invaluable evidence on the ancient history of the area. 'Papyrus' is the Latin form, from which our word 'paper' derives. Its stems were also bound together in bundles together to make lightweight boats. Used first in Egypt, it later replaced clay tablets in the Near East when the Aramaic alphabet replaced the cuneiform script. Unlike engraved clay tablets, papyrus allowed a light, cursive script, thus encouraging the spread of a technique that was originally very restricted and specialized. The earliest papyrus dates to the 1st Dynasty, the latest to the Islamic Period, when the plant died out in Egypt.

Pitted-Ware culture

CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: In Sweden and Finland, a series of foraging groups during the 3rd-1st millennia BC, part of the circumpolar complex of Holocene foragers. Amber ornaments were made widely and communities depended on seals and pigs for subsistence.

Preceramic Period

CATEGORY: culture; chronology
DEFINITION: The earliest of a seven-period chronological construction used in Peruvian archaeology, c 9000-1800 BC, starting with the first human occupation and ending with the introduction of ceramic artifacts. It is usually subdivided into six periods and is characterized by a variety of subsistence patterns and by a lack of ceramics. The first two periods (up to 8000 BC) represent a subsistence based on hunting. The third period, c 8000-6000 BC is seen as transitional from hunting to hunting and gathering. Period four c 6000-4000 BC had cyclical, seasonal migration. In Preceramic V, c 4000-2500 BC, the lomas dried up and people tended to be sedentary; agriculture supplied an increasing part of the diet. Large habitation sites, ceremonial centers and agriculture appear increasingly in Preceramic VI c 2500-1800 BC. There are lithic complexes in the Early Preceramic, followed by an Archaic Period with foraging populations and the beginning of domestic and ceremonial architecture. The Preceramic was followed by the Initial Period.

Satruper Moor

CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Region in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, with sites c 3500-3000 BC, the transition from foraging to sedentary lifestyle in northern Europe. Some of the sites are of the Ertebolle/Ellerbek culture with pointed-base pots.

seasoned

CATEGORY: term
DEFINITION: Pertaining to maturing or aging by exposure to certain conditions or treatment as with wood or bone.

tell or tepe

SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: tell mound; tel (Hebrew); choga, tepe (Persian); hüyük (Turkish)
CATEGORY: feature
DEFINITION: A large mound formed by superimposed habitation layers, particularly in the Middle East (Near East). Tells are the result of continuous habitation over a long time span, and are important ancient settlement sites. Tells are normally found only in regions where buildings were of mud-brick, a material of limited life and too plentiful to be worth salvaging when it collapses. This, coupled with the accumulation of domestic refuse, can build up vast mounds 100 feet/30 meters +. The tells of the Middle East offer valuable stratigraphic evidence. Such mounds incorporate other settlement refuse, graves, and many other materials. [Site names beginning with Tell" in this dictionary are alphabetized under the second part of the name.]"

Timor

CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An island of the Malay Archipelago, eastern Indonesia, possibly a staging point for early migrations to Australia. Timor and neighboring Flores had possible Pleistocene industries. There is some evidence of early Pleistocene land-bridges reaching the island from Java. The earliest archaeological dated remains come from caves in east Timor, where flake industries date from c 11,000 BC and Neolithic cultures appear after 3000 BC.

trend surface analysis

CATEGORY: technique
DEFINITION: A method used to make a generalized map from observed data and used to highlight the main features and important trends of a geographic distribution. Archaeological observations mapped are discontinuous and at isolated points and therefore must be used to give information over a wider area. This is done either by averaging the values at a number of points to produce a general value or by a form of linear regression analysis which finds the contours which best fit the observations plotted on the map. The map produced then shows a general trend of the distribution, along with localized fluctuations. The technique is most useful for displaying archaeological data in a simplified and generalized form, making it easier to examine and explain the broad regional trends and the local variations. It can be applied to several different artifact distributions at the regional level, and has also been used to describe the distribution of artifact types within a site.

tribe

CATEGORY: term
DEFINITION: An egalitarian society generally comprised of a centrally organized group of bands. Its kinship is more complex than that of the band, and its economy is often agricultural rather than foraging, though they also include nomadic pastoral groups whose economy is based on exploitation of livestock. Individual communities tend to be integrated into the larger society through kinship ties. Political dominance gained through achieved leadership. Tribes may be aggregated into higher-order clusters, called nations.

Winckelmann, Johann Joachim (1717-1768)

CATEGORY: person
DEFINITION: German scholar who was an early contributor to the development of archaeology and art history. His work on the art recovered from Herculaneum and Pompeii was a move towards a study of artifacts as historical documents. His History of the Art of Antiquity" (1763-1764) covering Classical sculpture and the art of Egypt and Etruria. It was the basis for stylistic development. Winckelmann's visits to Pompeii and Herculaneum led to his "open letters exposing amateur treasure seekers and encouraging archaeology to become more professional and competent. In Germany, Winckelmann is regarded as the founder of classical archaeology.