Archaeology Wordsmith

Results for cattle:

cattle: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: live stock
CATEGORY: fauna
DEFINITION: Domesticated bovine farm animals of the genus Bos raised for their meat or milk or for draft purposes. Wild cattle or aurochs (Bos primigenius) were widely distributed and are beautifully portrayed in Palaeolithic cave art and present from the Middle Pleistocene. The earliest evidence of domestication (Bos taurus) comes from northern Greece before 6000 BC (Nea Nikomedeia in Macedonia, Argissa in Thessaly and Knossos in Crete) and from c 5800 BC at Catal Huyuk (Anatolia). Thereafter, different breeds were developed, notably B. longifrons in southwest Asia and Europe, and the humped zebu, B. indica, in India. The last record of Bos primigenius was 1627 AD in Poland, but it was uncommon long before then.
Afanasievo culture: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A Neolithic culture of the Yenisei valley of southern Siberia. The people, who were stock breeders and hunters, probably moved into the area in the late 3rd millennium BC. Excavations uncovered burials under kurgans (low mounds), surrounded by circular stone walls. There was stamped dentate pottery, stone, bone, and bronze tools, and some copper ornaments with the burials. The Afanasievo people were the first food-producers in the area, breeding cattle, horses, and sheep, but also practiced hunting. The Afanasievo were succeeded by the Andronovo culture in the mid-2nd millennium BC.
Amri: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A site in the Indus Valley in Pakistan, probably dating to the early 3rd millennium. It was the first site to be recognized as belonging to the Early Harappan Period when excavated by Majumdar in 1929. Its name has been given to a style of hand- and wheel-made painted pottery found in its Chalcolithic levels and on tells over much of Sind and up into the hills of Baluchistan. These tall globular beakers of fine buff ware are painted with geometric designs in black between red horizontal bands. Chert and some copper were used for tools and the architecture was in mud-brick. Fractional burial was the practice for the dead. Periods I and II represent the pre-Harappan settlement of agricultural farmers, who kept cattle, sheep, goat and donkey, but also hunted (or herded) gazelle. In the later part of Period II Harappan ceramics appear alongside Amri wares; Period III represents a full mature Harappan occupation. The culture was gradually succeeded by that of the Indus civilization. The uppermost levels contained Jhukar and Jhangar material.
Andronovo culture: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A culture of southern Siberia, between the Don and Yenisei Rivers, dating to the 2nd millennium BC. The culture was relatively uniform in this large area and agriculture played a large role. Wheat and millet were cultivated and cattle, horses, and sheep bred. The metal-using culture (ores from the Altai), which succeeded the Afansievo, lived in settlements of up to ten large log cabin-like semisubterranean houses. Bowl- and flowerpot-shaped vessels were flat-bottomed, smoothed, and decorated with geometric patterns, triangles, rhombs, and meanders. Burial was in contracted position either in stone cists or enclosures with underground timber chambers. The wooden constructions in rich graves may have designated social differentiation. The Andronovo complex is related to the Timber-Grave (Russian Srubna) group in southern Russia and both are branches of the Indo-Iranian cultural block. The Andronovo were the ancestors of Karasuk nomads who later inhabited the Central Asiatic and Siberian steppes.
Anlo: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A site in Holland with a long sequence of occupation, starting with the Funnel Beaker culture. It was followed by a cattle enclosure during the Late Neolithic (protruding foot beaker) people, then a cemetery of five flat graves with foot beakers and bell beakers with cord ornament. The next phase was a settlement with late varieties of Beaker pottery, followed by a Middle Bronze Age plow soil, and a Late Bronze Age urnfield.
Aq Kupruk: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A rock shelter (Aq Kupruk II) and open site (Aq Kupruk III) on the Balkh River in northern Afghanistan. It is one of the richest Palaeolithic sites in that area. Aq Kupruk II had a single late Palaeolithic deposit with a blade industry (including microliths) with a radiocarbon date of c 14,600 BC. Aq Kupruk III had two deposits, one with artifacts similar to II and a lower one without microlithics. The presence of domesticated sheep and goats at Aq Kupruk has been dated to 8000 BC and that of cattle to about 6000 BC. Sickle blades, peaked stone hoes, chisels, hand mills, and pounders suggest the collection and preparation of wild grains, if not cultivation.
Argissa: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An important Neolithic site in Thessaly, northern Greece, which has given much information on the early phases of the Greek Aceramic Neolithic period. In the Argissa Magula near Larissa, there have been early prepottery Neolithic finds of probably the 6th millennium BC. Timber-framed huts consisted of shallow mud-walled pits that were likely roofed with branches. Obsidian was already being traded and flint tools were made. The earliest known domesticated cattle date from about 6000 BC at Argissa (and Nea Nikomedeia) in Greece, in association with cultivated einkorn, emmer wheat, and barley, millet, lentils. Sheep, goats, and pigs were also cultivate and kept. This site (along with Knossos) is also responsible for the earliest evidence of agriculture, soon after 7000 BC. The site was occupied throughout the Neolithic and well into the Bronze Age.
ash mound: CATEGORY: feature
DEFINITION: A site type found in India where the remains of Neolithic cattle pens of the 3rd millennium BC created by regular fires burning palisades enclosing cattle.
auroch: CATEGORY: fauna
DEFINITION: The name of an extinct species of wild ox (Bos primigenius), the ancestor of present-day domestic cattle, which became extinct in the 17th century AD. It was described by Caesar as Urus and it inhabited Europe and the British Isles in ancient times and survived in most recent times in Lithuania, Poland, and Prussia. The name has often been applied erroneously to another species, the European bison, which still exists in the Lithuania forests. It was probably domesticated in some places, such as in eastern Hungary during the 4th millennium BC.
Baikal Neolithic: CATEGORY: chronology; culture
DEFINITION: The Neolithic period of the Lake Baikal region in eastern Siberia. Stratified sites in the area show a long, gradual move from the Palaeolithic to Neolithic stage, starting in the 4th millennium BC. The Postglacial culture was not true" Neolithic in that it farmed but Neolithic in the sense of using pottery. It was actually a Mongoloid hunting-and-fishing culture (except in southern Siberia around the Aral Sea) with a microlithic flint industry with polished-stone blade tools together with antler bone and ivory artifacts; pointed- or round-based pottery and the bow and arrow. Points and scrapers made on flakes of Mousterian aspect and pebble tools showing a survival of the ancient chopper-chopping tool tradition of eastern Asia have also been found. There was a woodworking and quartzite industry and some cattle breeding. The first bronzes of the region are related to the Shang period of northern China and the earliest Ordos bronzes. The area covers the mountainous regions from Lake Baikal to the Pacific Ocean and the taiga (coniferous forest) and tundra of northern Siberia. A first stage is name for the site Isakovo and is known only from a small number of burials in cemeteries. The succeeding Serovo stage is also known mainly from burials with the addition of the compound bow backed with bone plates. The third phase named Kitoi has burials with red ochre and composite fish hooks possibly indicate more fishing. The succeeding Glazkovo phase of the 2nd millennium BC saw the beginnings of metal-using but generally showed continuity in artifact and burial types. Some remains of semi-subterranean dwellings with centrally located hearths occur together with female statuettes in bone."
Balakot: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A settlement site on the coast west of Karachi, Pakistan, dating to the 4th millennium BC. The Balakotian ceramic was followed by Harappan levels. Resources were fish, cattle, sheep, and goats.
Bandkeramik: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Linearbandkeramik, LBK, Linienbandkeramik (German)
CATEGORY: ceramics; culture
DEFINITION: A pottery of the Danubian I culture, a Neolithic culture that existed over large areas of Europe north and west of the Danube River c 5th millennium BC. It consists of hemispherical bowls and globular jars, usually round-based and strongly suggesting copies of gourds. The name refers specifically to the standard incised linear decoration which was pairs of parallel lines forming spirals, meanders, chevrons, etc. There was farming of emmer wheat and barley and the keeping of domestic animals such as cattle. The most common stone tool was a polished stone adze. The people lived in large rectangular houses in medium-sized village communities or as small, dispersed clusters.
Banpo: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The site of an early Yangshao Neolithic village, now a museum at Xi'an, China, in the basin of the confluence of the Yellow River (Huang Ho), the Fen Ho, and Kuei Shui. Radiocarbon dates range from c 4800-4300 BC. The settlement was about 50,000 sq. meters and included a cemetery and pottery kilns outside a ditch that surrounded the residences. Dogs, cattle, sheep, chicken and pigs were domesticated and millet, rice, kaoling, and possibly soybeans grown. The horse and silkworm may also have been raised. Unpainted pottery was cord-marked or stamped, and fine ceremonial" pottery vessels were painted in black or red with some simple geometric patterns and drawings of fish turtles deer and faces. There were some elaborately worked objects in jade as well as everyday objects made from flint bone and groundstone. Sites with similar remains have been excavated at nearby Jiangzhai Baoji Beishouling and Hua Xian Yuanjunmiao. These sites all exhibit the first evidence of food production in China."
Beldibi: CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: A rock shelter which gave its name to a Mesolithic or 'Proto-Neolithic' culture succeeding the Belbasi culture in southern Anatolia. Phases contained imported obsidian and early forms of pottery. There is no evidence of food production or herding. Bones of deer, ibex, and cattle occur and subsistence was likely by coastal fishing and the gathering of wild grain.
Bigo: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A great earthwork site in western Uganda associated with the Chwezi people. The massive linear earthworks, over 6 1/2 miles long (10 km), is a ditch system, some of it cut out of rock, enclosing a large grazing area on a riverbank. It may have comprised both a royal capital and a cattle enclosure. Its construction would have required considerable labor and supports a distinction between cultivators and a pastoral aristocracy, which later became typical of this area. Radioactive carbon dating suggests Bigo was occupied from the mid-14th to the early 16th century. The site has also yielded early 13th-15th century AD roulette-decorated pottery, characteristic of the later Iron Age over much of East Africa.
Bir Kiseiba: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A site in southern Egypt's Sahara with early ceramics and cattle bones dating to c 9500 BP.
Bouqras: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: 7th-millennium BC Pre-Pottery Neolithic village near the River Euphrates in Syria. The first occupation phase had two levels with rectangular mud-brick houses. The next four levels had more solid mud-brick houses, some with plastered floors, benches, and pillars. The economy was based on hunting of wild animals, except in the final phase when sheep and cattle were bred. Sickle blades, pounders, and querns were used for wild or cultivated plants in the first phase. Artifacts include a white ware, made of mixed lime and ash and used to cover baskets, producing watertight vessels. Obsidian occurs in large quantities, indicating extensive trade networks linking Bouqras with the source sites in Anatolia.
Brahmagiri: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A settlement site and cemetery dating from at least the 2nd millennium BC in southern India. Wheeler found a Chalcolithic level (c 2800-1250 BC) with abundant microliths, polished stone axes, and crude burnished gray pottery, an Iron Age level (1st millennium BC) with black-and-red ware, 300 tombs, stone circles, and ossuaries for bones, and a level from the 1st century AD with rouletted ware and traces of Roman contact. Bone points and some evidence of a stone-blade industry have also been found. There are many cattle bones, but also sheep and goats. The culture seemed to continue with little change for many centuries.
Broederstroom: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An Early Iron Age village site in Pretoria, South Africa from the mid-1st millennium AD. Its remains, including 13 circular houses, gives a fairly complete picture of life at the time. There was iron-smelting and herding of cattle, sheep, and goats. Broederstroom pottery suggests connections with contemporary people to the northwest.
Bug / Dniester: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Bug-Dniester
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A complex of sites in two river valleys in Russia from the 5th millennium BC. Each phase is typified by short-lived sites on river terraces, occupied year-round for 5-10 years. There was hunting, fishing and shell-collecting, and some domestication of pigs, cattle, and einkorn wheat. Pointed-base pottery evolved there.
Burgaschi-See Sud: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A lake settlement site of the Neolithic Cortaillod culture in Switzerland, dated to the mid-4th millennium BC. The organic remains are well-preserved as on other Cortaillod sites. The most important hunted fauna were red deer, roe deer, aurochs, and wild boar. Domesticated cattle, sheep, goat and pig were kept. Artifacts include copper beads.
Bylany: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A large village settlement of the Danubian culture in the loess lands of the Bohemian plain of Czechoslovakia. This large site had many phases of occupation, including by people who made stroke-ornamented pottery. There were timber-framed long houses in the three main phases of the Linear Pottery sequence. Subsistence was based on emmer wheat cultivation and cattle husbandry.
Capelitti: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: 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 cattle are also attested.
Carnac: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A village in western France near the Atlantic coast that is the site of more than 3,000 prehistoric stone monuments of the alignment type. These menhirs are arranged in three groups of 10-13 parallel rows, which ended at semicircles or rectangles of standing stones. The single stone menhirs and multistone dolmens were made from local granite and are worn by time and weather and covered in white lichen. The area also has a series of long cairns of mid-Neolithic to Early Bronze Age which covers funerary chambers and secondary cists. The grave goods included polished axes of rare stones such as jadeite and fibrolite, stone boxes containing charcoal, cattle bones, and pottery. The area was clearly an important ritual center, venerated by the Bretons until fairly recent times, and adopted by the Romans for religious purposes. Christians added crosses and other symbols to the stones. In 1874, James Miln uncovered the remains of a Gallo-Roman villa one mile east of the village. The Musée Miln-Le Rouzic in Carnac has an important collection of artifacts.
Catal Huyuk: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Çatal Hüyük
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: One of the world's earliest towns, a huge Neolithic site in south central Turkey's Konya plain. At least 14 levels have been excavated so far with radiocarbon dates from 6500 BC to 5400 BC, without undisturbed deposits being reached. Cereals were cultivated, cattle and sheep were bred, and hunting took place. Pottery had apparently only just been introduced. Trade in such materials as obsidian and seashells was extensive. There were flaked stone tools and polished obsidian mirrors. The mud-brick buildings were rectangular with access only possible through the roofs. Built-in furniture included benches and platforms. The earliest evidence of religious beliefs have been found at the mound of Çatal Hüyük. Shrines were very frequent, with huge figures of goddesses in the posture of giving birth, leopards, and the heads of bulls and rams modeled in high relief on the walls. Other shrines contain elaborate frescoes of the hunting of deer and aurochs, or vultures devouring headless human corpses. Stone and terra-cotta statuettes found in these shrines represent a female figure, sometimes accompanied by leopards and, from the earlier levels of excavation, a male either bearded and seated on a bull or youthful and riding a leopard. The main deity of these people was evidently a goddess. The dead were buried beneath plastered platforms within the shrines or under the floors of the buildings. Evidence suggests both craft specialization and social stratification.
Cavdar: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Cevdar
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A tell site in western Bulgaria of the first temperate Neolithic, dating to c 5100-4700 BC. There are Kremikovci occupation levels and one Karanovo level. The farming economy grew emmer wheat and barley and raised cattle. Kremikovci painted wares include a rich polychrome assemblage dating to the end of the Early Neolithic.
Choga Mami: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A settlement site of the Samarra culture in southeast Iraq with radiocarbon dates of the late 6th millennium BC. There are several occupation phases from the Samarran to the Ubaid culture. Cattle, sheep, and goats were raised and wheat, barley, and flax cultivated with the aid of irrigation. The site has buildings of mud-brick; houses were rectangular and had ranges of rooms, in two or three rows. A mud-brick tower guarded the entrance to the settlement. Artifacts include Samarran painted pottery and elaborate female figurines of clay.
Daima: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A series of large mounds in northeastern Nigeria, which constitute the remains of early farming villages on the southern flood plain of Lake Chad and were occupied from about 600 BC-1200 AD. For the first five centuries, the Daima people only had polished stone axes and tools of bone, plus stone grinders and querns. There is pottery present from first occupation and evidence of domesticated cattle, sheep, and goats. Cultivation of sorghum was important, as was hunting and fishing. Iron was introduced the 1st-6th centuries AD. Some centuries later, however, Daima became part of a more wide-ranging trade system.
Dasas: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: The inhabitants of northwestern India at the time of the Indo-European migrations, described in the Rig-Veda" as having dark faces and snub noses unintelligible speech and worshipping strange gods but living in fortified cities (pur) and being very rich especially in cattle. The Dasas are often identified with the inhabitants of the towns of the Indus Valley culture."
Deverel-Rimbury culture: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Deverel-Rimbury people
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A Bronze Age culture of southern Britain of the 15th-12th centuries BC. It was named after two sites in Dorset, and was characterized by Celtic fields, nucleated small farmsteads and palisaded cattle enclosures, and by inurned cremations, either in flat urnfields or under low barrows. The distinctive pots were globular vessels with channeled or fluted decoration, and barrel- or bucket-shaped urns with cordoned ornament. It is thought that people came over from France and were great farmers, introducing the plow into England. The square lynchets, which can be seen today, are the result of their plowing.
Dhar Tichitt: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An area of south-central Mauritania (Africa) on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert with evidence of local beginnings of cereal cultivation in the 2nd millennium BC in the form of plant impressions on pottery. Wild sorghum and bulrush millet are indigenous to the area. At the time, there were extensive lakes at Dhar Tichitt for fishing and by c 1500 BC the inhabitants had domestic cattle and goats. By the 4th century BC, bulrush millet clearly formed the staple diet of the inhabitants of the area.
Divostin: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A Neolithic site in Serbia with occupations of the Early Starcevo and Vinca cultures dating from c 5250-4960 (Starcevo) to c 3900-3300 BC (Vinca). Excavation uncovered seven complete house-plans of the Late Vinca village, including one house containing 100 pots. The subsistence economy was based on cattle husbandry and agriculture. Cult objects included a model ritual scene and many fired clay anthropomorphic figurines.
Djeitun: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A Neolithic site of a 6th millennium BC (and possibly late 7th) culture of Turkmenia characterized by mud-brick architecture of one-roomed houses with lime-plastered floors. Both floors and walls were sometimes painted. The subsistence economy was based on cereal agriculture (barley, wheat), accompanied by the rearing of sheep, cattle, and goats and the hunting of gazelle, onager, wild pig, and smaller animals. The Djeitun culture had a microlithic flint industry and chaff-tempered pottery, decorated with simple painted designs. The culture was the earliest Neolithic of central Asia.
domestication: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: domestic animals
CATEGORY: term
DEFINITION: The adaptation of an animal or plant through breeding in captivity for useful advantage to and by humans. Early agriculturists controlled fauna through selection and breeding so that animals might produce more of what man needed than their wild forebears. The definition includes the taming of cats and dogs as house pets, as well as the care and control of cattle, sheep, goat, pig, horse, llama, camel, guinea pig, etc. It included breeding for produce such as milk, meat, hides, and wool, and the training of animals for draft and carrying. This selection by man resulted in osteological changes in the animals, so that in general domesticated animals can be distinguished by their remains from their wild ancestors. The process of domestication was a slow one; dogs likely being the first in Mesolithic times. Sheep were likely domesticated by 9000 BC in Iraq. Goats, cattle, and pigs followed in the next 3000 years, all in southwest Asia. The horse appears in the 2nd millennium, and the camel in the 1st. In the New World, domesticable animals were far fewer, notably the dog, llama, and guinea pig. The change involved, from hunting and gathering to food production was one of the most important in human development. Adaptations made by animal and plant species to the cultural environment as a result of human interference in reproductive or other behavior are often detectable as specific physical changes in faunal or floral ecofacts.
elephant: CATEGORY: fauna
DEFINITION: Either of two species of the family Elephantidae, characterized by their large size, huge head, columnar legs, and large ears. The Indian elephant was regularly employed for show and war as early as the Bronze Age in China. Wild herds survived in the Near East into the 1st millennium BC, when they were hunted to extinction for their ivory, and in North Africa, where they supplied Hannibal with his war elephants. Forms now extinct, especially the mammoth, were an important source of food in the Palaeolithic period, and are portrayed in cave art. Living elephants are now confined to Africa. The African elephant formerly occupied a far larger area, as is attested by skeletal evidence and cave paintings in North Africa. The reduction in its range is probably due to the combined effects of climatic change, human hunting, and cattle-grazing. The straight-tusked elephant, Elephas antiquus, apparently adapted to the open deciduous woodlands of interglacials in Europe, but became extinct at the end of the Ipswichian interglacial. Dwarf forms of the straight-tusked elephant evolved on islands of the Mediterranean.
Elmenteitan: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A Pastoral Neolithic stone industry of early East Africa in a restricted area on the west side of the central Rift Valley in Kenya. Typical artifact assemblages include large double-edged obsidian blades, plain pottery bowls, and shallow stone vessels. Domestic cattle and small stock were herded. The dead were cremated, as at the mass-burial site at Njoro River Cave (c 1000 BC), one of the earliest Elmenteitan sites. The industry continued into the 1st millennium AD. The name also applies to the Pastoral Neolithic and Iron Age pottery tradition associated with the stone artifacts.
Fayyum, al- or Fayum: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Fayoum, Fayum region, ancient Ta-she, She-resy, Moeris
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A large fertile depression in the Libyan Desert, southwest of Cairo near the west bank of the Nile, with two prehistoric cultures dating to c 5000 BC and c 4500 BC. These early settlements were of the first food-producing peoples of Egypt. Emmer and barley were cultivated and cattle, sheep, and pigs bred. Saw-edged sickle flints, mat-lined silo pits, and saddle querns have been found and ax heads were of flaked flint or ground pebbles. Hollow-based flint arrowheads, bone dart tips, stone maceheads, and bone harpoons were used for hunting and fishing. Artifacts of special note include a threshing flail and a wooden sickle set with flint teeth. Pottery was in use and beads of ostrich eggshell and seashells of both Mediterranean and Red Sea types were imported. Lake Qarun had fish which were a delicacy for Egyptians throughout the ages. In Middle Empire (c 2000 BC), the pharaohs (Amenemhet III) engaged in huge irrigation and drainage schemes and the area was famous for orchards and gardens. After a period of decline, the Ptolemies in turn took an interest in the area, establishing a number of small towns there, the papyrus archives which have survived in great quantity and excellent state of preservation. The region incorporates archaeological sites dating from the late Palaeolithic to the late Roman and Christian periods (c 8000 BC-641 AD), including Shedet (later Crocodilopolis), chief center for worship of the crocodile-god Sebek, near which al-Fayyum town now lies.
First Temperate Neolithic: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: FTN
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A term sometimes used to describe the earliest farming cultures in the temperate zone of Europe (and sometimes in other areas). In southeast Europe from c 5400-4500/4300 BC, there was the Starcevo (eastern and northern Yugoslavia), Körös (eastern and southwest Hungary), Cris (west and lowland Rumania), Kremikovci (northwest Bulgaria), and Karanovo (central and southern Bulgaria). The regional groups are differentiated by their individual painted wares, but the group of cultures is unified by non-ceramic traits such a miniature polished bone spoons, fired clay lip-plugs, rod-head figurines, and stamp seals. The vast majority of early FTN sites are located in the major river valleys of the Balkans, either as tell settlements or as short-lived flat sites. Hoe or digging-stick agriculture combined with cattle husbandry was the economic base of most FTN settlements.
Gomolava: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A large, frequently occupied, double-tell site on the Sava River in Serbia. On both tells, the prehistoric sequence goes from the Late Neolithic to the Middle Ages. The Late Neolithic occupation belongs primarily to the Vinca culture, with houses, pits, and a cemetery with copper grave goods. The subsistence economy of most levels indicates reliance on einkorn wheat, flax, and cattle husbandry.
Hacilar: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A small but important site in the lake region of southwest Turkey, with a Late Neolithic and early Chalcolithic (c 5600-4500 BC). The aceramic early levels have some radiocarbon dates in the 7th millennium BC. The houses were of mudbrick or wood and daub on stone foundations, with an upper story of wood. They were finished internally in plaster, rarely painted. Crops included barley, emmer, and lentils and bones of sheep, deer, and cattle were also found. The site was abandoned and reoccupied in the Late Neolithic, early in the 6th millennium BC, when it had more substantial houses, monochrome red to brown pottery, and some use of copper. Querns, mortars and braziers were fitted into mud plaster floors, while recesses in the walls acted as cupboards. The kitchen was separated from the living rooms and upper stories were used as granaries and workshops. Female figurines of a unique style were also made. The latest phase of this period was burnt c 5400 BC and when the site was reoccupied it was smaller; this settlement was also burnt c 5050-5000 BC. The Hacilar (Chalcolithic) period had a fortified settlement, characterized by boldly painted red on white pottery.
Hassuna: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Tell Hassuna
CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: A prehistoric tell site near Mosul in northern Iraq with a sequence of a pre-Samarran culture in northern Mesopotamia. The site has given its name to the pottery ware present in its lowest levels, dated to the 6th millennium BC, and a culture complex. This pottery may be related to that of the upper levels at Jarmo and is widely distributed. It was usually a buff ware in simple shapes, sometimes burnished, sometimes painted or incised with simple geometric patterns. In higher levels it was replaced by Samarra ware. Evidence from Yarim Tepe, another important Hassuna site, indicates that they were already experimenting with metallurgy and that pottery-making was a specialist activity (with true pottery kilns). The appearance of stamp seals suggests the importance of private ownership. There were several Halaf levels and 'Ubaid levels. Subsistence was cereal cultivation and herding cattle, goat, and sheep. The material culture used copper, turquoise, and carnelian beads.
Hemudu: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Ho-mu-tu
CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: An Early Neolithic site in Zhejiang Province, China, dating back to the late 6th and early 5th millennia BC. Two radiocarbon dates of c 5000 and c 4800 BC are the earliest yet for rice cultivation and it is the type-site of the southern rice-growing regime (millet was grown in the north). Pigs, dogs, and water buffalo were domesticated. Hoes or spades made from cattle scapulae have been found in large quantity; stone tools were few and crude. Timber houses show the use of a mortise-and-tenon technique. The low-fired handmade pottery includes shallow Ding tripods. It was succeeded by the Qingliangang culture in the Early Neolithic and by the Daxi, Qujialing, and Liangzhu cultures in the Middle Neolithic, c 3800-2800 BC.
horn: CATEGORY: fauna
DEFINITION: One of a pair of bony processes that grow from the head of many hoofed mammals. They are usually permanent hollow sheaths of keratin present in both sexes of cattle and their relatives. Antlers are also horns.
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.
Housesteads: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: ancient Vercovicium, Borcovicium; Dorcovicus
CATEGORY: structure
DEFINITION: The best-preserved fort along Hadrian's Wall in Britain; one of the best examples of a permanent military camp there, with its defenses, street plan, administrative buildings, and barrack blocks. There was also a small civil settlement for traders, etc., at its gates. It is roughly midway along the Wall's length, in Northumberland. At Housesteads, archaeologists have uncovered a market where northern natives exchanged cattle and hides for Roman products. This allowed Roman wares and Roman cultural influences to make their way north.
Hyrax Hill: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A site located on Lake Nakuru in central Kenya with Later Stone Age material and a pastoral Neolithic settlement. The earlier settlement is attributed to the East African Pastoral Neolithic complex. The second phase is of the Iron Age, and includes a series of so-called Sirikwa Holes which are interpreted as semi-subterranean cattle pens constructed by Nilotic-speaking peoples. There is also a cemetery of stone-covered flexed burials.
Ibero-Maurusian: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Iberomaurusian; Mouillian; Oranian
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A stone tool culture characterized by small backed bladelets and found across the North African coast from at least 22,000-10,000 years ago (the late Würm (last) glacial period). It followed the Aterian in the Epipalaeolithic of Maghreb in North Africa and preceded the Capsian. The culture was related to Cro-Magnon, a group of people known as the Mechta-el-Arbi race, living along the Mediterranean from Tunisia to Morocco and also Libya. Linked to the sea, there are huge shell mounds of mussels, oysters, and arca. Associated with these are pottery and limited stone tool industry, in conjunction with hearths, sometimes still marked by supporting stones. Extensive cemeteries have been investigated, as at Taforalt, and also at Afalou bou Rhummel and Columnata in Algeria. Burials were sometimes decorated with ochre or accompanied by food remains or by horns of wild cattle. The industry does bear a close resemblance to the late Magdalenian culture in Spain, which is broadly contemporary (c 15,000 BC). There is evidence suggesting that the Ibero-Maurusian industry is derived from a Nile River valley culture known as Halfan, which dates from c 17,000 BC.
Ileret: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Koobi Fora
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A site on the east side of Lake Turkana in Kenya which has yielded important archaeological sites from the Pleistocene and one from the late 3rd millennium BC. Domestic cattle and sheep make this one of the earliest sites in East Africa with evidence for pastoralism. Associated pottery and stone bowls serve as a link with Pastoral Neolithic sites of significantly later date in the Rift Valley highlands to the south. The site of Koobi Fora is very important for its finds of early Hominid fossils and stone artifacts from 2.5-1 million years ago.
Indus civilization: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Indus Valley civilization, Harrapan civilization
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: The earliest known urban culture of the Indian subcontinent, identified in 1921-1992 by its two capitals -- Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro -- both in modern Pakistan. It was also the most extensive of the three earliest civilizations, the other two being Mesopotamia and Egypt. It was one of the greatest civilizations of antiquity, but its origins are obscure. By around 2300 BC, the Indus civilization was fully developed and in trading contact with Sargonid Sumer. Radiocarbon dates from several sites support an origin c 2600 BC, and suggest that by 2000 BC the civilization was in marked decline. The Indus River seems to have played a significant part, as many sites show deposits left by frequent catastrophic floods. Exploitation of the vegetation, particularly for the baking of enormous quantities of brick, caused the decline of the countryside. The final collapse seems to have been due to hostile attack. A few inhumation cemeteries have been found associated with the gridiron-plan cities and there were elaborate drainage systems, also. The site of Mohenjo-Daro had a great bath, assembly hall, and other monumental buildings. There was widespread use of an undeciphered hieroglyphic script and standard weights and measures. The economy was based on mixed agriculture and humped cattle were the most important domestic animals. The pottery was mass-produced and plain. Artistically the finest products were square steatite seals, carved with local or mythical animals and brief inscriptions. The civilization's effect on the later culture and religion of India seems to have been considerable.
Kadero: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Important Khartoum Neolithic site on the edge of the old Nile flood plain which has lent information on the early development of food production in the central Sudan. Kadero was an extensive village inhabited during the second half of the 4th millennium BC. Herding was mainly of cattle, with some sheep and goats. There were many grindstones, and grain impressions on the pottery indicate the presence of wild panicum, sorghum, and finger millet. Burials included stone mace heads, palettes, carnelian bead necklaces, ivory bracelets, pottery, and ochre.
Kalomo: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A Late Iron Age industry in southern Zambia, dating from the end of the 9th till the 13th century AD. The industry probably developed from an Early Iron Age ancestor in the valley and spread to the plateau. The people were subsistence farmers, herding cattle and small stock, cultivating a variety of food crops, making pottery and a few metal tools, and occupying villages beside river valleys or on artificially built mounds.
Karako: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A village site in Nara prefecture, Japan, of the Yayoi culture that is the type-site for the western Yayoi pottery chronology. Over 100 dwelling and storage pits contained pottery covering the whole span of the Yayoi period in this area. Organic materials were well-preserved, including baskets, wooden agricultural tools, a bundle of rice plants, melon seeds, nuts, and bones of wild boar, deer, dogs, and cattle. A bronze bell casting mold indicated craft production.
Karasuk: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A Bronze Age culture that succeeded the Andronovo culture in southern Siberia in the late 2nd millennium BC. The three main, basically successive, yet often overlapping cultures were the Afanasyevskaya, Andronovo, and Karasuk. The Karasuk culture developed when a gradual change was made from settled communities to seasonal transhumance. Two settlements of large pit houses are known and many cemeteries of stone cists covered by a low mound and set in a square stone enclosure equipped with round-bottomed pots; many of these are in the Minusinsk Basin. The Karasuk people were farmers who concentrated on sheep- and cattle-breeding. They also practiced metallurgy on a large scale; the most characteristic artifact is a bronze knife or dagger, with a curved profile and a decorated handle, related to China's An-Yang. They produced a realistic animal art, which probably contributed to the development of the later Sytho-Siberian animal art style. Remains of bridles mark the beginning of horse riding on the Siberian steppe. The character of their material culture came from exchange with the centers of Far Eastern metallurgy. The Karasuk culture originated and spread its influences farther to western Siberia and Russian Turkistan than did the Andronovo. Trade relations extended to central Russia. Chronology of this period is based on comparisons with northern Chinese bronzes. The Karasuk period persisted down to c 700 BC.
Khoikhoin: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Khoi, Khoikhoi, Khoekhoe; Hottentots
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A Stone Age pastoral people of southwestern Africa during the last 2000 years. The first European explorers found them in the hinterland and they now live either in European settlements or on official reserves in South Africa or Namibia. Khoikhoin (meaning men of men") is their own name for themselves; Hottentot is the term fashioned by the Dutch (later Afrikaner) settlers probably in imitation of the clicks in their language. They may be descended from Bantu speakers of northern Botswana. They have cattle sheep and goats and make pottery."
Laga Oda: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A rock shelter near Harar in southeastern Ethiopia with occupation beginning around the 14th millennium BC. The industry of small blades and numerous backed elements continued into the 2nd millennium AD. The site also contains rock paintings depicting humans, cattle, and fat-tailed sheep.
Levanzo: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A small island off western Sicily, Italy, where fine engravings of animals have been found in a cave, Grotta Genovese. It belongs to the Upper Palaeolithic Romanellian group of c 10,000 BC and depicts horses, deer, cattle, and humans.
Longshan: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Lung Shan; Lung-shan; lungshanoid
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: Collective name of the regional cultures of the Late Neolithic in northern China of the 3rd to mid-2nd millennia BC. The term refers to the culture of the Chengziyai type site, often distinguished as the Classic Longshan or Shandong Longshan, which may have survived to a time contemporary with the bronze-using Shang civilization. The Longshan period encompasses first metal use, warfare, compressed earth walled sites of Hangtu construction, abundant gray pottery, rectangular polished stone axes, and the delicate wheelturned black-burnished pottery of intricate shapes. A method of divination involving the heating of cattle bones and interpreting the cracks began here. In Honan, where its distribution overlaps that of the Yang Shao culture, Longshan is stratified above the former and below Shang material. Lungshanoid is another term used to describe these Neolithic cultures.
Merimde Beni Salama: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Merinde, Merimda Beni Salama
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Site on the west bank of the Nile Delta, Egypt, representing one of the earliest cultures of Egypt, similar to that of the Fayyum (Faiyum). It yielded a radiocarbon date of 5060 BC and was occupied for about 600 years, probably c 4900-4300 BC, by a population up to 16,000. Three occupation phases showed progressively more substantial shelters, beneath which the dead were buried in a crouched position. Barley and emmer, cattle, sheep, and pigs are attested. Sickle flints and hollow-based arrowheads, pyriform and spherical maceheads, sling stones, fishhooks, spindle whorls, and simple stone axheads have been found. The pottery was poor, plain, straw-tempered and often covered with a slip. It is the earliest evidence for fully sedentary village life in the Nile valley. The Merimda phase of the Lower Egyptian Predynastic Period appears to have been roughly contemporary with the late Badarian and Amratian phases in Upper Egypt.
Nabta Playa: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A low-lying lake basin near the Egypt/Sudan border in the desert west of the Nile. Extensive scattered prehistoric occupation is attested from c 8100 bp, with assemblages of wild plant foods and ceramics. Settlement later concentrated in larger sites adjacent to the lakeshore. Pottery and concave-based arrowheads show affinities to those from Early Khartoum and the Fayyum, respectively. Cattle, probably domestic, were in the faunal remains. Sheep and goats were present by 6700 bp. Seeds were well-preserved and include two kinds of barley, doum palm, date palm, possible sorghum and several weed species indicative of the presence of cultivation. The degree of continuity from earlier times illustrated by this Neolithic phase is noteworthy, as is the early documentation of food production. A large aggregation site of 7000-6000 BP has associated megaliths.
Nanna: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Akkadian Sin
CATEGORY: deity
DEFINITION: The Sumerian moon god; also known as the Akkadian/ Semitic Sin. With his consort Ningal, he was the patron deity of Ur, where his temple and ziggurat were built. Nanna was intimately connected with the cattle herds that were the livelihood of the people in the marshes of the lower Euphrates River, where the cult developed.
Nea Nikomedeia: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Nea Nikomidhia
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An Early Neolithic tell settlement in Macedonia in northern Greece. From a large structure (shrine?) in the center of the mound, there were terra-cotta female figurines thought to have been used in rituals. The remains of rectangular mud houses, a number of crouched burials, and plain and painted pottery, frogs carved from greenstone, flint blades, and many ground stone axes have been found. Radiocarbon dates of c 6200-5300 BC was obtained. The earliest known domesticated cattle date from about 6000 BC at Nea Nikomedeia, in association with cultivated einkorn, emmer, and barley.
Ngamuriak: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Neolithic site in southwestern Kenya with stone tools and pottery of the Elmenteitan tradition, c 2000 BP. The earliest evidence for humped cattle in eastern Africa was found there as well as obsidian obtained from the Rift Valley, more than 100 km away, used to make tools.
Non Nok Tha: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Extensively excavated prehistoric site in north-central Thailand (Khorat region), with burials spanning the period c 3500 BC to late 1st millennium AD. There is evidence for possible 4th-3rd millennium BC domestication of cattle, pig, and dog; the cultivation of rice, and the use of copper and bronze. Non Nok Tha and Ban Chiang may have the earliest evidence for bronzeworking in the world. Unlike Ban Chiang, it appears to have been abandoned before iron was in general use.
Nubian A Group: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Nubian A-Group culture
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: The name conventionally given to the earliest fully food-producing society known in the archaeological record of Nubia, late in the 4th millennium BC. The 'A Group' people probably had an indigenous Nubian ancestry, but were evidently in regular trade contact. The A Group is known mainly from graves, as from the excavated cemetery at Qustul, and adopted symbols of kingship similar to those of contemporary kings of Egypt of the Naqadah II-III period. It was one of the earliest phases of state formation in the world. Some settlement sites have been investigated, as at Afyeh near the First Cataract where rectangular stone houses were built, as well other rural villages. Sheep and goats were herded, with some cattle, while both wheat and barley were cultivated. Luxury manufactured goods imported from Egypt included stone vessels, amulets, copper tools and linen cloth.
Nubian C Group: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Nubian C-Group culture
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: The conventional designation of the indigenous population of Nubia in the late 3rd millennium BC. There is disagreement as to the extent to which these people were the direct descendants of the preceding Nubian A Group population. There are apparent connections between the C Group and contemporary peoples inhabiting the Red Sea hills, east of the Nile. Livelihood depended to a large extent on their herds of small stock and cattle. Settlement sites investigated consist mainly of circular houses with their lower walls of stone. In later C-Group times, more elaborate buildings were erected, and there was an increase in the quantity of luxury goods imported from Egypt. Both these developments reached their peak at Karmah. Egypt no longer controlled Lower Nubia, which was settled by the C Group and formed into political units of gradually increasing size; relations with this state deteriorated into armed conflict in the reign of Pepi II. Karmah was the southern cultural successor of the Nubian A Group and became an urban center in the late 3rd millennium BC, remaining Egypt's chief southern neighbor for seven centuries.
pan-grave culture: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Pan-grave culture
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: Material culture of a group of semi-nomadic Nubian cattle herders who entered Egypt in the late Middle Kingdom (2055-1650 BC) and during the Second Intermediate Period (c 1633-1550 BC). They are well attested in Eastern Desert, the characteristic being shallow circular pit-graves with black-topped pottery, the 'pan graves' of Upper Egypt and Lower Nubia. Their material culture was similar to the C-Group. The people were mercenaries during this period of Egyptian history and during the New Kingdom, when they were called the Medjay.
Pastoral Neolithic: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Pastoral Neolithic of East Africa
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A complex of cultures that appeared in southern Kenya and northern Tanzania about 3500 BC; a general term for the pre-Iron Age food-producing societies of East Africa.. It remains unknown whether they also cultivated plants. The earliest sites are on the plains of northern Kenya and date to the mid-3rd millennium BC. About 1300 years ago, they were absorbed or replaced by iron-using pastoralists and mixed farmers. Disposal of the dead was by burial beneath a stone cairn or between rocks. Stone platters, bowls, and pestles occur on most sites. Settlements show a great range of size, as does the relative importance of herding cattle and small stock in comparison with hunting. Pastoral Neolithic settlement is attested as far to the south as the Serengeti Plain of northern Tanzania. The subdivision of the Pastoral Neolithic in the East African highlands is not clearly defined. Pastoral Neolithic traditions recognized, though not well defined chronologically, are: Elmenteitan, Kansyore, Narosura, Nderit, Njoro River Cave, Oldishi, Olmalenge, and Oltome.
pastoralist: CATEGORY: people
DEFINITION: An animal herder, esp. sheep or cattle.
Peterborough Culture: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: Neolithic culture grafted on to the native Mesolithic culture, one of the two major Neolithic groups of England (with the Windmill Hill people). They lived in villages and on seashores, grew grain and raised cattle, and hunted with square-tipped arrowheads. They also used axes and microlithic sickles.
Phalaborwa: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Palabora
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An area of the eastern Transvaal, South Africa, with a copper and iron ore mining town and a long Iron Age sequence dated to the 8th century AD. Mining began during the final centuries of the 1st millennium AD and from the 11th century onwards the later Iron Age occupation appears to belong to a single developing tradition, perhaps related to that Sotho groups. Agriculture on terraced hillsides and the herding of domestic cattle formed the basis of the subsistence economy. There are hundreds of sites where ore was smelted and then worked into tools and ornaments.
pre-Dynastic period: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Pre-Dynastic Egypt; Predynastic
CATEGORY: chronology; culture
DEFINITION: The period before recorded history in Egypt and before it became a unified state in c 3100 BC. The term predynastic denotes the period of emerging cultures that preceded the establishment of the 1st dynasty in Egypt. In the late 5th millennium BC there began to emerge patterns of civilization that displayed characteristics deserving to be called Egyptian. The accepted sequence of predynastic cultures is based on the excavations of Sir Flinders Petrie at Naqadah, al-'Amirah (el-'Amra), and al-Jazirah (el-Gezira). Another somewhat earlier stage of predynastic culture has been identified at al-Badari in Upper Egypt. Until recently, most of our knowledge of pre-Dynastic Egypt was derived from the excavation of graves. Pre-Dynastic communities appeared in the section of the Nile Valley immediately south of Asyut. Large settlements were established, notably that at Hierakonpolis. Some time after 5000 BC the raising of crops was introduced, probably on a horticultural scale, in small, local cultures that seem to have penetrated southward through Egypt into the oases and the Sudan. The food-producing economy was based on the cultivation of emmer wheat and barley and on the herding of cattle and small stock, together with some fishing, hunting, and use of wild plant foods. Highly specialized craftsmen emerged to build vessels, make copper objects, weave linen, and make basketry and pottery. A series of small states arose until around 3100 BC, the unified kingdom of Ancient Egypt came into being.
Samarra: CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: Islamic city of the Abbasid dynasty, mid-8th to mid-10th century AD, founded as the new capital in 836 AD on the Tigris River in central Iraq. Its Neolithic culture, 6th millennium BC, was remarkable for its elaborate painted pottery with geometric or naturalistic patterns. At that time, it was characterized by large villages with complex, multi-room buildings, and introduction of irrigated agriculture and cattle rearing. The pottery, found mainly in the Samarra cemetery, replaced Hassuna ware, on which it marked a considerable advance. It was absorbed by the Halaf tradition c 5000 BC. It is a rich source of information on early Islamic architecture, public monuments, and town planning.
Selevac: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Late Neolithic site of the Early Vinca culture (B-C phases) in the Morava Valley of northern Serbia, dating c 4300-3950 BC. The houses were of timber posts with wattle-and-daub walls. Subsistence was mixed farming (cattle husbandry and cultivation of emmer and bread wheat). Copper from the Rudna Glava mine was used alongside stone.
Sirikwa Holes: CATEGORY: feature; site
DEFINITION: Feature of Iron Age sites in the Western Highlands of Kenya which consists of circular depressions 5-10 meters in diameter, sometimes encircled by stone walling. They functioned as cattle barns during the first half of the 2nd millennium AD.
Soroki: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A complex of short-lived settlement sites of the Late Mesolithic and Early Neolithic, located in the middle Dniester valley in Moldova. The Mesolithic sites, with radiocarbon dates of c 5600-5400 BC, have provided data on the late Mesolithic / early Neolithic Bug-Dniester culture. The earliest occupations are aceramic and had a hunting-fishing economy. Later levels, c 4800 BC, have pointed-base vessels, hearths, and shallow pits. The subsistence economy is similar to the preceding Mesolithic, with the addition of some cultivated einkorn wheat and some domesticated cattle and pig.
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.
Suberde: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Small aceramic Neolithic settlement in the Konya plain of southern Turkey, dated to the later 7th millennium BC. Two occupation levels were recognized, the earlier with traces of hut floors, the latter with building of mudbrick and plastered floors. Thousands of animal bones have been found -- sheep, goat, cattle, pig and some harvesting of wild cereals may have occurred.
Sur Jangal: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Prehistoric site in the Loralai Valley of northern Baluchistan, Pakistan, with three major phases of occupation probably belong to the later 4th and 3rd millennia BC. Black-on-red painted wares frequently show humped (zebu) and humpless cattle; other artifacts include female figurines of Zhob type.
Tassili n'Ajjer: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Tassili-n-Ajjer
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Site in southeast Algeria with famous but undated rock art covering most of the Saharan sequence. The art is in three styles -- archaic" paintings of large animal and human figures and geometric abstract symbols; a "naturalistic" style with humans and animals portrayed in great detail in scenes showing cattle running and herdsmen with bows; and a "cubist" style with dark shapes and light areas. Stone forms which were probably used as tomb sculpture have also been found at the Tassili site. There is much stone painting but not much stone carving or engraving. Scholars have been unable to decipher the hieroglyphic language that is engraved on the rocks."
Thailand: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Archaeological evidence indicates almost continuous human occupation of Thailand for the last 20,000 years. Tai-speaking peoples migrated southward and westward from China around the 10th century AD. Important Hoabinhian sites are Sai Yok, Spirit Cave, Non Nok Tha, and Ban Chiang, which suggest the presence of rice cultivation, cattle domestication, and copper-bronze metallurgy from about 3500 BC, followed by iron metallurgy and wet rice cultivation about 1500 BC. In southern Thailand at Ban Kao and Kok Charoen, Neolithic cultures continued into the 2nd millennium BC. The Bronze and Iron Age remains are related to the Dong-Son culture of Vietnam (1st millennium BC).
Tisza: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: Late Neolithic culture of eastern Hungary, centered on the middle Danube region east of the River Tisza of the early 4th millennium BC, with tell and horizontal settlements. Characteristic are anthropomorphic vessels and pottery with incised basketry designs or with paint applied after firing. The wide variety of forms included footed and pedestaled bowls. Cereal production was important, as demonstrated by the large quantity of cereal storage jars, fired clay bins, and granaries in the villages. There was domestication of aurochs and intensive cattle husbandry. The culture is contemporaneous with the Lengyel culture of east-central Europe.
transhumance: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Transhumance; Transhumant
CATEGORY: term
DEFINITION: A subsistence practice which forms one aspect of seasonality of occupation; the transfer of cattle from summer to winter pasture and vice versa. It consists of the movement of farmers and their herds and flocks away from the winter settlement to upland pasture. Spring to autumn is spent on high pasture and in winter animals are taken to a main settlement, often in sheltered valleys, where fodder has been collected. This movement of farmers results in the occupation of two sites at different times of the year by the same group of people. In Europe and the Old World, the term is for pastoralist farmers and livestock. In the New World, the term is used for any animal-and-human migration. Identification of transhumance patterns is a focus of palaeoeconomy.
trumpet: CATEGORY: artifact
DEFINITION: A brass wind musical instrument sounded by lip vibration against a cup mouthpiece. It has been made of horn, conch, reed, or wood, with a horn or gourd bell, as well as the modern brass instrument. The metal trumpet dates from the 2nd millennium BC in Egypt, when it was a small ritual or military instrument sounding only one or two notes. In the Late Bronze Age, it was made by riveting sheet bronze into the shape of a cattle horn.
Umm Dabaghiyah: CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: Early 6th-millennium BC type site of the Umm Dabaghiyah culture, the earliest-known culture of the northern Iraq plain, a pre-Hassuna occupation of Mesopotamia. The small site has long buildings with rows of small cell-like rooms arranged around a central space. Some wall paintings have been recorded with hunting scenes -- something relied upon heavily for the economy. Domesticated sheep, goats, cattle, and pigs were also kept and some domesticated cereals are present, possibly imported. Pottery is abundant in all the four main phases and includes incised, burnished, plain, and painted types similar to 'archaic' Hassuna pottery. Other sites of this culture are Yarim Tepe, Telul Thalathat, and Tell es-Sotto (Tell Soto).
Utnur: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: One of the earliest known settlements of peninsular India, dating to c 2900 BC. It is a Neolithic site in the central Deccan, with four major phases of occupation. The people were primarily cattle-herders, probably living in huts built of branches and brush. Pottery and stone tools were found.
Valhager: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Migration Period nucleated settlement of the 5th and 6th centuries on the Baltic island of Gotland just off the coast of Sweden. There were cattle droveways and individual farm dwellings enclosed within stone-walled fields. The buildings are typical longhouses with central hearths.
Wilton: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Wiltonian
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: Microlithic Later Stone Age industry with its type site in a rock shelter in Cape Province, South Africa and found in other parts of eastern and southern Africa. It is the African equivalent of the Mesolithic cultures of Europe, though of later date, and in its final stage shows contact with the Iron Age farmers of the 1st millennium AD. It occurred over the last 8000 years. In the rock shelter area, the characteristic tool is the tiny convex or 'thumbnail' scraper; crescent-shaped backed microliths, adzes, and backed blades are also present. There is rock painting, plant remains, and faunal remains of non-gregarious" browsing antelope as well as evidence of fishing. Around the beginning of the Christian era the descendants of the Wilton folk acquired domestic sheep and possibly cattle and learned the art of pottery manufacture (called post-climax Wilson or ceramic Wilton)."
Windmill Hill: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Windmill Hill culture
CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: Neolithic causewayed camp north of Avebury, Wiltshire, England, the type site of the culture of the same name. The camp of c 3350 BC has three ditch circuits which are part of the Avebury complex of Neolithic ritual monuments. Windmill Hill ware sensu stricto (decorated with grooves and pits), was closely followed by the oldest (Ebbsfleet) variant of Peterborough ware -- 3330 +/- 150. More recent levels have Peterborough styles, grooved ware, and beaker sherds. An earthen long barrow has a radiocarbon date of 4030 +/- 150 and there is a cemetery of Bronze Age round barrows. This culture and that of Peterborough were the two first main food-growing and cattle-raising peoples. Stone axes, coarse scrapers, and pressure-flaked leaf-shaped arrowheads were used. They raised pigs, cattle, goats, and had dogs for herding; cereals were grown. The pottery is now divided into separate traditions (Grimston-Lyles Hill, Hembury, Abingdon), and the rest of the cultural content, causewayed camps, long barrows, leaf-shaped arrowheads and polished flint or other stone axes, is now regarded as simply 'British Neolithic'. The culture existed until c 2500 BC.
Zhob: CATEGORY: site; culture
DEFINITION: A valley in north Baluchistan, western Pakistan, with a number of sites of a Chalcolithic culture, c 4th-3rd millennia BC. Rana Ghundai, Periano Ghundai, and Moghul Ghundai are the best-known sites. The pottery is painted black or red over a red slip; decoration may be stylized humped cattle and buck and groups of vertical lines linking narrow horizontal bands. Other artifacts include female figurines and copper. Buildings were of mudbrick and burials by cremation. Related material was found stratified beneath that of the Indus Civilization at Harappa, and there are similarities to the painted ware of Tepe Hissar in northern Iran. This phase was succeeded by the 'Incinerary Pot' phase, with burials placed in vessels under house floors, after disarticulation and some cremation.

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