Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology (190 page)

A drainage channel, often underground.

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

South American cultural grouping found in the Rio Ucayali area of Amazonia in the period
c.
ad 800–1000. Defined by its ceramics which belong to the Polychrome Horizon of painted wares.

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

A term given by
L. CHITTY
to a distinctive type of large polished stone axe of middle Neolithic date made in the Lake District of northwest England. Also known as a ‘Cumbrian-type’ stone axe. The main features of a Cumbrian club are its large size (150–380mm long), broad-butted form, long, narrow proportions, its maximum width more or less in the middle of its length, and a distinct ‘waisting’ of constriction towards the butt end. All known examples are made of Langdale tuff (Group VI), examples being traded out from the Lake District to most other parts of the British Isles. The large size of these implements suggests they are ceremonial, prestige, or display objects.

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

The term used to describe early writing in the Middle East (Sumerian, Akkadian and related languages) in which wedge-shaped impressions are left on a clay tablet. It was used from the 3rd through to the 1st millennia
bc
and is thought to have derived from older Sumerian pictographic script.

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

Cunnington , Maud
(1869–1951)
[Bi].

British prehistorian who married into the last of three generations of archaeologists who devoted their time to the exploration of Wiltshire's ancient past. For over 40 years Maud and her husband Benjamin excavated hillforts, barrows, and other sites in central Wiltshire, notably All Cannings Cross (1920–2), Woodhenge (1926–8), and The Sanctuary (1930). In 1931 she was elected the President of Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society, the first woman to hold the post; in 1948 she was made a Companion of the Order of the British Empire in the birthday honours list ‘for services to archaeology’.
[Obit.:
Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine
, 54, 104–6]

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

Cunnington , William
(1754–1810)
[Bi].

British antiquary and pioneer excavator who worked for Sir Richard Colt Hoare in Wiltshire, England. Born in Northamptonshire, he was sent to Wiltshire to an apprenticeship at a clothier's near Warminster. In the early 1770s he was living in Heytesbury, and by the mid 1780s he seems to have developed his own business. During this time he seems to have developed an interest in the wealth of archaeological monuments of the area, and made friends with other antiquarians in the region. His first barrow opening appears to have been a small bowl barrow south of the Knook Long Barrow in or around 1800. Most of his archaeological work thereafter involved excavating round barrows, including Bush Barrow near Stonehenge.
[Bio.: R. H. Cunnington , 1975,
From antiquary to archaeologist: A biography of William Cunnington 1754–1810
. Princes Risborough: Shire Publications]

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search