Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology (543 page)

BOOK: Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology
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Pioneer Phase
[CP].
A general term referring to the second of the five main cultural historical stages defined for the archaeology of southwestern parts of North America: broadly the period
c.
100 bc–ad 600, succeeding the Archaic and preceding the Colonial. The Pioneer Phase represents the earliest agriculturalist communities. The period is characterized by the gradual introduction of maize and other tropical cultigens, gradually transforming the resident hunter-gatherer populations into sedentary agricultural communities. The several different environments in the area produced adaptations with recognizable subdivisions, one of the most notable of which is the Hohokam of the southern Arizona desert which dates from the very end of the 1st millennium
bc
. The first Hohokam Phase includes the cultivation of crops using irrigation canals, the first use of ceramics in the area, and sub-rectangular pit-houses in small villages.
pipe
[Ar].
Stone or ceramic holder for use in smoking tobacco. The main elements are the bowl and a connecting tube through which smoke can be drawn into the mouth. Pipes first appear in the archaeological record on Archaic Stage sites in Illinois, North America, from around 1500 bc onwards. They become common in the eastern woodlands by 500 bc. It is possible that organic pipes were used before this time, but tobacco is a native plant of South America and so must have been taken northwards in the same way as other crops. Some stone pipes, for example those made by Middle and Late Woodland communities, were extremely elaborate in their design and decoration.
pipe clay
[Ma].
Relatively pure clay containing little or no iron which is usually fired to a white or pale cream colour. In recent times it was commonly used in making tobacco pipes.
pipe-clay figurine
[Ar].
Small statuettes modelled or cast in fine white pipe clay.
pipkin
[Ar].
Style of medieval ceramic vessel in the form of a saucepan with a single hollow handle probably made to take a wooden extension.
Pirri point
[Ar].
A type of roughly symmetrical unifacially worked leaf-shaped point in flint or stone, up to 7cm long, found widely distributed across inland Australia from South Australia to the Northern Territory. During manufacture the bulb of percussion is sometimes removed in order to produce a rounded and thinned butt. Part of the
AUSTRALIAN SMALL TOOL TRADITION
and conventionally dated to the period after 3000 bc.

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