Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology (681 page)

A burial monument of later prehistoric date in the British Isles that comprises a circular mound of earth and redeposited bedrock, anything between 6m and 15m across, which covers a central burial deposit and which is enclosed within a roughly square or rectangular quarry ditch. The central burial is usually an adult inhumation and is variously set on the old ground surface or in a burial pit. Grave goods, in some cases including complete or dismantled wheeled vehicles, usually accompany the interment. Most square barrows date to the La Tène I period in Britain, broadly the 6th and 5th centuries
bc
, and are mainly found in Humberside and the East Riding of Yorkshire. An increasing number, however, are being recognized in other parts of England. The square barrow tradition in England has been characterized as a key part of the Arras Culture which may have been introduced to eastern England by settlers from France.

 
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Groups of later prehistoric square barrows forming organized cemeteries. Large cemeteries of this kind may contain more than 500 individual barrows, as at Dane's Graves and Burton Fleming in the East Riding of Yorkshire.

 
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Term applied to the type of pottery found in middle Neolithic contexts in northern Italy. The characteristic shape is produced by taking a round pot and, while still pliable, pinching the mouth to produce a squared-off top.

 
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An annual herb (Cucurbita mixta) that grows as a trailing plant and produces large yellow-coloured fruits with edible flesh. Native to south Mexico and South America. Domesticated by
c.
3000 bc. Recorded in the eastern parts of North America by
c.
2000 bc.

 
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Squier , Ephraim George
(1821–88)
[Bi].

A North American journalist by profession, Squier was also an amateur archaeologist who is best known for his work excavating and recording hundreds of prehistoric mounds in the Ohio and Mississippi valleys. In 1851 he published an account of his work done jointly with E. H. Davis :
Ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley
(Washington DC: Smithsonian Institution). Squier also carried out excavations in central America, Peru, and Bolivia.
[Bio.:
American National Biography
, 20, 519–20]

 
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Exposed river terrace formations in the Somme Valley that have been the subject of interest for geologists and archaeologists since the late 19th century. One of the first to study the sequence was V. Commont . He defined three main terraces according to their height above the floor of the buried channel below the terrace exposure: the High Terrace at 45m, the Middle Terrace at 30m, and the Low Terrace at 10m. Although it is now known that Commont's sequence is over-simplified, nonetheless it is a reasonable approximation and allows a general understanding of several Lower Palaeolithic industries. The 45m terrace is especially important because it is associated with a faunal assemblage of
CROMERIAN
affinities, broadly 200000 to 300000 years ago. It is here also that pear-shaped bifacially worked handaxes that have come to characterize an Acheulean tradition now recognized throughout Africa and the Old World have been found in considerable quantity.
[Sum.: J. M. Coles and E. S. Higgs , 1969,
The archaeology of early man
. London: Faber and Faber]

 
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