Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology (355 page)

Early Arctic coastal communities living on Kodiak Island, the Alaska Peninsula and Cook Inlet in North America in the period 500 bc to ad 1100. Descendants of the Ocean Bay Tradition, but more sedentary with extensive living sites marked by middens which include hearths and storage pits. Hunting included birds, whales, fish, and shellfish. The material culture of these groups is rich and includes both ground and chipped stone tools, bone points and harpoons, and fishing equipment. Personal ornaments are also abundant. Skulls interpreted as trophy heads occur, with features modelled in clay and inset with artificial bone eyes.

 
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Formerly the first pluvial period dated to the lower Pleistocene. Now more or less abandoned or incorporated with the
KAMASIAN
.

 
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An in-situ Lower Palaeolithic site and a series of later deposits beside a small lake basin behind the lip of the 220m high Kalambo Falls on the Kalambo River on the border between Tanzania and Zambia. Discovered in 1953, the area has been extensively surveyed and excavated by J. Desmond Clark and a large team of international collaborators.
The earliest deposits are the remains of dry-season encampment by Acheulian communities around 200000 years ago. An arc of stones may be the remains of a windbreak, while two grass-filled hollows may be sleeping places. Bone was not preserved at the site, but pieces of wood appear to show deliberate shaping and burning. Pollen shows that plants favouring a rather cooler and damper climate than prevails in the area today were present in the late Acheulean. These in-situ deposits are amongst the very few such Lower Palaeolithic sites in the world. The area was also occupied around 100000 years ago with Sangoan and later Lupemban industry flintwork recovered from later deposits.
[Rep.: J. D. Clark , 1969–74,
Kalambo Falls prehistoric sites
. Cambridge: CUP, 2 vols.]

 
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Second pluvial period in Africa, dated to the middle Pleistocene.

 
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A large Maya ceremonial centre and settlement in the southern highlands on the western outskirts of Guatemala City. Originating in the Formative stage (early Pre-Classic), the most important occupation dates to the Miraflores Phase (
c.
100 bc to ad 100). From this period there are over 200 mounds of mud brick, some of several phases. Tombs were sometimes dug into the mounds, many with luxury grave goods and evidence for the sacrifice and ritual burial of the retainers of the deceased. Mound E-III-3 is typical and consists of several superimposed temple pyramids which in its final form rose to a height of 18m. Each successive building operation took place to house the remains of an exalted person, whose burial place was constructed in the top of the pyramid as a pit formed from a series of stepped rectangles of decreasing size. The corpse was deposited in the lowest, smallest part of the pit, grave goods being set on the steps rising up all around.
After about ad 200 there is a hiatus in the use of parts of the site, before a phase of regeneration and reconstruction in the Classic Stage accompanied by an influx of Teotihucán material. At this time the site seems to have controlled obsidian production on the Pacific slopes and contact between central Mexico and Teotihuacán. A group of temple pyramids and a ball-court were constructed near the centre of the site, and rich tombs continued to be built. Its wealth and importance may be related to the local production of cacao and cotton.
[Rep.: A. V. Kidder , J. L. Jennings , and E. M. Stook , 1946,
Excavations at Kaminaljuyú, Guatemala
. Washington: Carnegie Institution]

 
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