Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology (86 page)

Early Upper Palaeolithic flint-working industries of central and eastern Europe characterized by oval bifacially worked implements, pointed at both ends.

 
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Brother of Attila and co-ruler of the Huns of the Danube area. Attila had Bleda murdered and assumed sole power in
c.
ad 445.

 
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Blegen , Carl William
(1887–1971)
[Bi].

American archaeologist specializing in Greek prehistory. Born in Minneapolis, he was educated at Augsburg Seminary, the University of Minnesota, and Yale where he took his Ph.D. After working in Athens for some years, he became the Director of the American School of Classical Studies. During WW2 he served with the Office of Strategic Services in Washington and later became cultural relations attaché with the American embassy in Greece. In addition to his excavations at Korakou, Prosymna, and Pylos in Greece, he worked extensively at Troy, Turkey, as part of the Archaeological Expedition of the University of Cincinnati.
[Obit.:
Antiquaries Journal
, 52 (1972), 459]

 
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1
Type of early Iron Age structure found in Shetland, rectangular in ground plan, three storeys high, heavily built, with a central passage at ground floor level, domestic accommodation to either side of the passage and on the first floor, and with a wall-walk and vantage point on the top floor. At the rear of the stone building was a small timber extension with a range of further accommodation.
2
A small strongly built defensive structure used specifically to house guns and to protect the gunners and ammunition from attack. Usually built of stone, blockhouses were typically sited to command a river, harbour entrance, or anchorage, or as an outlying work to provide enfilading fire or protection to other defensive works. Accommodation within the blockhouse is confined to the short-term needs of the gunners or garrison. The basic design involves a tower dominating a bastion or gun platform, usually with a ditch or moat on its most vulnerable side. Built mainly between the late 13th and mid 16th centuries. Also known as gun towers.

 
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A furnace for smelting iron. Although bellows were used to force air into the furnace, it was not possible to make the iron hot enough to melt. Before it can be used, the spongy lump of iron removed from the furnace, called a
bloom
, has to be hammered at red heat in order to expel impurities and add a proportion of carbon.

 
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Three small caves in the Old Crow Basin of the northern Yukon, possibly the earliest evidence of occupation in North America so far recovered. Discovered in 1975, and subsequently investigated by Jacques Cinq-Mars , the earliest layers at Bluefish Cave I yielded a few flint chips indicative of human activity in association with broken animal bones from Ice Age mammals such as the horse, bison, and caribou. The deposits are thought to date to between 15000 and 12000 bc.
[Rep.: J. Cinq-Mars , 1978, Bluefish Cave I: A late Pleistocene eastern Beringian cave deposit in the northern Yukon.
Canadian Journal of Archaeology
, 3, 1–32]

 
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