WHAT IS THE CRESTED BLADE ?

CRESTED BLADE: A flint blade with negative impressions of removals on one side of the dorsal surface, creating a crest. These constitute part of a previously worked striking platform or result from preparing the  flaked surface on a core before detaching the flakes or blades.

WHAT IS THE CRESCENT ?

CRESCENT: A crescent-shaped, bifacially flaked stone tool generally restricted to the Paleoindian period and almost always found in association with extinct Pleistocene lakes. They were possibly used for hunting large shorebirds. [Great Basin transverse point]

WHAT IS THE CRATER ?

CRATER: A large, wide-mouthed, two-handled Greek or Roman bowl or vase, usually made of pottery or metal. It is characteristic of Greece in the Mycenaean and Classical periods. They were used to serve wine, mixed with water in varying proportions, into individual drinking cups, and handed out at banquets and sacrifices. The word is Greek for “mixing bowl.” There is a classification of four types: column crater, volute crater, calyx crater, and bell crater, which take their names from the characteristic shape either of the handle or of the body of the vase.

WHAT IS THE CRAMBECK WARE ?

CRAMBECK WARE: A type of pottery that was widely distributed across the north of England and North Wales in the second half of the 4th century ad, including cream-colored mortaria and parchment wares, imitation Samian forms, and gray kitchen wares.

WHAT IS THE CORTEX ?

CORTEX: A tough covering or crust on an unmodified stone cobble or newly exposed flint nodule and tabular flint. It is formed by weathering and is usually discarded during the knapping process.

WHAT IS THE CORNER NOTCH ?

CORNER NOTCH : A major projectile form that is described as a point that has had notches for hafting struck into the corners of the base; a flaking technique applied to accommodate hafting which involved the flaking of notches into the basal corners of a preform base. [corner-notched, corner-notched point]

WHAT IS THE CORN MUMMY ?

CORN MUMMY: A type of anthropomorphic funerary object made of soil mixed with grains of corn, which was usually wrapped up in linen bandages and had a face mask.

WHAT IS THE CORINTHIAN POTTERY ?

CORINTHIAN POTTERY: A widely distributed pottery made at Corinth and found throughout the Mediterranean, from the late 7th century bc until the mid 6th century bc. This important stage of vase painting included “naturalistic” designs of animals, maenads, and satyrs and the invention of the black-figure technique and some new shapes, such as the aryballos and alabastron. Proto-Corinthian pottery, most of which is miniature in size, was the first to be decorated in the black-figure painting technique – figure silhouettes drawn in black and filled in with incised details.

WHAT IS THE CORE TOOL ?

CORE TOOL: A stone tool, such as a hand ax, chopper, or scraper, formed by chipping away flakes from a core. These tools, often large and relatively heavy, were characteristic of Paleolithic culture. They were made by using a pebble, antler, or bone hammer. [core-tool]

WHAT IS THE CORE REJUVENATION FLAKE ?

CORE REJUVENATION FLAKE: A roughly round and slightly wedge-shaped flake of flint with the remains of flake beds around the outside edge. These flakes are created to extend the life of a core that has become uneven or difficult to work. [core tablet]

WHAT IS THE CORE ?

CORE: 1. A piece of stone used as a blank from which flakes or blades were removed by prehistoric toolmakers. Usually it was the byproduct of toolmaking, but it may also have been shaped and modified to serve as an implement in its own right. An object, such as a hand ax, chopper, or scraper made in this way is a core tool. Cores were most often produced when hit by a pebble, antler, or bone hammer. [blank, nucleus] 2. A black or gray zone in the interior crosssection of a vessel wall, usually associated with incomplete removal of carbonaceous matter from the clay during relatively low-temperature firing; not to be confused with black coring at high temperatures, which results from trapped gases and may lead to bloating. [coring (n.)]

WHAT IS THE CORDENED URN ?

CORDENED URN: A type of Middle Bronze Age pottery in the northern parts of the British Isles during the 2nd millennium bc, generally tall straightsided vessels with a flat base, slightly flaring body and a simple rim. The outer face is decorated with applied cordons ornamented with incised decoration.

WHAT IS THE CORDILLERAN ?

CORDILLERAN: The ice mass that covered the coastal mountains along the Pacific Ocean coast of North America from northern Washington state into southern Alaska. At its maximum extent, about 20,000 years ago, it connected with the Laurentide ice sheet to the east and with the Pacific Ocean to the west, and reached a thickness of some 3 km (1 mile). The Cordilleran geosyncline was a linear trough in the Earth’s crust in which rocks of Late Precambrian to Mesozoic age (roughly 600 million to 66 million years ago) were deposited along the western coast of North America, from southern Alaska through western Canada and the United States, probably to western Mexico. The eastern boundary of the geosyncline extended from southeastern Alaska along the eastern edge of the northern Cordillera and northern Rocky Mountains of Canada and Montana, along the eastern edge of the Great Basin of Utah and Nevada, and into southeastern California and Mexico. The Old Cordilleran culture appeared in the Pacific Northwest about 9000 or 10,000 bc and persisted until about 5000 bc in some areas. Subsistence was based on hunting, fishing, and gathering. Simple willowleafshaped, bipointed projectile points are characteristic artifacts.

WHAT IS THE CORDED WARE ?

CORDED WARE: a Late Neolithic pottery ware decorated with twisted cord ornament found over much of north and central Europe in the 2nd half of the 3rd millennium bc. The commonest shapes are the beaker and the globular amphora. The ware is always associated with early agriculture, the stone battle ax, and usually with single burial under a small barrow or kurgan. The ware may derive from Denmark, central Germany (Saxo-Thuringia), eastern Poland, or the Ukraine. The culture received its name from the characteristic pottery. Some groups also had metal artifacts. There is some evidence that Corded ware people had domesticated horses and wheeled vehicles, and they are sometimes interpreted as nomadic groups – possibly Indo-European speaking – who spread across northern Europe from the east. Closely related are the Globular amphora and Funnel beaker cultures.

WHAT IS THE CORACLE ?

CORACLE: Primitive, light, small bowl-shaped boat with a wattle frame of grasses, reeds, or saplings covered with hides. They were first known in the Iron Age and are still used in Wales and along coastal Ireland, usually with a canvas and tar covering. The term also refers to an Old English boat of wickerwork covered with hides. Native Americans used the similar bullboat, covered with buffalo hides, on the Missouri River, and the corita, often sealed with bitumen, on the Colorado.

WHAT IS THE COPRIC PERIOD ?

COPRIC PERIOD: Chronological phase in Egypt lasting from the end of the Roman period, c. ad 395, until the Islamic conquest, c. ad 641. It is also described as the “Christian” period and is roughly equivalent to the Byzantine period elsewhere in the Near East.

WHAT IS THE COPROLITE ?

COPROLITE: Fossilized or desiccated human or animal feces. The study of these remains can provide information about human or animal activity in that particular locale, such as diet and disease; the study of these remains is called coprology. Coprolites only survive in exceptional circumstances – arid, frozen, and occasionally waterlogged deposits. They can be reconstituted by the addition of chemicals like trisodium phosphate, and can then be analyzed for their plant and animal remains. This gives additional insight into what was being eaten at a site, since the evidence from pollen analysis, or flotation, only suggests what was being grown.

WHAT IS THE COPPER HOARD ?

Copper Hoard Culture

COPPER HOARD: A hoard of copper artifacts, many of which occur in the Ganges-Yamuna doab (alluvial plain) and in the area south of the lower Ganges, the former occasionally associated with ocher-colored pottery. The hoards, dated broadly to the 2nd millennium bc, include flat axes, anthropomorphous axes, barbed harpoons, and sword blades. They have been cited as evidence of the Vedia arrival by some. Other copper hoards with different artifact typologies also occur elsewhere in India and Pakistan.

WHAT IS THE COPPER AGE ?

Iceman Otzi

COPPER AGE: An intermediate period between the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, characterized by the use of copper tools. According to the principles of the Three Age System, it should strictly mean the period when copper was the main material for man’s basic tools and weapons. It is difficult to apply in this sense as copper at its first appearance was very scarce, and experimentation with alloying seems to have begun early on. The alternative names of Chalcolithic and Eneolithic imply the joint use of copper and stone. In many sequences, notably in Europe and Asia, there is a period between the Neolithic and Bronze Age, separated from each by breaks in the cultural development, within which copper was coming into use and Copper Age is the best term to use. In Asia, the age saw the origins of civilization, and in Europe the great folk movements of the Beaker and Corded ware cultures, and perhaps the introduction of the Indo-European languages. The period lasted for almost 1000 years in southeast Europe, from 3500 bc.

WHAT IS THE CONG ?

CONG: A tubular, jade object, circular on the inside and enclosed in a rectangular body, made in various sizes and used for ritual purposes in ancient China. Cong were described in ancient Chinese texts as symbols of rank and were used as ritual objects primarily in the Shang (18th to 12th century bc) and Zhou/Chou (1111–255 bc) dynasties. They have been found in graves, arranged with bidisks around the corpses of the elite. The cong is thought to have symbolized Earth or possibly to have been an astronomical                                                                                         instrument. [ts’ung]