Ch. 1 - Meet Some Real Archaeologists

Question 1

Artifact

Answer 1

Any moveable object that has been used, modified, or manufactured by humans; include stone, bone, and metal tools, beads, ornaments, pottery, artwork, religious or sacred items.

Question 2

Classical archaeology

Answer 2

The branch of archaeology that studies the “classical” civilizations of the Mediterranean, such as Greece, Rome, and the Near East.

Question 3

Antiquarian

Answer 3

Originally, someone who studied antiquities (ancient objects) largely for the sake of the objects themselves - not to understand the people or culture that produced them.

Question 4

Midden

Answer 4

Refuse deposit resulting from human activities, generally consisting of sediment, food remains such as charred seeds, animal bone, and shell, and discarded artifacts.

Question 5

Potsherd

Answer 5

Fragments of pottery

Question 6

Stratigraphy

Answer 6

A site’s physical structure produced by the deposition of geological and/or cultural sediments into layers, or strata

Question 7

Culture history

Answer 7

The kind of archaeology practiced mainly in the early to mid 20th century; it “explains” differences or changes over time in artifact frequencies by positing the diffusion of ideas between neighboring cultures or the migration of a people who had different mental templates for artifact styles.
(Pots=People)

Question 8

New archaeology

Answer 8

Also called “processual”;
An approach to archaeology that arose in the 1960s emphasizing the understanding of underlying cultural processes and the use of the scientific method.
Lewis Binford