Free Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology by Timothy Darvill Page B

industrial stage of the British early Bronze Age spanning the 16th and 15th centuries bc and part of Burgess's BEDD BRANWEN PERIOD . Named after a small hoard of weapons found at Arreton Down on the Isle of Wight in December 1735, the industry is characterized by the production of flat axes, tanged spearheads, end-looped spearheads, tanged and collared spearheads, chisels and tracers.
     
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    arris [De].
    The sharp edge formed, for instance, at the meeting point of two flutes in the Doric column, a vulnerable feature of the order, rectified in the Ionic by the substitution of a flat narrow fillet between the flutes.
     
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    arrowhead [Ar].
    Stone or metal tip for mounting at the business end of a wooden arrow shaft to increase the penetrating power or modify the impact of the arrow when it strikes its target. The earliest arrowheads are of upper Palaeolithic date; in Britain Neolithic arrowheads are typically of leaf-shaped form, while Bronze Age examples are triangular in outline, with a tang for hafting and barbs for increasing attachment to the target.
     
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    arrow straighteners [Ar].
    A single block of stone, or more unusually a pair of stones, with a straight groove on one face which was rubbed up and down the shaft of an arrow to straighten and smooth it.
     
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    arroyo [De].
    The dry bed of a seasonal stream.
     
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    arsenic [Ma].
    A steel-grey semi-metallic element (As) that is highly toxic but which occurs naturally in many copper deposits and which was later sought after and added to bronze by early European metalworkers in order to improve the casting properties of their metal.
     
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    arsenical bronze [Ma].
    Bronze that contains a high proportion (up to 30 per cent) of arsenic.
     
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    artefact (artifact) [Ge].
    Any object which has been modified, fashioned, or manufactured according to a set of humanly imposed attributes, including tools, weapons, ornaments, utensils, houses, buildings, etc. Artefacts are the basic components of MATERIAL CULTURE .
     
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    artefact attribute [De].
    A logically irreducible characteristic or independent variable within a specific artefact.
     
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    Arthur [Na].
    Legendary king and champion of the British against the Anglo-Saxon invaders, immortalized in the 15th century ad by Malory's chivalric tales about the Knights of the Round Table and the search for the Holy Grail. Most of the stories about Arthur belong to the 12th century and later, and even his existence is disputed.
     
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    artillery castle [MC].
    A powerful defensive structure built specifically to house heavy guns in multiple tiers. The castle walls were built of stone, sometimes with earthen outworks. They were usually constructed to protect a harbour entrance or anchorage from attack by sea. Accommodation inside the castle was usually limited to that needed for the garrison and to store munitions. One of the earliest examples is Dartmouth Castle, Devon, built in ad 1481; the majority were constructed in the 16th century ad .
     
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    Aruã Complex [CP].
    South American farming cultures found in the Marajo area of Amazonia and tentatively dated to c. ad 1300–1500, characterized by their ceramic assemblages which belong to the Incised and Punctuate Horizon defined in the Amazon Basin. The Aruã Complex was a successor to, and apparently simpler than, the Marajoara Culture that spread widely in Amazonia in the early 1st millennium ad .
     
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    Aryans [CP].
    Groups of people who called themselves Arya, and who spoke the Indo-European SANSKRIT language, are known from the Rigveda and other early Indian historical sources. They probably invaded India from the northwest during the 2nd millennium bc ,