Archaeology Glossary Entries from C-Group to Ceren

Caguana Site, Puerto Rico
Caguana was an important settlement in Puerto Rico, associated with the Taino culture of the Caribbean.

Cart Ruts on Malta
On the islands of Malta and Gozo are an architectural feature that may or may not have something to do with the famous Temples.

El Castillo (Cantabria, Spain)
El Castillo is a mountain in the Cantabrian region of that contains many important caves related to understanding the relationship between humans and their neanderthal cousins.

Calpulli
The Calpulli is the Nahua name for the basic unit of social organization in the Aztec empire

Cempoala, Veracruz (Mexico)
Cempoala (or Zempoala) in Veracruz state of Mexico was the capital of the Totonacs during the Postclassic Period in Mesoamerica.

Centeotl
Centeotl was the god of maize for the Aztec civilization

Chaco Canyon (New Mexico, USA)
Chaco Canyon archaeology. Chaco Canyon Road System. The Chaco Canyon phenomenon. History of ancestral Puebloan societies

Castillo de Teayo, Veracruz, Mexico
Castillo de Teayo is a Huastec culture Postclassic site on the Gulf Coast of Mexico with architecture that exhibits the strong influence of Aztec art and architecture.

Ceiba Pentandra the Sacred Tree of the Maya
Ceiba is a tall tropical tree that was considered by the ancient Maya a symbol of the universe.

Cacao in Mesoamerica
Criollo cacao (Theobroma cacao spp cacao) is the name of a small tropical tree with large ovate fruit, native to the northern Amazon of South America but found in ancient planted groves throughout central America.

Ceibal (Guatemala)
One of the most ancient Maya sites in Mesoamerica, Ceibal is famed for its impressive stelae.

Cacaxtla (Mexico)
Cacaxtla was a Late Classic to Epiclassic (AD 600-900) city in the Puebla Valley, Tlaxcala, Mexico, with a population of about 10,000 at its peak.

Cactus Hill (USA)
Cactus Hill is a buried multicomponent site on the Nottaway River of Virginia, with archaic, Clovis and, below the Clovis and separated by sterile sand, an apparent Pre-Clovis occupation.

Caddoan Culture
Caddoan culture is the name given to farmers in the Arkansas River Valley of the central southern United States and southwestward between about 1100-400 BP (years before the present).

Cahuachi (Peru)
Cahuachi is a major ceremonial center of the Nasca civilization in Peru, occupied from between AD 1-500.

Cadiz (Spain)
The modern port city of Cadiz (originally called Gadir or Gardes) in the Andalucia region of Spain was a Phoenician colony of Tyre founded at least by the 9th century BC.

Cahal Pech (Belize)
The site of Cahal Pech is an early Middle Formative to Classic period Maya site in Belize, occupied pretty much continuously between 900 B.C. to A.D. 800.

Cahokia (USA)
Cahokia is a large Mississippian (AD 1000-1600) agricultural settlement located on the American Bottom of the Mississippi River in Illinois.

Cai Beo (Vietnam)
Cai Beo is an archaeological site and the name of the related Hoabinhian period culture in Vietnam.

Cairn
A cairn is, in essence, an intentionally-laid pile of rocks.

Cairo (Egypt)
The Islamic city of Cairo is, oddly enough, one of the newer cities in Egypt, founded in the 7th century AD as a military outpost.

Cajamarca Culture
The Cajamarca Culture was a small polity in the Peruvian highlands, ca. AD 500-1450

Calico Hills (USA)
Calico Hills is an area of the Mojave Desert in California and the location of the attempts by paleoanthropologists Louis Leakey and Ruth Simpson to find evidence of early humans in the New World.

Camels
There are two species of quadruped animal of the deserts of the world, both of which have implications for archaeology.

Can Llobateres (Spain)
Can Llobateres is a Middle Miocene site in Spain, where fossilized remains of the extinct ape Dryopithecus fontani were recovered and have been to between 9-10 million years ago.

Canaan
Canaan (also called Phoenicia) is the name of a Bronze Age culture and country in what is now Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, Jordan, and the southern portions of Syria and Lebanon.

Cannibalism
Cannibalism refers to a range of behaviors in which one human consumes another or parts of another for survival, dietary, ritual and/or pathological reasons.

Cannibalism
One of the early and rare practices of human beings, cannibalism involves a range of behaviors in which one human consumes another or parts of another, for dietary or ritual purposes.

Canterbury Cathedral (UK)
The Canterbury Cathedral is probably among the most famous church edifices in the world, partly because of its famous archbishops including St. Augustine, Thomas Cranmer, and Thomas Becket

Capacocha Ceremony
The capacocha ceremony was an important part of the Inca civilization, in which children were sacrificed to celebrate royal events, or to avoid natural catastrophes.

Capelinha (Brazil)
The site of Capelinha is a Paleoindian site in the Ribeira do Iguape Valley of Sao Paulo state in Brazil, and it is a shell midden with six human burials.

Capernaum (Israel)
The town of Capernaum is mentioned several times in the New Testament of the Judeo-Christian bible, as the home of several apostles.

Caravansary
A caravansary is a roadside inn or way station located on the various connecting roads making up the ancient Silk Road across Asia.

Cardiff Giant (USA)
The Cardiff Giant was a famous nineteenth century hoax, which paid off handsomely to its perpetrators.

Carib Indians
Native American group who had the unfortunate honor of being the first to meet Columbus in the New World in 1492. Within a decade, they were reported to have been destroyed by diseases brought by the Spanish explorers; but their ancestors continue to populate the Caribbean Islands.

Carnac (France)
Carnac is a town on the Morbihan coast of the Bretagne region of France, the vicinity of which is known world wide for abundant Neolithic megalithic structures.

Carthage (Tunisia)
Carthage was a Phoenician colony located in what is now the country of Tunisia about 15 kilometers from the capital city of Tunis.

Casas Grandes (Mexico)
Casas Grandes (or Paquimé) was a large, influential capital city of the Casas Grandes polity in the state of Chihuahua, northern Mexico

Cassava
Cassava (Manihot esculenta), also known as manioc, tapioca, yuca and mandioca, is a domesticated species of tuber, originally domesticated on the southwestern border of the Amazon Basin.

Casimiroid Culture
The Casimiroid culture is an Archaic period culture of the Caribbean Sea in Central America, with the type site found on the island of Casimira in the Dominican Republic.

Castel del Monte (Italy)
The World Heritage site Castel del Monte is a medieval period castle, built by Frederick II between AD 1229 and 1249.

Castelluccio Culture
The Castelluccio Culture is a Bronze Age (2000-1400 BC) culture of Sicily, and the name of the type site.

Causeways
A causeway is an early form of transportation system, consisting of a narrow, man-made earthen or rock structure that bridged a waterway.

Cedar Box
Cedar boxes are an important type of artifact used for storage by the Northwest Coast Native Americans

Catal Hoyuk (Turkey)
Catal Hoyuk is an Early Neolithic site in Turkey (6300-5500 BC), and so far the oldest civilization on earth.

Cayönü (Turkey)
Cayönü is an Early Neolithic site (Pre-Pottery Neolithic B) in the upper Tigris valley of southeastern Turkey

Cave Art
Cave art refers to paintings, murals, drawings, etchings, carvings, and pecked artwork on the interior of rockshelters and caves.

Cellular Theory of Prehistory
The cellular theory of prehistory was dreamed up by German pathologist Rudolf Virchow, who believed that if you looked hard enough, you could find the archaeological roots of each particular ethnic group as a segregated, intact whole.

Celtic Culture
The Celtic culture (or Celts) were a long-recognized cultural group of the Iron Age in western Europe, from about the 11th to the first century BC.

Ceque System
The Inca ceque system was both a physical layout of shrines and pathways, and a social/sacred ritual that the Inca used.

Cerros (Belize)
Cerros was an important preclassic Maya trading center on a small peninsula on the Chetumal Bay, near the modern town of Corozal.

Ceramics and Pottery
The term ceramics or pottery refers to artifacts made of heated earth, including storage and cooking vessels, building material such as adobe brick, and occasionally tools and furniture.

Cerro Lampay (Peru)
Cerro Lampay is a Late Archaic, Caral-Supe civilization site located in the Fortaleza Valley of Peru.

Cerén (el Salvador)
The archaeological site of Ceren is a Mesoamerican agricultural village in El Salvador, known as the American Pompeii.

El Castillo (Spain, Mexico, and Belize)
The name El Castillo ("the Castle" in Spanish) has been given to at least four sites that I'm aware of.