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Archaeology is the study of human activity in the past, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts (also known as eco-facts) and cultural landscapes (the archaeological record).
Prehistoric archaeology is a subfield of archaeology, [1] which deals specifically with artefacts, civilisations and other materials from societies that existed before any form of writing system or historical record.
The Canaanite Ivory Comb is a 3,700-year-old artifact discovered in the ruins of Lachish, an ancient Canaanite city-state located in modern-day Israel.Measuring approximately 3.5 by 2.5 centimetres (1.38 by 0.98 in), the comb is made of elephant ivory and contains the earliest known complete sentence written in a phonetic alphabet. [1]
Without archaeology, little or nothing would be known about the use of material culture by humanity that pre-dates writing. [49] However, it is not only prehistoric, pre-literate cultures that can be studied using archaeology but historic, literate cultures as well, through the sub-discipline of historical archaeology.
As the National Geographic Society has explained it: "This is why the most basic definition of the word civilization is 'a society made up of cities.'" [13] The earliest emergence of civilizations is generally connected with the final stages of the Neolithic Revolution in West Asia, culminating in the relatively rapid process of urban ...
The early earthworks built in Louisiana around 3500 BCE are the only ones known to have been built by a hunter-gatherer culture, rather than a more settled culture based on agricultural surpluses. The best-known flat-topped pyramidal structure is Monks Mound at Cahokia, near present-day Collinsville, Illinois. This community was the center of ...
Neolithic architecture refers to structures encompassing housing and shelter from approximately 10,000 to 2,000 BC, the Neolithic period. In southwest Asia, Neolithic cultures appear soon after 10,000 BC, initially in the Levant ( Pre-Pottery Neolithic A and Pre-Pottery Neolithic B ) and from there into the east and west.
The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic (c. 3.3 million – c. 11,700 years ago) (/ ˌ p eɪ l i oʊ ˈ l ɪ θ ɪ k, ˌ p æ l i-/ PAY-lee-oh-LITH-ik, PAL-ee-), also called the Old Stone Age (from Ancient Greek παλαιός (palaiós) 'old' and λίθος (líthos) 'stone'), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone tools, and which represents almost ...