gallitrap

(folklore, Cornwall, Devon, Gloucestershire, Somerset) Grass growing in a circle that possesses the magical power of compelling anyone standing within it to confess their wrongdoings.

(folklore, Cornwall, Devon, Gloucestershire, Somerset) A magical circle of grass believed to have been created by pixies, that causes any mortal stepping into it to believe they are continuing to walk forward when they are actually walking in a circle.


pyrocentric

en-adj

pyrocentric (comparative more pyrocentric, superlative most pyrocentric)

more pyrocentric (comparative)
most pyrocentric (superlative)

To Pythagoras himself has been frequently ascribed the idea of a pyrocentric Kosmos—with worlds revolving round a central sun—according to the Copernican, or, to speak more accurately, the Newtonian scheme.

1874, Bernard H. Becker, Scientific London, page 302:

Apollyon, who, as god of the sun, has a certain stake in the matter, teaches the Prior the truth of what the Greeks, Pythagoras' disciples, knew many years before— the nature of the heliocentric (or pyrocentric) planetary system.

1967, Gerald Cornelius Monsman, Pater's Portraits: Mythic Pattern in the Fiction of Walter Pater, pages 187–188:

All the same, some 2000 years later Copernicus would refer to Philolaus' pyrocentric world model for support of the idea that the Earth is a circularly moving planet.

2007, Helge S. Kragh, Conceptions of Cosmos: From Myths to the Accelerating Universe: A History of Cosmology, page 16:

(astronomy, history) Of or relating to the Pythagorean astronomical system, which posited that the Earth, Moon, Sun, and planets orbit an invisible "Central Fire".


diphyllic

diphyllic (comparative more diphyllic, superlative most diphyllic)

more diphyllic (comparative)
most diphyllic (superlative)

The first lateral lobe is diphyllic, having two nearly equal-sized secondary lobes. The second lateral lobe is monophyllic having a single secondary lobe which lies on the side toward the venter.

1933, The Geology of Texas - Issue 3701, Volume 3, page 308:

The suture line is characterized by the presence of diphyllic saddles, a feature better developed on LS1 and LS2.

1962, José Idamor Corvalán, Early Mesozoic Biostratigraphy of the Westgate Area, page 152:

However as Dr W.J. Arkell observed in his MS notes the distinction between a diphyllic and tetraphyllic lateral saddle depends on the relative development of the small terminal folioles, which are liable to vary and change with growth.

1997, Graeme Roy Stevens, The Late Jurassic Ammonite Fauna of New Zealand, page 19:

(paleontology) Having two phylloid lobes.


tamanoas

(folklore) Magical power, in the Chinook culture.


Tardenoisian

(archaeology) Of or relating to an Epipaleolithic culture whose characteristic arrowheads were found at Coincy in the Tardenois region of France in 1885.


gen. et sp. nov.

(taxonomy, biology, paleontology) new genus and species


anti-commentary

Metrodorus too had written against two Platonic dialogues polemics that appear to have been of a similar sort; and later Philodemus also composed an anti-commentary against Xenophon’s Oeconomicus.

2011, Eleni Kechagia, Plutarch Against Colotes: A Lesson in History of Philosophy, →ISBN, page 80:

More comprehensive than any of these […] is the De Rerum Natura juxta propria principia of Bernardino Telesio: in one sense a commentary on the natural philosophical works of Aristotle, in another sense a rejection of the Philosopher – an anti-commentary, as it were.

2018, Linda Deer Richardson, Academic Theories of Generation in the Renaissance: The Contemporaries and Successors of Jean Fernel (1497–1558), →ISBN, page 144:

The first argues that sacred signs ordained by God have always been corrupted by men, the second, called ‘our litil treatise of ye Messe’, is an anti-commentary on the Mass and vestments, and the third a commentary on the Reformed liturgy.

2019, Stephen Mark Holmes, “Liturgical Theology before 1600”, in David Ferguson, Mark W. Elliott, editors, The History of Scottish Theology, volume 1, Celtic Origins to Reformed Orthodoxy, →ISBN, page 63:

The Herculaneum papyri preserve fragments of two other works of his: the anticommentaries “Against Plato’s Euthydemus” (PHerc. 1032) and “Against Plato’s Lysis” (PHerc. 208).

2021, Michael McOsker, The Good Poem According to Philodemus, →ISBN, page 53:

(history of philosophy) A hostile commentary, as distinct from an exposition.


sapeornithid

(paleontology) Any member of the Sapeornithidae (also officially known as Omnivoropterygidae) family of theropods.


pappotheriid

(paleontology) Any member of the Pappotheriidae of extinct mammals


tribothere

(paleontology) One of a group of extinct tribosphenic marsupial-like therians.


palaeolimnologist

(paleontology) Alternative spelling of paleolimnologist


centrosaurin

(paleontology) Any member of the Centrosaurinae subfamily of dinosaurs.


cyclidan

(paleontology) Any member of the Cyclida order of crab-like arthropods.


hut circle

(archaeology) A circular or oval depression in the ground, sometimes with a low stone wall around it, that was once the foundation of a roundhouse.


shriker

(folklore) Synonym of shuck (“supernatural black dog”)


Regio Esercito

Unadapted borrowing from Italian Regio Esercito (Royal Italian Army).

unadapted borrowing

The popularity of the Regio Esercito was also enhanced by bringing an effective health service system to the region.

2015 December 30, Emanuele Sica, Mussolini's Army in the French Riviera: Italy's Occupation of France, University of Illinois Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, page 71:

(history, military) The Kingdom of Italy’s army.


hydroarchaeology

(archaeology, uncommon) The study of artefacts or remains found underwater.


Oneota

(archaeology) A cultural complex that existed in the eastern plains and Great Lakes area of what is now occupied by the United States from around AD 900 to around 1650 or 1700, considered a major component of Upper Mississippian culture, and characterized by globular, shell-tempered pottery that is often coarse in fibre.


Danubian corridor

The caves lie on a migration route into western Europe known as the Danubian Corridor.

2018, Tim Flannery, Europe: A Natural History, page 179:

(paleontology, archaeology) A route along the valleys of the Danube and Rhine Rivers taken by of various ancient migrations of Eastern cultures into the north and northwest of Europe.


living floor

A living floor is, in archaeological terms, the floor of a cave upon which people lived and which retains evidence of their activities.

2018, Tim Flannery, Europe: A Natural History, page 202:

(archaeology) A flat and relatively level space inside a cave showing evidence of ancient habitation.


faunal assemblage

en-noun

faunal assemblage (plural faunal assemblages)

Europe’s mammals are described by scientists as comprising faunal assemblages - groups of species that typically occur together.

2018, Tim Flannery, Europe: A Natural History, page 192:

(archaeology, paleontology) A group of different species that commonly associated with one another whose fossils occur together in a particular stratum.


scimitar-toothed

(paleontology) Of various prehistoric mammals, having long, slender, curved canines in the upper mouth.


Clovis point

They closely resemble the famed American Clovis points, which are associated with large mammal extinctions across the North American continent.

2018, Tim Flannery, Europe: A Natural History, page 219:

(archaeology) A fluted spearhead or the like created by people of the prehistoric Paleoamerican Clovis culture.


July Revolution

Coordinate term: February Revolution

(history) The French Revolution of 1830, which led to the July Monarchy.


petrified carpentry

It is, however, often used in woodwork, where it is easier to execute, and it seems possible that its use at Göbekli Tepe constitutes an example of ʻpetrified carpentryʼ.

2018, Tim Flannery, Europe: A Natural History, page 228:

(archaeology) The presence in stonework architecture of designs that originated in carved wooden structures.


Creswellian

(archaeology) A British Upper Palaeolithic culture named after the type site of Creswell Crags in Derbyshire.


Reihengräber

From German Reihengräber (literally “row grave”).

bor

(historical, archaeology) A culture characterized by the burial practice of regularly arranged, identically oriented inhumation graves, existing between the mid-fifth and early-eighth century in central and western Europe, within the Merovingian sphere of influence.


actinosiphonate

Cyrtochoanitic orthoceracones or slightly curved cyrtoceracones in which the septal necks are longer than the brims, and in which the connecting ring does not attain the adoral septum. Deposits within the siphuncle, if present, limited to a continuous lamellose lining, exhibiting neither actinosiphonate nor annulosiphonate structure.

1935 August 23, R. H. Flower, K. E. Caster, “The Stratigraphy and Paleontology of Northwestern Pennsylvania. Part II: Paleontology. Section A: The Cephalopod Fauna of the Conewango Series of the Upper Devonian in New York and Pennsylvania”, in Bulletins of American Paleontology, volume 22, number 75, Ithaca, NY, page 225:

(paleontology) Having vertical lamellae on the siphuncle, hypothesized to be either outgrowths of the connecting ring, or the result of gerontic secretions.


annulosiphonate

(paleontology) Having ring-shaped deposits at the septal foramina or siphuncle which resemble a thickening of the connecting ring.


fairy hill

On this Hill [...] are the Remains of a CAMP, and where the Ground has suffered no Rupture are to be seen Tokens of circular Tents, called Fairy Hills, round which the vulgar report these Sylphes were wont to dance.

1754, Thomas Gardner, An Historical Account of Dunwich, Antiently a City, Now a Borough, page 189:

Their Fairy hills were called Tomhans and Shian, and were supposed to possess great internal comforts, with doors and windows that could only be discovered on dark evenings, by the bright light of the fairy fires shining through the artfully-constructed apertures.

1865, Cuthbert Bede, The White Wife: With Other Stories, Supernatural, Romantic and Legendary, page 189:

Finally, as regards the places in which these rites and mysteries may have been held, certain writers believe them to have been the "Fairy Hills" or "howes" in various parts of Scotland.

1928, Lewis Spence, Mysteries of Britain, page v. 136:

(folklore) A hill, barrow (tumulus), or other circular eminence, beneath which fairies live.


climatic optimum

en-noun

climatic optimum (plural climatic optima or climatic optimums)

climatic optima (plural)
climatic optimums (plural)

(geology, paleontology, climatology) Any time period, ranging from a few centuries to millions of years, marked by persistently warm temperatures.


wulver

(folklore) A wolf-like humanoid creature in Shetland folklore.


Bennelong

A Dharug surname
(history) Woollarawaree Bennelong

A Dharug surname
Woollarawaree Bennelong


Truganini

(history) An Aboriginal Tasmanian woman, known for being the last full-blooded Aboriginal Tasmanian


glaistig

glaistigs (plural)
glastig (alternative)

(folklore) A kind of ghost in Scottish folklore, usually depicted as a woman, a goat, or a hybrid of the two.


climatic pessimum

climatic pessimum (plural climatic pessima or climatic pessimums)

climatic pessima (plural)
climatic pessimums (plural)

(geology, paleontology, climatology) Any time period, ranging from a few centuries to millions of years, marked by persistently cold temperatures, but not always glaciation.


mammisi

Borrowed from French mammisi, a neologism coined by Jean-François Champollion as if from Bohairic Coptic *ⲙⲁⲙ̀ⲙⲓⲥⲓ (*mam̀misi) (a term otherwise unattested), from ⲙⲁ (ma, “place”) + ⲛ̀- (ǹ-, “of”) + ⲙⲓⲥⲓ (misi, “birth”) as a calque of earlier Egyptian pr-ms (“mammisi”, literally “house of birth”).

der

(Egyptology) a subsidiary chapel in Ancient Egypt attached to a larger temple and associated with the nativity of a god


Elling Woman

The Elling woman from the same large bog as Tollund man, and similarly hanged, had long plaited hair which had presented problems to the executioner, who had wound it up and round itself to remove its contact with the rope.

1996, D. Brothwell, “European bog bodies: current state of research and preservation”, in Konrad Spindler, Harald Wilfing, Elisabeth Rastbichler-Zissernig, Dieter ZurNedden, Hans Nothdurfter, editors, Human Mummies, Springer, page 169:

Sleeping near the Tollund Man for centuries is the Elling Woman, whose body was discovered in 1938 about 60m (200 ft.) from where the Tollund Man was later discovered.

2009, Darwin Porter, Danforth Prince, Frommer's Denmark, Wiley, page 356:

Elling Woman from Denmark was also hanged with a leather belt that left a deep scar around her throat.

2016, Dennis William Harding, Death and Burial in Iron Age Britain, Oxford University Press, page 216:

(archaeology) A bog body found preserved in peat on the Jutland peninsula, Denmark, in 1938; the naturally mummified body of a woman believed to have died approximately 280 BCE, during the period characterised in Scandinavia as the pre-Roman Iron Age.


Priestly

en-adj

Priestly (not generally comparable, comparative more Priestly, superlative most Priestly)

more Priestly (comparative)
most Priestly (superlative)

Semantic loan from German priesterlich and Priesterschrift (“Priestly source”, literally “priest document”), so called because of the reconstructed source’s emphasis on cultic issues. See priestly.

Thus we continue to meet the new Priestly expression, “you (they) shall know that I am Yahweh” […]

1971, Norman Habel, Literary Criticism of the Old Testament, →ISBN, page 79:

Then, Welch (1939) went the opposite way, asserting that the original layer, written before the end of the exile showed Deuteronomy’s influence and that more Priestly texts were secondary.

2004, Steven L. McKenzie, Abingdon Old Testament Commentaries: I & II Chronicles, →ISBN, page 27:

Noth made the necessary objections to that view and demonstrated that these are additions in the Priestly style which presuppose the bringing together of P and the non-Priestly text in Genesis–Numbers and the combination of Genesis–Joshua.

2005 [2000], Reinhard G. Kratz, translated by John Bowden, The Composition of the Narrative Books of the Old Testament, →ISBN, page 110:

documentary hypothesis
documentary hypothesis

(history) Pertaining to the Priestly source (“P”), one of the sources of the Torah or Pentateuch according to the documentary hypothesis.


turfline

(archaeology) A stratum of soil between two other layers.


Sa Huỳnh

(archaeology) A culture in modern-day central and southern Vietnam (1000 BCE–200 C.E.).


Okvik

(archaeology) An early subdivision of the Old Bering Sea culture.


Skinner's maxim

After British intellectual historian Quentin Skinner, who formulated the principle in 1969.

When we respect Skinner’s maxim we shall give an account of the dead thinker ‘in his own terms’, ignoring the fact that we should think ill of anyone who still used those terms today. When we ignore Skinner’s maxim, we give an account ‘in our own terms’, ignoring the fact that the dead thinker, in his linguistic habits as he lived, would have repudiated these terms as foregn to his interests and intentions.

1984, Richard Rorty, “The historiography of philosophy: four genres”, in Richard Rorty, J. B. Schneewind, Quentin Skinner, editors, Philosophy in History: Essays on the Historiography of Philosophy, →ISBN, page 54:

Historical reconstruction obeys Skinner’s Maxim: no agent can eventually be said to have said or meant something which he could never be brought to accept as a correct description of what he said or meant.

1988, Stephen Makin, “How can we find out what Ancient Philosophers said?”, in Phronesis, volume 33, number 2, →JSTOR, page 122:

Historical reconstructions will follow ‘Skinner’s maxim’, and will constrain themselves to offering only descriptions that the writer in question could in principle endorse.

2020, Patrick Fessenbecker, Reading Ideas in Victorian Literature: Literary Content as Artistic Experience, →ISBN, page 122:

(history) The principle that any historical account of what someone meant by a certain action or statement must in some measure conform to that person’s own understanding of what they were saying or doing.


Elmenteitan

(archaeology) A prehistoric lithic industry and pottery tradition with a distinct pattern of land use, hunting and pastoralism that appeared and developed on the western plains of Kenya during the Pastoral Neolithic c.3300-1200 BP.


Kitezh

(Slavic mythology, folklore) A city in Russian folklore that was believed to have disappeared under a lake, to avoid being conquered by the Mongols.


Royal Scythians

(antiquity, history) The main Scythian tribe, and the ruling tribe of the whole of Scythia.


Iberization

(history) The introduction of a market economy in the Iberian Peninsula around 300 BC.


Piggi-Billa

(folklore) An echidna that appears in Aboriginal fairy tales.


Ipiutak

(archaeology) A culture that arose possibly as early as 100–200 BCE and collapsed around 800 CE, found from the south of the Bering Strait, across the Brooks Range and possibly as far north as Point Barrow.


euconodont

(paleontology) Any member of the extinct Euconodonta group of conodonts.


trichonodelliform

(paleontology) Bilaterally symmetrical with lateral processes on each side of the cusps, and with a posterior process. Applied to conodont elements.


neoprioniodiform

(paleontology) Characterised by a main terminal cusp, an underside with deep grooves, a variable number of subsidiary cusps which may or may not be fused together. Applied to conodonts or shark teeth.


rastrate

(paleontology, zoology) rake-like or with parallel serrations.


Free Soviets

(history, anarchism, communism) An anarchist territory in southern Ukraine during the Russian Civil War


placodontoid

(paleontology) Any member of the Placodontoidea superfamily of extinct reptiles.


New Year's bottle

en-noun

New Year's bottle (plural New Year's bottles)

(archaeology) A kind of lentoid bottle found in the cultures of Ancient Egypt, designed to be filled with Nile water or possibly perfume or oil and offered as celebratory gifts for the New Year.


basiolabial

(zoology, paleontology) Bottom facing the lips.


spondist

Calque of Egyptian sqbb (“libator”), participle of sqbb (“to cool, to libate with water”), by way of Ancient Greek σπονδή (spondḗ, “libation”) suffixed with -ist.

der

Spondists in the temple of Nebt-Hotep;

1855, Dunbar Isidore Heath, The Exodus Papyri, London : J.W. Parker, page 175:

I am the priest in Tattuo, the spondist of Abydos, growing tall among the tall. I am the priest in Abydos, the day of calling the world. I see the hidden places of the Rusta. I am the maker of the Festivals of the Spirit Lord of Tattu.

1867, Egypt's Place in Universal History: an Historical Investigation in Five Books Christian C. J. Bunsen: Vol. 5, page 162:

DSJOT-MEN. A spondist of the temple of Amen. Period uncertain. DSJOT-MONTH. A spondist of Amen, and prophet and overseer of the sacred scribes of the god. Period uncertain.

1876, William Ricketts Cooper, An Archaic Dictionary: Biographical, Historical, and Mythological: From the Egyptian, Assyrian, and Etruscan Monuments and Papyri, page 177:

"you who are in the service of Osiris or of Anubis," "priest, prophet, scribe, spondist, ministrant, male or female, every man and every woman passing by this tomb, statue, tablet or shrine, whether you be passing northwards or southwards as you desire to enjoy the favour of the king […]"

(archaic, Egyptology) An Ancient Egyptian priest responsible for pouring libations of water.


German dualism

(German history) The period (1740–1866) during which Germany was dominated by the two poles of Austria and Prussia vying for supremacy thereover.

deutscher Dualismus

period wherein Austria and Prussia vied for supremacy over Germany (1740–1866)


cadet branch

(history, heraldry) A house (dynasty) descended from one of the patriarch's younger sons.


cadet house

(history, heraldry) Synonym of cadet branch (“house (dynasty) descended from one of the patriarch's younger sons”)


kossmaticeratid

(paleontology) Any member of the family Kossmaticeratidae of ammonites.


dischizotomous

(paleontology, malacology) Furcating from two points.


monoschizotomous

... (one of which was inked in by Buckman and shows in his photograph, giving an erroneous impression of quadrifurcation). The furcation is monoschizotomous and very regular.

Monoschizotomous, i.e. ribs bifurcating from one point. The following are distinguished according to the differentiation of the sutural lobe : (a) Stephanoceratidae with a suspensive ('hanging') sutural lobe; (b)[…]

1983 June 2, Ulrich Lehmann, G. Hillmer, Fossil Invertebrates, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 164:

(paleontology, malacology) Furcating from a single point.


polyschizotomous

(paleontology, malacology) Furcating at many points.


Salinar

(archaeology, historical) A culture of ancient Peru that developed in the coastal area of Ancash and La Libertad.


Stillbay

Named by archaeologists A. J. H. Goodwin and C. van Riet Lowe in 1929.

(archaeology) A Middle Stone Age stone tool manufacturing style, first described from the site of Stilbaai (Still Bay) in South Africa.


Scholomance

(folklore) A fabled underground school of black magic in Romania.


Free City of Tri-Insula

The Tri-Insula element derives from Latin tri- (combining form of trēs, tria, “three”) + īnsula (“island”).

The commercial interests of New York were ever opposed to war. Meetings were held repeatedly in January, 1861, to petition Congress for peace. Meanwhile Mayor Fernando Wood proposed to the Common Council that Manhattan Island, Long Island and Staten Island should secede from the Union and constitute the free city of “Tri-Insula.”

1925, William Thompson Bonner, New York: The World’s Metropolis, 1623–4—1923–4. A Presentation of the Greater City at the beginning of its Second Quarter Century of Amalgamated Government and the 300ᵗʰ Anniversary of Its Founding with review of the Interim Accomplishments of Its Citizens., 524 Broadway, New York: R. L. Polk & Co., Inc., Section One: “New York — The Metropolis”, Chapter VII: «New York’s Military History — Events and Personnel», ‘Civil War’, ‹Wood’s Proposed Free City›, page 104/1:

“Are you trying to tell me that the mayor of New York wants to proclaim independence from the United States of America?” asked Pinkerton.
“The council approved the plan in January,” Mannion said, delighted by the reaction he had so deliberately provoked. “They’re going to merge Manhattan, Staten Island and Long Island into the ‘Free City of Tri-Insula.’ Best goddamn idea Fernandy Wood ever had.”

2011, Dominic Lagan, The Coming Storm: A Red Mannion Novel, Morrisville: Lulu.com, →ISBN, chapter three, page 34:

Like any debate, it goes on and on and nothing is said that hasn’t been said a thousand times before, so I pull out my thin screen and enjoy the ride into the Free City of Tri-Insula, or what used to be the old City of New York.

2013 May, Sam A. Patel, Data Runner (Data Runner Series; Book One), first edition, New York: Diversion Books, →ISBN, part II: “When Security is the Only Option”, chapter 5, no pagination:

(history and fantasy) A city-state comprising Long, Manhattan, and Staten Islands, proposed on the 6th of January, 1861 by the seventy-fifth mayor of New York City, Fernando Wood, shortly before the beginning of the American Civil War.


gokenin

(Japanese history) A vassal of the shogun.


world history

en-noun

world history (countable and uncountable, plural world histories)

(history) A field of historical study that examines history from a global perspective.


penis-cover

(anthropology, Egyptology, very rare) A covering or concealment of the penis found on certain statues in Ancient Egypt.


Micoquien

Micoquean (alternative)
Micoquian (alternative)

(archaeology) An early middle Paleolithic industry, found in the Eemian and in an early episode of the Würm glaciation (about 130,000 to 60,000 BCE), and distinguished technologically by the appearance of distinctly asymmetrical bifaces.


New Empire

(archaic, historical, Egyptology) Synonym of New Kingdom


circulation time

circulation time (countable and uncountable, plural circulation times)

tracing the precise circulation routes and circulation time of exchange goods may offer finer detail on social questions, cf. Frankenstein and Rowlands ( 1978 ).

1984, John L. Bintliff, European Social Evolution: Archaeological Perspectives, page 28:

This would seem to confirm our hypothesis that increasing circulation time reflects periods of declining supplies of bronze.

1984, Matthew Spriggs, Marxist Perspectives in Archaeology, page 92:

Swords were classified according to degree of wear—that is, circulation time.

2005, Kristian Kristiansen, Michael Rowlands, Social Transformations in Archaeology, page 93:

During its circulation time, capital does not function as productive capital, and therefore produces neither commodities nor surplus-value.

We can think of the capitalist's desire to reduce circulation time in terms of turnover time.

Industrial capital requires —to a greater or lesser degree—time (circulation time) and costs (circulation costs) for the sale.

2018, Teinosuke Otani, A Guide to Marxian Political Economy, page 295:

(economics, archaeology) The time in which capital is bound up the form of a commodity; the time in which a manufactured item is in use.


OVRA

Borrowed from Italian OVRA with unknown full form. Speculated by some as initialism of Organizzazione per la Vigilanza e la Repressione dell'Antifascismo (Organization for Vigilance and Repression of Anti-Fascism).

initialism

(history) The secret police of Fascist Italy active from 1927 to 1945.


Rhomaean

en-adj

Rhomaean (comparative more Rhomaean, superlative most Rhomaean)

more Rhomaean (comparative)
most Rhomaean (superlative)

Learned borrowing from Byzantine Greek Ῥωμαῖος (Rhōmaîos), referring to the autonym used by Grecophone writers in the Eastern Roman (or Byzantine) Empire.

lbor

(historiography, rare) Synonym of Rhomaian; of or pertaining to the Eastern Roman (or Byzantine) empire.


Old Bering Sea

The culture was initially named the Bering Sea culture by Canadian archaeologist Diamond Jenness in 1928, following the discovery on the Diomede Islands of distinctively decorated objects such as whaling and sealing harpoon heads. The adjective "Old" was added by Smithsonian archaeologist Henry B. Collins to distinguish the culture from younger materials with similar design elements.

archaeological culture
archaeological culture

(archaeology, historical) An archaeological culture associated with a distinctive, elaborate circle-and-dot aesthetic style and centered on the Bering Strait region.


aulacophore

From Latin aulax (“furrow”) or its etymon Ancient Greek αὖλαξ (aûlax, “furrow”) + -phore (“bearer, carrier”).

Stylophorans are divided into two orders the Cornuta and Ankyroida: cornutes have asymmetrical thecae, aulacophores with stylocones and cover plates over the food groove that open widely; ankyroids have essentially bilaterally symmetrical thecae, aulacophores with styloids and in most the cover plates do not open widely.

1997 October, R[onald] L. Parsley, “The echinoderm classes Stylophora and Homoiostelea: non Calcichordata”, in The Paleontological Society Papers, volume 3, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 225:

(paleontology) A tail-like longitudinally differentiated appendage found in mitrates and cornutes, originally believed to be used for feeding, but now believed to be used for locomotion.


stylocone

(paleontology) A spiky plate on an echinoderm.


epispire

Epispires, cothumopores, and lamellipores in cornutes are respiratory structures not atypical of early echinoderms and are only superficially similar to chordate gill slits.

(paleontology) A spiral ridge on the surface of the shell of some fossilized gastropods.


cothurnopore

Epispires, cothurnopores, and lamellipores in cornutes are respiratory structures not atypical of early echinoderms and are only superficially similar to chordate gill slits.

In all cornute species where cothurnopores are well preserved, each cothurnopore consists of two U-plates that meet one another at the tips, thus enclosing a small elliptical area.

2002 April, Mónica Martí Mus, “The Ordovician cornute Flabellicystis rushtoni n. gen. n. sp. (Stylophora, Echinodermata) and its phylogenetic position within the group Cornuta”, in Paläontologische Zeitschrift, volume 76, Suttgart: E. Schweizerbartsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 105, column 1:

(paleontology) A proto-lamellate organ of a stylophoran composed of U-shaped plates.


lamellipore

(paleontology) A thin, sheet-like extension that forms part of the skeletal walls of some bryozoan colonies.


dickinsoniomorph

From Dickinsonia + -o- + -morph. First attested since at least 2007.

Phylum uncertain, but in the past has been placed in the Phylum Proarticulata based on its "symmetry of gliding reflection" where segments meet along the midline in a zigzag fashion. Class: Vendiamorph; Family: Vendomiidae; possibly a dickinsoniomorph.

2007, Mikhail A. Fedonkin, The Rise of Animals, page 281:

This tool, we suggest, has the potential to be used for testing the unity of an evolutionary clade, such as 'rangeomorphs' and 'dickinsoniomorphs'.

2007, Patricia Vickers-Rich, Patricia Komarower, The Rise and Fall of the Ediacaran Biota, page 377:

The taxon is known from shallow-water sediments, and has been veriously interpreted as possibly a dickinsoniomorph, a protoarticulate, a marine alga, a trace fossil, or an erniettomorph (Vickers-Rich et al. in Fedonkin et al. 2007, p . 282; Xiao and Laflamme 2009).

2010, Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, page 1314:

'Epibaion', a series of trace fossil impressions in a Proterozoic biomat thought to have beern formed by the dickinsoniomorph Yorgia consuming the surface of the biomat.

2020, Encyclopedia of Geology, page 567:

(paleontology) A member of the genus Dickinsonia.


kimberellomorph

Here I report seven additional creatures from the Clemente biota, including […] the solzid kimberellomorph Zirabagtaria ovata […]

2018 March 14, Mark A.S. McMenamin, Deep Time Analysis, Springer, →ISBN, page 78:

The largest and most central cluster—the White Sea module—predominantly consists of bilateralomorph, dickinsoniomorph, and kimberellomorph genera, along with other Ediacara-type taxa.

2019 February 22, “Ediacaran biozones identified with network analysis provide evidence for pulsed extinctions of early complex life”, in A. D. Muscente, Natalia Bykova, Thomas H. Boag, Luis A. Buatois, M. Gabriela Mángano, Ahmed Eleish, Anirudh Prabhu, Feifei Pan, Michael B. Meyer, James D. Schiffbauer, Peter Fox, Robert M. Hazen, Andrew H. Knoll, editors, Nature Communications:

Reconstruction of the kimberellomorph Ediacaran Kimberella.

2020 December 16, Encyclopedia of Geology, Academic Press, →ISBN, page 564:

(paleontology) A member of the genus Kimberella.


Ertebølle

Named after the type site in the village of Ertebølle on Limfjorden in Danish Jutland.

(archaeology) A pottery-making, hunter-gatherer and fisher culture dating to the end of the Mesolithic period, and concentrated in southern Scandinavia.


Keftian

We see such gold ox-heads figured both in the inventories on the clay tablets at Knossos and on the Tomb of Rekhmara, as part of the tribute brought by the Keftians, the men of the isles in the midst of the sea, to the Egypt of the early fifteenth century.

1907, Ronald M. Burrows, The Discoveries In Crete, page 15:

(Egyptology) A member of an unidentified ancient people of the Mediterranean, sometimes linked with the Minoans, known from their interactions with the Ancient Egyptians.


Second Thirty Years' War

the Second Thirty Years' War (canonical)

Holonym: short twentieth century


Kingdom of Bulgaria

Tsardom of Bulgaria
Tsardom of Bulgaria#English

(formal, history) Synonym of Tsardom of Bulgaria


Lenné Triangle

the Lenné Triangle (canonical)
Lenné-Triangle (alternative)
Lenné triangle (alternative)
Lenné-triangle (alternative)

Partial calque of German Lenné-Dreieck: Dreieck → triangle.

German Democratic Republic
German Democratic Republic#English

(history) The gore delineated by the Bellevue-, Ebert-, and Lennéstraßen which, between 1961 and 1988, was part of the German Democratic Republic de jure, but was separated from it by the Berlin Wall, which ran along the Ebertstraße.

Lenné-Dreieck

East German gore cut off from the rest of the GDR by the Berlin Wall


neo-Christian

neo-Christians (plural)
Neo-Christian (alternative)

Before the banishment of Jews from Spain took effect, Antonio di Moro, a Jewish peddler of Cordova, flourished as the last of Spanish troubadours, and Rodrigo da Cota, a neo-Christian of Seville, as the first of Spanish dramatists, the supposed author of Celestina, one of the most celebrated of old Spanish dramatic compositions.

1895, Gustav Karpeles, Jewish Literature, and Other Essays, Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, page 97:

(Christianity, history) Synonym of New Christian


Chellean

After the town of Chelles, a suburb of Paris, France.

(archaeology, dated) Synonym of Abbevillian


Pre-Pottery Neolithic

Holonyms: Neolithic, New Stone Age

Meronyms: Pre-Pottery Neolithic A, Pre-Pottery Neolithic B


Turkana Boy

Named after Lake Turkana, Kenya, near which the fossil was discovered in 1984 by Kenyan palaeontologist Kamoya Kimeu, on the bank of the Nariokotome River.

The prime importance of the Turkana Boy is that he represented the earliest kind of human we know of whose general body proportions matched those of living people.

1995, Ian Tattersall, The Fossil Trail, Cambridge University Press, page 118:

1999, Barry Bogin, Patterns of Human Growth, Cambridge University Press, 2nd Edition, page 202,
As Homo erectus is no chimpanzee, Turkana boy’s true age at death was probably between seven and 11 years. What is clear is that the Turkana boy followed a pattern of growth that is neither that of a modern human nor that of a chimpanzee.

2009, Richard Dawkins, The Greatest Show on Earth, Simon & Schuster (Free Press), page 197,
The most famous specimen of Homo ergaster, and one of the most complete pre-human fossils ever found, is the Turkana Boy, or Nariokotome Boy, discovered by Kamoya Kimeu, star fossil-finder of Richard Leakey's team of palaeontologists.
The Turkana Boy lived approximately 1.6 million years ago and died at the age of about eleven.

Homo ergaster
Homo ergaster#Translingual

(archaeology) The nearly complete fossilised skeleton of a Homo ergaster youth (estimated 7–11 years old at death) who lived 1.5 to 1.6 million years ago.

KNM-WT 15000

fossil designation by National Museums of Kenya


Pre-Pottery Neolithic A

Holonyms: Pre-Pottery Neolithic, PPN < Neolithic, New Stone Age

Comeronyms: Pre-Pottery Neolithic B, PPNB

Pre-Pottery Neolithic
Pre-Pottery Neolithic

(archaeology) The first stage of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic.


Pre-Pottery Neolithic B

Comeronyms: Pre-Pottery Neolithic A, PPNA

(archaeology) The second stage of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic.


PPNA

Pre-Pottery Neolithic A
Pre-Pottery Neolithic A#English

(archaeology) Abbreviation of Pre-Pottery Neolithic A.


dooligah

(folklore) In Australian Aboriginal folklore, a giant hairy man said to abduct children.


eopterosaurian

(paleontology) Any member of the Eopterosauria clade of pterosaurs.


early Helladic

(history, archaeology) related to or referring to the early Bronze Age period (3000–2000 BCE)


EDSA

(history, Philippine politics) Ellipsis of EDSA Revolution.


Lower Xiajiadian culture

Calque of Mandarin 夏家店下層文化 /夏家店下层文化 (Xiàjiādiàn xiàcéng wénhuà), from 夏家店 (Xiàjiādiàn, “Xiajiadian”) + 下層 /下层 (xiàcéng, “lower strata”) + 文化 (wénhuà, “culture”), with Xiajiadian being the location of the type site, which was discovered at a lower level than that of the Upper Xiajiadian culture. By surface analysis, lower + Xiajiadian + culture.

surf

Coordinate term: Upper Xiajiadian culture

(archaeology) An archaeological culture found throughout southeastern Inner Mongolia, northern Hebei and western Liaoning in China, who thrived from approximately 2200 to 1600 BCE.


Upper Xiajiadian culture

Calque of Mandarin 夏家店上層文化 /夏家店上层文化 (Xiàjiādiàn shàngcéng wénhuà), from 夏家店 (Xiàjiādiàn, “Xiajiadian”) + 上層 /上层 (shàngcéng, “upper strata”) + 文化 (wénhuà, “culture”), with Xiajiadian being the location of the type site, which was discovered at a higher level than that of the Lower Xiajiadian culture. By surface analysis, upper + Xiajiadian + culture.

surf

Coordinate term: Lower Xiajiadian culture

(archaeology) An archaeological culture found throughout southeastern Inner Mongolia, northern Hebei and western Liaoning in China, who thrived from approximately 1000 to 600 BCE.


archaeological culture

en-noun

archaeological culture (plural archaeological cultures)

(archaeology) A recurring assemblage of artifacts from a specific time and place that may constitute the material culture remains of a particular past human society.


Liaoning bronze dagger culture

Partial calque of Mandarin 遼寧青銅文化 /辽宁青铜文化 (Liáoníng qīngtóng wénhuà), from 遼寧 /辽宁 (Liáoníng, “Liaoning”) + 青銅 /青铜 (qīngtóng, “bronze”) + 文化 (wénhuà, “culture”), with Liaoning being the location of the type site, and the fact that the culture is characterised by its manufacture of bronze daggers. By surface analysis, Liaoning + bronze + dagger + culture.

surf

(archaeology) An archaeological culture dating from the Bronze Age in north-eastern China and parts of the Korean Peninsula, characterised by the high zinc content of the bronze daggers which it manufactured.


cladial

Berry (1964) provided a comprehensive description of the species and Maletz (1994) confirmed Berry's consclusions concering the proximal development and cladial branching of Pterograptus from isolated material.

2005, Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences - Volume 42, Issues 5-8, page 800:

Several stages in the development of a cladium, showing the secondary nema as the leading rod of the cladial stipe (based on Bulman 1970a, Fig. 65).

2017, Jörg Maletz, Graptolite Paleobiology, page 36:

(paleontology) Pertaining to the cladium.


Old Anatolian Turkish

(history) The ancestor language of Modern Turkish, spoken in Anatolia between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, from which Ottoman Turkish developed


Old Anatolian Turkish

(history) Of or relating to the Old Anatolian Turkish language


Old Anatolian Turkic

Old Anatolian Turkic, a very important stage in the history of Turkic languages, is represented by a great number of literary documents.

1972, A. Bodroglieti, “On Modern Turkish Üstünkörü and Yüzükoyun”, in Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, volume 26, number 1, Akadémiai Kiadó, →JSTOR, page 145:

In Old Anatolian Turkic we find constructions with a nominative subject without agreement marking.

2000, C. Schönig, “Some formal types of Turkic relative clause equivalents”, in Aslı Göksel, Celia Kerslake, editors, Studies on Turkish and Turkic Languages, page 200:

Old Anatolian Turkish
Old Anatolian Turkish#English

(history) Synonym of Old Anatolian Turkish


Old Anatolian Turkic

The Old Anatolian Turkic converb suffix -(y)IcAk signifying 'when' could very well come from this suffix together with the particle (O)k.

2004, Marcel Erdal, A Grammar of Old Turkic, page 314:


water sprite

(folklore) A general term for an elemental spirit associated with water, said to be able to breathe water or air and sometimes is able to fly.


gentry bush

(Ireland, folklore) A thorny bush, especially a hawthorn.


pseudaelurine

(paleontology) Any member of the Pseudaelurus genus of fossil cats.


Ashina

/ɑːˈʃiːənɑː/

(history) The Turkic tribe who served as the ruling dynasty of the Göktürks during the First and Second Turkic Khaganates (552–603 and 682–744, respectively).

阿史那

Turkic tribe, ruling dynasty of the Göktürks


Ashina

From Japanese 蘆(あし)名(な) (Ashina, literally “reed-name”).

ja-r

蘆(あし)名(な)千(せん)鶴(つる)丸(まる) w:ja:蘆名千鶴丸

(history) A Japanese clan, which became distinct from the Miura branch of the Taira clan during the late Heian period, came to prominence during the Sengoku period, and which became extinct during the early Edo period with the death of its twenty-second head, 蘆(あし)名(な)千(せん)鶴(つる)丸(まる) (Ashina Sentsurumaru, 1650–1653).

蘆名

Japanese clan descended from the Miura branch of the Taira clan


mojo hand

(African-American, spirituality, folklore) A small flannel bag containing one or more magical items.

African-American; spirituality; African-American; spirituality


michelinocerid

Derived from Michelinocerida, which derives from the genus Michelinoceras, named by Foeste in 1932.

(paleontology) Any member of the Michelinocerida (also known as Orthocerida) order of cephalopods.


axis of upheaval

Coined by Richard Fontaine and Andrea Kendall-Taylor on 23 April 2024, by analogy with terms such as axis of evil.

The four powers increasingly identify common interests, match up their rhetoric, and coordinate their military and diplomatic activities. Their convergence is creating a new axis of upheaval—a development that is fundamentally altering the geopolitical landscape.

2024 May/June, Andrea Kendall-Taylor, Richard Fontaine, “The Axis of Upheaval: How America’s Adversaries Are Uniting to Overturn the Global Order”, in Foreign Affairs, volume 103, page 50:

Washington’s efforts at strengthening its Quad relationship is being met by a new quad, the so-called “axis of upheaval” involving Beijing, Moscow, Pyongyang, and Tehran.

2024 May, Ralph A Cossa, Brad Glosserman, “The ‘year of elections,’ take two!”, in Comparative Connections, volume 26, page 2:

While for decades the threats to the U.S.-led economic order were limited, today China and Russia, along with North Korea and Iran, have coalesced into an "axis of upheaval" whose shared ambition is nothing short of remaking the U.S.-led global liberal economic order of the past 80 years.

2024 June 3, Joseph Quinlan, “It’s a New World. Investors’ Old Rules No Longer Apply”, in Barron’s, volume 104, page 46:

(neologism, politics, history) The alleged antiwestern collaboration between China, Iran, North Korea and Russia.


endosiphuncle

(paleontology) An inner tube in a siphuncle.


proarticulate

(paleontology) Any member of the Proarticulata phylum of extinct animals.


Old Slovak

(linguistics, history) A historical form of the Slovak language, spoken between the 11th and 18th centuries.

Wiktionary’s coverage of Old Slovak terms


Middle Czech

(linguistics, history) A historical form of the Czech language, spoken from about 1500 AD to 1780 AD.


bird point

bird points (plural)
birdpoint (alternative)
bird-point (alternative)

She had watched the turned ground passing and had snatched up three partial arrowheads and a flint scraper and one fine complete bird point.

1997, Charles Frazier, “Ashes of Roses”, in Cold Mountain, New York: Atlantic:

Flint chips and flakes were scattered about. Here and there, every so often, one would find a point or blade. Occasionally, a tiny arrow-point (birdpoint) would surface.

1999, Bob Rampani, “Yesterday In Bridgeton, Site #6”, in Central States Archaeological Journal, volume 46, number 1, pages 9-10:

(US, archaeology) A small flint arrowhead


clurichaun

clurichauns (plural)
cluracan (alternative)
cluracaun (alternative)
cluricaun (alternative)
cluricaune (alternative)
clúrachán (alternative)

The residents of a house would leave offerings for the clurichaun, who sing in Gaelic with enchantingly beautiful voices. Related to leprechauns, clurichauns are house faeries who specialize in caring for and protecting wine and beer cellars.

2012, Sirona Knight, Wiccan Spell A Night, Kensington Publishing, unnumbered page:

2016, Keith B. Darrell, Flashbacks: Fangs & Fur, Book 1, Amber Book Company, unnumbered page,
"Clurichauns are Dark Fae cousins of leprechauns," Aurae explained. "Unlike their Seelie Court cousins, the clurichauns drink to excess and are seldom sober. But despite always being drunk, the clurichauns are impeccably groomed and well-dressed... although they can be a bit surly."

(Irish folklore) A mischievous, potentially malicious fairy, akin to the leprechaun, that greatly loves drinking and tends to haunt breweries, pubs and wine cellars.


toft and croft

en-noun

toft and croft (plural tofts and crofts)

(history, agriculture) A smallholding consisting of cottage (the croft) with a small area of attached land (the toft).


ghost bullet

People believe that a beast shoots "ghost bullets" when they ford a stream in Sihch'uan at any time except the winter months .

1968, Wolfram Eberhard, The Local Cultures of South and East China, page 195:

The leaves were used in the removal of ghost bullets " (supernatural objects that were shot into people by ghosts).

Pushing Teddy off, ignoring the part of him that mourned the loss—not the time, dumbass, not the time, ghosts were kind of a big fucking deal—he scrambled to his knees and looked at where the ghost had tried to put a ghost bullet in his brain.

"Somebody shot the doctor," the big police sergeant said. "It wasn't a ghost bullet; it was lead.

It was a ward against ghosts, but he was pretty sure it wasn't going to stop a ghost bullet.

2017, Mike Mignola, Christopher Golden, Hellboy: An Assortment of Horrors, page 105:

He ain't shootin' ghost bullets, neither. Here's his slug.

2020, Kenneth Robeson, The Squeaking Goblin, page 66:

(folklore or fantasy) A supernatural bullet that wounds or kills a person, especially one that is shot by a supernatural assailant.


ardipith

(anthropology, paleontology) Any of the hominids of the extinct genus Ardipithecus.


ardipith

en-adj

ardipith (comparative more ardipith, superlative most ardipith)

more ardipith (comparative)
most ardipith (superlative)

(anthropology, paleontology) Of or pertaining to the hominids of the extinct genus Ardipithecus.


imbunche

(folklore) In Chilote folklore, a deformed humanoid monster that protects the entrance to a warlock's cave.


toyol

(folklore) An undead infant in Indonesian and Malay folklore, typically invoked as a helper by black magic.


ammonitologist

Arkell was a Jurassic ammonitologist with immense personal experience.

1984, Edward T. Tozer, The Trias and Its Ammonoids The Evolution of a Time Scale, page 23:

However, a clearly distinctive element is the ammonitella, which is now the focus of attention of many ammonitologists.

1996, Cyprian Kulick, “Ammonoid Shell Microstructure”, in Kazushige Tanabe, Neil H. Landman, Richard Arnold Davis, editors, Ammonoid Paleobiology, page 95:

René Hoffmann, an ammonitologist at the Ruhr-University Bochum in Germany who reviewed the study, called the fossil a “paleontological jackpot you have only once in a lifetime.”

2021 January 31, Sabrina Imbler, “This Ammonite Was Fossilized Outside Its Shell”, in The New York Times:

(paleontology) A paleobiologist or researcher specializing in the study of ammonites.


ammonitology

The elaborate resulting nomenclature (taxonomy) is admittedly cumbersome. Unfortunately this aspect of ammonitology turns many away from an exciting and fruitful field of research.

Ammonitology was a bastion of documentation during the heyday of recapitulation, and therefore became the great hunting ground for a claim about frequent paedomorphosis when fashions shifted.

1988, Stephen J. Gould, “The Uses of Heterochrony”, in Michael L. McKinney, editor, Heterochrony in Evolution: A Multidisciplinary Approach, page 9:

Since the early times of the Hungarian geology, a special attention was dedicated to the Jurassic biostratigraphy and ammonitology.

1996, A. C. Riccardi, editor, Advances in Jurassic Research, page 187:

(paleontology) The scientific study of ammonites.


kloedenellid

This is also done for Dizygopleura landesi Roth and Eukloedenella pontotocensis Lundin, new species, which illustrate domiciliar (kloedenellid) dimorphism.

1965, Robert F. Lundin, Bulletin - Issue 108, page 18:

The difference between the kloedenellids and the geisinids , as defined , is the development of an anterodorsal process in the former.

1978, Robert Vernon Kesling, Ruth B. Chilman, Ostracods of the Middle Devonian Silica Formation:

According to the latter authors, domatial dimorphism takes the form of a special posterior domiciliar space for egg/brood care in females, and is found in extant ostracods such as cytherellids and the podocopid Cyprideis lineage as well as in extinct Palaeozoic groups such as kloedenellids, monotiopleurids and leperditellids.

1998, Koen Martens, Sex and Parthenogenesis, page 188:

(paleontology) Any of a group of small, Paleozoic seed shrimps, noted for their distinct shell shapes.


Eser

Socialist Revolutionary Party
Socialist Revolutionary Party

(history) A member of the Socialist Revolutionary Party of Russia.


unprovenienced

Near-synonym: unprovenanced

There are many problems associated with artifacts and objects that lack a secure archaeological context. As Biblical Archaeology Review readers know, we typically describe such objects as “unprovenanced” (or, more accurately, unprovenienced). Since they were not found through controlled scientific excavation and often enter collections through the antiquities market, unprovenanced objects present serious practical, ethical, and even legal issues that scholars must consider when discussing them.

2021 November 19, Glenn J. Corbett, “The Problem with Unprovenanced Objects”, in Bible History Daily, Biblical Archaeology Society:

“Unprovenienced” is to be differentiated from “unprovenanced,” which refers to artifacts whose ownership history is unknown.

2024 April 3, Christopher J. Foster, Glenda Chao, and Mercedes Valmisa, “The Methods and Ethics of Researching Unprovenienced Artifacts from East Asia”, in Cambridge Elements: Elements in Ancient East Asia, Cambridge University Press:

(especially archaeology, of an artifact) Not having provenience: not having complete and fully ascertained information about origin, not even knowledge of the site in which an artifact was first found by archaeology (let alone any other aspect of its history).


wormworld

en-noun

wormworld (countable and uncountable, plural wormworlds)

(paleontology) An age that is dominated by worms.

(paleontology) A region that is dominated by worm-life.


field investigation

field investigation (plural field investigations)

Field investigation is required..to prove that these valley-bottom villages are, in fact, sited on patches of low terrace.

(law, archaeology) The study of the traces of human culture at any site by means of surveying, sampling, excavating, or removing the surface or subsurface.


underground people

The inhabitants of Rügen believe in three kinds of Dwarfs, or underground people, the White, the Brown, and the Black, so named from the colour of their several habiliments.

1828, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, volume I, London: William Harrison Ainsworth, page 281:

Gross superstition still prevails in most parts of Nordland, particularly regarding the underground people.

1872 November 6, Overland Monthly: Devoted to the Development of the Country, San Francisco, page 425, column 1:

(folklore) Any of the fairy folk, trolls, dwarfs, or other supernatural beings, that primarily live underground.


Early Modern Czech

(linguistics, history) A historical form of the Czech language used between 1780 to the 1840s.


Earth Surface Person

Earth Surface Person (plural Earth Surface People)

Earth Surface People (plural)
Earth surface person (alternative)
earth surface person (alternative)

Their tales qualify this as Earth People or Earth Surface People, for, in the long, poetic myth which is their bible, they climbed up to the earth's flat disk from her dark, underground womb.

1956, Ruth Murray Underhill, The Navajos, page 4:

Toad denounces angrily that an earth surface person should be going about here and shoots mudballs at various parts of her body (soles, hip joint, small of back, meeting of shoulder blades, hollow of head); she is lamed and felled by this witchery.

1957, Katherine Spencer, Mythology and Values, An Analysis of Navaho Chantway Myths, page 153:

Down where berries were reported to be, they went again, when suddenly she saw the woman's tracks. "Whose tracks are these? They are tracks of an earth surface person!" [Holy Young Woman said].

1975, Leland C. Wyman, The Mountainway of the Navajo, page 190:

Thus, the story of Changing Woman here is the story of her creation of the earth-surface people and of the things that they need in order to exist.

1984, John R. Farella, The Main Stalk, A Synthesis of Navajo Philosophy, page 89:

The great Navajo chant Beauty Way deals with a fruitful coming-together of an earth-surface person - a human being - and a spirit; the Beauty Way ceremony itself, which incorporates the story, is given to the Navajo people as a consequence of that event.

1993, Leslie Marmon Silko, Yellow Woman, page 121:

Sure, people have problems when they're married; no Earth Surface Person is perfect.

2001, Rose Mitchell, Tall Woman, The Life Story of Rose Mitchell, a Navajo Woman, c. 1874-1977, page 297:

The old man began the Restoration of the Earth Surface Person Upon His Return Home prayer, which describes the reuniting of a person with his home.

2003, R. A. F. McPhearson, Blackening Rite, page 22:

(folklore, Native American) A human being, specifically in cultures like the Navajo, residing on the physical Earth, as opposed to spiritual beings or deities, considered to reside in higher realms.


xenusian

(paleontology) Any lobopodian in the class †Xenusia.


Proavis

From pro- (“prior”) + Latin avis (“bird”)

(paleontology) Any of various hypothetical extinct species or taxons that were coined in the early 20th century in an attempt to support and explain the hypothetical evolutionary steps and anatomical adaptations leading from non-avian theropod dinosaurs to birds.


henodontid

(paleontology) Any of the family †Henodontidae of extinct placodonts.


petalonamid

Adapted borrowing from taxonomic name †Petalonamae + -id

(paleontology) Any of the extinct phylum †Petalonamae of motionless archaic animals that resemble leaves.


frondomorph

Adapted borrowing from taxonomic name †Frondomorpha.

(paleontology) Any of the extinct phylum †Frondomorpha (syn. †Petalonamae) of motionless archaic animals that resemble leaves.


pothunt

en-verb

pothunt (third-person singular simple present pothunts, present participle pothunting, simple past and past participle pothunted)

pothunts (present singular third-person)
pothunting (participle present)
pothunted (participle past)
pothunted (past)

(archaeology) To seek artifacts for one's personal collection or to sell without regard to their cultural importance.


conisterion

conisterions (plural)
conisterium (alternative)

Borrowed from Ancient Greek κονιστήριον (konistḗrion).

bor+

Prodigious ruins of walls, which formerly were all coated with marble, still point out the two temples, the two ephebea, the places where youths exercised themselves in the gymnastic games, the place for the wrestlers, the piscina, or the pool for the swimmers, different divisions for the houses of the superintendants, the apodyterion, or place where the wrestlers undressed, the conisterion, or place where the wrestlers, after being anointed with oil, were sprinkled with dust, the heliafterion, or place where they sunned themselves, the vestibulum, which was a rotunda, the baths, which consisted of cold, lukewarm, warm, and sweating baths, the theatre, two libraries, one Greek and one Latin, the course for racing, the place for playing at ball, a place which formerly was planted with the plane tree, and exedræ, for poets, philofophers, and rhetoricians.

1796, FREDERIC LEOPOLD COUNT STOLBERG, translated by THOMAS HOLCROFT, TRAVELS through GERMANY, SWITZERLAND, ITALY, and SICILY., translation of original in German, page 421:

The Conisterion, from sand, it being the place in which the bodies of the wrestlers were sanded.

1862, EDWARD FALKENER, EPHESUS and THE TEMPLE OF DIANA., page 62:

(archaeology) A room in ancient Greek and Roman gymnasiums where athletes, particularly wrestlers, applied sand or dust to their bodies after being anointed with oil. This practice enhanced grip during matches by counteracting the slipperiness caused by oil and sweat.


Sushkivka

Borrowed from Ukrainian Су́шківка (Súškivka).

(archaeology) An ancient Cucuteni–Trypillia city in Uman Raion, Cherkasy Oblast, Ukraine.


sansuke

(Japanese history) A male bathhouse worker who assisted the bathers.


Eastern Front

(history) A major theater of combat during World War II that included operations in the Soviet Union, the Balkans, the Baltic states, as well as Eastern and Central Europe.


Dea Nutrix

Dea Nutrices (plural)
dea nutrix (alternative)

(history) A pagan goddess taking the form of a nursing mother, known mainly from Roman Britain.

(archaeology) A figurine (or other depiction) of such a goddess.


Roman Britain

The period of British history during which the island of Britain was occupied by Roman forces, i.e. from AD 43 to AD 410.

The Roman province established by the occupation of Britain.


Otoman

Archaic form of Osman, the name borne by

[…] Ortogules, ſonne to Oguzalpes, and father to Otoman the firſt of name of the Turkiſh nation […]

1599, The Principal Nauigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoueries, page 490:

Osman I (d. 1323/4), founder of the Ottoman Empire.


Othoman

OTHOMAN, or OSMAN, the firſt King of the Turks […]

1701, The Great Historical, Geographical, Genealogical and Poetical Dictionary, page 178:


gumberoo

(US, folklore) A fictional animal with hide so tough that bullets bounce off it.


agropelter

agropelters (plural)
argopelter (alternative)

(US, folklore) A mythical monster of the United States, said to inhabit hollow tree trunks and hurl wooden splinters and branches at passers-by.


splintercat

(US, folklore) A fictional cat-like animal of the Pacific Northwest said to run into trees, knocking the branches off and withering the trunks.


dungavenhooter

(US, folklore) A fictional crocodile-like animal with no mouth and huge nostrils that uses its tail as a weapon.


belled buzzard

(US, folklore) A fictional buzzard-like bird with a bell attached, whose ringing is an omen of disaster.


ball-tailed cat

en-noun

ball-tailed cat (plural ball-tailed cats)

(US, folklore) A fictional animal said to resemble a mountain lion, but with a long tail ending in a solid ball with which it strikes its prey.


Generation T

Generation T refers to those born beginning in 2010, years marked by an exponential technological leap accompanied by social movements that have in turn have left their mark on mothers and fathers and others that make up the child’s education circle.

2018 May 21, Andrés Guillén, “Generation T: the generation that will inherit the world”, in BBVA:

(neologism, generation, history) A way of referring to the group of people who were born in the early 2000s and who spend a lot of their free time travelling and going on holiday.


goofus bird

(US, folklore) A backwards-flying bird that builds its nest upside down, according to lumberjack folklore.


wampus cat

(US, folklore) A folkloric cat-like creature, of varying description.


axhandle hound

axhandle hounds (plural)
axehandle hound (alternative)

(US, folklore) A folkloric dog-like animal with a somewhat ax-shaped body, supposed to subsist on a diet of the handles of axes left unattended.


Water Baby

(folklore) A kind of spirit in Native American folklore, inhabiting bodies of water and often appearing as an infant whose cries are an omen of impending disaster.


blue list

(conservation, zoology) A list used to categorize species that are not endangered or threatened, but are still considered vulnerable due to factors like sensitivity to human activities or natural events.


-ichnion

From Ancient Greek ἴχνιον (íkhnion, “track, footprint”).

der

(paleontology) Forms names of types of trace fossils.


Whig history

en-noun

Whig history (countable and uncountable, plural Whig histories)

Described by English historian Herbert Butterfield in The Whig Interpretation of History (1931).

He [William Cronon] concisely explains that Whig histories tend to "praise revolutions [for history of science, we could read novelties, ideas or individuals]^([sic]) provided they have been successful, emphasise certain principles of progress in the past and produce a story which is the ratification if not the glorification of the present".

2012 October 3, Rebekah Higgitt, “Why whiggish won't do”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

The British, in other words, “do right” by their colonial subjects, referred to as “charges”, while the only massacres of the 19th century apparently were those committed by the Ottomans in the Balkans. This is Whig history on steroids, repackaged as a mirthless morality tale for the 21st century.

2019 May 19, Kim A. Wagner, “Rees-Mogg’s book is ‘sentimental jingoism and empire nostalgia’”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

(historiography) An approach to historiography that presents history as a journey from an oppressive and benighted past to a “glorious present”.


pre-Samnite

The walls of Pompeii show different methods of construction which date from Samnite and pre-Samnite times

1978, Alfonso De Franciscis, Pompeii & Herculaneum: The Buried Cities, Crescent Books, →ISBN, page 19:

Pre-Samnite (i.e., pre-Oscan) is the name given to a handful of inscriptions found in Campania and Lucania, dating from before 500 B.C.

2011, Paul Beekes, Robert Stephen, Comparative Indo-European Linguistics: An Introduction, page 26:

(history) of or pertaining to the civilizations that existed in areas colonized by the Samnites prior to said colonization