Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology (617 page)

BOOK: Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology
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roof furniture
[Ar].
Wooden, stone, or ceramic items used as decorative and functional features of a roof. They include
finials
on the gables,
antefixes
to act as stoppers for hollow tiles emerging at the eaves,
chimney pots
,
louvres
, and
smoke turrets
to ventilate fires inside the building and let fumes escape, and
ridge tiles
along the highest point.
Roonka Flat, Australia
[Si].
A multi-phase Aboriginal open-air occupation site and burial ground on an elevated terrace of the Murray River in South Australia. The earliest use of the site dates back to about 16000 bc with fairly extensive evidence of occupation and two burials. Later, between 5000 and 2000 bc, the area was mainly used as a burial ground. Finally, from 2000 bc down to the 19th century
ad
, it was again used for settlement as well as burial. More than 100 burials are known from excavations, including flat graves with either dorsal or flexed burials and shaft graves in which the body was placed upright but later crumpled as the shaft filled with debris. Grave goods were found in the shaft graves, including animal remains, ochre, bone and shell ornaments, and, in the late phases, stone and bone tools.
[Sum.: G. L. Pretty , 1977, The cultural chronology of the Roonka Flat. A preliminary consideration. In R. V. S. Wright (ed.),
Stone tools as cultural markers: change, evolution and complexity
. Canberra: Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, 288–331]
ROPA
[Ab].
Rosegate series points
[Ar].
Bifacially worked chipped stone projectile points characteristic of Archaic communities living in the Great Basin of North America in the period ad 700–1300. Distinguished by having a triangular outline, small corner notches and a basal tang. Once known as Rose Spring and East Gate types, they are now recognized as part of a single series.
Rosetta Stone
[Ar].
An inscribed basalt stela discovered at Rosetta at the western mouth of the Nile in Egypt in July 1799 during Napoleon's occupation of the country. The inscription is an honorific decree by Ptolemy V passed on the 27 March 196 bc which has parallel texts in Greek, Demotic, and Egyptian hieroglyphs. It provided the key to the decipherment of the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic script by the French scholar Jean François Champollion in the early 1820s. The Rosetta Stone is now in the British Museum in London.
rose window
[Co].
Large round window found in cathedrals and churches in Europe from the 12th century
ad
onwards. Often highly ornate with
STAINED GLASS
.

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