Encyclopedia of Society and Culture in the Ancient World

lie in the southeast corner. Th e island of Tasmania lies south of this area; its mountainous terrain is a continuation of the A ...

materials, such as copper and salt, as well as for their lush upland pastures in their foothills. Th e arc of the Carpathians en ...

Valuable information both for studying ancient climate and for dating comes from tree rings. Ancient timbers and old trees dredg ...

Pleistocene Ice Sheet of northern Europe was almost com- pletely melted by about 7000 b.c.e. Th e melting of the glaciers meant ...

complete. Once the most fertile lands were colonized, farm- ing spread to poorer quality soil, which the invention of the plow m ...

Because water has a specifi c heat at least four times greater than land—that is, it takes on heat and gives up heat four times ...

rainy winter and spring, as snow melted off the mountains, only to dry to trickles or dry up altogether during the dry summer. T ...

THESSALY, PHOCIS, BOEOTIA (CENTRAL GREECE) South of Mount Olympus, on the east coast of Greece, was Thessaly. Homer calls this t ...

of Corcyra, modern Corfu, was especially prosperous. Its active trade to the east and west, combined with its high rainfall, led ...

Rome was a hilly city. Th e ancient town was built on top of a hill on the east bank of the Tiber near a point where the river c ...

plant cultivation) and easily navigable rivers such as the Tiber and the Arno. Th e east side had rivers that were narrow or dry ...

winter travel could mean seasickness at best and shipwreck at worst. SICILY, SARDINIA, AND CORSICA Sicily is a large island sout ...

southern city of Cordoba, located on the river Baetis, was also accessible by water. To the south of Italy, directly across the ...

northern Rocky Mountains begin in northwestern Canada and run down the western coast. To the east of the moun- tains, the Great ...

Th e Appalachian Mountains stretch from what is now eastern Canada down to northern Georgia. Th ey are fairly low, gentle mounta ...

tán is underlaid with subterranean sinkholes called cenotes, and the Maya dug wells to reach the freshwater contained in these. ...

Travel in the Andes was extremely diffi cult and had to be done a l most ent i rely on foot at h ig h a lt it ude s. A nde a n p ...

as hunter-gatherers starting about 8000 b.c.e.; by 1000 b.c.e. people were cultivating crops in the eastern plains. See also agr ...

palm trees, olive trees, and laurels, not only within, but in a great part also without the straits. Th ere is also an island ca ...

on account of the neighboring pirates, who occupy a place called Nitriae, nor is it specially rich in articles of merchandise; a ...