DWELLING encyclopedia topics

lake dwelling, prehistoric habitation built over the shallow waters of a lake shore or a marsh, usually erected on pile-supported platforms, but sometimes on artificial mounds. Such a site afforded easy access to a varied food supply by the availability of fish, marsh fowl, and good cropland. Africa, Asia, and South America have had lake-dwelling peoples; pile dwellings were also found in the lagoons of Pacific islands. In Europe, remains of Bronze Age lake dwellings were discovered in Britain, Ireland (where they are called crannogs), and central Europe. The lake dwellings of Neolithic Switzerland have been reinterpreted as lakeside villages constructed during periods of low water level; sometimes houses were built even on dry lake beds.

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cliff dwelling

Prehistoric, usually multistoried house of the ancestors of present-day Pueblo Indians, built from circa 1000 along the sides or under the overhangs of cliffs. The use of hand-hewn stone building blocks and adobe mortar in these communal dwellings was unexcelled even in later times. Rooms on upper levels could be entered either by doorways from adjoining rooms or by ladders through holes in the ceilings; ground-floor rooms could be entered only through the ceiling. It is thought that the cliff dwellings were built as a defense against invading Navajo and Apache tribes. They were deserted by the inhabitants around the end of the 13th century. Many ruins remain, including notable ones at Canyon de Chelly National Monument, Mesa Verde National Park, and Montezuma Castle National Monument.

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Encyclopedia Britannica, 2008. Encyclopedia Britannica Online.