SUMMARY

The Human Past: World Prehistory and the Development of Human Societies
Chris Scarre

Chapter 7 | From Mobile Foragers to Complex Societies in Southwest Asia

Epipalaeolithic (c. 20,000 – 9600 BCE)

Hunter gatherer communities from the Epipalaeolithic can be Distinguished from their upper
Palaeolithic relatives by:

 presence of microlith technology

 Use of bows and arrows
 Changing ratio between larger (decreasing) and smaller prey (increasing)
 Use of plant foods (presence of heavy grinding stones)
o Harvested annually and stored
 Increased trend of seasonal settlement and eventually sedentism

e.g: Kharaneh IV, Jordan

KEY SITE | Ohalo II (1989) Northern Israel, c. 20,000-19,000 BCE

 Chipped microlithic, stone tools, of kebaran type
 Tight cluster of oval huts (3-4 m) of wood and brush
 Number of external hearths and fire pits
 Area for disposal of domestic waste
 1 grave of a 35-40 year-old male
o Head supported on 3 stones
o Legs tightly folded at the knees, with heels against the buttocks
 Animal bones, preserved seeds and plant foods
o Indicated the use of over 100 plant species
o Had a vast collecting range
 SUMMARY
The Human Past: World Prehistory and the Development of Human Societies
Chris Scarre

o Plant remains suggest year-round occupation

Not a typical Kebaran site which typically indicate a more short-term seasonal occupation.

Late Epipalaeolithic: The Natufians

 Began permanent settlements before agriculture
 Invested time in the processing of stored cereals and pulses
 Often occupied cave sites (el Wad) or open-air stations (Eynan)
 Sites up to 2000 m2
 Cemeteries
 Substantial architecture (stone-built huts)
 Rich material culture
o Self-adornment (shell jewellery, head coverings, cloaks)
o High presence of mortars & Pestles (often basalt)
o Sickle (lunate) blades  cultivation of wild cereals
 Limited variety of animals due to smaller catchment area

KEY SITE | Abu Hureyra (1970s) Northern Syria, c. 11,000-6800 BCE

Epipalaeolithic site:

 Established just before the Younger Dryas and abandoned just before the end.
 Round houses sunk into the ground with thatched roofs supported by wooden poles
 Hunted gazelle, few wild cattle and sheep
 Gathered plants from various ecological zones (wild cereals/grasses)
 Location exploited resources provided by the river, floodplain, and seasonal water course
zones

Aceramic Neolithic Settlement:

 Re-inhabited around 8800 BCE

 Larger more spaced housing  inhabitants were more populous
 Rectangular Buildings
o Mud-brick
o Consisted of storage rooms (cells) with living accommodation on an upper floor
o Built on top of each other
 Inhabitants had domesticated wheat, barley & pulses
 Meat was acquired through hunting
 Later there was a reliance on sheep herding

Site shows gradual shift extending several centuries from hunting, gathering and cultivation to farming
and domestication
 SUMMARY
The Human Past: World Prehistory and the Development of Human Societies
Chris Scarre

Early Aceramic Neolithic (c. 9600 – 8800 BCE)

Also, PPNA.

Although microlith technologies showed a clear progression “there is almost a complete disruption of
settlement location”.

 Settlements larger in size

 More solid architecture
 Evidence of city-planning (defined zones for rubbish)
 Large presence of storage cells
 Communal life
 Extensive food production

KEY SITE | Jerf el Ahmar (1980s) North Syria, Aceramic Neolithic

 Subsistence needs supplied by hunting, cereals and pulses
o Increasing grain size “showed that they were on their way to their domestic forms”
 Rectangular houses had diverse layouts and sat on 2 or 3 terraces to cope with hilly landscape
o Large hearths
 Village rebuilt several times following a general plan
 Central communal area containing a circular subterranean structure (8-9 m)
o Sub-divided into several cells
o Used for storing lentils, barley and rye
 Rooms with large quernstones indicate a communal milling and food processing facilities
 2 flat stone plaques with a non-textual prototype of written communication

KEY SITE | Göbekli Tepe Southeast Turkey, PPNA – Early PPNB

 Mound (300 m diameter)
 Large ceremonial buildings within several circular enclosures
 Sculpted T-shaped monoliths
o Anthropomorphic
o Animal iconography
 Food waste and chipped stone but nothing indicates long-term occupation at or near the site
 perhaps it served as a “central place” for communities to gather and perform communal
ceremonies.
 Required large labour force

Similar: Nevalı Çori

Late Aceramic Neolithic (c. 8800 – 6500 BCE)

Also, PPNB.

 Continued intensification of cultivational and agricultural efforts led ultimately to animal and
plant domesticates (i.e. sheep, pig, cattle, goat)
 Only around 7500 BCE did communities completely rely on “a developed and effective mixed
farming economy”
 Dramatic increase in population levels  larger and more frequent settlements
 SUMMARY
The Human Past: World Prehistory and the Development of Human Societies
Chris Scarre

 Higher building density

 Houses:
o Larger
o Rectilinear
o Internal subdivisions with room functionality
o Built in distinct local/regional styles
o Constantly maintained/renewed
o Multi-storeyed
 “management of farming economy at household level
 Specialised communal buildings
 “Each settlement represented an autonomous community, responsible for its own affairs; but
all these settled communities were locked into local and regional networks, exchanging goods
and materials, and sharing innovations and ideas”
o Obsidian!

Funerary culture:

 Burials were often found under house floors or in-between them

 Removal of the cranium
 Sometimes cranium was recovered with facial features remodelled in clay and sometimes
even coloured
 Ritual practices varied from region to region

KEY SITE | Çatalhöyük (1958) Southern Anatolia, 7100 – 6000 BCE

 13 acres with 21 m of stratified occupational debris
 At least 10,000 people
 Unique decorated architecture
o Tightly packed rectangular housing
o Flat rooftops served as circulation and access
o Main room and smaller storage room
o Walls repeatedly plastered with mud plaster
o Floors often painted red
o Red painted patterns, motifs or scenes on the walls (both geometric and figurative)
o Clay oven usually below the access ladder
 Many subfloor burials
o While some had no burials, other houses had as many as 68 bodies buried under the
floor
 Due to low rainfall (200-250 mm) it was only suited to dry farming.
 Site established in a large alluvial fan of the Anatolian plateau  productive, fertile area
o Relied on the farming of domesticated crops and the herding of large flocks of sheep
 Chipped stone was almost entirely obsidian (non-local)
 SUMMARY
The Human Past: World Prehistory and the Development of Human Societies
Chris Scarre

Transformation, Dispersal, and Expansion (c. 6500 – 6000 BCE)

Following the climax of the Aceramic Neolithic many settlements became abandoned communities
favouring smaller, more dispersed settlements that appeared a few centuries later. Although there
were some anomalies.

KEY SITE | Tell Sabi Abyad I (1986) North Syria, 7000 – BCE
One of four tells beside the river Balikh in northern Syria.

 Large building complexes with cell-like rooms

o Rooms connected by small low openings
o Access from the roof
o Destroyed by a fire
 Extensive material culture
o Pots/stone vessels/flint & obsidian tools/ground stone tools/clay figurines/beads
o Clay sealings with stamp seal impressions
 Community of farmers and pastoralists