Transitions, Urbanism, and Collapse in the Bronze Age
Essays in Honor of Suzanne Richard
Edited by
Jesse C. Long, Jr. [+–]
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
William G. Dever [+–]
University of Arizona
William G. Dever is Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Arizona. He is the author of over 26 books and numerous chapters and journal articles.
In recognition of the significant contribution that Suzanne Richard has made to the archaeology of the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, this Festschrift represents the best of scholarship in her areas of interest and publication in the field. Professor Richard is known for her work on the Early Bronze Age, especially the EB III-IV. Her first major articles (BASOR 1980; BA 1987) are still standard references in the field. More recently, she is concerned with interconnectivity, social organization in rural periods, and urban-rural transitions in the Levant in the fourth and third millennia BCE in particular.
With an international cadre of leading scholars, the volume reflects recent scholarship on the nature of Bronze Age urbanism and cultural transitions at key junctures. The volume is an important contribution to the field of late 4th through the 2nd millennia BCE.
Table of Contents
Prelims
List of Figures x-xiv
University of Arizona
William G. Dever is Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Arizona. He is the author of over 26 books and numerous chapters and journal articles.
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
List of Tables xv-xvi
University of Arizona
William G. Dever is Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Arizona. He is the author of over 26 books and numerous chapters and journal articles.
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
University of Arizona
William G. Dever is Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Arizona. He is the author of over 26 books and numerous chapters and journal articles.
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
Introduction
1. Suzanne Richard: An Appreciation [+–] 1-4
University of Arizona
William G. Dever is Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Arizona. He is the author of over 26 books and numerous chapters and journal articles.
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
Extended biography for Suzanne Richard.
Suzanne Richard Publications [+–] 5-11
University of Arizona
William G. Dever is Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Arizona. He is the author of over 26 books and numerous chapters and journal articles.
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
List of Suzanne Richard’s publications.
Transitions
Montana State University
Susan L. Cohen received her Ph.D. in Syro-Palestinian Archaeology and Hebrew Bible from the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University in 2000. Her research focuses on the archaeology, history, and international interconnections of the Bronze Age in the southern Levant, with emphasis on rural settlement and subsistence, rural-urban relations, and synchronisms and interactions with ancient Egypt. She was Director of the excavations at the Middle Bronze Age mortuary site of Gesher, and the small rural multi-period site of Tel Zahara, both in the Jordan Valley, and is Co-Director of the Tell Abu Shusha excavations beginning in summer 2019. She is currently Chair of the Department of History and Philosophy at Montana State University, and Chair of the Fellowships Committee of the W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem.
Both continuity and change mark the transition from the Intermediate Bronze Age to the Middle Bronze Age I in the southern Levant, and evidence for connection and disjunction may be found in social customs, settlement patterns, and economic organization in both eras. These associations and transitions are particularly notable in certain social practices: namely diet, drinking, and the customs surrounding the disposal of the dead, the last of which frequently also incorporates the first two. Evidence from both settlement and mortuary contexts suggests that there were considerable changes in practices associated with drinking between these two eras, yet at the same time, this evidence also exhibits considerable continuity in diet and subsistence patterns. Analysis of these social practices, using comparative data from excavated Intermediate Bronze Age and Middle Bronze Age sites, further illustrates the transition between these eras.
Sapienza University of Rome
Marta D’Andrea is an Italian archaeologist with a PhD degree from Sapienza University of Rome. She has excavated in Italy, Palestine, and Syria and taken part in numerous Italian and international excavations and research projects in Jordan. Currently, she is a co-director of the Madaba Regional Archaeological Museum Project (MRAMP) and of the excavations at Khirbat Iskandar (Jordan) and a senior staff member of the Italian Archaeological Expedition to Ebla (Syria). Her research interests include the processes of formation, crisis or collapse, and regeneration of urbanization in the Levant in the Early and Middle Bronze Ages, Levantine pottery, ancient technologies, interconnectivity, interculturality, construction of social identities, trade and exchange in antiquity, and, more recently, public archaeology and cultural heritage safeguarding strategies. She has participated in several international congresses, conferences, and symposia on the archaeology of the ancient Near East. She has authored or co-authored 52 published works, including articles in peer-reviewed journals, reviews, a research monograph (The Southern Levant in Early Bronze IV. Issues and Perspective, Rome 2014), and two co-edited books (Ebla and Beyond, Wiesbaden 2018; Pearls of the Past, Münster 2019).
This paper reviews past and current interpretations of urbanism, collapse, and transitions in the Early Bronze Age and the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age in the southern Levant in order to reanalyse the critical Early Bronze III/IV and Early Bronze IV/Middle Bronze I nexuses. Current interpretive constructs of the southern Levantine society during Early Bronze II-III are discussed to reappraise the question of early urbanization in this region, as well as of how it came to an end and transitioned to the non-urban Early Bronze IV period. Likewise, the nature of the early Middle Bronze Age society and the question of continuity and discontinuity with Early Bronze IV are re-evaluated considering archaeological correlates and chronological issues. All through the paper, the evidence from Khirbat Iskandar is discussed within its regional context in order to re-investigate those intricate phenomena.
Sapienza University of Rome
Frances Pinnock is Associate Professor of Ancient Near Eastern History of Art and Archaeology at the Sapienza University of Rome and co-director with Paolo Matthiae of the Ebla Expedition. Her main research interests are as follows: Syrian and Mesopotamian art and archaeology, with special concern for the third and second millennia BC; gender studies; ancient architecture and urban planning. She is author of six scientific monographs and of more than 100 articles in scientific international journals, encyclopaedias and popular journals.
In this contribution, I will present the archaeological evidence about the phases of LB I–II at Tell Mardikh/Ebla. This was the first period of true decadence of the site: immediately after the destruction around 1600 BCE, there was an attempt to resettle the site, as also happened in other great centers of northern Syria like Alalakh, which had also been destroyed in the same period, or slightly earlier. Unlike other sites, however, the attempt was not successful, although the region of Ebla was under the control of the Hittite Empire, which guaranteed stability. I will present the evidence thus far, and I will analyse the possible reasons for the failure of this experiment of resettlement, which, on the contrary, was successful in other areas of northern Syria, like nearby Tell Afis, Alalakh, and Aleppo.
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Dr. Shlomit Bechar has been the co-director of the Tel Hazor excavations since 2015. She has a Master’s degree and PhD from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She has co-authored the seventh volume of the Hazor publications and is currently co-authoring both the eighth volume of publication as well as the publication of the lower city excavations. Her research interests include the Intermediate, Middle, and Late Bronze Ages in the Levant and the interconnections between the southern and northern Levant.
This article deals with the changes in the built environment of the lower city of Hazor during the Middle and Late Bronze Ages. It will be shown that major changes occurred between Stratum 2, dated to the LBI, and Stratum 1b, dated to the LBIIa. During the Middle Bronze Age and the LBI, most of the excavated areas in the lower city comprised public and monumental buildings whereas in the LBIIa the city was mainly occupied by domestic structures. The historic and social implications of these will be discussed as well as the question of who were the inhabitants of the lower city of Hazor.
La Sapienza University of Rome
Paolo Matthiae is Emeritus Professor of Archaeology and Art History of the Ancient Near East in Sapienza University of Rome, and Fellow of the Accademia dei Lincei (Rome), Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres (Paris), Akademie der Wissenschaften (Wien), Royal Swedish Academy (Stockholm) and Deutsches Archäologisches Institut (Berlin). He received the Ad Honorem Doctorate from the Universities of Madrid and Copenhagen. In 1985 he received the highest honour of the Syrian Arab Republic and in 1996 he was nominated Knight of Great Cross of Italian Republic, the highest of the Italian honours. Between March 2001 and November 2004 he has been Dean of the Faculty of Humanistic Sciences in Sapienza University and between 2005 and 2008 he has been Vice-President of the same University for Cultural Initiatives. Since April 2001 till 2013 he was member of the Prize Committee of the International Foundation Balzan, Zürich-Milan. He is the discoverer of Ebla, Syria, where he started the excavations in 1964 and directed 47 work seasons till 2010. Since the beginning, in 1998 till 2018, he was the Chairman of the Scientific Committee of the International Congress of the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East (1998 Rome; 2000 Copenhagen; 2002 Paris; 2004 Berlin; 2006 Madrid; 2008 Rome; 2010 London; 2012 Warsaw; Basel 2014; 2016 Vienna; 2018 Munich). Between his many publications (18 books and more than 300 articles in scientific journals): Ebla. An Empire Rediscovered (Doubleday 1978), Il sovrano e l’opera. Arte e potere nella Mesopotamia antica (Laterza 1994), L’arte degli Assiri (Laterza 1996), La storia dell’arte dell’Oriente antico, 2100-330 a.C., 3 vols (Electa 1996-2001), Ninive (Electa 1998), Prima lezione di archeologia orientale (Laterza 2006), Gli Archivi Reali di Ebla. La scoperta, i testi, il significato (Mondadori 2008), Ebla, la città del trono. Archeologia e storia (Einaudi 2010), Ebla and Its Landscape. Early State Formation in the Ancient Near East (with N. Marchetti, eds, Left Coast 2013), Studies on the Archaeology of Ebla, 1980-2010 (Harrassowitz 2013), Distruzioni, saccheggi e rinascite. Gli attacchi al patrimonio artistico dall’antichità all’ISIS (Electa 2015), Dalla terra alla storia. Scoperte leggendarie d’archeologia orientale (Einaudi 2018).
The Archaic Palace of the Lower Town North at Ebla was identified in a sounding opened in 1992 in Area P North ca. 7.00 m to the north of the northern edge of the Northern Palace of Middle Bronze II, and it was subsequently exposed laterally in 1993-1996 (Matthiae 1993: 638-39, fig. 14; 1995: 659-74, figs. 6-18; 1998: 564-68, figs. 5-6). The construction of this new palatial building (fig. 1) began in a terminal phase of Early Bronze IVB (ca. 2340/2320-2000 BCE), and it was halted by the destruction of the settlement at the end of this period (Matthiae 2006a; 2010: 396-99; in press a). However, the building was not abandoned at the beginning of Middle Bronze I (ca. 2000-1600 BCE); it was completed during Middle Bronze IA (ca. 2000-1900 BCE) with noticeable changes compared to the original project of the Early Bronze IVB (Matthiae 2006a). The Archaic Palace was likely used all through Middle Bronze IA, but perhaps in an early or, at most, central phase of Middle Bronze IB (ca. 1900-1800 BCE) there was a new series of remakes (Matthiae 2010: 298-99). During Middle Bronze IB, probably in a central phase and as a consequence of the collapse of some of the cavities of the limestone terrace on which the palace had been built, a new building, dubbed Intermediate Palace and seemingly never destroyed, was built above the central and south areas of the last Archaic Palace (Matthiae 1995: 674-76). Probably at the beginning of Middle Bronze IIA, for completely unknown reasons, the Northern Palace was built with a plan and an extension very similar to that of the Intermediate Palace. The Northern Palace was used until the end of Middle Bronze IIA-B up to the final destruction of the urban settlement at the end of Middle Bronze IIB (Matthiae 2006c; 2007a; 2009), when this building was set on fire (Matthiae 2010: 457-61; in press b). Being the last palatial building of Area P North in chronological order, within the sequence of palaces in Area P, the Northern Palace of Middle Bronze IIA-B is the better preserved one, just below the surface of what is today Tell Mardikh, except for the southwest and southeast corners (Matthiae 2010: 254-56, 457-58, fig. 246).
The Early Bronze Age and Urbanism
7. EBI and Early Urbanism in Jordan: New Lights on a Formative Period from Jebel Mutawwaq [+–] 95-109
University of Perugia
Andrea Polcaro, MA and PhD in Archaeology at Sapienza University of Rome, was first fixed term researcher and then research fellow at Perugia University, Italy, where since 2008 he is contract professor in Near Eastern Archaeology. His main research interests are funerary archaeology, landscape archaeology, Early Bronze Age urbanization and megalithism, and ancient Near Eastern religions. Since 2012, he co-directs the Italian-Spanish Archaeological Expedition to Jebel al-Mutawwaq, Jordan. Since 2014, he co-directs the Italian Archaeological Expedition to the Sumerian site of Tell Zurghul, ancient Nigin, in Southern Iraq. From 2015, he also co-directs the Italian-American-Jordanian MRAMP (Madaba Regional Archaeological Museum Project), which concerns the valorization of the Madaba Archaeological Park West and the setup of a new archaeological museum. He has published a book (Costumi Funerari in Palestina dal Bronzo Antico I al Bronzo Antico III – CMAO XI Rome 2006), a university manual (Archeologia della Mesopotamia – Carocci 2015), and more than 50 papers in national and international scientific journals.
Jebel al-Mutawwaq is an Early Bronze Age I site located along the Middle Wadi az-Zarqa Valley in the center of the Transjordan highlands. The recent excavations of the Italian-Spanish archaeological expedition have identified two main phases of occupation of the site, corresponding to the EB IA and to the EB IB-IIA periods. The site shows peculiar architectonical features reflecting the social organization of the settlement already form the EB IA. This article addresses the actual state of the science on the EB I, considered not only as a transitional period but also as a formative moment in the history of the southern Levant. The discoveries of the last years in Jebel al-Mutawwaq, both in the settlement with large public buildings excavated in the central and eastern sectors and in the necropolis with several dolmens recovered intact, are illustrated in the article. These discoveries demonstrate that Jebel al-Mutawwaq must be considered a key site for the study of the development of the Jordanian population of the central highlands during the different phases of transformation and evolution of the settlement from the villages to the first walled cities of the EB II-III.
Yarmouk University
Zeidan Kafafi is Professor of Archaeology in the Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology, Yarmouk University, Jordan. He is a leading archaeologist who has directed numerous excavations in Jordan and is widely published. He also served as acting director of the Jordan Museum and serves as Dean of Graduate Studies at Yarmouk.
This paper focuses on tracing the development of urbanism through major transitions in the Early Bronze Age, particularly in Jordan. The paper revisits various pertinent topics for the Early Bronze Age, such as continuity/discontinuity, urbanization, and the city-state model, in light of recent discoveries and research. The article will survey sites primarily from the Lower Jordan Valley and the Ghors from the Chalcolithic through the EB IV period. The author will attempt to make the case for urbanization, continuity, and the city-state model in Jordan. The article also considers the Egyptian presence and possible influence on urbanism in the period. During the fourth millennium BCE the southern Levant was in permanent contact with Egypt through copper trade. Evidence for this trade in Jordan was found in the archaeological excavations conducted at sites, such as Hujeirat el-Ghuzlan and Maqas, on the eastern side of the Wadi Arabah. This relationship enhanced at the beginning of the third millennium BCE, after the start of the Dynastic Period in Egypt and, undoubtedly, impacted the urbanization development in the southern Levant. I dedicate this brief survey on the Early Bronze Age to my dear friend and colleague for many years in Jordan, Dr. Suzanne Richard.
9. “Show Me How You Bury Your People”: Dolmens, Burials and Social Development in the Early Bronze Age [+–] 127-140
University of Copenhagen
Susanne Kerner studied Near Eastern Archaeology, Ethnography and Ancient Oriental Languages at Free University Berlin. She was the director of the German Protestant Institute for Archaeology and History in Amman, Jordan until 1996. Since 2004 she is Lektor (Associate Professor) in Near Eastern Archaeology at the Carsten-Niebuhr-Section (now Department of Cross-cultural and Regional Reserach) in Copenhagen, Denmark. She has directed and co-directed several excavations and surveys in Jordan from the Neolithic to the Classic periods, including very different projects from Roman water systems to Chalcolithic villages. The Ritual Landscape of Murayghat is the latest project consisting of survey and excavation of dolmen, standing stones and other architecture. Research focus: social complexity, food and identity, gender archaeology, theoretical archaeology, rituals.
The pattern of burials changes from the Late Chalcolithic to the Early Bronze Age, the latter being characterised by the existence of large, visible burial grounds, which take many different forms. They can consist of open air cemeteries as in Bab edh-Dhra or in dolmen fields as in several sites along the Jordanian plateau and lowland. The dolmen fields of Murayghat are introduced here and put in context with the social development during the Early Bronze Age I.
University of California, Santa Barbara
Aaron David Gidding is a Lecturer and Associate Researcher in Anthropology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is interested in the application of digital methods in archaeological research and the role of metals in the development of early complex economies.
University of California, San Diego
Thomas E. Levy is Distinguished Professor of the Graduate Division, Co-Director of the Center for Cyber-Archaeology and Sustainability at the Qualcomm Institute and inaugural holder of the Norma Kershaw Chair in the Archaeology of Ancient Israel and Neighboring Lands at the University of California, San Diego. With over thirty years of archaeological field experience in Israel and Jordan, Levy’s current research focuses on the Iron Age historical archaeology of Edom in southern Jordan. He is Associate Director of the Center of Interdisciplinary Science for Art, Architecture and Archaeology (CISA3) at UCSD’s California Insitute of Telecommunications and Information Technology (Calit2). Levy is editor of Archaeology, Anthropology and Cult: The Sanctuary at Gilat, Israel (Equinox Publishing, 2006) and co-editor, with Thomas Higham, of The Bible and Radiocarbon Dating: Archaeology, Text and Science (Equinox Publishing, 2005). His most recent book, with his wife Alina and the Sthapathy brothers of Swamimalai is Masters of Fire: Hereditary Bronze Casters of South India (German Mining Museum, 2008). Levy is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
This paper examines the political economy of the terminal phase (2600 ¬– 2000 BCE) of the southern Levantine Early Bronze Age through a study of characteristic bar-shaped ingots. The focus of the analysis is at the site Khirbat Hamra Ifdan (KHI), which is the best-preserved metal production facility dating to the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant (Levy et al. 2002). KHI offers a detailed picture of the organization of ingot production during the Early Bronze Age and is used to contextualize bar-shaped ingots found in other locations. Comparing the metrology of the ingots from KHI to ingots found at sites in the Negev Highlands offers important details on the copper trade network. In conjunction, the two datasets highlight a non-centralized political economy that nevertheless was able to develop a long-distance exchange network marketing copper as a commodity intensively for the first time in the region. The analysis highlights that the ingots share a consistent design, but lack metrological consistency associated with currency.
Mississippi State University
Joe D. Seger is Middle Eastern Archaeologist, Director Emeritus, Cobb Institute of Archaeology, and Emeritus Professor, Department of Anthropology and Middle Eastern Cultures, Mississippi State University
Beginning in the 1970’s the Lahav Research Project (LRP) conducted extensive research at and in the environs of Tell Halif, near Kibbutz Lahav in Southern Israel. Excavations on the tell and on the adjacent eastern terrace exposed well stratified evidence of Late Chalcolithic to EB I, and subsequent EB III, occupations. The Halif Terrace remains included four well defined strata (XIX-XVI) and thirteen contiguous phases of Chalcolithic and EB I settlement. These provide clear evidence of association with other regional emporia in a trading network with Pre- and Early Dynastic Egyptians. After a hiatus during EB II, when regional occupations migrated to the Major centers at Arad and Yarmut, Halif recovered in the EB III era becoming a large well-fortified city flourishing along with regional sites such as Tell el-Hesi and Yarmut. This first, EB IIIA, Stratum XV, settlement suffered massive destruction. None-the-less occupation at Halif endured through three further stages of development (Strata XIV-XII). These were unfortified, open enclaves sustained by local agriculture and a still thriving flint knapping industry. Stratum XII occupation ended in the 23rd century B.C.E., perhaps at the hand General Uni in his campaigns during the Egyptian VIth Dynasty. Halif’s progressive decline is paradigmatic of the ruralization of late EB III cultures in southern Palestine as contacts with Egypt flagged and local subsistence became increasingly untenable.
Early Bronze IV
12. EB IV Community in the Upper Wadi Zarqa, North Central Jordan: Ethnoarchaeological Perspectives [+–] 171-185
Sultan Qaboos University, Oman
Khalid Douglas is Associate Professor of Archaeology and Chair, Department of Archaeology, College of Arts and Social Sciences, Sultan Qaboos University (Muscat, Sultanate of Oman). Well published, Khalid serves as Director of the Archaeological Excavations at Jneneh/Zarqa, Jordan, Co-Director of the Ethnoarchaeological Project at Gharsia in the Upper Wadi al-Zarqa, Co-director of the Archaeological Excavations at Khirbet al-Batrawy, Jordan, and Supervisor of the rescue and documentation of the Archaeological Excavations at Ain Ghazal, Jordan.
Several EBIV sites were found in the Upper Wadi az-Zarqa in north central Jordan indicating that the region was a favorite during this period. From an environmental perspective, this region is considered as a transitional area between the arid zone in the east and the Mediterranean one in the west. Excavations at three sites: Jabal er-Raheel, Khirbet al-Batrawy and Jneneh, showed that their inhabitants had adopted a semi-nomadic life-style where their substance economy relied mainly on seasonal agriculture and livestock. In order to understand their socio-economic lifestyle an ethno-archaeological study was carried out on a modern village located in the same region was taken as a case study. The village called Gharissa, it was established on a hill-top on the ruins of earlier settlements in the beginning of the twentieth century, settled for almost half century by a semi-nomadic community then it was abandoned completely. The inhabitants moved down and established a new village (New Gharissa). The ruins of the old village are relatively well preserved. Few of the first inhabitants are still a life. Interestingly interviewing some of them uncovered new aspects and ideas related to their way of life, environment adopted system and subsistence economy where it can be applied to understand the EBIV inhabitants of the region.
University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Steve Falconer is Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology, University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He has directed excavations at Tell Abu en-Ni ‘aj, Tell el-Hayyat, Dhahret Umm al-Marar and Zahrat adh-Dhra‘ in Jordan along the Jordan Rift, as well as at Politiko-Troullia, Cyprus.
University of North Carolina, Charlotte
Pat Fall is Professor in the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences, University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She has co-directed excavations at Bronze Age sites along the Jordan Rift and on Cyprus. Her research reconstructs and models ancient paleoenvironments, agrarian economies and agricultural terraces in the Levant and Cyprus.
Bayesian modeling of calibrated 14C ages from Khirbat Iskandar, Bab edh-Dhra‘, and Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj bolsters an emerging high chronology for the Southern Levantine Early Bronze Age. The work of Suzanne Richard, especially through the excavation of Khirbat Iskandar, highlights the importance of sedentary settlements amid the mobile pastoralism normally emphasized for Early Bronze IV (EB IV) society. Comparative analysis of radiocarbon dates from Khirbat Iskandar and Bab edh-Dhra‘ permits reexamination of their stratigraphic and chronological correlations. Integration of these results with a Bayesian model of 14C ages from Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj provides a coordinated overview of chronological relationships among these important sedentary communities and through the full course of a newly-lengthened EB IV Period. Jointly, the temporal insights from these settlements contribute to a potential uncoupling of EB IV from the Egyptian First Intermediate Period, both chronologically and interpretively, and a revised orientation toward non-urban settlement as a hallmark of Early Bronze Age society.
14. On the Edge of the Valley: The Wadi Hammeh and the Hinterland of Pella in the EB IV Period [+–] 201-224
University of Western Australia
Dr. Melissa A. Kennedy is currently a Research Associate at the University of Western Australia, for the project Aerial Archaeology in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (AAKSAU); where she is conducting one of the first remote ground surveys of the Al-‘Ula hinterland. Her research interest lies in the Early and Middle Bronze Ages of the Levant, specially the Early Bronze Age IV and the connections between the northern and southern Levant. She has also conducted extensive fieldwork in Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Greece and Australia.
University of Sydney
Dr. Stephen Bourke has nearly forty years field experience in the Middle East, with interests ranging from the archaeology of the Palaeolithic through late Medieval periods. He has directed the University of Sydney excavations at Pella in Jordan since 1992. Previously he directed four seasons of renewed excavations at Teleilat Ghassul (Jordan). He also had a long-term association with British UCL excavations at Tell Nebi Mend, Syria, and the Durham University’s Homs Regional Survey. He has written widely on the archaeology of the Levant in particular, and has more than 90 publications in that field.
This paper presents for the first-time key information regarding one of the great unknown periods at Pella and its hinterland, the EB IV. By offering previously unpublished materials from the University of Sydney’s 1985 Wadi Hammeh Survey and the excavations in Area XXXII on the main mound of Pella itself, this paper traces the settlement history of this site during the final centuries of the third millennium BCE. Offering new insights into the reoccupation of Pella at the EB-MB transition.
15. Testing the Statistical EB IV Ceramic Study: New Excavations in Area C at Khirbat Iskandar [+–] 225-235
Khirbat Iskandar Expedition
Stanley Holdorf is a lawyer and independent scholar who has served since 1994 in various roles for the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, notably as Information Specialist and Camp Manager. His research interests include applying statistical measures to ceramic distributions for stratigraphic analysis.
This paper focuses on a quantitative study of the Khirbat Iskandar Area C EB IV ceramics. The original statistical probability study, published in Volume 1 of the Expedition (Holdorf 2010), demonstrated a correlation between three ceramic phases and three stratigraphical phases excavated in Area C. In a second application, the innovative study was able to link the chronology of the tombs in the vicinity with the site’s three-phase typo-chronology. Further, the quantitative results, when applied to Bab adh-Dhra‘, both the site and the cemeteries, offered a first-time quantitative correlation between the phasing of two regionally separated EB IV sites. Renewed excavations in Area C in 2016 and 2019, intended to recheck the critical three-phase EB IV stratigraphic/ceramic chronology of the area, allows us to test hypotheses put forth in the quantitative study of the area. This paper represents a preliminary study of the 2016 and 2019 ceramics, using the methods of the previously published quantitative analysis and phasing in Area C. Although a relatively small sample, this analysis, nevertheless, provides an opportunity to test some of the conclusions drawn previously. The paper offers a summary of previous work along with a first glimpse at the new discoveries in Area C, with a discussion of the process and lessons learned from the previously published quantitative study.
Abilene Christian University
Shelby Green is an adjunct instructor in the College of Biblical Studies at Abilene Christian University in Abilene, TX. She has served as Field Supervisor with the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan. Her research interests include the interpretation of the Old Testament and the archaeology of space, particularly landscapes and domestic structures.
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
Shaped and segmented by culture, architecture is a reflection of the social organization of the society that created it. This paper applies this theory to the Early Bronze Age site of Khirbet Iskandar in Central Jordan. On the heels of the “collapse” of Early Bronze Age II-III urbanism, the succeeding EB IV reflects a sociopolitical organizational change to a rural period of sedentary agricultural settlements, as well as to a complementary stratum of pastoral-nomadic subsistence throughout the southern Levant. The EBIV phase at Khirbet Iskandar is extremely significant in the fact that substantial architecture, such as house complexes, fortifications, and even a gateway, have been uncovered providing opportunity for studying the spatiality of an EBIV permanently settled agricultural settlement. This paper discusses the last occupational phase at Khirbat Iskandar: Phase A in Area B. For each sub-phase of Phase A, it first provides a description of the house complexes and then considers the cultural conventions present in the architecture, through the use of sightline and access analysis diagrams. From this, a sketch of possible “standard” house characteristics in Phase A is constructed. Overall, the Phase A architecture at Khirbat Iskandar shows a trend from less privacy to more privacy between households, as seen in the increasing partitioning of space.
17. A Survey of the EB IV Presence in Jordan [+–] 259-272
St Francis Xavier University
Burton MacDonald is Professor, St. Francis Xavier University, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada. He has conducted five major survey projects, with numerous related publications, focusing on the Edomite plateau in southern Jordan.
Suzanne Richard’s work in Jordan has centered on Early Bronze IV presence at Khirbat Iskandar in west-central Jordan. What her work at the site has emphasized is the sedentary and agrarian component of EB IV presence there. Her findings, when combined with the well-documented pastoral-nomadic populations of EB IV, provide a balanced perspective on the peoples of the period (Richard et al. 2010: 1). Moreover, not only does Richard’s work affirm the agrarian component of the EB IV population, it also illuminates strong ties with antecedent Early Bronze Age traditions. She concludes that her findings support the view that the Early Bronze Age was one continuous tradition with continuity from EB I to EB IV, that is, from ca. 3600 to 2000 BCE (Richard et al. 2010: 5, 278). This is in line with similar findings at other sites in Jordan especially in the Jordan Valley, in the area between Wadi Zarqa and Khirbat Iskandar, on the Karak Plateau, and in the Southern Ghors and Northeast `Arabah and in Wadi Fidan. To the west, in the Negev and Sinai such presence is also found. This is in contrast to lack of such presence on the southern Transjordan Plateau and in the Southeast `Arabah. This paper will look at both where EB IV sedentary and agrarian presence is evident and where it is not.
University of Florence
Stefania Mazzoni is full professor of “Archaeology and Art History of the Ancient Near East” at the University of Florence (Department of SAGAS: Stirua Arcgeologia Geografia Arte Spettacolo). She has conducted excavations in Syria and directed the archaeological mission of Tell Afis (Syria: Idlib) and Uşaklı Höyük (Turkey: Yozgat). Professor Mazzoni has investigated the 3rd millennium “Second Urbanization” of Syria, with special reference to pottery and glyptic, the Late Bronze/Iron Age transition, and the formation of the 1st millennium Luwian and Aramaean cultures, including monumental art, ivories and material culture.
The rich inventory of materials, vessels, and botanic residuals found in the destruction level of Palace G at Ebla, in Syria, gives evidence of the storage organization and the wealth of food of an Early Syrian capital around 2400 B.C.E. While the texts offer a detailed picture of the management of the victuals accumulated by the administration over many years, archaeology supplies instead partial but tangible evidence from the last days of the life of the palace and its food reserves. This evidence illustrates the impressive size of the alimentary resources at the disposal of the court and the officers.
19. The EB IV / Intermediate Bronze Age at Batrawy and Jericho: Post-urban vs. Proto-urban [+–] 293-308
Sapienza University of Rome
Lorenzo Nigro (Rome, 1967), PhD, is Professor of Near Eastern and Phoenician Punic Archaeology in the Faculty of Letters, Dept. of Oriental Studies at Sapienza University of Rome. He is an archaeologist with 25 years of experience on the field in the Near East and the Mediterranean. Since 2002, he is the Director of Sapienza University Expeditions to Motya, a Phoenician colony in Western Sicily, and to Palestine & Jordan (2004-2018) carrying on projects at the sites of Tell es-Sultan (ancient Jericho), Tell Abu Zarad (ancient Tappuah), and Bethlehem in Palestine; and Khirbet al-Batrawy, a 3rd millennium BCE city in Jordan.
Two major projects carried on in the last decades by Sapienza University of Rome, the Palestinian MOTA-DACH, and the Jordanian DoA, respectively at Tell es-Sultan in Palestine (Nigro 2015) and Khirbet al-Batrawy in northcentral Jordan (Nigro 2017a: 149), yielded fresh data about the Early Bronze Age IV/Intermediate Bronze Age (Amiran 1960; Albright 1962; Dever 1970; 1980; Oren 1973; Prag 1974; Richard 1980; 2003; Palumbo 1990; Nigro 2003a; Richard 2010: 1; D’Andrea 2012; 2014 vol. 1: 265-287), which may further our understanding (or interpretation) of such post/pre-urban periods in the history of southern Levant. In both cases, the excavations have exposed occupation layers and have obtained stratigraphic sequences to be included into the regional scenario. Both Jericho and Batrawy in fact were re-settled after a major destruction marking the end of the Early Bronze Age III city (Nigro 2017a: 165-166) and occupied for a time span of about a century or more. Their almost parallel archaeo-narratives offer a cue for further reflections about EB IV. There has already been such a plea, but I hope fresh data and analyses will provide extra insights. To present them to a distinguished scholar, Suzanne Richard, a friend and an esteemed colleague, is an honour and a pleasure.
Ceramics
20. The Madaba Settlement Cluster and the Nature of Early Bronze Age Urbanism in the Central Highlands of Jordan [+–] 311-334
University of Toronto
Stanley Klassen is Collections Manager and Lab Technician of the Archaeology Laboratory in the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations at the University of Toronto. He has excavated in Israel, Jordan, and Turkey, and has published numerous studies on the Bronze and Iron Age pottery of the southern Levant and Egypt, with a special focus on their technological, mineralogical, and chemical properties.
University of Chicago
Timothy Harrison (PhD University of Chicago 1995) is Director of the Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures (ISAC) and Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Chicago. He has directed excavations at the Bronze and Iron Age site of Tall Mādabā, Jordan and is currently directing the Tayinat Archaeological Project in southeastern Turkey. These projects form part of a wider, interregional research effort that seeks to shed light on the early development of urban life and state-ordered society within the diverse cultures that have given shape to the eastern Mediterranean world. As part of this effort, he launched the CRANE Project (Computational Research on the Ancient Near East), an international consortium of scholars and projects conducting research in the Orontes Watershed (www.crane.utoronto.ca). He served as President of the American Society of Overseas Research between 2008 and 2013. Prior to his appointment as ISAC Director, he was Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Toronto.
Numerous studies have attempted to define the development of urbanism in the southern Levant during the Early Bronze Age. While pan-regional models have generally been favored, fieldwork has increasingly demonstrated the complex and diverse character of the archaeological record during this period, emphasizing the importance of examining development at the local regional level. The Madaba Settlement Cluster, situated in the Highlands of central Jordan, offers a unique opportunity to test integration at this regional level. This paper presents the preliminary results of a holistic analysis of pottery assemblages from six Early Bronze II sites within the Madaba Settlement Cluster and highlights the distributed nature and organization of the ceramic industry during this period.
American University of Beirut, Lebanon
Hermann Genz received his PhD from the University of Tübingen in 1998. Since 2004 he is Professor of Archaeology at the American University of Beirut. He directs excavation projects in Lebanon at Tell Fadous-Kfarabida (2004 – 2016), Baalbek (2012 – ongoing) and Tell Mirhan (2016 – ongoing).
His research focuses on the Bronze and Iron Ages of the Eastern Mediterranean, especially the Levant and Anatolia, including the transition from village communities to more complex forms of socio-political organization, often called ‘city-states’ in the late fourth/early third millennia, and the ultimate incorporation of the Levant into large empires in the second millennium BCE and the accompanying socio-economic changes.
His research focuses on the Bronze and Iron Ages of the Eastern Mediterranean, especially the Levant and Anatolia, including the transition from village communities to more complex forms of socio-political organization, often called ‘city-states’ in the late fourth/early third millennia, and the ultimate incorporation of the Levant into large empires in the second millennium BCE and the accompanying socio-economic changes.
University of Durham
Kamal Badreshany is a research associate in the Department of Archaeology at Durham University. He received his PhD from the University of Chicago in 2013. He specializes in the analysis and geological characterization of ancient ceramics using archaeometric techniques, including ceramic petrography, scanning electron microscopy, and X-ray diffraction. Although incorporating data at the micro-level, he is a landscape-oriented anthropological archaeologist interested in human adaptation to changing social, economic, and environmental conditions, especially as related to increasing settlement density and early empires.
University of Paris
Mathilde Jean is a PhD student in Near-Eastern archaeology at the University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and member of the French Mission at Tell Arqa since 2012. Her PhD thesis investigates the evolution of pottery production and diffusion in the northern Levant during the Early Bronze Age through petrographic analyses. While focusing on Tell Arqa, she also incorporates other regional assemblages such as Enfeh, Qatna and Ras Shamra. She received a three-years research contract from heSam University for her PhD and is a member of the UMR 7041 ArScAn/VEPMO in the CNRS.
Ever since its first discovery at Megiddo in the 1930s, Black Wheelmade ware has sparked the interest of researchers, especially regarding its origin. Most of the research so far has focused on northern Palestine. Lebanon has occasionally been mentioned as a possible region of manufacture, but so far without providing any detailed evidence. In this article, we discuss the occurrence of Black Wheelmade ware in Lebanon and provide the results of the first petrographic and geochemical data from this region.
22. One Potter, Multiple Clay Body Types [+–] 355-367
Independent Scholar
Gloria London received her Ph.D from the University of Arizona. She is the author of Ancient Cookware from the Levant (2017, Equinox), Traditional Pottery in Cyrpus (1989, Philipp von Zabern), creator of a video Women Potters of Cyprus (2000, Tetraktys), and co-creator of the Museum of Traditional Pottery in Ayios Dimitrios (Marathasa), Cyprus.
Three studies of traditional craft specialists in Cyprus, the Philippines, and Cameroon, demonstrate that potters regularly work with clays derived from multiple sources. As a result, the jugs, jars, and cookware produced by an potter will vary depending on where s/he shaped the products. Potters intentionally mix clays to create a less porous clay body. For water jugs, the same potters create a more porous fabric by using one clay only. All of the wares examined here are destined for use by the local populace and do not reach tourist markets. The potters work in their courtyards, in a small factory-like setting, or as itinerants. They shape utilitarian round bottomed pots from whatever clay is available. The archaeological implications concern: sources of variation of the work of craft specialists and within contemporaneous assemblages of ancient ceramics.
End Matter
Subject and Author Index 369-374
University of Arizona
William G. Dever is Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Arizona. He is the author of over 26 books and numerous chapters and journal articles.
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
Sites and Places Index 375-379
University of Arizona
William G. Dever is Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Arizona. He is the author of over 26 books and numerous chapters and journal articles.
Lubbock Christian University
Jesse C. Long, Jr., is Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Archaeology in the Smith College of Biblical Studies at Lubbock Christian University, Lubbock, TX. He has served as co-director of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar, Jordan, since 1994, working closely with Suzanne Richard, his mentor and PI of the excavation. His research interests include the Early Bronze Age in the southern Levant, biblical archaeology, and Hebrew narrative.
