Perforated Stars: Networks of Prestige Item Exchange and the Role of Perforated Flint Objects in the Late Chalcolithic of the Southern Levant

Evidence for both basket weaving and salt production is often elusive in the prehistoric archaeological record. An assemblage of Middle–Late Chalcolithic pottery from Provadia-Solnitsata in Bulgaria provides insight into these two different technologies and the relationship between them. The authors analyse sherds from vessels used in large-scale salt production, the bases of which bear the impression of woven mats. This analysis reveals the possible raw materials used in mat weaving at Provadia-Solnitsata and allows interpretation of the role of these mats in salt production at the site. The results illustrate how it is possible to see the ‘invisible’ material culture of prehistoric south-eastern Europe and its importance for production and consumption.

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Cultural Metallurgy—A Key Factor in the Transition from the Chalcolithic to Bronze Age in the Southern Levant

Cambridge Archaeological Journal ◽

10.1017/s0959774321000524 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-21

Author(s):

Nissim Amzallag

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

Coastal Plain ◽

Transitional Period ◽

Practical Approach ◽

Nile Valley ◽

Southern Levant ◽

Religious Expression ◽

Late Chalcolithic ◽

Key Factor ◽

The Bronze Age

The causes of the disappearance of Late Chalcolithic society (Ghassulian) in the early fourth millennium bc remain obscure. This study identifies the collapse as the consequence of a change in the approach to metallurgy from cosmological fundament (Late Chalcolithic) to a practical craft (EB1). This endogenous transition accounts for the cultural recession characterizing the transitional period (EB1A) and the discontinuity in ritual practices. The new practical approach in metallurgy is firstly observed in the southern margin of the Ghassulian culture, which produced copper for distribution in the Nile valley rather than the southern Levant. Nevertheless, the Ghassulian cultural markers visible in the newly emerging areas of copper working (southern coastal plain, Nile valley) denote the survival of the old cosmological traditions among metalworkers of the EB1 culture. Their religious expression unveils the extension of the Ghassulian beliefs attached to metallurgy and their metamorphosis into the esoteric fundaments of the Bronze Age religions.

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A Large Copper Artefacts Assemblage of Fazael, Jordan Valley

Documenta Praehistorica ◽

10.4312/dp.47.14 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 47 ◽

pp. 246-261

Author(s):

Danny Rosenberg ◽

Eli Buchman ◽

Sariel Shalev ◽

Shay Bar

Keyword(s):

Social Organization ◽

Social Institutions ◽

Current Paper ◽

Copper Industry ◽

Southern Levant ◽

Jordan Valley ◽

Late Chalcolithic ◽

Chalcolithic Period ◽

First Time ◽

Comprehensive Study

Late Chalcolithic metallurgy developed in the southern Levant simultaneously with other crafts and new social institutions, reflecting advances in social organization, cults and technology. Until recently, copper items were mostly found in the Negev and Judean Desert, while other areas, specifically the Jordan Valley, were considered poor, with limited copper finds. Recent excavations at Late Chalcolithic Fazael in the Jordan Valley yielded dozens of copper items that allow for the first time a comprehensive study of copper items from this area. The assemblage is one of the largest of any site in the Late Chalcolithic period and includes most of the known components of the Late Chalcolithic copper industry. The current paper presents the new metallurgical discoveries from the Fazael Basin and discusses their significance to our understanding of the Late Chalcolithic copper industry.

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Chalcolithic groundwater mining in the southern Levant: open, vertical shafts in the Late Chalcolithic central coastal plain settlement landscape of Israel

Levant ◽

10.1080/00758914.2020.1818174 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-35

Author(s):

Edwin C. M. van den Brink ◽

Oren Ackermann ◽

Yaakov Anker ◽

Yeshua Dray ◽

Gilad Itach ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Coastal Plain ◽

Southern Levant ◽

Late Chalcolithic ◽

Settlement Landscape

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Culture, ecology, and pigs from the 5th to the 3rd millennium BC around the Fertile Crescent

Pigs and Humans ◽

10.1093/oso/9780199207046.003.0014 ◽

2007 ◽

Author(s):

Caroline Grigson

Keyword(s):

Middle East ◽

Environmental Factors ◽

Domestic Economy ◽

Southern Levant ◽

Late Neolithic ◽

Radiocarbon Dates ◽

Cultural Attitude ◽

South Eastern ◽

Fertile Crescent ◽

Late Chalcolithic

By the 5th millennium BC people in the Middle East were dependent for their meat on four domestic ungulates: sheep, goats, cattle, and pigs, all considerably smaller than their wild ancestors (Bökönyi 1977; Uerpmann 1979; Flannery, K.V. 1983; Laffer 1983; Meadow 1983; Stampfli 1983; Grigson 1989; Ducos 1993; Horwitz & Tchernov 1998; Vigne & Buitenhuis 1999; Peters et al. 2000; Ervynck et al. 2001; and many others). It is uncertain whether equids had been domesticated at this date, but their remains are so few in most sites of the 5th, 4th, and 3rd millennia that they can be discounted in any discussion relating to the domestic economy. On the small number of sites where their remains are plentiful they are thought to be derived from wild onagers or wild asses (Uerpmann 1986). In these three millennia the numerical proportion of pig remains compared with those of other domestic artiodactyls varies from site to site. In view of the later pig prohibitions of Islam and Judaism it is of particular interest to know, for the prehistory of the area, when and where pigs were present or absent, and if absent whether this can already be accounted for by any developing social or cultural attitude, in the millennia before the establishment of these religions, or whether it must be explained by simpler economic or environmental factors. All dates in the present work are based on uncalibrated radiocarbon years BC, simply because even when radiocarbon dates for the sites are available (which is by no means always the case), many have not been published in calibrated form. The period studied in the present work starts with the later pottery cultures of the 5th millennium BC which are usually designated as Early Chalcolithic (Late Halaf, Amuq E, and Ubaid 2 and 3) although in the southern Levant most authorities refer to the contemporary Wadi Rabah culture as the Late Neolithic. The 4th millennium is the period of the Chalcolithic (or Late Chalcolithic), typically the Ghassoul-Beersheva culture of the southern Levant and the Uruk and Late Ubaid periods in Mesopotamia, northern Syria, and south-eastern Turkey.

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Negevite, the pyrite-type NiP2, a new terrestrial phosphide

American Mineralogist ◽

10.2138/am-2020-7192 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 105 (3) ◽

pp. 422-427 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Sergey N. Britvin ◽

Michail N. Murashko ◽

Yevgeny Vapnik ◽

Yury S. Polekhovsky ◽

Sergey V. Krivovichev ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Crystal Structure ◽

Chemical Composition ◽

Empirical Formula ◽

Structural Analog ◽

Structure Type ◽

P System ◽

Southern Levant ◽

Holotype Specimen ◽

Reflected Light

Abstract Negevite, ideally NiP2, is a new phosphide mineral from pyrometamorphic complex of the Hatrurim Formation (the Mottled Zone), Southern Levant. It is found in phosphide assemblages of the Hatrurim Basin, south Negev Desert, Israel, and Daba-Siwaqa complex, Jordan. The mineral occurs as tiny isometric grains reaching 15 μm in size and forms intimate intergrowths with other phosphides related to the Fe-Ni-P system. In reflected light, negevite is white with yellowish tint and isotropic. Reflectance values for COM recommended wavelengths [R (%), λ (nm)] are as follows: 54.6 (470), 55.0 (546), 55.3 (589), 55.6 (650). Chemical composition of the holotype specimen (electron micro-probe, wt%): Ni 42.57, Co 3.40, Fe 2.87, P 42.93, S 8.33, total 100.10, corresponding to the empirical formula (Ni0.88Co0.07Fe0.06)Σ1.01(P1.68S0.31)Σ1.99. The crystal structure of negevite was solved and refined to R1 = 1.73% based on 52 independent observed [I >2σ(I)] reflections. The mineral is cubic, space group Pa3, a = 5.4816(5) Å, V = 164.71(3) Å3, and Z = 4. Dx = 4.881(1) g/cm3 calculated on the basis of the empirical formula. Negevite is a first natural phosphide belonging to the pyrite structure type. It is a chemical and structural analog of vaesite, NiS2, krutovite, NiAs2, and penroseite, NiSe2. The well-explored catalytic and photocatalytic properties of a synthetic counterpart of negevite could provide new insights into the possible role of higher phosphides as a source of low-valent phosphorus in prebiotic phosphorylation processes.

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