Abstract: Urbanization occupies an ambiguous position in the development of the Middle Euphrates region of Turkey and Syria, in part because the area frequently formed a contested region between other stronger Early Bronze Age polities. This paper aims to review evidence from a series of archaeological surveys to illustrate trends in settlement during the 4th and 3rd millennium BC. Re-analysis of survey data from three exemplar regions in the Middle Euphrates demonstrates that by including settlement away from the main Euphrates Valley we get a picture of two main zones of settlement corresponding to agro-ecological zones. In the northern zone, settlements underwent phases of nucleation and dispersal through time, but long-term configurations were relatively stable. In contrast, a southern zone, south of the Sajur Valley, was characterized by rapid colonization and some degree of boom and bust growth of towns, perhaps encouraged by the opportunities afforded by the high risk but high rewards of the ‘zone of...

Abstract: The Early Bronze IV period of the Southern Levant (2300–2000 BC) is characterized by a number of sub-regional cultural units. That of southern Transjordan has usually been considered the earliest on a morpho-stylistic basis. Recent research has provided new stratigraphic and ceramic sequences, and radiocarbon dates, which enable a reconsideration of chronology. New theoretical approaches to ceramic assemblages allow the issue of regionalism to be viewed in terms of the socio-economic activities of different cultural groups within a region. Building on these insights, it is now possible to revaluate the historical, chronological and socio-economic significance of the so-called Transjordan Family, of EB IV ceramics.

Abstract: Whilst use of alcoholic beverages is considered an important feature of most societies, identifying alcohol production and consumption in the archaeological record is notoriously difficult. Presented here is a recently excavated oven-like installation, unique in the Cypriot Bronze Age, from the south-western settlement of Kissonerga-Skalia. The form of this construction suggests that the most likely function was as a drying-kiln, and that one of the primary uses of this structure was for drying malt or curing malt cakes for making beer. The associated architecture and material culture is primarily of types found at Bronze Age sites elsewhere, but when considered holistically allows for extrapolation of some of the less archaeologically distinct aspects of beer production. Important evidence also comes from the well-known ‘scenic compositions’ found in tombs of the Early–Middle Cypriot Bronze Age, which have been the focus of a great deal of speculation on the nature of the activities shown and the...

Abstract: European travel reports of the 19th century and excavations in Transjordan created the impression that population numbers were strongly reduced during the Islamic periods, leading to ‘empty’ lands which were only resettled during the early 20th century. This development was considered to be caused by bad (Muslim) governance, nomadic incursions, and environmental degradation. However, our case study near the ancient site Abila of the Decapolis in northern Jordan found that the land was never empty and always fertile, but there is evidence for a rapid and intense landscape change during the Late Byzantine period. This was probably caused by a significant shift to aridity which also triggered socio-economic changes in subsistence strategies from agriculture to nomadism. The climatic change seems to have occurred rapidly within approximately 100 years in the late 6th and early 7th centuries AD and was accompanied by heavy rainfall events. It might have been caused or triggered by the climatic event of...

Abstract: Recent excavations carried out in Area HH at Tell Mardikh/Ebla identified a huge sacred area in use from the middle of the 3rd millennium BC until the final destruction of the Middle Bronze Age city. The first building erected in this area in the Early Bronze IVA (2400–2300 BC) was the monumental Temple of the Rock, which was ritually sealed and abandoned at the beginning of the Early Bronze IVB (around 2300–2250 BC). Two of the pits inside the cavity in the cella of the Temple were found to have been filled with a large quantity of fine vessels, as part of a purification ritual carried out before their definitive sealing with superimposed courses of mud-brick. These provide the first coherent ceramic pottery assemblage for the initial stage of the EB IVB Period, and accordingly shed new light on the ceramic horizon of North-West Inner Syria during the last third of the 3rd millennium BC.

Abstract: This article seeks to demonstrate that Phoenician vessels were considered to be more than just planks of timber fashioned together to form a platform on which mariners could conduct their daily lives whilst at sea; it will show, rather, that they were thought of as self-contained entities that were imbued with a living spirit that needed the protection of a number of maritime deities. By emphasizing the zoomorphic and anthropomorphic aspects of Canaanite and Phoenician vessels, it is possible to challenge previous suggestions that the horns mounted on a vessel’s prow were either part of its superstructure or simply a decorative device, and instead establish their specific religious significance. By integrating a study of the horns found on warships into wider scholarly discourses exploring the symbolic significance of horns and cornute imagery in the ancient Near East, this article will demonstrate that the horns adorning warships were not simply intended to denote the presence of the divine or to avert e...

Abstract: Dolmen-like structures occur through much of the Levant, where they are commonly assigned an Early Bronze Age date. Publication of similar structures in Anatolia has been primarily in Turkish, and the Anatolian evidence has generally not figured in discussions of the ‘dolmen phenomenon’. This study describes in some detail the above-ground burial structures at two locations in Hatay, and, more briefly, describes previously published structures at five additional sites, within the west bank drainage of the Euphrates River in south-eastern Anatolia. The study then situates the dolmen-like structures at these seven sites as part of the transregional ‘dolmen phenomenon’, and locates them in the context of local landscapes and settlement systems.

Abstract: The social organization of regional settlement systems in the Southern Levant during the mid 4th millennium (EB IA) is addressed through a new interpretation of the spatial patterning of houses and agglomerations in the Syrian Leja. The implications of an explanation which treats residential mobility as a major factor in the spatial and social structure of settlements are first explored at the level of the Leja and subsequently extended to the Southern Levant.