Art Studies: Normative Approaches

  • PDF / 22,802,915 Bytes
  • 738 Pages / 504.567 x 720 pts Page_size
  • 102 Downloads / 252 Views

DOWNLOAD

REPORT


Abu Hureyra: Agriculture and Domestication Andrew M. T. Moore Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY, USA

Introduction The prehistoric settlement of Abu Hureyra (35 520 N, 38 240 E) was located on the edge of the valley of the Euphrates River in northern Syria. It was a very large (11.5 ha) mound composed of two superimposed villages, Abu Hureyra 1 (c. 13,400–11,500 CalB.P.) and Abu Hureyra 2 (c. 10,600–7,500 CalB.P.) with an Intermediate episode of occupation (c. 11,500–10,600 CalB.P.) (Moore et al. 2000: Fig. 14.1). The site was thus continuously inhabited for 6,000 years. Culturally, Abu Hureyra 1 had late Epipalaeolithic affinities while the Intermediate Period and Abu Hureyra 2 fell within the Neolithic of Western Asia.

Key Issues The site was excavated in 1972 and 1973 as part of an international salvage campaign that preceded the completion of a dam across the Euphrates. The site was flooded in 1974. Seven trenches were dug across the site to establish the sequence of occupation. These demonstrated that the initial

settlement of Abu Hureyra 1 was confined to the north-west sector of the mound. The bulk of the deposits was derived from the much more extensive settlement of Abu Hureyra 2. All the soil was dry-sieved to ensure near-total recovery of artifacts and animal bones. Given the potential of the site to yield information about the formative stages of agriculture, the excavators systematically employed flotation to recover large samples of plant remains. The 2 t of animal bones and 500 l of plant remains retrieved by these methods provided important insights on changes in the economy and environment. The initial settlement at Abu Hureyra in Period 1A consisted of multichambered pit dwellings dug into the subsoil that were covered with a timber framework and roofed with reeds. This settlement was occupied year-round and lasted for 500 years. The form of the settlement changed abruptly in Periods 1B and 1C. The inhabitants built their huts on the surface of the ground with a frame of wooden posts and floors of trodden earth or clay. Finds of human bones suggested that some of the deceased were buried within the settlement. The most numerous artifacts were made of chipped stone. Microliths, especially large lunates, and also scrapers and notched pieces, were conspicuous. A few fragments of obsidian were imported from Anatolia to the north. The bone artifacts included bipoints used as arrowheads, many awls, and some pins. Many of the other tools were made of basalt, among them grinding dishes, querns, rubbing stones, pestles,

C. Smith (ed.), Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology, DOI 10.1007/978-1-4419-0465-2, # Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

A

2

and mortars. These were used to prepare food and to grind pigments. Notched pebbles were probably used as sinkers for fishing lines and nets. The inhabitants of Abu Hureyra 1A were hunters and gatherers who consumed a diverse range of foods. They collected over 100 species of edible plants (Moore et al. 2000: 369), of which wild cerea