Archaeology in Jordan Author(s): Bert de Vries and Pierre Bikai Source: American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 97, No. 3 (Jul., 1993), pp. 457-520 Published by: Archaeological Institute of America Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/506366 Accessed: 16/07/2009 15:03 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=aia. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1995 to build trusted digital archives for scholarship. We work with the scholarly community to preserve their work and the materials they rely upon, and to build a common research platform that promotes the discovery and use of these resources. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Archaeological Institute of America is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to American Journal of Archaeology. http://www.jstor.org Archaeology in Jordan BERT DE VRIES AND PIERRE BIKAI This installment of the annual newsletter on ar- chronologicalo verlap to achieve a ranking. All eras chaeology in Jordan reports comprehensivelyo n cur- from the Palaeolithic to the 20th century are well rent activities. These activities include not only represented. fieldworkc onducted last year (December 1991 to Oc- Several institutionsa re cited frequently below and tober 1992), but also new laboratorya nd interpretive are abbreviateda s follows: American Center of Ori- work on projects previously in the field. The 1993 ental Research( ACOR),A mericanS choolso f Oriental edition of the newsletter is fully representativeo f the Research (ASOR), British Institute at Amman for archaeologicalr esearch conducted in the Hashemite Archaeologya nd History (BIAAH), the CulturalR e- Kingdom by scholars from North America, Europe, source Management division of ACOR (CRM), the Australia,a nd Jordan itself. Publicationo f "Archae- Department of Antiquitieso f Jordan (DAJ), and the ology in Jordan" in AJA has been funded in part this United States Agency for InternationalD evelopment year, as last year, by generous matching subventions (USAID). from the Jordan Societyi n Washington,D .C., and the Endowmentf or BiblicalR esearch,B oston. PALAEOLITHIC, NEOLITHIC, CHALCOLITHIC This newsletter includes 44 reports on research Wadi Hasa. G.A. Clark, Department of Anthro- involving 39 sites (fig. 1). It includes 37 projects that pology, Arizona State University,r eports: were active in the field during the first nine months The third season of excavation and survey of the of 1992. This high number testifies in part to the Wadi Hasa Palaeolithic Project (WHPP) took place normal business of archaeologyi n Jordan. The num- between 11 Februarya nd 8 April 1992 and was di- ber is unusually high, however, because several proj- rected by G.A. Clark.T here were three majora spects ects delayed by war in the Gulf took 1992 as the first of the work: 1) continued excavationo f the Ain Difla opportunity for rescheduling. rockshelter( WHS 634) in the Wadi Ali, 2) horizontal As before, the archaeologists who have done the expansion of the 44 m trench (WHS 1065) at el-Hasa, fieldwork,u sually projectd irectorso r codirectors,r e- and 3) initiationo f a multiseasons urvey program on port herein on their own work. We thank all the the north bank of the Wadi Hasa, the Wadi Hasa contributorsf or taking the time to write and send us North Bank Survey (WHNBS). The survey is in- their essays,a nd editoriala ssistantJaneH aney for the tended to complement Burton MacDonald's Wadi countless hours spent on the manuscript. Hasa Survey( WHS),w hich was restrictedt o the south These reports, though technical in nature, are in- bank. tended as news items, and do not replace the more The Ain Difla rockshelter( fig. 2) was located by the elaborate scholarly reporting in the Annual of the Wadi Hasa Survey in 1982 and tested previously by Department of Antiquities of Jordan (ADAJ) and the Clarki n 1984 and by Clarka nd G. Rollefson in 1986. journals of the various national societies. Regular re- The earliere xcavationsp roduced some 8,000 artifacts ports on fieldworki n Jordan also appear in the ACOR pertaining to a Tabun Type D, elongated Levallois Newsletter and Ancient Jordan, the newsletter of the Mousteriana ssemblage,b ut did not penetrate below Jordanian Friends of Archaeology Society.F or multi- 1 m from the surface of the deposits (which was season projects with a research history prior to 1990, variableb ecause of irregularitieso n the original floor bibliographya nd comprehensivef ield reports may be of the rockshelter).B urnt flint samples from the 1986 found in Archaeology of Jordan, prepared by D. excavations produced a thermoluminescence (TL) Homes-Fredericqa nd J.B. Hennessy in supplements date of 105,000 + 15,000 B.P. (Oxford University III, VII, and VIII of Akkadica. Laboratoryf or Isotope Geochemistry).I t should be In order to convey a historicalo verview,t he reports noted that this date is at the top of the deposit and are arranged in chronological order. Reports on can be considered to date only the latest phases of multiperiod sites are placed with the period where Mousterian occupation. No archaeological remains the project appears to be making its greatest contri- later than the Mousterian (Middle Palaeolithic)a re bution currently. We accept full responsibility for preserved at the site. faulty judgments here! In the section on the Helle- The 1992 excavationse xtended tests begun in 1984 nistic to Medievalp eriods, however, the arrangement and 1986 to a depth of nearly 3 m and uncovered the is geographical because there is generally too much remainso f dozens of smallh earths and firepits,w hich 457 AmericanJ ournal of Archaeology9 7 (1993) 458 BERT DE VRIES AND PIERRE BIKAI [AJA 97 26 / A 24 25 ' .. , " ,1 wadi hasa 13 15 2 tabaqat el-bt uma 3 beidha 212 31 4 iraq ed-dubb tell esh-shur na dead, '-^~ 325 deseaa;d/ 32 , e 6 wadi el-yabis ,*/^^ --<7 abu snesleh pella V/*^17^\ 8 Jgi74 3 99 lehun 3: 3 r10 baqa 'ah vall(e y *kherSa)k 11 tell el- 'umeii ri 12 tell jalul 4~ T^ r)13 tell iktanu 14 tell abu al- kh araz ~- ~/18 '~c\ v 15 tell jawa (r/( r\ <~'> ,. 16 khilda /) L3'-53>J 17 el- balu ,/ X t A 18 feifa / -Js^ ^y__ 19 petra I/ J {? ^ 20 tell el-fukha r f,~)fI~ / f~- {21 umm qais I 43 1200m 900 m 22 abila /1I 9p} 23 dohaleh m / \ 9t ma'an Z4 umm el- jima iI \ 39 37 25 umm el - qutt(e in x/ yj \N )26 burqu' / ruw(e ishid / (< \ \, 27 jerash I g^ y^~ ,~C] ~2 8 tell abu sart )ut 6 I 29 'amman: ten nple of hercules -u^/?~> +S < ? s/i \30 'amman: khilr bet salameh 31 madaba 32 machaerus 33 khirbet faris qaba ) 34 deir 'ain 'abalt a J t/ c5 ,'35 t uwaneh t ) 36 humeima //,__A " <,37 ma'an / ~..7 , 0,-- .38 'aqaba 39 taibeh Fig. 1. Sketch map of archaeologicals ites in Jordan referred to in the text. Not to scale. 1993] ARCHAEOLOGYI N JORDAN 459 Fig. 2. 'AinD ifla rockshelter( WHS6 34). Viewed from the 27 m high terraceo f the WadiA li system,l ooking northwest. should yield more dates from what is Jordan's earliest minations to about 16,000 years ago. The overall Palaeolithic site. Thousands of artifacts were recov- objectiveo f the researchw ast o get a pictureo f human ered along with poorly preserved animal bone. Many life in the waning millennia of the Pleistocenei n the of the artifacts showed signs of having been burned intervalj ust prior to the appearance of the earliest in fires-certain evidence of the systematic use of fire domesticatedp lantsa nd animals.T he aim of the 1992 by these early, pre-modern humans. Some 3-4 m of excavationw as to open up some horizontal areas of archaeological deposit still remain to be sampled, with the site, with the possibilityo f identifying living sur- the exciting prospect of uncovering stratified evidence faces or structural remains. Additional excavation of early humans extending back 250,000 years or might also enable us to isolate discrete phases of Epi- more. The site is located on top of an ancient river palaeolithico ccupation. Kebarana nd Natufian com- terrace, one of three preserved in the valley, and is in ponents were identifiedb y means offossiles directeurs close proximity to an enormous fossil spring, which in the 1984 tests. can also be dated using uranium series methods. The Our objectives were only partially met. We were aim of the research is to shed light on early Middle unable to identify unequivocall iving surfaces or ar- Palaeolithic adaptations prior to the emergence of chitecture,b ut a Kebaranc omponent may have been modern man. isolated in the complex occupation sequence at the We also expanded earlier tests at WHS 1065, an site, which evidently" moved"u p and down the slope 800 m2 Epipalaeolithic site associated with a fossil lake over the long term probablyi n response to changes in the eastern part of the Wadi Hasa. This site had in the level of the lake. We also noted differences in been tested in 1984 by a series of eight 5 m and one lithic technology,w hich should be further elucidated 4 m step trenches that bisected the site and ran from by laboratorya nalysisa t ArizonaS tate Universityd ur- the marls below it to the collapsed rockshelter and ing the summer and fall of 1992. If these stand up to fossil spring with which it is associated. These exca- further scrutiny,t hey could have a substantiali mpact vations produced enormous quantities of stone tools on the traditional notions of the Kebaran and of and animal bones dated by five radiocarbon deter- Epipalaeolithicin dustriesi n general. 460 BERTD E VRIESA ND PIERREB IKAI [AJA9 7 Finally,s ince human adaptationsa re regional phe- do not postdatet he Natufian( ca. 12,500-10,000 B.P.). nomena, isolated sites can provide only "snapshots" The high elevations of the Jebel el'Misqa re covered of the panorama of human adjustmentt o a series of in a flint-richg ravel scree in which there is a contin- changing Upper and Post-Pleistocenee nvironments. uous light scattero f deflated, heavilyp atinated,w ind- In order to develop a more adequate regional picture polished artifacts. These tend to be ancient (i.e., of these adaptations, we initiated an intensive (ca. Lowera nd Middle Palaeolithic,s ometimes Upper Pa- 100%) survey of the north bank of the Wadi Hasa laeolithic), and were associated with vanished land beginning at its eastern terminus just west of the surfaces that existed some 10-20 m above those of Desert Highway. Our intention was to survey com- the present day. pletely a 16 km2a rea extending westwards ome 8 km This researchi s supported by the National Science from the road and north at least 2 km. This effort Foundation, the National Geographic Society, Ari- revealeds even sites dominated by Stone Age material. zona State University,a nd the Chase Bank of Arizona, Only 18 sites (23%) produced ceramics and/or had with the logisticala ssistanceo f ACOR and under the distinctive architecturalr emains. These were domi- aegis of ASOR'sC ommitteeo n ArchaeologicalP olicy nated by Late Byzantine/EarlyI slamic sites (7 sites, (CAP)a nd the DAJ. 39% of ceramic total) and a scattering of Roman (2, Tabaqat al-Buma, Wadi Ziqlab. E.B. Banning, 11%),N abataean( 1, 5%),A yyubid/Mamluk( 5, 28%), Departmento f Anthropology,U niversityo f Toronto, and Ottoman (3, 17%) sites. Many sites with and reports: without architectureh ad more than one component. The third season of excavationsa t Tabaqata l-Buma The remaining 60 sites (67%), as well as some of (WZ2 00) was funded by the Social Sciences and Hu- those with ceramics, yielded collections of lithic arti- manities ResearchC ouncil of Canada and took place facts ranging in time from the Lower Palaeolithic from May to July 1992. The work concentrated (Acheulean)t o the MetalA ges. Of considerablei nter- mainly on the Neolithic occupation of the site, to est is a respectablen umber of Upper Palaeolithics ites complete excavation of a structure that was partially (25, 27%), which were not reported in Jordan until exposed in 1990 (Banning, AJA 96 [1992] 506-507) MacDonald's1 979-1983 survey but which have sub- and to test for the presence of other structures (fig. sequently been shown to be well represented in the 3). There was also work on Kebarand eposits in areas Hasa drainage and in the Wadi Hisma (southwest E34 and F34, and a small excavation at nearby site Jordan). The Stone Age sites are generally found on WZ 310. Previous (uncalibrated)r adiocarbon dates top of alluvialf ans extending down from the southern on the site have ranged from 14,850 ? 160 B.P. to slopes of the Jebel el'Misq,a lthough they sometimes 11,170 ? 100 B.P. for the Kebaran deposits (four occur eroding out of the lacustrine marls formed by dates), 7800 ? 70 B.P. to 5740 ? 110 B.P. for the PleistoceneL ake Hasa, which appearst o have reached Neolithico ccupation( four dates), and 1680 ? 60 B.P. a maximum elevation of ca. 815 masl, probably at (calibrateda ge, A.D. 254-299 or A.D. 322-421) for some point early in its formation. The lake is thought a camping episode on the site associatedw ith fourth- to have been in existence between ca. 70,000 and century pottery. 12,000 B.P. and was essentiallyc ontemporaneousw ith Work in areas G34, G35, H34, and H35 revealed the Lisan Lake. Like the Lisan Lake it was alkaline the remainder of a large Late Neolithic structure, 4 throughout much of its existence and evidently be- m wide and 8 m long, with its northeastern wall came more alkaline over time. Its end was different missing.I ts interiorf loor had a large, circular,p laster- than that of Lisan, however, since it was probably lined hearth, and a burialo f two individualsh ad been breached and drained by headward erosion of the placed and covered by stones in the south corner after developing Wadi Hasa at some point about 15,000- the room's abandonment, much like a similar burial 12,000 B.P. Its disappearancew as likely to have been found in the west corner in 1990. The neighboring more of an "event"t han a "process,"a nd drainage areasG 35 and H35 also contained a later parallelw all, could have occurred fairly rapidly, possibly aided by almost 1.5 m thick; pits had been dug into both it and faulting (a number of shear faults can be observed in the southeasternw allo f the large structurea fter aban- the eastern end of the wadi in what would have been donment of the room. In one case, a carefully slab- the northeastern corner of the lake). Although an- lined pit contained a child burial. cient stone artifactss ometimes occur on alluvial fans Two structures, one in areas E33, F33, and D31, at elevations below 815 m, sites with some degree of the other in areas D32 and E32, date near the very compositionali ntegrity appear to be found only at or end of the Late Neolithic in the fifth millennium B.C. abovet hat elevation. Moreover, those tested in 1984 The earlier eastern room during its last use had a 1993] ARCHAEOLOGY IN JORDAN 461 0- 0 J34 J33 I 133 134 Od~~~~~r-L?)' 0 - I i ? I Fig. 3. Tabaqata l-Buma,W adiZ iqlab.L ate Neolithic architecture,e xcavateda reas, 1992. cobble floor associatedw ith an extremely large stone deposits in other excavation areas includes a hard mortar. Like the earlier room to the northeast, it black-burnishedw are with occasional combed deco- appears to have measured some 4 x 7 m, possibly ration (fig. 4). It seems to be identical to much of the with a similar placement of the hearth. An earlier ceramicr epertoire of site WZ 310, some 600 m away, plaster floor or feature within this room seems to be and has parallelsi n "WadiR abah"s ites. associatedw ith an earlier demolished structurei n this A stone feature in area F34 proved to be another area. The smaller later structureh ad an unusual fea- large slab-lineda nd slab-coveredc ist grave, very sim- ture in one corner that incorporated a large ceramic ilar to the one excavated in 1987 (Banning, AJA 95 plaque and a cracked basalt quern. The pottery as- [1991] 257-58). Inside were the skeletal remains of a sociated with these structures and some of the later 15-year-olda nd a six-month-oldc hild wearing a den- 462 BERTD E VRIESA ND PIERREB IKAI [AJA 97 with two rooms, built with smaller chert blocks and wadi cobbles. Their walls, which often incorporate earlier walls into parts of their foundations, them- selves show considerable alteration, rebuilding, and reuse in later times along the northeast edge of the site. The last major Neolithic phase of occupation on the site has three well-built rectangular rooms, typi- cally with cobbled floors, associated with dark-bur- nished pottery and incised, combed, or impressed decoration. This pottery also appears at nearby site WZ 310. Beidha. Brian F. Byrd, San Diego, California, re- ports: The second volume of Excavationsa t Beidha: The Neolithic Village of Beidha: Architecture,O ccupation History and Spatial Organization,b y Brian Byrd, is now complete and in press. It is part of the Beidha PublicationP roject, a cooperative venture by Diana Kirkbride( director of the excavations), Peder Mor- tensen (director of the ForhistoriskM useum, Moes- gaard, Denmark),a nd Brian Byrd, with four volumes projected. The first volume, also by Byrd, is entitled The Natufian Encampmenat t Beidha:L ate Pleistocene Adaptationin theS outhernL evant( Aarhus 1989). This project is only possible due to the extensive and sub- stantial nature of Kirkbride'se ight seasons of field research. Her excavations,o ver 2,200 m2 in area and up to 3 m in depth, uncovered over 65 buildings within a long sequence of Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) habitationd ating to the seventh millennium B.C. Beidha 2 examines the stratigraphic history, the character and distinctiveness of the built environ- Fig.4 . Tabaqaat l-BumaW, adiZ iqlabL. ateN eolithicb ur- ment, and the nature of communityo rganizationd ur- nisheda ndi mpressedp ot. (J. Pfaff) ing the Early Neolithic. The Neolithic settlement appears to have been continuously occupied, during talium-shell necklace when interred. The grave ap- which time an indigenous architecturalp rogression pears to belong to the earliest Neolithic phase took place from clusterso f oval post-houses, through identified so far at the site but awaits radiocarbon individualo val and subrectangularb uildings, and ul- determinationf or an absolute date. Unfortunatelyn o timately to full rectangular buildings complete with pottery occurred as grave goods. two stories.T he villageh istoryi s modeled stratigraph- It now appears that we have at least three major icallyb y distinguishingt hree major phases: A, B, and phases of the Late Neolithic at the site, each with C (with two spatially restricted subphases during distinctivea rchitecture,p ottery, and lithics. The low- phases A and C). The tell is considered to have built est phase, with single-leaf walls built of massive up steadily, albeit unevenly, and in certain instances squared limestone blocks, remains exposed only in a there may have been overlap in the habitation span few areas, and we have little materialt o associatew ith of individual buildings between subphases and pos- the architecture, which appears to be fragments of sibly phases (particularlyb etween phases B and C). three or four structures. A single small sherd with There is no evidence to suggest that the village was typical "Yarmoukian"in cised decoration, if it is not ever abandoned for any period of time and then intrusive, may belong to this phase. The next phase, reoccupied. with predominantly friable salmon-coloredc eramics The settlement grew and spread during each sub- and expedient lithics, has at least two structures,o ne phase and phase by the founding of new structures 1993] ARCHAEOLOGIYN JORDAN 463 and the decay and desertion of old ones. Both mul- focused on expanding areas excavated in 1989 and tiple and individual construction events were preva- 1990. Funded by the National Science Foundation, lent, and considerablev ariabilityi n habitationp attern the Departmento f Anthropologya t HarvardU niver- exists between phases. Trends in individual building sity, the Peabody Museum, the Social Sciences and abandonment also vary greatly between phases. HumanitiesR esearchC ouncil of Canada,A SOR, and Throughout the settlement's history its organization the Sigma Xi Foundation, the ongoing excavationsa t appears to have been relativelyu nplanned, with only 'Iraq ed-Dubb (Cave of the Bear) have provided evi- a series of limiting rules affecting the random spread dence for the year-round Early Neolithic occupation and distributiono f dwellings. No formal or planned of this cave and the use of forested upland areas village community emerges, but changes are discern- above the Jordan Valley. ible in the elaborationa nd refinement of privatea nd With the 1991 field season, excavations have now public space. The distributiono f structuresb ecomes led to the identificationo f three oval stone structures, more compacted and public space more spatiallyr e- multiple pit features, four fire hearths, and several stricted either to the margins of the settlement or to subfloor burials, all situated within cultural deposits an elongated east-west central area. Individuald well- of less than 1.5 m in depth and on top of bedrock. ings become less open in plan and more restrictedi n These stone structures,s ome 4 m or greater in size, access. Furthermore,t he entrances to adjacentb uild- were constructed with upright stone walls and had ings become more spatiallyd iscrete over time. plasteredm ud floors. In the two fully excavateds truc- I have hypothesized that small, individual house- tures, evidence was recovered for multiple floor-plas- holds (perhaps best considered nuclear families)c on- tering events (structure 1), an internal fire hearth stituted the primary residential and economic unit (structure 1), large grinding and anvil stones set into throughout the occupation of Beidha. This inference the floor with a stone collar foundation (structure2 ), is based on rigorous comparativea nalysiso f patterns and a central 10-15 cm circularm ud platform (struc- in interior floor area, the distribution and range of ture 2). Also uncovered were several adult and ado- features, and the nature of in situ floor artifacta ssem- lescent burialsl ocated in extramurala reas. Typical of blages. In addition, significantly larger corporate the EarlyN eolithic period, these burialsl acked grave structures,w ith a distincts et of attributes,c oexist with goods and the deceased had had their craniar emoved the domestic units throughout most of the settle- (fig. 5). ment's history (except possibly during the earliest Despite the restricteds ize of the excavationsa t 'Iraq subphase). Over time their size increases along with ed-Dubb (less than 36 m2), large quantitieso f faunal, the domestic units, as does their structurale labora- archaeobotanicala, nd lithic materialsw ere recovered. tion. These non-domestic units are inferred to have Preservationo f archaeozoologicala nd palaeobotani- been the venue of supra-householdd ecision-making cal materialsw as excellent and, with the completion and related ceremonial activities. Over time there of laboratorya nalysis,t hese will provide us with one appearst o have been an increasedd istinctionb etween of the most comprehensive overviews of subsistence privatea nd public space, along with greater evidence and economicp racticesf or the EarlyN eolithic period. of production activitiesw ithin individualh ouseholds. Among the other materials recovered were over This is particularlyt rue with respect to the probable 50,000 pieces of chipped stone, some 30 items of location of household storage and production areas. ground stone, some 30 pieces of ground and polished The Neolithic settlemento f Beidha is significantf or bone, over 25 complete or partial seashells, and sev- its sequence of changes in architecturals tyle and tech- eral clay objects.C onventionala nd acceleratorr adio- nique and the organization and layout of the com- carbon dates from the site indicate that the majority munity. These developments provide considerable of the culturald eposits, and all of the structures,d ate insights into how one small community attempted to to the EarlyN eolithic period (10,500-9300 B.P.), and embracet he sociala nd economic changes taking place that deposits below this level date to the terminal with the establishmento f sedentary food-producing stages of the Late Natufian period (12,800-10,500 communitiest hroughout southwest Asia. B.P.). In light of the paucityo f known Early Neolithic 'Iraq ed-Dubb. Ian Kuijt, Harvard University,r e- sites in the Levant, let alone small, single-component ports: cave sites located in the highlands, this site provides As part of the wider surveya nd excavationp rogram an important,i f not unique, opportunity to focus on centered on the Wadi el-Yabisu nder the direction of several largely unresolved aspects of Early Neolithic G. Palumboa ndJ. Mabry,t he 1991 excavationsa t the palaeoeconomy,s ettlement systems, and subsistence Early Neolithic (PPNA) cave of 'Iraq ed-Dubb were practicesi n the Levant. 464 BERT DE VRIES AND PIERRE BIKAI [AJA 97 Fig. 5. 'Iraq ed-Dubb. Plan of burial II and stone wall of structure II. Charcoalt o the north yielded radiocarbond ate of 10,785?285 B.P. (GX-17399). Wadi el-Yabis. Gaetano Palumbo, Universita di The second sounding was conducted at the Neo- Roma, and Jonathan Mabry, University of Arizona, lithic village site of er-Rahib,n ear 'Irjan. This village report: is dated by the materials found to the late PPNB A fourth season of fieldwork was conducted be- period, approximately 8500-8000 B.P. The corner tween June and July 1992 in the area of Wadi el- and side wall of a house with a thick plastered floor Yabis, north of Ajlun, by a team of archaeologists led were found during the excavations.I n a possible" gar- by Gaetano Palumbo and Jonathan Mabry. This work bage dump"f ound outside of the house, many animal was financed by grants from the Italian Ministry of bones and chipped flint tools were recovered. Among Foreign Affairs and the Italian National Research the retouched stone tools, Byblos, Jericho, and Hel- Council (CNR). wan projectile point types were represented. Four Four projects were conducted during this year's pieces of obsidian were also found. fieldwork. Soundings were conducted at Tell el- The third project was the intensive survey of three Meqbereh in the Jordan Valley, where excavations areas in the Wadi el-Yabis basin, which led to the revealed almost 5 m of archaeological layers charac- discoveryo f 61 new archaeologicals ites. Most of them terized by domestic structures with well-preserved date to the Middle Palaeolithicp eriod (50,000-30,000 walls, floors, and hearths, dated between the 12th and B.P.), while other sites found date to the Roman, ninth centuries B.C. (Iron Age I to Iron Age II). The Byzantine, Islamic, or Ottoman periods. A Roman site was fortified, as evidenced by a wide stone wall fort was located on a hill near the village of Ba'un. It exposed on the north side of the tell. The long se- probablyc ontrolled the road from Pella to Gerasa.A quence of Iron Age occupation was quite unexpected, large Early Bronze Age cemetery was found on the considering that the nearby large site of Tell Abu el- hills above the Ghor. A survey was also conducted to Kharaz does not show a similar occupational history. identify the 19th-centuryw ater mills between the vil- 1993] ARCHAEOLOGIYN JORDAN 465 AN 451924E N TELLE SH-SHUNAN ORTH LEGEH AREA A Edsf Tch - - 1992 . 2 Fig.6 . Telle sh-ShunaN orth.A reasA andF . lages of Rasun and Judeitta, along 8 km of the Wadi at least 2.3 m wide (wall 139), was uncovered to the el-Yabiss tream. east of and parallelt o the three large stone walls (23, The fourth project has been the architecturala nd 24, and 36) exposed in 1991. The resulting symmet- ethnographics urvey of the village of Kurkuma,n ear rical arrangement( fig. 6) suggests that the walls form the Jordan Valley; a small traditional village mostly part of a large building, measuringa t least 18 m east- abandoned today, but still used by the villagerso f the west. The construction of this edifice cannot yet be nearbyv illageo f Hashemiyai n the winterc rop season. securely dated. The deep fills between the walls have The village is characterizedb y different types of tra- produced no pottery postdatingt he EB I period. Two ditionalr ural houses, from the common arched house plaster floors, however, were found running up to a to the more rare pillared house, with pillars reused vertical plaster face abutting a rubble and mud su- from the Roman-Byzantine ruins still preserved un- perstructureo n wall 139. These overlay the various der part of the modern village. As part of the project fillsb etween the walls,a nd were 1.1-1.2 m above their the village was mapped, and some houses were se- base. Both floors are cut by at least one Late Helle- lected for detailed plans and elevations.E thnographic nistic grave. A small, isolated fragment of one of the research included interviews with families still using plasterf loors (most likely the upper one) runs up the the village,a nd researchi nto the agriculturalp ractices lip of a large, dressed limestone block sitting on wall of the area. 36 (slab 39), which seals another Hellenistic grave. Therefore, the surface itself must be of Hellenistic BRONZE AGE, IRON AGE date. The slabs and the plaster floor may belong to Tell esh-Shuna. Graham Philip, Institute of Ar- the same phase of use. Given their symmetricala r- chaeology, London, and Douglas Baird, Edinburgh rangement on what is now seen to be the central pair University,r eport: of walls, the three slabs may well have done double The present report covers the second season of duty as roof supports and grave markers. excavationa t Tell esh-Shuna in March-May 1992. A Areas E (8 x 5 m) and F (4 x 3 m) were opened in third season is planned for February-May1 993. The an attempt to follow these walls to the north and overalla im of the projecti s to reach an understanding south, respectively. A possible robber trench was of the development of major centers from the fifth to noted on the correct alignment for a northerly con- the third millennium B.C. (calibrated). tinuation of wall 36. The upper plaster floor contin- Upper Tell. Area A was extended 5 m to the east ued right into the north section of area E, along the this season (now 18 x 5 m). A fourth large stone wall, east side of this robber trench, a total length of 11 m.