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Assessing the Shift from Early to Middle Epipalaeolithic at Kharaneh IV

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Assessing the Shift from Early to Middle Epipalaeolithic at Kharaneh IV UC Berkeley UC Berkeley Previously Published Works Title Technological Change and Economy in the Epipalaeolithic: Assessing the Shift from Early to Middle Epipalaeolithic at Kharaneh IV Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/2xh7719z Journal Journal of Field Archaeology, 43(6) ISSN 0093-4690 Authors Macdonald, DA Allentuck, A Maher, LA Publication Date 2018-08-18 DOI 10.1080/00934690.2018.1504542 Peer reviewed eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California Journal of Field Archaeology ISSN: 0093-4690 (Print) 2042-4582 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/yjfa20 Technological Change and Economy in the Epipalaeolithic: Assessing the Shift from Early to Middle Epipalaeolithic at Kharaneh IV Danielle A. Macdonald, Adam Allentuck & Lisa A. Maher To cite this article: Danielle A. Macdonald, Adam Allentuck & Lisa A. Maher (2018): Technological Change and Economy in the Epipalaeolithic: Assessing the Shift from Early to Middle Epipalaeolithic at Kharaneh IV, Journal of Field Archaeology, DOI: 10.1080/00934690.2018.1504542 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/00934690.2018.1504542 Published online: 11 Sep 2018. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 36 View Crossmark data Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=yjfa20 JOURNAL OF FIELD ARCHAEOLOGY https://doi.org/10.1080/00934690.2018.1504542 Technological Change and Economy in the Epipalaeolithic: Assessing the Shift from Early to Middle Epipalaeolithic at Kharaneh IV Danielle A. Macdonald a, Adam Allentuckb, and Lisa A. Maher c aThe University of Tulsa, Tulsa, OK; bThe University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada; cUniversity of California, Berkeley, CA ABSTRACT KEYWORDS Epipalaeolithic hunter-gatherer communities in the Southern Levant exhibit numerous complex Epipalaeolithic; lithic analysis; trends that suggest that the transition to the Neolithic was patchy and protracted. This paper faunal analysis; hunter- explores the changing nature of occupation at the Epipalaeolithic site Kharaneh IV, Jordan, through gatherer aggregation; an in-depth analysis of the lithic and faunal assemblages. Focusing on the analysis of a single deep cultural change sounding (unit AS42), we address how Kharaneh IV occupations link to the local landscape and environmental changes. As an aggregation site, Kharaneh IV represents an interesting locale to explore the changing nature of aggregation and social cohesion prior to the origins of agriculture, as well as changes in technology and subsistence between the Early and Middle Epipalaeolithic. We explore the tempo and nature of transition from one archaeological culture to the next through changes in technology and how this reflects the people making and using tools, to understand how foragers adapted to a changing landscape. Introduction pected but can now empirically demonstrate, the hunter- gatherers occupying the South Levantine landscape during Hunter-gatherer groups occupying the Southern Levant the Early and Middle Epipalaeolithic were not simple hun- during the Late Pleistocene sit at the debated threshold of ter-gatherers, but multifaceted peoples with nuanced and some of the most impactful changes in human history: the complex ways of life exhibiting early traces of behaviors origins of sedentism and the origins of agriculture, associated that compose the Neolithic package. with the Neolithic period (ca. 11,500 CAL B.P.). These Epipa- Through an in-depth analysis of the chipped stone lithic laeolithic hunter-gatherers (21,000–11,500 CAL B.P.) predate assemblage and associated fauna—the two most abundant the Neolithic by several thousands of years, yet exhibit com- categories of Epipalaeolithic material culture—this paper plex social, technological, and ideological behaviors that pre- explores the changing nature of occupation at the Early/ cede these seemingly revolutionary changes. The Late Middle Epipalaeolithic site Kharaneh IV, Jordan. We hypoth- Epipalaeolithic Natufian culture was long seen as a precursor esize that changing cultural trends at Kharaneh IV correlate to the Neolithic, demonstrating nascent cultural patterns to changes in the local environment. Focusing on the analysis common to later periods, such as burials with symbolic of a single deep sounding in excavation unit AS42, we address grave goods, stone structures, sedentism, and incipient dom- how Kharaneh IV occupations link to the local landscape and estication (Bar-Yosef 1998; Bar-Yosef and Belfer-Cohen 1991; environment through analysis of material culture and faunal Belfer-Cohen 1995; Byrd 2005; Davis and Valla 1978; Goring- changes over time. To date, this is the only excavated trench Morris and Belfer-Cohen 2011; Grosman et al. 2008; Lieber- at Kharaneh IV with clearly stratified Early and Middle Epi- man and Bar-Yosef 1994; Nadel et al. 2013; Valla and Bar- palaeolithic occupations. As an aggregation site, Kharaneh IV Yosef 2013). However, recent research has shown that these represents an interesting locale to explore the changing patterns existed earlier, tracing threads of these Neolithic nature of occupation prior to the origins of agriculture behaviors earlier than the Natufian, into the Early and Middle through changes in technology and animal use. Lithic techno- Epipalaeolithic (Dubreuil and Nadel 2015; Maher, Richter, logical changes highlight the shift from non-geometric to geo- Macdonald, et al. 2012; Maher, Richter, and Stock 2012; Ols- metric microliths and place these microliths in context with zewski and al-Nahar 2016; Sterelny and Watkins 2015; Wat- how culture is conceptualized and constituted during the Epi- kins 2010). These include early structures (Maher, Richter, palaeolithic (Dobres 2000). Through understanding the tran- Macdonald, et al. 2012; Nadel 2002; Nadel et al. 2004; sitions between different cultural industries at the site, we can Nadel and Werker 1999; Yeshurun et al. 2015), burials within explore the tempo and nature of transition from one archae- houses (Lisa Maher, Danielle Macdonald, Emma Pomoroy, ological culture to the next and how this relates to changes in and Jay T. Stock, personal communication 2018), increasingly the landscape where people interacted. social relationships with animals (Maher et al. 2011), use of personal ornamentation (Kuhn et al. 2001; Richter et al. 2011), increasing sedentism (Maher, Richter, Macdonald, The Epipalaeolithic et al. 2012), and symbolic artifacts (Gregg et al. 2011; Hovers 1990; Kaufman et al. 2018; Maher, Richter, Macdonald, et al. The Epipalaeolithic, in its original definition, is characterized 2012; Yaroshevich et al. 2016). Thus, as we have long sus- by hunter-gatherers using microlithic tools (Bar-Yosef 1970; CONTACT Danielle A. Macdonald [email protected] Department of Anthropology, 800 S. Tucker Drive, The University of Tulsa, Tulsa, Okla- homa, 74104, USA © Trustees of Boston University 2018 2 D. A. MACDONALD ET AL. Perrot 1966; Tixier 1963). Although it is now recognized that assemblages signify the interaction of numerous communities the Epipalaeolithic includes other diverse types of material who congregated at the site on a repeated and multi-seasonal culture, it is these microlithic tools that define boundaries basis, attracted to a local habitat rich in fauna and flora between archaeological groups; different forms of microliths (Maher et al. 2016). As well, the deep accumulation of cul- and frequencies of tool types delineate discrete archaeological tural material suggests that these interactions persisted over entities. Lengthy debates about what scale of variability time. Changes in the chaîne opératoire from the Early to should constitute a new Epipalaeolithic culture have resulted the Middle Epipalaeolithic illuminate different technological in two primary camps of typological organization: those who strategies employed by the inhabitants of Kharaneh IV over split the archaeological record into a wide diversity of differ- time, and when paired with evidence of a changing environ- ent entities based on a finer scale of variability (Bar-Yosef ment, they highlight shifts in communities at the site that 1970; Goring-Morris 1987; Goring-Morris and Belfer- reflect both local adaptations to fluctuations in the surround- Cohen 1998; Henry 1989, 1995); and those who lump arti- ing habitat and changes in social relationships between aggre- facts at the coarser scale, suggesting that there is inherent gating community members. variability within a single cultural practice (Goring-Morris et al. 2009; Maher et al. 2016; Maher and Macdonald 2013; Olszewski 2006, 2001, 2011). Through a lumper’s lens, Kharaneh IV Background Early Epipalaeolithic groups are characterized by the domi- Environment nance of non-geometric microliths in the lithic assemblage, Middle Epipalaeolithic groups by geometric microliths such The multi-component Early and Middle Epipalaeolithic site as trapeze-rectangles, and Late Epipaleolithic groups by Kharaneh IV is located in the Azraq Basin, eastern Jordan lunates. (FIGURE 1). Radiocarbon dates place occupation of the site The nature of the transition from Early to Middle to Late between 19,830–18,600 CAL B.P., suggesting that habitation Epipalaeolithic assemblages, documented at several multi- of the site was relatively brief (in archaeological terms), but component sites such as Kharaneh IV (Maher and Macdo- clearly intensive (Richter et al. 2013). The site is situated on nald 2013; Muheisen and Wada
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