Settlement Intensification in Late Prehistoric Southeastern Arabia Peter Magee Bryn Mawr College, [email protected]

Bryn Mawr College Scholarship, Research, and Creative Work at Bryn Mawr College Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology Faculty Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology Research and Scholarship 2007 Beyond the Desert and the Sown: Settlement Intensification in Late Prehistoric Southeastern Arabia Peter Magee Bryn Mawr College, [email protected] Let us know how access to this document benefits ouy . Follow this and additional works at: http://repository.brynmawr.edu/arch_pubs Part of the Classical Archaeology and Art History Commons, and the Other History of Art, Architecture, and Archaeology Commons Custom Citation Magee, Peter. 2007. Beyond the Desert and the Sown: Settlement Intensification in Late Prehistoric Southeastern Arabia. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 347:83-105. This paper is posted at Scholarship, Research, and Creative Work at Bryn Mawr College. http://repository.brynmawr.edu/arch_pubs/146 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Beyond the Desert and the Sown: Settlement Intensification in Late Prehistoric Southeastern Arabia Peter Magee Department of Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology Bryn Mawr College Bryn Mawr, PA 19010 [email protected] Arabia lies outside the focus of most archaeologists working in western Asia and is considered to have been a periphery in the past and therefore peripheral to contem porary research interests. The reasons for this include generalized assumptions about a human-environmental dynamics and belief in the necessity of foreign intervention two as a spur for innovation and change in arid environments. In this paper, these a assumptions are examined, and case study from southeastern Arabia is presented which details evidence for indigenous adaptation and a concomitant emergence of B.c. political and economic complexity in the early first millennium a with few to an INTRODUCTION: THE BEDU, trasted desert, obvious resources, inwhich there is the THE HADHAR, AND ARABIA IN NEAR agricultural landscape potential for economic because of cereal EASTERN ARCHAEOLOGY growth production. In this interpretation, conflict results because one landscape is less materially advantaged than the In her landmark conspectus on the archaeology other. As the desert is perceived as environmentally of theHoly Land, Dame Kathleen Kenyon wrote: static, these patterns of behavior are considered "The Fertile Crescent encloses the plateau of the immutable. Recent archaeological research in the Arabian desert, which from the dawn of history has Near East has done much to overturn some of these served as a vast reservoir of nomadic raiders upon perceptions (e.g., Banning 1986), but the belief that the riches of the surrounding Crescent" (Kenyon inhabitants of desert environments remain relatively 1979: 11). Kenyon's view embodies many percep unchanging in their adaptational behavior still per tions of ancient Arabia. These include the belief that meates much research. Arabia is essentially a homogenous, desert environ Related to these assumptions is a belief that any ment and as such provokes a defined set of behav change in human behavior in desert environments ioral responses, normally aggressive nomadism. This must be allochthonous in origin, more often than not view embodies a master narrative based upon the coming from an imperial or economic center. This Western reading of theArabic paradigm of theBedu view is crystallized by one side of the debate on the and the Hadhar, or the Desert and the Sown. As origin of oasis polities in theHijaz of northwestern formulated by Ibn Khaldun in the 14th century, this Arabia. Archaeological research at Tayma, al-Ula, was a complex notion that sought to characterize the and Qurayya led Parr (1993) and others (Parr,Hard symbiotic relationship between urban and non-urban ing, and Dayton 1968-1969) to argue thatduring the life. It operated on many levels: environmental, eco Late Bronze and Iron Ages there were two discrete nomic, and spiritual. In the hands of Western ex periods of flourishing oasis urbanism. Parr (1993) plorers like Bell (1907) or Stark (1940), it lostmost argued that theLate Bronze Age phenomenon was a of its heuristic complexity and was quickly reduced direct result of Egyptian imperialism during the 19th to a form of environmental determinism that con and 20th Dynasties. Specifically, he argued that the 83 84 PETER MAGEE BASOR 347 Egyptians created Hijazi towns and settled nomadic lighted themany factors thatmay have contributed people in order to control the caravan trade from to this process, but in essence the ability to exploit southern Arabia. Parr argued thatwhen the power a river using irrigation and utilize the resultant sur of theEgyptian 20th Dynasty declined, urban settle pluses lies at the economic core of Mesopotamia ments were abandoned and the local population re and the Egyptian civilization. Two factors differenti turned to their "natural" nomadic lifestyle.With the ate southeastern Arabia, defined here as the United renewed interest in theHijaz under theNeo-BabyIo Arab Emirates (UAE) and Sultanate of Oman, from nian and Achaemenid kings, particularly Nabonidus, these regions (fig. 1). The lack of a permanent or even Hijazi towns once again emerged, according to semi-permanent river is the most obvious dif Parr. Underlying this argument is an absolute belief ference. Although wadis in the al-Hajjar Mountains in the veracity of canonical, in this case Assyrian, may experience short periods of rapid flow during representations of so-called peripheries. To quote precipitation, there are few above-ground sources of Parr, "although the inhabitants of the north Arabian water suitable for intensive cereal cultivation. Lenses desert during the 8th and 7th centuries were undoubt of freshwater can appear on the coast because of a edly powerful and well-organized peoples, engaged Ghyben-Herzberg interface, but these are episodic in the aromatic trade and acquiring considerable and cannot sustain intensive cereal cultivation. Av wealth from it, it is entirely as nomadic pastoralists erage annual rainfall is around 90 mm (J.H. Stevens that they are characterized in the Assyrian records 1975: 161), thus clearly falling outside the optimal and reliefs" (Parr 1993: 54). Despite Bawden's (1992; climatic conditions of the Fertile Crescent, and a Bawden and Edens 1988) presentation of new data very high degree of interannum variation means that that largely overturns thismodel, Parr's interpreta for several years theremay be little or no rainfall and tion has persisted as a seeming opinio communis. It then downpours of over 100 mm in several weeks in is simply accepted as fact in a recent volume on pre winter. For example, rainfall records from the city of Islamic Arabia (Hoyland 2001: 90-92). The possi Sharjah on thewestern coast of theUAE indicate an bility, raised by Bawden, that the inhabitants of this average per annum rainfall of 164 mm for the four part of Arabia may have undergone transformation year period from 1954 to 1958, which dropped to in their lifeways as a result of indigenous adaptation 51 mm per annum for the following four years (thus or environmental exploitation (e.g., mining) is ne creating an average of 107 mm, close to the long term glected in favor of a model emphasizing the primacy annual precipitation average).1 of foreign intervention for which there is typically Despite the restrictive-rainfallpattern, thephysical abundant textual and historical evidence. environment of southeastern Arabia contains abun resources can var These sets of biases have done much tomarginal dant, albeit dispersed, that support ize the study of ancient Arabia, since it is assumed ied subsistence strategies. Running through the spine that change in ancient lifeways is either absent or can of the entire peninsula is the al-Hajjar mountain be inferred from themachinations of ancient politi range. These mountains contain a wealth of mineral area cal and economic centers. New data from the Ara resources?in particular copper, for which this bian southeast indicates that this is not the case and was famous in antiquity. Although one might think thatprocesses of adaptation and social and economic that agricultural potential would be restricted in the change were indigenously developed as a unique re mountains, the many intermontane wadis are an im sponse to the distinctive challenges presented by an portant resource niche. Their banks can be terraced arid environment. In this paper, this new evidence to produce flat agricultural fieldworks and trap rain is presented, with the aim of overturning some of fall and soils. Furthermore, the base of the wadis the assumptions that still contour archaeological re provides easy access to thewater table, which is rap search on the ancient Near East. idly recharged through gravel deposits during peri ods of rainfall and from the occasional spring. The SOUTHEASTERN ARABIA Batinah coast lies on the east side of thesemountains and extends to theArabian Sea. This is a thin agri In ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, the dynamic cultural plain inwhich there is relatively easy access between a riverine environment and a restricted rainfall the basis for the 1 regime provided emergence Based on data provided by the Sharjah Directorate of Antiq of state-level complexity. Algaze (2001) has high uities (Sharjah, UAE). 2007 LATE PREHISTORIC SOUTHEASTERN ARABIA 85 THE GULF Shimal> SEA 4 ed Dur OF lell Abraq OMAN Hamriya 100km Bithna Muweilah al Qusais alba Jebel Buh?is/al-Thu jsn Awhala aclialQawr ^-iatinah qst&t umeilat Bida Bir k?o^ar desert belt Over 300m 150-300m 0-150m Fig. 1. The physical environment of southeastern Arabia and major Iron Age II settlements. to thewater table and to a varied coastal environment troughs may provide access to the water table to that is not only useful for obtaining marine food, grow plants, such as the date palm, that are relatively but also supports pockets of mangrove inwhich use resistant to sandy and saline conditions. Furthermore, ful woods, edible shellfish (particularly Terebralia the desert belt contains many plants on which camels palustris), and edible birds such as the Socotra cor can graze.

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