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The Natufian Culture and the Origin of the Neolithic in the Levant

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The Natufian Culture and the Origin of the Neolithic in the Levant The Natufian Culture and the Origin of the Neolithic in the Levant The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Bar-Yosef, O., and F. Valla. 1990. “The Natufian Culture and the Origin of the Neolithic in the Levant.” Current Anthropology 31 (4) (January): 433. Published Version doi:10.1086/203867 Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:12210882 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA Volume 3i, Number 4, August-October I990 1 433 nists, and microwearanalysts. The followingis a sum- The NatufianCulture and mary of the main topics discussed. The papers of the the Originof the Neolithic conferencewill soon be published. Paleoenvironments.After recent coring in the Hula in the Levant' Valley, S. Bottemaand U. Baruchwere able to suggesta general climatic sequence for the Levant from about I5,000 to 8,ooo B.P. derivedfrom their densely sampled 0. BAR-YOSEF AND F. VALLA pollen cores. While previouswork in the Ghab marshes Departmentof Anthropology, Harvard University, of the northernOrontes Valley was taken into account, Cambridge,Mass. 02I38, U.S.A.!Centredes it seems thatthe conflictin chronologicalinterpretation RecherchesFrangais de Jerusalem,CNRS, P.O. Box between the Hula Valley and the Ghab sequence may 547, Jerusalem9I004, Israel. 5 III 90 result fromthe paucity of radiocarbondates fromthe Ghab. The recent palynological profilefrom the Hula The Natufianculture occupies a special place in the evo- Basin, as yet dated by only two readings,correlates well lution ofhuman societies in the Near East, namely,that with the earlier palynological graph from another of the threshold to the emergence of farmingcom- boreholein the Hula Valley done by H. Tsukada, which munities.The idea that the Natufianswere the earliest is dated by i 6 radiocarbonsamples (Bottema and van farmersis as old as the originaldiscovery of theircul- Zeist I98I, Cowgilli969). Bottemaviews the Ghab se- turalremains by Garrod(I932). What seemed at the time quence as well foundedand considersthe colder Pleni- an intuitivesuggestion is now consideredperhaps the glacial period to have been longer in the northernLe- right interpretation (Moore i982, Unger-Hamilton vant. Warmingled to the expansion of forestvegetation i989). The shiftfrom hunting-and-gathering with some firstin the southernLevant, where a peak was reached horticultureto a true farmingeconomy seems a logical around iI,500 B.P. The later slightdecrease in arboreal continuum(Henry i989). The factthat most of the hard pollen in the Hula Basin possiblyrepresents the Younger evidence fromthe Natufian sites comes fromthe Early Dryas, and a slight increase marks the onset of wetter or even Middle Natufian (Valla i984), which predates Holoceneconditions probably around I0,000 B.P. The the EarlyNeolithic by at least 8oo radiocarbonyears, is pollen evidence indicates that the Early Holocene was rarelytaken into account (Bar-Yosefand Belfer-Cohen wetter than the Mid- and Late Holocene. Tchernov's i989). The discoveryof earlyfarming sites in the Jordan (Noy, Schuldenrein,and Tchernov i980) faunal analysis Valley and the adjacent hilly areas on both the east and of large samples fromNetiv Hagdud and Gilgal, Early the west side ofthe RiftValley has made it clear thatthe Neolithic (Pre-PotteryNeolithic A) sites i 3 km northof origins of wheat and barley agriculturewere in the Jericho in the Lower Jordan Valley, supports this southernLevant (van Zeist I988, Bar-Yosefi989). Thus climatic interpretation.He concludes that the only way the need to understandcultural processes in and around to account for the presence there of so many diverse the Natufian homeland (Stordeur i98i) has assumed freshwateravian and rodent species is in terms of the special importance. formerexistence of bodies of freshwater nearby.Paly- Explainingnot only how but also why the Natufian nological evidence from Netiv Hagdud studied by cultureemerged from a worldof hunter-gatherers appar- Leroi-Gourhanand Darmon (i987) reflectsthe presence entlynot much differentin material culturefrom their of a rich aquatic flora and corroboratesthe geomor- contemporarieshas become the concernof a numberof phologicalevidence produced by Schuldenreinand Gold- scholars. Henry (i989) has produced perhaps the most berg(i98i). While thereis disagreementabout the value substantialdiscussion, which takes population dynam- of pollen data derivedfrom archaeological sites, it is of ics into account. As more and more new data have been interestthat Leroi-Gourhanand Darmon have reached retrievedfrom Natufian sites, pollen cores, and faunal conclusions similar to those based on the pollen cores collections,the need fordirect international discussion fromthe Hula Valley. has become obvious, especially since many scholars In sum, the various lines of evidence demonstrate workingin various countriesof the Near East have no cold, wet conditions during the Geometric Kebaran/ such communicationbecause of the political situation. Mushabianperiod (I4,000-I2,800/i2,500 B.P.) preceding The participantsin the conferenceon the Natufianheld the Natufian,a dryspell duringthe veryEarly Natufian, at the Centre des Recherches Archeologiques,Sophia a steady increase in arboreal pollen during the Early Antipolis, Valbonne, June 6-8, I989, were archaeolo- Natufian, and an ensuing drier period in the Late gists, zooarchaeologists,palynologists and palaeobota- Natufian (YoungerDryas). An increase in humidityis documentedfor the EarlyHolocene both fromMureybet i. ? I990 by The Wenner-GrenFoundation for Anthropological in the middle Euphrates Valley in northernSyria and Research. All rights reserved ooII-3204/90/3Io4-0005$I.OO. We fromthe Lower JordanValley. thankthe Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research The archaeologyof Natufian sites. The presentationof (New York),the AmericanSchool forPrehistoric Research (Pea- archaeologicalreports was an inevitablemixture of final bodyMuseum, Harvard University), the CNRS, andthe Ministry of ForeignAffairs (Paris) for making possible the conferencereported site reportsfrom the excavationscarried out in the I96os here.We also thankMme. Pallierand L. Meignen,who helpedin and I970S and preliminaryreports on new excavations organizingit. or sites discoveredin recentsurveys. This content downloaded from 128.103.149.52 on Tue, 20 May 2014 04:38:33 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 434 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY J.Perrot described and discussed the types of burials ers joined the successful Early Neolithic (Pre-Pottery exhumed in the excavations of Ain Mallaha (Eynan), Neolithic A) farmingcommunities in the JordanValley now fullypublished (Perrotand Ladiray i988). Skeletal or southernJordan, it seems more probablethat the on- remainswere oftenfound in flexedand semiflexedposi- set of the wet Early Holocene conditions,which must tion,rarely with bodydecorations made ofseries of Den- have improvedthe success of early cultivators,did not talium shells. Accordingto Solivers-Massei(i988), the entirelycoincide with the disappearanceof the Harifian, populationof Ain Mallaha demonstratesmarked sexual as has been indicated recentlyby C'4 dates obtained dimorphism,often greater stature than among other fromPre-Pottery Neolithic A sites in the JordanValley Natufiangroups, and greatermorphological robusticity (Bar-Yosefi989). (which Ferembach [I976] has attributedto dietarydif- The othermarginal zone forthe Natufiandistribution ferences). was the EuphratesValley. Togetherwith A. Moore, who B. Byrd described the scanty Natufian remains ex- described the stratigraphicand architecturalremains cavated under the Pre-PotteryNeolithic B village of fromAbu Hureyra,D. Olszewski presentedsome ideas Beidha,dated to i2,500 B.P. (Byrdi989). He stressedthat, concerningthe taxonomyof the lithic industryderived contraryto earlierreports, there is no evidence forthe fromthe deposits. The comparisonwith Tell Mureybit, use ofmud bricksby the Natufianoccupants. In an addi- which lies only 2o km away on the oppositebank of the tional communicationhe describedthe potentialof an- river,is inevitable.Cauvin (i982) and Calley (i986) sug- othersite recentlydiscovered in a tributaryof Wadi Hasa gestthat there is no good reason not to include the lithic (southernJordan), where numerousmortars were found assemblage from Mureybet IA in the Natufian. This in what seems to be a rich EarlyNatufian occupation. does not necessarilymean that the same can be said for A paucityof Natufianoccurrences was reportedby A. Abu Hureyra(Olszewski i986); it is not impossiblethat Garrardfor the Azraq Basin (Garrardet al. i987) and by it was occupied by a differentgroup with the same sub- A. Bettsfor the Black Desert in Jordan.The only site in sistence strategy as the preceding Epi-Palaeolithic the Azraq Basin at which a few secondaryburials were hunter-gatherersof the region. The stratigraphicse- uncovered was destroyedby subsequent development quence at Mureybit,which leads to the EarlyNeolithic activities.Ephemeral Natufian occupations left only im- and resembles Khiamian and Sultanian sites in the poverishedlithic assemblages in the Black Desert,where southernLevant, indicates that there are real differences water sources are only seasonal (Betts i982). between the cultural
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