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The dawn of the Bronze Age was a tumultuous time for galore quality societies, arsenic the societal bid of the preceding Copper Age fell apart. Yet small is known astir this pivotal play successful quality history, including wherefore precisely it happened oregon however radical handled it.
In a caller study, researchers instrumentality a person look astatine this transformative epoch done the lens of Murayghat, an past archaeological tract located adjacent the metropolis of Madaba successful what is present Jordan.
The Copper (or Chalcolithic) Age had seen sedentary farming communities proliferate astir the Levant successful the Middle East, on with cardinal advances similar copper mining and smelting. Around 5,500 years ago, however, galore of these communities look to person experienced immoderate benignant of upheaval, either shrinking oregon abandoning their settlements.
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Previous probe suggests the civilization whitethorn person collapsed owed to a premix of climate change and societal disruption. The Chalcolithic was reportedly humid, with trees increasing successful the present treeless Negev desert, and its culmination coincided with a determination displacement toward a drier climate.
Emerging successful this context, Murayghat stands retired from the area's earlier residential communities. It seems much similar a spot for ceremonial assemblies, says archaeologist and survey writer Susanne Kerner from the University of Copenhagen.
The cardinal knoll of Murayghat. (The Ritual Landscapes of Murayghat Project, Susanne Kerner)"Instead of the ample home settlements with smaller shrines established during the Chalcolithic, our excavations astatine Early Bronze Age Murayghat amusement clusters of dolmens, lasting stones, and ample megalithic structures that constituent to ritual gatherings and communal burials alternatively than surviving quarters," Kerner says.
Dolmens, besides known arsenic portal tombs, are megalithic burial chambers typically consisting of 2 ample vertical stones supporting a horizontal capstone. Kerner and her colleagues documented the remains of much than 95 dolmens astatine Murayghat dating to the Early Bronze Age, describing much than 70 of them successful detail.
One of the lasting stones astatine Murayghat, positioned wrong a walled enclosure, with a ample limestone mortar adjacent by (right). (The Ritual Landscapes of Murayghat project, Maximilian Holmström)Although nary of the dolmens look to incorporate immoderate remains, their resemblance to better-preserved dolmen fields successful the portion suggests a ceremonial purpose.
In summation to this precocious density of dolmens, the site's cardinal hilltop is location to chromatic enclosures and carved bedrock that suggest ceremonial alternatively than residential use, Kerner reports. There is besides small grounds of definite home amenities, specified arsenic hearths.
The architecture is simply a divers premix of styles, which would beryllium antithetic for a residential tract of this era. Yet it could beryllium explained by antithetic groups of radical traveling to Murayghat and bringing their ain traditions with them, Kerner points out.
The layout of the tract and prominence of the dolmens enactment this interpretation, arsenic bash galore of the artifacts recovered there. Pottery discovered astatine the tract includes ample communal bowls, for example, on with different items associated with rituals and feasting.
While a drying clime whitethorn person reshuffled the sociopolitical scenery of the precocious Chalcolithic Levant, it did not unit radical retired of the country entirely. Some places evidently did endure steep declines oregon adjacent depopulation, but radical besides recovered ways to persevere.
"People had to find mechanisms to woody with a concern successful which the accepted values and patterns of behaviour nary longer worked," Kerner writes. "Thus, caller ways to signifier beingness (and death) had to beryllium found, and recovered wrong a nine with anemic hierarchical structures, inactive dealing with a large disruption to mundane patterns of life."
Details astir those adaptations stay elusive today, and aft each these thousands of years, we whitethorn ne'er genuinely recognize what was going connected astatine Murayghat successful the Early Bronze Age.
It's worthy trying to larn what we can, however, to illuminate however past radical dealt with specified melodramatic turmoil, particularly fixed the comparative abundance of clues preserved astatine Murayghat.
"Murayghat gives us, we believe, fascinating caller insights into however aboriginal societies coped with disruption by gathering monuments, redefining societal roles, and creating caller forms of community," Kerner says.
The survey was published successful Levant: The Journal of the Council for British Research successful the Levant.
