Quaternary of the Levant

Quaternary of the Levant

Author: Yehouda Enzel

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2017-04-27

Total Pages: 789

ISBN-13: 1316841847

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Quaternary of the Levant presents up-to-date research achievements from a region that displays unique interactions between the climate, the environment and human evolution. Focusing on southeast Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Israel, it brings together over eighty contributions from leading researchers to review 2.5 million years of environmental change and human cultural evolution. Information from prehistoric sites and palaeoanthropological studies contributing to our understanding of 'out of Africa' migrations, Neanderthals, cultures of modern humans, and the origins of agriculture are assessed within the context of glacial-interglacial cycles, marine isotope cycles, plate tectonics, geochronology, geomorphology, palaeoecology and genetics. Complemented by overview summaries that draw together the findings of each chapter, the resulting coverage is wide-ranging and cohesive. The cross-disciplinary nature of the volume makes it an invaluable resource for academics and advanced students of Quaternary science and human prehistory, as well as being an important reference for archaeologists working in the region.


The Social Archaeology of the Levant

The Social Archaeology of the Levant

Author: Assaf Yasur-Landau

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2018-12-20

Total Pages: 941

ISBN-13: 1108668240

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The volume offers a comprehensive introduction to the archaeology of the southern Levant (modern day Israel, Palestine and Jordan) from the Paleolithic period to the Islamic era, presenting the past with chronological changes from hunter-gatherers to empires. Written by an international team of scholars in the fields of archaeology, epigraphy, and bioanthropology, the volume presents central debates around a range of archaeological issues, including gender, ritual, the creation of alphabets and early writing, biblical periods, archaeometallurgy, looting, and maritime trade. Collectively, the essays also engage diverse theoretical approaches to demonstrate the multi-vocal nature of studying the past. Significantly, The Social Archaeology of the Levant updates and contextualizes major shifts in archaeological interpretation.


Before Writing, Vol. I

Before Writing, Vol. I

Author: Denise Schmandt-Besserat

Publisher: University of Texas Press

Published: 1992

Total Pages: 310

ISBN-13: 9780292707832

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Before Writing gives a new perspective on the evolution of communication. It points out that when writing began in Mesopotamia it was not, as previously thought, a sudden and spontaneous invention. Instead, it was the outgrowth of many thousands of years' worth of experience at manipulating symbols. In Volume I: From Counting to Cuneiform, Denise Schmandt-Besserat describes how in about 8000 B.C., coinciding with the rise of agriculture, a system of counters, or tokens, appeared in the Near East. These tokens—small, geometrically shaped objects made of clay—represented various units of goods and were used to count and account for them. The token system was a breakthrough in data processing and communication that ultimately led to the invention of writing about 3100 B.C. Through a study of archaeological and epigraphic evidence, Schmandt-Besserat traces how the Sumerian cuneiform script, the first writing system, emerged from a counting device. In Volume II: A Catalog of Near Eastern Tokens, Schmandt-Besserat presents the primary data on which she bases her theories. These data consist of several thousand tokens, catalogued by country, archaeological site, and token types and subtypes. The information also includes the chronology, stratigraphy, museum ownership, accession or field number, references to previous publications, material, and size of the artifacts. Line drawings and photographs illustrate the various token types.


The Middle and Upper Paleolithic Archeology of the Levant and Beyond

The Middle and Upper Paleolithic Archeology of the Levant and Beyond

Author: Yoshihiro Nishiaki

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2017-12-06

Total Pages: 222

ISBN-13: 9811068267

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This volume is a compilation of results from sessions of the Second International Conference on the Replacement of Neanderthals by Modern Humans, which took place between November 30 and December 6, 2014, in Hokkaido, Japan. Similar to the first conference held in 2012 in Tokyo, the 2014 conference (RNMH2014) aimed to compile the results of the latest multidisciplinary approaches investigating the issues surrounding the replacement of Neanderthals by modern humans. The results of the sessions, supplemented by off-site contributions, center on the archeology of the Middle and Upper Paleolithic of the Levant and beyond. The first part of this volume presents recent findings from the Levant, while the second part focuses on the neighboring regions, namely, the Caucasus, the Zagros, and South Asia. The 13 chapters in this volume highlight the distinct nature of the cultural occurrences during the Middle and Upper Paleolithic periods of the Levant, displaying a continuous development as well as a combination of lithic traditions that may have originated in different regions. This syncretism, which is an unusual occurrence in the regions discussed in this volume, reinforces the importance of the Levant as a region for interpreting the RNMH phenomenon in West Asia.


Quaternary of the Levant

Quaternary of the Levant

Author: Yehouda Enzel

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2017-04-27

Total Pages: 789

ISBN-13: 1107090466

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Over eighty contributions from leading researchers review 2.5 million years of environmental change and human cultural evolution in the Levant.


Origins of Anatomically Modern Humans

Origins of Anatomically Modern Humans

Author: Doris V. Nitecki

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2013-11-11

Total Pages: 347

ISBN-13: 1489915079

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This volume is based on the Field Museum of Natural History Spring System atics Symposium held in Chicago on May 11, 1991. The financial support of Ray and Jean Auel and of the Field Museum is gratefully acknowledged. When we teach or write, we present only those elements that support our arguments. We avoid all weak points of our debate and all the uncer tainties of our models. Thus, we offer hypotheses as facts. Multiauthored books like ours, which simultaneously advocate and question diverse views, avoid the pitfalls and lessen the impact of indoctrination. In this volume we analyze the anthropological and biological disagreements and the positions taken on the origins of modern humans, point out difficultieswith the inter pretations, and suggest that the concept of the human origin can be explained only when we first attempt to define Homo sapiens sapiens. One of the major controversies in physical anthropology concerns the geographic origin of anatomically modern humans. It is undisputed, due to the extensive research of the Leakeys and their colleagues, that the family Hominidae originated in Africa, but the geographic origin of Homo sapiens sapiens is less concretely accepted. Two schools of thought existon this topic.


The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology and Anthropology of Hunter-Gatherers

The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology and Anthropology of Hunter-Gatherers

Author: Vicki Cummings

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2014-04-24

Total Pages: 1361

ISBN-13: 0191025275

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For more than a century, the study of hunting and gathering societies has been central to the development of both archaeology and anthropology as academic disciplines, and has also generated widespread public interest and debate. The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology and Anthropology of Hunter-Gatherers provides a comprehensive review of hunter-gatherer studies to date, including critical engagements with older debates, new theoretical perspectives, and renewed obligations for greater engagement between researchers and indigenous communities. Chapters provide in-depth archaeological, historical, and anthropological case-studies, and examine far-reaching questions about human social relations, attitudes to technology, ecology, and management of resources and the environment, as well as issues of diet, health, and gender relations - all central topics in hunter-gatherer research, but also themes that have great relevance for modern global society and its future challenges. The Handbook also provides a strategic vision for how the integration of new methods, approaches, and study regions can ensure that future research into the archaeology and anthropology of hunter-gatherers will continue to deliver penetrating insights into the factors that underlie all human diversity.