David Eitam E-mail: davi.eitam@mail.huji.ac.il Ph. D. dissertation topic: Archaeo-Industry of the Natufian Culture: Installations and Ground Stone Tools in the Late Epipalaeolithic in the Southern Levant. Advisors: Prof. Nigel Goring-Morris and Prof. Anna Belfer-Cohen

Abstract:

Archaeo-industry is a discipline that focuses on examining subsistence, social and cultural applications. In the context of my Ph. D. research, the archaeo-industry approach is applied to stone tool technology and function through time and space via landscape archaeology projects. The research aims to study the different functions of Natufian(13,000-9,300 cal BC) rock-cut installations and ground stone tools. A quite large database and a methodological framework were constructed as foundations and means of research. The data was gathered by surveying 24 Late Epipalaeolithic (key site: Hruk Musa in the Southern Jordan Valley) and Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA, 9,300-8,000 cal BC) sites and from 12 additional excavated sites in the Southern Levant. The new methodological framework includes a classification system and typology list of Late Epipalaeolithic and PPNA stone tools (Eitam 2008, 2010). Some of the rock-cut installations were experimentally operated by us. The presentation of the experimental operations, discussion of the results and implications and conclusions and the presentation of all collected data and analysis of functional, chronological and geo-cultural aspects of stone tools, as well as examination of subsistence, social and cultural applications of the Natufian entity in this instance of stone tool technology and function. The above three issues will be published in two article. The study may solve a lacuna in the Natufian archaeological record and fill-in the absent of methodological by presenting hundreds of unknown rock-cut installations within methodological framework. Solving some functions of different stone tools such as threshing floor, de-husking and grinding devices, brought us to conclude that wild barely bread was possibly produced during the late Natufian. This technological ability may indicate a significant step in the transition from hunter-gatherer toward farmers' societies and eventually to early agricultural communities in the PPNB.

Projects:

• 2008-present. Studding the ground stone tools and rock-cut installations of Ein Gev (IA II) and Tel Rechesh (MB II, IA II and Roman periods) and writing reports, Rikkyo and Tenri Universities, Japan.
• 2007-present. Studding the Ground stone tools of Tel Dor (LB, IAI) and writing report, Tel Dor Expedition, Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa.
• 2006-present. Studding Natufian, PPNA and EB Age rock-cut installations of Tel Bareqet, Tel Bareqet Expedition.
• 2005-present. Archaeo-industrial survey of Late Epipalaeolithic and PPNA in Eastern Samaria and Southern Jordan Valley, Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University.

List of Publications