Jordan (Other Keyword)
1-12 (12 Records)
Located in southwest Jordan, Busayra has long been suspected of being the capital of the Iron Age polity of Edom. British excavations in the 1970s revealed monumental buildings, fortifications, and domestic residences on Busayra’s acropolis that confirms the settlement’s stature as an administrative center. Despite this impressive evidence, little else is known about the town’s design. In order to further investigate Busayra’s sub-surface features, the authors conducted a geophysical survey...
Drones in the desert: Unpiloted Aerial Vehicle (UAV) survey in the Black Desert, Jordan (2017)
Unpiloted Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and photogrammetry provide a precise tool for high resolution surveys of arid landscapes. In 2016, as part of the Eastern Badia Archaeological Project, we undertook a large survey (32 km2) in the remote Black Desert of eastern Jordan. Although excavation has been ongoing in the survey area for several years, many extant Neolithic structures have not been properly mapped or identified because of the large number of structures and the large scale of the area. For...
The environmental context of the Middle Pleistocene occupation at the Shishan Marsh, Azraq, Jordan (2017)
The Greater Azraq Oasis Area occupies a hyper-arid area of the Syro-Arabian Desert. Geomorphological and paleoecological evidence suggests that at times during the Pleistocene the region experienced moister conditions than at present. This particular study centers on the environment surrounding the Middle Pleistocene hominin occupation dated approximately 250,000 BP. Archaeological and archaeozoological remains from this occupation have provided significant information about the wide range of...
Feeding the Troops?: Patterns of Agricultural Production in the Macrobotanical Remains of Nabatean-Late Roman sites in the Wadi ath-Thamad, Jordan (2015)
The macrobotanical record from Khirbat ez-Zona, a Late Roman castellum, reveals a pattern of crop refuse that does not fit the grand narrative of Roman agricultural practice or previous studies of contemporaneous military structures in the region. The Eastern Mediterranean witnessed a considerable boom in both population and agricultural productivity during the Late Roman period. This productivity can reflect the practices of an empire from religious ritual and pilgrimage, to preparation for...
In Smaller Things Forgotten: Using microdebris to enhance our understanding of Middle Islamic Dhiban (Jordan) (2015)
This paper presents heavy fraction data from the archaeological site of Dhiban, Jordan, dating to the Middle Islamic period of occupation (late 12th to late 15th centuries CE). Based on a comparative study between larger heavy fraction materials and microartifacts I argue for the importance of smaller material residues in interpreting specific use-space as well as understanding Dhiban in relation to larger regional trends. Using a systematic flotation sampling strategy that recorded volume and...
Middle Pleistocene Lifeways in the Azraq Oasis, Jordan (2017)
This introductory paper to the session on research underway at the Shishan Marsh I site in the Azraq Oasis, Jordan presents an overview of the results of our paleoenvironmental, faunal, lithic and site formation analyses. A model of targeted and repeated use of the marsh is suggested. These results are situated within their historic and regional contexts and their implications for understanding the capabilities of Middle Pleistocene hominins are also considered.
A multi-proxy site formation analysis of a late Middle Pleistocene occupation in the Azraq wetlands of northeastern Jordan (2017)
The Azraq Marshes Archaeological and Paleoecological Project (AMAPP) aims to understand and evaluate the importance of the Azraq wetlands for Pleistocene hominin populations. Ongoing research since 2009 indicates that the northern wetland, the Druze Marsh, acted as a desert refugium for hominins throughout the Middle and Late Pleistocene. Excavations in the southern marsh—known as the Shishan Marsh—began in 2013 and uncovered a rich assemblage of bifaces, small tools, and flakes, along with...
Predict and Confirm: Survey and Excavation at Three Candidate Sites in Wadi Quseiba, Jordan in search of Late Neolithic Occupation (2015)
In 2012 and 2013, a team from University of Toronto surveyed the Wadi Quseiba drainage in northwest Jordan. The survey had two goals. The first was to discover evidence of Late Neolithic habitation and landscape use. Many large villages declined or were abandoned at the end of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic and we sought to augment our knowledge of Late Neolithic sites to help learn why this might be. The second was to increase the efficiency and reliability with which sites are located. To this end...
(Re)Constructing and Using Space in the Epipalaeolithic: Exploring Technologies, Domestic Activities and Communal Living in Eastern Jordan (2015)
In the 10,000 or so years that make up the Epipalaeolithic period, we witness several dramatic social, economic and technological changes documented in the archaeological record, including the appearance of aggregation sites and sedentary villages, intensified use of particular plants and animals, and the movements of people and objects over long distances. While it is easy to track these changes over this large time span, we rarely catch a glimpse of the daily activities and day-to-day...
Rethinking The Cultural and Natural Dimensions of Landscape Pollution in the Faynan Valley, Southern Jordan (2015)
The human impact on marginal environments is an issue that has especially affected societies in the Middle East during the past 8,000 years, a time when some of the most significant political and economic developments in the history of human societies took place. Such development often permanently altered the character of these fragile ecosystems. Landscape degradation, especially heavy metal pollution, is a poignant example of the deleterious effects that humans can have on the environment. We...
Sweep Widths in the Evaluation of Coverage by Archaeological Surveys in Jordan and Cyprus (2015)
The Wadi Quseiba Survey in northern Jordan and Tremethos Valley Survey in Cyprus recently employed "calibration runs" by survey crews to calculate sweep widths in a variety of visibility contexts. The resulting sweep widths were a critical element in evaluating the coverage of spaces previously surveyed, and these coverages were integral to the planning of additional survey according to a Bayesian allocation algorithm. SAA 2015 abstracts made available in tDAR courtesy of the Society for...
Understanding Temporal Patterns of Occupation at Small Sites: The case of early Neolithic al-Khayran, west-central Jordan (2015)
Beyond their identification and recording during survey, small sites have only occasionally and sporadically been the object of significant research in archaeology. Yet, such sites can be of great significance when trying to understand a wide variety of social systems and practices. While the potential practices associated with small sites in the past are virtually limitless, some patterns are commonly found within specific forms of settlement systems. Within autonomous village-based settlement...