Archaeology and Desertification : : The Wadi Faynan Landscape Survey, Southern Jordan / / Graeme Barker, David Gilbertson, David Mattingly.

• Superior document: Wadi Faynan series
• VerfasserIn: Barker, Graeme,; Mattingly, David,; Gilbertson, David ,
• TeilnehmendeR: Mattingly, David,; Gilbertson, David ,
• Place / Publishing House: Oxford : : CBRL,, 2007.
• Year of Publication: 2007
• Language: English
• Series: Wadi Faynan series.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (536 pages).

The Wadi Faynan is a harshly beautiful and desertic landscape in southern Jordan, situated between the hyper-arid deserts of the Wadi 'Arabah and the rugged and wetter Mountains of Edom. Archaeology and Desertification presents the results of the Wadi Faynan Landscape Survey, an inter-disciplinary study of landscape change undertaken in the Wadi Faynan by a team of archaeologists and geographers with the goal of contributing to present-day desertification debates by providing a long-term perspective on the relationship between environmental change and human history. The Wadi Faynan was the focus for some of the earliest farming in the Near East, and the earliest metallurgy, and in Roman times was a centre for copper and lead mining. The project reveals how past communities of farmers, shepherds, and miners managed their challenging environment, the solutions they developed, their successes and failures, and their short- and long-term environmental impacts. The richness of the palaeoclimatic, archaeological and palaeoecological data reveals an environmental/cultural history of complex pathways, synergies, and feedbacks operating at many different geographical scales, rates, and intensities. The project's findings on the complexity of past and present people:environment relations in the Wadi Faynan affirm the power of inter-disciplinary landscape archaeology to contribute significantly to the desertification debate. With global warming likely to threaten the lives of millions of people in the semi-arid and arid lands that comprise over a third of the planet through the course of this century, with potentially dire consequences for adjacent populations in better-watered regions, understanding the complexity of past responses to aridification has never been more urgent.

Table of Contents

List of figures -- xi -- List of tables -- xix -- List of contributors -- xxi -- Preface and acknowledgements xxiii -- Glossary xxv -- PART I Research Themes, Methods, and Background -- The Wadi Faynan Landscape Survey: research themes and project development -- 3 (22) -- Graeme Barker -- David Gilbertson -- David Mattingly -- Introduction -- 3 (1) -- Background and research context -- 3 (5) -- Archaeology and desertification -- 8 (1) -- Initial frameworks -- 9 (7) -- New perspectives, new questions -- 16 (2) -- Developing research themes -- 18 (1) -- Integration -- 19 (3) -- Conclusion and structure of this book -- 22 (3) -- The Wadi Faynan today: landscape, environment, people -- 25 (34) -- Carol Palmer -- David Gilbertson -- Hwedi el-Rishi -- Chris Hunt -- John Grattan -- Sue McLaren -- Brian Pyatt -- Landscape and environment -- 25 (13) -- People -- 38 (21) -- The past and present landscapes of the Wadi Faynan: geoarchaeological approaches and frameworks -- 59 (38) -- Hwedi el-ishi -- Chris Hunt -- John Grattan -- Sue McLaren -- Brian Pyatt -- Geoff Duller -- Gavin Gillmore -- Paul Phillips -- Fieldwork strategy and methodologies -- 59 (3) -- Chronostratigraphies -- 62 (2) -- The Late Quaternary geomorphological framework -- 64 (4) -- Palynological, palynofacies, and macrofossil investigations -- 68 (11) -- Geochemical studies -- 79 (3) -- The industrially-polluted landscapes of the Wadi Faynan -- 82 (4) -- Metal-pollution burdens and pathways in plants, animals, and the agricultural economy -- 86 (3) -- Radon gas and human health in the mines -- 89 (3) -- Holocene landscapes in the Wadi Faynan: an outline palaeoenvironmental framework -- 92 (5) -- Recording and classifying the archaeological record -- 97 (44) -- Oliver Creighton -- Graeme Barker -- David Mattingly -- Introduction -- 97 (3) -- Artefact `site' -- 100 (1) -- Domestic structure -- 101 (11) -- Excavation -- 112 (1) -- Field system -- 113 (2) -- Funerary structure -- 115 (9) -- Hydraulic structure -- 124 (4) -- Mining feature -- 128 (5) -- Metallurgical feature -- 133 (3) -- Miscellaneous structures -- 136 (2) -- Religious structure -- 138 (1) -- Rock engraving -- 139 (2) -- The Wadi Faynan field systems -- 141 (36) -- Paul Newson -- Graeme Barker -- Patrick Daly -- David Mattingly -- David Gilbertson -- Introduction -- 141 (4) -- The field system survey -- 145 (3) -- Constructing the GIS -- 148 (2) -- Walls, channels, and hydraulic technology -- 150 (12) -- Other water-management structures -- 162 (2) -- Other structures -- 164 (2) -- Surface artefact distributions -- 166 (3) -- The palimpsest landscape -- 169 (8) -- PART II Chronological Syntheses -- Pleistocene environments and human settlement -- 177 (22) -- Sue McLaren -- Tim Reynolds -- David Gilbertson -- John Grattan -- Chris Hunt -- Hwedi el-Rishi -- Graeme Barker -- Geoff Duller -- Introduction -- 177 (3) -- Pleistocene climates -- 180 (1) -- Geomorphological processes and deposits -- 181 (10) -- Human occupation in the Pleistocene -- 191 (7) -- The Pleistocene landscape and its human utilization -- 198 (1) -- Early Holocene environments and early farming, c. 11,000-7000 cal. BP, c.9500-5000 cal. BC -- 199 (28) -- Graeme Barker -- Chris Hunt -- Sue McLaren -- Tim Reynolds -- Hwedi el-Rishi -- David Gilbertson -- John Grattan -- Introduction -- 199 (3) -- Environments of the early to mid Holocene -- 202 (3) -- Palaeoecology -- 205 (3) -- Initial Neolithic settlement, c.9500-8500 BC -- 208 (4) -- Later Pre-Pottery Neolithic settlement, c.8500-6500 BC -- 212 (4) -- Later Neolithic settlement -- 216 (4) -- Neolithic pictographs? -- 220 (5) -- Conclusion -- 225 (2) -- Chalcolithic (c.5000-3600 cal. BC) and Bronze Age (c.3600-1200 cal. BC) settlement in Wadi Faynan: metallurgy and social complexity -- 227 (44) -- Graeme Barker -- Russell Adams -- Oliver Creighton -- Hwedi el-Rishi -- David Gilbertson -- John Grattan -- Chris Hunt -- Paul Newson -- Brian Pyatt -- Tim Reynolds -- Introduction -- 227 (1) -- Climate and environment -- 227 (4) -- Chalcolithic settlement in Wadi Faynan -- 231 (1) -- Early Bronze Age `urbanism' -- 232 (3) -- Bronze Age monument types in Wadi Faynan -- 235 (1) -- The major settlement complex of WF100 -- 236 (6) -- Domestic, funerary, and hydraulic structures south of WF100 -- 242 (9) -- The WF24 water catchment: sediments and palynology -- 251 (4) -- EBA settlement beside the Wadi Faynan channel -- 255 (2) -- Pastoral settlement away from the Wadi Faynan channel -- 257 (4) -- Metallurgical activity -- 261 (1) -- Bronze Age pictographs? -- 262 (5) -- The Bronze Age landscapes and societies of the Wadi Faynan -- 267 (4) -- The making of early states: the Iron Age and Nabataean periods -- 271 (34) -- David Mattingly -- Paul Newson -- John Grattan -- Roberta Tomber -- Graneme Barker -- David Gilbertson -- Chris Hunt -- Introduction -- 271 (1) -- Edom and the `Edomites' -- 271 (2) -- Copper mining and smelting -- 273 (5) -- Iron Age settlement in Wadi Faynan -- 278 (7) -- Evidence of environmental change -- 285 (3) -- Dating issues -- 288 (2) -- Ancient Edom and copper production in Wadi Faynan -- 290 (1) -- Nabataean Faynan -- 291 (10) -- Historical implications -- 301 (4) -- A landscape of imperial power: Roman and Byzantine Phaino -- 305 (44) -- David Mattingly -- Paul Newson -- Oliver Creighton -- Roberta Tomber -- John Grattan -- Chris Hunt -- David Gilbertson -- Hwedi el-Rishi -- Brian Pyatt -- Introduction -- 305 (3) -- Roman copper exploitation in the Wadi `Arabah region -- 308 (1) -- The Roman army in southern Jordan -- 309 (1) -- The Roman mining landscape around Faynan -- 309 (23) -- Dating issues -- 332 (1) -- The labour force at the mines -- 333 (1) -- Environment and people: the impacts of Roman mining -- 334 (10) -- The logistics of supply -- 344 (1) -- Charcoal and fuel demands -- 345 (1) -- A landscape of imperial power -- 346 (3) -- The Islamic and Ottoman periods -- 349 (20) -- Paul Newson -- David Mattingly -- Patrick Daly -- Roberta Tomber -- Hwedi el-Rishi -- David Gilbertson -- John Grattan -- Chris Hunt -- Sue McLaren -- Brian Pyatt -- Introduction -- 349 (3) -- Climate, environment, and human impacts -- 352 (11) -- Archaeology -- 363 (4) -- Synthesis: life in an abandoned industrial landscape -- 367 (2) -- Ethnoarchaeology -- 369 (28) -- Carol Palmer -- Helen Smith -- Patrick Daly -- Introduction -- 369 (1) -- The Bedouin Camp Survey -- 369 (1) -- Campsite architecture -- 370 (3) -- Campsite location -- 373 (1) -- Tent orientation -- 374 (1) -- Tribal associations -- 375 (1) -- Durable campsite architecture -- 376 (4) -- Contrasts in campsite organization and architecture -- 380 (4) -- Artefacts and activities around tent sites -- 384 (9) -- Bedouin material culture in the recent past -- 393 (1) -- Other evidence of bedouin activity around the Wadi Faynan -- 393 (1) -- Conclusion -- 394 (3) -- Archaeology and desertification: the landscapes of the Wadi Faynan -- 397 (68) -- David Gilbertson -- Graeme Barker -- David Mattingly -- Carol Palmer -- John Grattan -- Brian Pyatt -- Introduction -- 397 (1) -- Desertification: research issues and analytical problems -- 398 (4) -- Pleistocene environments and human occupation -- 402 (2) -- People and environment in the Holocene: disaggregating desertification -- 404 (9) -- Scale and complexity -- 413 (3) -- Cores and peripheries -- 416 (1) -- Arid-zone archaeology -- 416 (1) -- Conclusion -- 417 (1) -- Postscript: the Wadi Faynan today and in the future -- 418 (7) -- Summaries -- English summary -- 425 (10) -- Arabic summary -- 435 (4) -- Appendices -- Appendix 1 Published radiocarbon dates from the Faynan region -- 439 (6) -- Chris Hunt -- David Mattingly -- Graeme Barker -- David Gilbertson -- Appendix 2 Classical and Islamic pottery -- 445 (20) -- Roberta Tomber -- A2.1 Introduction -- 445 (1) -- A2.2 Method -- 445 (1) -- A2.3 Pottery classification -- 446 (4) -- A2.4 Chronological summary -- 450 (15) -- Bibliography 465 (38) -- Index 503.