Iris Groman-YaroslavskiUniversity of Haifa | haifa · Department of Archaeology
Iris Groman-Yaroslavski
PhD
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43
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Introduction
Publications
Publications (43)
Tel Qishyon, situated in the eastern Jezreel Valley, was identified as an archaeological site during a regional survey of the British Mandate (1942). It was surveyed in the late 1970s by N. Zori, D.L. Esse, and Z. Gal, and first excavated during the late 1970s and early 1980s by C. Arnon and R. Amiran. Additional rescue excavations were carried on...
This study combines typology and use-wear analysis applied to a large sample of flint sickle blades from Tel Tsaf, Jordan Valley, Israel, dated to the Middle Chalcolithic period (ca. 5200–4700 cal BC). The dominant backed, bi-truncated rectangle sickle blade, typical of the Chalcolithic period, was analyzed, revealing new types that are identified...
The production of bladelets and their use as retouched and shaped microliths are among the hallmarks of the Levantine Epipaleolithic. The vast majority of bladelets and microliths are found broken in prehistoric sites, yet the causes of the high percentage of breakage are only partially understood, and systematic analyses concerning their breakage...
One of the most characteristic aspects of the Late Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age periods in the southern Levant is the appearance of large assemblages of basalt vessels. These vessels, frequently meticulously made, appear sometimes a considerable distance from the raw material sources and are found mainly at habitation sites. While these and th...
The Early Middle Paleolithic (EMP) is a less-studied phase of the Levantine Middle Paleolithic, attributable to the small number of sites discovered. Drawing on the dense archaeological accumulations at Misliya Cave, Mount Carmel, Israel, the present study seeks to trace EMP daily activities and behavioral patterns through the prism of use-wear ana...
This paper communicates the results of a detailed use-wear analysis of flint tools from Unit III of Nesher Ramla, central Israel, an open-air Middle Paleolithic site, dated to Marine Isotope Stage 5. The analyzed sample consists of 966 artifacts that represent major techno-typological categories; scrapers, tools with a lateral tranchet blow, natura...
During the Middle Paleolithic in Eurasia, the production of deliberate, abstract engraving on bone or stone materials is a rare phenomenon. It is now widely accepted that both anatomically modern humans and hominins that predate them have produced deliberate engravings associated with symbolic behavior. Within the Levantine Middle Paleolithic conte...
During the reanalysis of the finds from Jelinek's and Ronen's excavations at Tabun Cave, Israel, we encountered a cobble bearing traces of mechanical alterations similar to those recorded on grinding tools. However, the artifact derives from the early layers of the Acheulo-Yabrudian complex of the late Lower Paleolithic (ca. 350 ka), a time with no...
Glycymeris shell beads found in Middle Palaeolithic sites are understood to be artifacts collected by modern humans for symbolic use. In Misliya Cave, Israel, dated to 240–160 ka BP, Glycymeris shells were found that were neither perforated nor manipulated; nevertheless, transportation to the cave is regarded as symbolic. In about 120 ka BP at Qafz...
The miniaturization of stone tools, as reflected through the systematic production of bladelets and bladelet tools (microliths), characterized many industries of the Late Pleistocene, with the Levantine Epipalaeolithic serving as a well-studied example. It is commonly held that microliths were used as modular inserts in composite projectiles, while...
The late Epipaleolithic Natufian Culture of the Levant (ca. 15,000–11,700 BP) is renowned for its rich bone industry. A specific type of bone bead, the gazelle phalanx bead, is abundant in several sites but nearly absent in others. In this study, phalanx bone beads from the current excavations at the Natufian site of el-Wad Terrace (Mount Carmel, I...
In this paper we describe two assemblages of flint retouchers or “bulb retouchers” retrieved from Nesher Ramla and Quneitra, two Middle Palaeolithic, open-air sites in the Levant. The site of Nesher Ramla yielded the largest assemblage of bulb retouchers (n = 159) currently known, allowing a detailed investigation of this poorly known phenomenon. A...
A salvage excavation took place in a well-preserved Neolithic quarry and blade production workshop near the town of Mitzpe Ramon, Negev desert, Israel. The quarry is part of a larger flint extraction site, where series of knapping localities from different periods were identified along a flint outcrop from the Zafit formation. While all other local...
We present a new example of bone engraving dated to ca 130 kys ago. It was retrieved from the Unit III at the Middle Paleolithic open-air site of Nesher Ramla (Israel). The incised bone was found within a small round feature (around 50 cm in diameter) composed of few flint artifacts, stones (manuports) and dense in faunal remains. The zooarchaeolog...
This study presents distinct and small task-specific sites associated with the Middle to Late Epipalaeolithic period exposed during a salvage project at the site of Ashalim at the fringe of the northwestern Negev desert dunefield (Israel). Six areas spanning the Geometric-Kebaran to Harifian periods were systematically collected upon a unique 4 m h...
Earliest modern humans out of Africa
Recent paleoanthropological studies have suggested that modern humans migrated from Africa as early as the beginning of the Late Pleistocene, 120,000 years ago. Hershkovitz et al. now suggest that early modern humans were already present outside of Africa more than 55,000 years earlier (see the Perspective by St...
Engraved artifacts from pre-Natufian Levantine Epipaleolithic contexts are notable for their scarcity. This is so even though a number of implements have recently been added to the inventory. We present here an analysis of two engraved flint nodules recovered from the Geometric Kebaran site of Neve David (Mt. Carmel, Israel) incorporating use-wear...
Sefunim Cave, Mount Carmel, Israel was previously excavated in the 1960s and is one of the main sites known for the occurrence of the cultural entity termed the Levantine Aurignacian. Renewed excavations at Sefunim Cave provide new insights into the Late Pleistocene occupations of the site and reveal a rich Epipaleolithic layer, in addition to the...
Use-wear analysis of five glossed flint blades found at Ohalo II, a 23,000-years-old fisher-hunter-gatherers’ camp on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, Northern Israel, provides the earliest evidence for the use of composite cereal harvesting tools. The wear traces indicate that tools were used for harvesting near-ripe semi-green wild cereals, short...
[Report]
Grooved items are usually regarded as tools used for modifying other implements made of bone, stone, plants or wood, whether referred to as shaft straighteners, smoothers, polishers or sharpening tools. They were also attributed to various symbolic meanings in Neolithic and Chalcolithic sites in the southern Levant and they were also asso...
Abu Sif points are the fossile directeur of the Levantine Early Middle Paleolithic (EMP; ca. 250–160 ka ago). At Misliya Cave these elongated retouched artifacts represent one of the major elements in the toolkit. In the past, Abu Sif points were interpreted as weapons or as multifunctional knives, and were considered to indicate incipient hafting...
Grooved items are usually regarded as tools used for modifying other implements made of bone, stone, plants or wood, whether referred to as shaft straighteners, smoothers, polishers or sharpening tools. They were also attributed to various symbolic meanings in Neolithic and Chalcolithic sites in the southern Levant and they were also associated wit...
Weeds are currently present in a wide range of ecosystems worldwide. Although the beginning
of their evolution is largely unknown, researchers assumed that they developed in tandem
with cultivation since the appearance of agricultural habitats some 12,000 years ago.
These rapidly-evolving plants invaded the human disturbed areas and thrived in the...
Use-wear analysis applied to two carnelian beads from Nahal Hemar Cave, southern Israel, and dated to the Middle Pre-Pottery Neolithic B period, revealed a manufacturing procedure that corresponds to genuine lapidary technologies of contemporary traditional societies. Based on ethnographic observations combined with experiments in working carnelian...
A sample of glossed and non-glossed Canaanean blades from the Early Bronze Age Ib-II site of Qiryat Ata, northern Israel, was the subject of a use-wear analysis. This research comprised microscopic analysis and a series of experiments based on the microscopic usewear detected to reconstruct the function of the archaeological Canaanean blades. Two m...
The site of Huzuq Musa (Lower Jordan Valley, Israel) revealed a large collection of flint perfora-tors, beads, and bead production waste, which were found mainly in one of the tested structures (Structure 1). These findings provided a case study for a functional analysis, reflecting on the func-tion of perforators as well as on bead production tech...
The site of Huzuq Musa (Lower Jordan Valley, Israel) revealed a large collection of flint perfora-tors, beads, and bead production waste, which were found mainly in one of the tested structures (Structure 1). These findings provided a case study for a functional analysis, reflecting on the func-tion of perforators as well as on bead production tech...
A sample of glossed and non-glossed Canaanean blades from the Early Bronze Age Ib–II site of Qiryat Ata, northern Israel, was the subject of a use-wear analysis. This research comprised microscopic analysis and a series of experiments based on the microscopic use-wear detected to reconstruct the function of the archaeological Canaanean blades. Two...
The transition from mobile hunter-gatherers to sedentary farmers in the Near East was one of the most crucial steps in human evolution. Several sites belonging to either the Late Epipalaeolithic or the Early Neolithic periods were studied in the Jordan Valley, one of the primary research regions for this important shift. However, occupation sites d...
We report here the results of our renewed, and continuing, excavations of the Natufian horizon on el-Wad Terrace. The original excavation conducted by Garrod was restricted to the cave and terrace in front of the cave's entrance and our project was initiated further to the NE in order to develop a more comprehensive view of the Natufian settlement...
We report here the results of our renewed, and continuing, excavations of the Natufian
horizon on el-Wad Terrace. The original excavation conducted by Garrod was restricted to
the cave and terrace in front of the cave's entrance and our project was initiated further to
the NE in order to develop a more comprehensive view of the Natufian settlement...