Ran BarkaiTel Aviv University | TAU · Aracheology
Ran Barkai
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Introduction
Publications
Publications (181)
Paleolithic rock shelters often include several hearths located in different parts of the site. In this paper, we
analyze relevant data from Middle Paleolithic Tor Faraj rock shelter as a case study of smoke density in corre
lation with hearth location and functionality. Since one of the major negative fire products is smoke, which has
an immedia...
Animal acquisition, butchering and processing was a crucial activity continuum in the subsistence of Lower Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers bolstered by a persistent Acheulian stone toolkit. Scrapers, bifaces, flakes and other Acheulian implements were successfully used during carcass manipulation, entailing functional compatibility with the prey taxa...
The longstanding debate over human contribution to Pleistocene megafauna extinctions motivates our examination of plausible hunting behaviors that may have impacted prey populations. Prey size declines during the Pleistocene have been proposed as a unifying selecting agent of human evolution. Here, we identify prey selection criteria and exploitati...
Biased skeletal part representation is a key element for making inferences about transport decisions, carcass procurement, and use patterns in anthropogenic accumulations. In the absence of destructive taphonomic processes, it is often assumed that the abundance of different anatomical portions represents selective transport and discard patterns of...
Evidence from the Levantine Late Lower Paleolithic sites of Jaljulia and Qesem Cave suggests that Quina scrapers, an innovation in a category of tools used mostly for butchery, emerged with changes in hunting practices. Quina scrapers were often made of non-local flint from the Samarian highlands, a home range of fallow deer populations throughout...
Human dependency on stone has its origins in Lower Paleolithic times, and some of the most primordial elements in human-stone relationships are rooted in those early days. In this paper, we focus our attention on extensive Paleolithic stone quarries discovered and studied in the Galilee, Israel. We propose a triadic model that connects stone outcro...
Analysis of lighting system management in Upper Paleolithic decorated caves is crucial to our understanding of the light sources used to create and observe depictions created deep in the interior halls. We developed a novel method for analyzing the environmental effects of the different light systems used in Upper Paleolithic caves. Our method uses...
The Acheulean site of Evron, which includes three localities (Quarry, Zinat, Pardes), is situated in the Western Galilee coast of Israel. More than 500 handaxes were retrieved from the Late Acheulean Zinat locality, from surface and from shallow excavation trenches. No flakes were found and no raw material sources is known from the vicinity of the...
This paper examines the hypothesis that changes in hunting weapons during the Paleolithic were a direct response to a progressive decline in prey size. The study builds upon a unified hypothesis that explains Paleolithic human evolutionary and behavioral/cultural phenomena, including improved cognitive capabilities, as adaptations to mitigate decli...
Bulb retouchers (or flint retouchers) are a specific tool category applied in stone knapping activities, commonly associated with Middle Palaeolithic assemblages and late Pleistocene hominins in north Africa, the Levant and Europe. A few flint flakes with pits on the ventral surface were identified in the lithic assemblage of Area D at late Acheule...
The nature of lithic morphological variability during the Acheulean is a much-debated topic, especially in the late Acheu-lean of the Levant. To explore this issue, we present a 3D analysis of 260 handaxes from Jaljulia, a recently discovered late Acheulean site dated to ca. 500-300/200 ka. We employ a comprehensive suite of 3D methods aimed at rec...
Prepared Core Technologies, often considered a hallmark of the Middle Paleolithic Mousterian, have recently been observed, to some extent, in many late Lower Paleolithic Acheulian sites. This may indicate a Lower Paleolithic origin of the Levallois method, although the circumstances leading to its emergence, spread and assimilation are still debate...
Humans consumed megaherbivores, including proboscideans, throughout the Pleistocene. However, there is a high potential for underappreciation of their relative importance to humans’ economy due to their potential relative underrepresentation
in Paleolithic archaeological sites. Relying on our previous work, we discuss the critical importance of lar...
The Lower Paleolithic Late Acheulian in the Levant marks a fascinating chapter in human cultural and biological evolution. Nevertheless, many aspects of the Late Acheulian are still undeciphered, hindered by the complex nature of each site on the one hand, a scarcity of wide, multidisciplinary studies on the other, and by difficulties in obtaining...
The life cycle of a successful technological innovation usually follows a well-known path: a slow inception, gradual assimilation of the technology, an increase in its frequency up to a certain peak, and then a decline. These different phases are characterized not only by varying frequency of use but also by degree of standardization and distinguis...
Flint tools exhibiting modified patinated surfaces (“double patina”, or post-patination flaked items) provide a glimpse into Paleolithic lithic recycling, stone economy, and human choices. Different life cycles of such items are visually evident by the presence of fresh new modified surfaces alongside old patinated ones (according to color and text...
Qesem cave is a Middle Pleistocene site located close to Tel Aviv, Israel, assigned to the Acheuleo-Yabrudian Cultural Complex (AYCC) of the Lower Palaeolithic. The site provides rich assemblages of knapped flint, animal remains and some human teeth making it of particular interest. Its location in the Levantine corridor confers a major interest to...
Recent techno-functional studies of the lithic assemblage of Layer C3 in Late Acheulian Revadim (Israel) have demonstrated the variability in tool production and use in this layer. Here we present the results of a techno-functional and residue analysis of two central categories of artifacts found in Layer C3: side-scrapers and cortical flakes. We i...
We analyze the influence of hearth location and smoke dispersal on potential activity areas at Lower Paleolithic Lazaret Cave, France, focusing on archaeostratigraphic unit UA25, where a single hearth was unearthed, and GIS and activity area analysis were performed by the excavators. We simulated smoke dispersal from 16 hypothetical hearth location...
Multiple large-bodied species went extinct during the Pleistocene. Changing climates and/or human hunting are the main hypotheses used to explain these extinctions. We studied the causes of Pleistocene extinctions in the Southern Levant, and their subsequent effect on local hominin food spectra, by examining faunal remains in archaeological sites a...
The behaviour and mobility of hominins are dependent on the availability of biotic and abiotic resources, which, in temperate ecosystems, are strongly related to seasonality. The objective of this study is to establish evidence of seasonality and duration of occupation(s) of specific archaeological contexts at late Lower Palaeolithic Qesem Cave bas...
The recurrent appearance, in Lower Palaeolithic
sites, of lithic industries characterized by the production and use of small flakes alongside butchered
elephant remains is the focus of this paper. Recent
technological, use-wear and residues analyses, as
well as experimental protocols, have shed light on
the relevant role lithic items of small dimen...
Humans consumed megaherbivores, including proboscideans, throughout the Pleistocene. However, there is a high potential for underappreciation of their relative importance to humans’ economy due to their potential relative underrepresentation in Palaeolithic archaeological sites. Relying on our previous work, we discuss the critical importance of la...
In recent decades, a significant number of Pleistocene (ca. 2.6 million years–10,000 years ago) open-air and cave sites yielding elephant or mammoth bones in direct association with hominin remains and/or lithic artifacts have been discovered in Eurasia, Africa and America. Many of them show strong evidence of acquisition and processing of probosci...
Handaxes, the hallmark of the Acheulian cultural complex, were occasionally recycled at the end of the Lower Paleolithic period as cores for the production of predetermined blanks. It appears that Late Acheulian flint knappers were well acquainted with both handaxe manufacture and the application of prepared core technologies. Following previous su...
In this paper, we present a novel hypothesis as to what led humans in the Upper Paleolithic to penetrate and decorate deep, dark caves. Many of the depictions in these caves are located in halls or narrow passages deep in the interior, navigable only with artificial light. We simulated the effect of torches on oxygen concentrations in structures si...
Lower Paleolithic bifaces are one of the most ubiquitous and persistent stone tools in prehistory, proliferating from Africa through Eurasia from as early as 1.75 Mya and remaining in use for over 1.5 million years. Numerous studies have thus far focused on Acheulean handaxes’ technological characteristics, underlining their relevance in terms of e...
The human trophic level (HTL) during the Pleistocene and its degree of variability serve, explicitly or tacitly, as the basis of many explanations for human evolution, behavior, and culture. Previous attempts to reconstruct the HTL have relied heavily on an analogy with recent hunter‐gatherer groups' diets. In addition to technological differences,...
We hypothesize that megafauna extinctions throughout the Pleistocene, that led to a progressive decline in large prey availability, were a primary selecting agent in key evolutionary and cultural changes in human prehistory. The Pleistocene human past is characterized by a series of transformations that include the evolution of new physiological tr...
Indigenous hunter-gatherers view the world differently than do WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich and Democratic) societies. They depend—as in prehistoric times—on intimate relationships with elements such as animals, plants and stones for their successful adaptation and prosperity. The desire to maintain the perceived world-order and e...
Chopping tools/choppers provide one of the earliest and most persistent examples of stone tools produced and used by early humans. These artifacts appeared for the first time ~2.5 million years ago in Africa and are characteristic of the Oldowan and Acheulean cultural complexes throughout the Old World. Chopping tools were manufactured and used by...
Prehistoric archaeology focuses on innovations, transformations, and turnovers. We focus instead on persistency, suggesting that technological persistency in prehistoric hunter-gatherers was triggered by the stability of prey. The technological persistency-faunal stability nexus was not only crucial to human prosperity but also provided safe ground...
This paper presents the results of a flint type analysis performed for the small assemblage of bifaces found at the Acheulo-Yabrudian site Qesem Cave (QC), Israel (420–200 kya), which includes 12 handaxes, three bifacial roughouts, one trihedral, and one bifacial spall. The analysed artefacts were measured and classified into flint types based on v...
The original version of this article unfortunately contained a mistake
Estimates of the human trophic level and dietary quality during the Paleolithic are the basis for many hypotheses and interpretations regarding human evolution and behavior. We describe an additional factor that could have significantly influenced human evolution and behavior, the availability of large prey animals.
Given the importance of large pr...
The presence of shaped stone balls at early Paleolithic sites has attracted scholarly attention since the pioneering work of the Leakeys in Olduvai, Tanzania. Despite the persistent presence of these items in the archaeological record over a period of two million years, their function is still debated. We present new results from Middle Pleistocene...
For indigenous hunter-gatherers, dependent for their subsistence and well-being on prey animals, animal extinction had significant and multifaceted effects, only some of which are reflected in the archaeological record. Contemporary hunter-gatherers often view animals as equal partners in a shared habitat, where these animals are simultaneously hun...
Flin items exhibiting modified patinated surfaces (usually known as "double patina") have become a criterion in assesing lithic recycling. These recycled items are patina-covered flakes items that were collected and modified again. They show "old" (original) flakes patinated surfaces alongside "new" surfaces with the "old" patina removed. We call t...
This book was funded by the EU 7th Framework Programme (7FP), TropicMicroArch 623293 Project (http://cordis.europa.eu/project/rcn/187754_en.html). The book will be Open Access, thanks to FP7 post-grant Open Access (https://www.openaire.eu/postgrantoapilot).
Early humans and elephants roamed the Pleistocene landscapes of Asia and shared habitats for hundreds of thousands of years. Many Paleolithic archaeological sites in Asia, and especially in the Middle East and China, contain abundant elephant remains that clearly demonstrate that early humans were capable of obtaining these mega herbivores. The sig...
Revadim is a multi-layered Late Acheulian site in the Levant which has yielded rich lithic assemblages comprising
dozens of handaxes, as well as many thousands of other items, mostly flakes. The techno-functional study
presented here focuses on Layer C3, the densest layer at the site in terms of flint artefacts and animal bones. The
lithic assembla...
Bone marrow and grease constitute an important source of nutrition and have attracted the attention of human groups since prehistoric times. Marrow consumption has been linked to immediate consumption following the procurement and removal of soft tissues. Here, we present the earliest evidence for storage and delayed consumption of bone marrow at Q...
The presence of fast-moving small game in the Paleolithic archaeological faunal record has long been considered a key variable to assess fundamental aspects of human behavior and subsistence. Birds occupy a prominent place in this debate not only due to their small size and to the difficulties in capturing them (essentially due to their ability to...
Stone tools provide a unique window into the mode of adaptation and cognitive abilities of Lower Paleolithic early humans. The persistently produced large cutting tools (bifaces/handaxes) have long been an appealing focus of research in the reconstruction of Lower Paleolithic survival strategies, at the expenses of the small flake tools considered...
CT-scan analyses were carried out on limb bones of straight-tusked elephants (Palaeoloxodon antiquus)from the Middle Pleistocene site of Castel di Guido (Italy), where bifaces made of elephant bone were found in association with lithics and a large number of intentionally modified bone remains of elephants and other taxa. CT-scans show that marrow...
Hearths were constructed and used at Paleolithic cave and rockshelter sites in Africa, Europe and Asia as early as the late Lower Paleolithic period. The advantages of the use of fire have been widely researched for the last decades. However, only a few studies have focused on the possible negative impact of the use of fire within closed spaces, su...
The purposeful production of small flakes is integral to the lithic variability of many Middle Pleistocene sites. Inhabitants of the Acheulo-Yabrudian site of Qesem Cave, Israel, systematically recycled ‘old’ discarded blanks and tools, using them as cores for the production of small sharp tools with distinct technological features. These recycling...
Recent research has demonstrated that the Eocene Timrat formation in northeastern Israel, which appears as an extensive land “strip” west of and parallel to the Rift Valley, was a major source of prehistoric flint. This supposition is supported by three large‐scale extraction and reduction (E&R) complexes identified within this region, which offer...
The Acheulean represents one of the most widespread cultural complexes spanning from Africa to Eurasia between 1.8 and 0.2 Mya. The site of Revadim, located on the southern coastal plain of Israel, represent one of the rare opportunities allowing to perform detailed functional analysis of stone tool assemblages from such old contexts. This paper pr...
The multi-layered Lower Paleolithic Late Acheulian site of Revadim has yielded rich lithic assemblages, including dozens of handaxes. These lithic assemblages are for the most part dominated by flake-production technologies and flake tools, as is the rule of thumb at many other Acheulian localities. This study presents the results of an analysis of...
With the ongoing growth of gene-based research in recent decades, examining changes that have taken place in structures over the course of evolution has become increasingly accessible. One intriguing subject at the forefront of evolutionary research is how environmental pressures affect species evolution through epigenetic adaptation. This article...
One of the unsolved ‘paradoxes’ in prehistoric archaeology is that of the gap between the considerable advances in human biological and cultural evolution during the Lower Palaeolithic period, and the over one million years of ‘stagnation’ of the Acheulean handaxe. Most of the research on this topic has focused on innovation – why it was delayed or...
This paper presents a new techno-typological analysis of a sample of small flakes that were produced through recycling from discarded blanks at the late Pottery Neolithic and Early Bronze Age site of Ein-Zippori, Lower Galilee, Israel. This study shows that the systematic production of small flakes from previously discarded blanks was not related t...
A microwear analysis of recycled lithic artefacts from late Pottery Neolithic Wadi Rabah and Early Bronze Age layers at Ein-Zippori, Israel included cores-on-flakes (COFs) which are discarded blanks made into cores, and the flakes detached from them. COFs may have microwear traces that formed before they were recycled. The focus here is on how blan...
Proboscideans and humans have shared habitats across the Old and New Worlds for hundreds of thousands of years. Proboscideans were included in the human diet starting from the Lower Paleolithic period and until the final stages of the Pleistocene. However, the question of how prehistoric people acquired proboscideans remains unresolved. Moreover, t...
This paper reports on a recently discovered Middle Paleolithic and Neolithic/Chalcolithic open-air flint extraction and reduction complex at Mt. Achbara in Israel's Eastern Galilee. Lithic assemblages recovered from a few of the hundreds of tailing piles documented in a field survey indicate a combination of Middle Paleolithic finds including Leval...
This paper describes the techno-typological affinities of a specific Acheulo-Yabrudian lithic assemblage dated to over 300 ka years ago from Qesem Cave, a middle Pleistocene site in central Israel. Aspects of blade production, knapping trajectories, and lithic recycling are examined in detail, demonstrating that this assemblage, notwithstanding its...
Qesem Cave is a Middle Pleistocene site in Israel occupied between 420 and 200 ka. Excavations have revealed a wealth of innovative behaviors most likely practiced by a new hominin lineage. These include early evidence for the habitual and continuous use of fire, the repeated use of a central hearth, systematic flint and bone recycling, early blade...
Scientific Reports 6 : Article number: 37686; 10.1038/srep37686 published online: 25 November 2016 ; updated: 03 May 2017 . In the Supplementary Information file originally published with this Article, Figure S3 was elongated and of poor quality.
For a long while, the controversy surrounding several bone tools coming from pre-Upper Palaeolithic contexts favoured the view of Homo sapiens as the only species of the genus Homo capable of modifying animal bones into specialised tools. However, evidence such as South African Early Stone Age modified bones, European Lower Palaeolithic flaked bone...
Israel is part of a corridor connecting Africa and Euro-Asia that has also been a major migratory route of birds throughout the Quaternary. Very few Middle Pleistocene sites have a large enough record of avian species to provide a taxonomic composition of ornithic paleocommunities to explain their geographic distribution and the human uses of birds...