Ruth Shahack-Gross

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Head of Department at University of Haifa

Recent excavations at the Middle Paleolithic site of Tinshemet Cave, Israel, showcase hominin burials and associated material culture that uniquely provide new information on hominin behavior in the south Levant around 120–100 ky ago. This study presents the site's stratigraphy in association with findings from sediment micromorphological analyses,...

Sedentary occupation of the southern Levantine coast spans from the Pre-Pottery Neolithic C to the Early Bronze Age Ib phase ( c. 7000–3100 BC). Sites dating to the Early Pottery Neolithic ( c. 6400–5500 BC) are scarce, however, potentially reflecting the effects of the 8.2ka climatic event. Here, the authors present the investigations at the subme...

Since its inception, geoarchaeology has proved to be essential to the discipline of archaeology. Traditional geoarchaeology, a research field closely linked to geomorphology and pedology, has contributed important insights regarding societal resilience, collapse, and adaptation, primarily through studies of regional environmental changes. The aim o...

Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy is frequently used for archaeological studies related to fire, allowing, among other things, researchers to distinguish between unheated and heated clay minerals. However, heat signatures are not always clear-cut in infrared spectra of bulk sediments, as spectra occasionally appear with ambiguous absor...

Geoarchaeological research at coastal urban sites in the Levant focused until recently on two research directions: the identification of ancient harbors and the study of occupation deposits in settlement portions that are located well above sea level (i.e., 'dry' excavations). Here we present a geoarchaeological study of the southern maritime water...

Combustion features are routinely studied using micro-geoarchaeology in prehistoric sites, providing information on human social life. In submerged prehistory such features have not been studied from the microscopic perspective, and here we present a study of three combustion features from two submerged Neolithic sites from the southeastern Mediter...

Burnt structures are well known archaeologically throughout the Near East. This study proposes an integrated interpretational framework for reconstructing fires in mud-brick structures using macro- and micro-archaeological types of evidence employing well-established tools. While previous research often utilized either macroscopic field evidence or...

Karstic caves in the Eastern Mediterranean region hold significant archaeological importance as they served as an important dwelling place for prehistoric hominins. Yet, such caves were used at the same time as a habitat for birds and bats. As a result, bat guano and bird droppings are not only a major source of cave deposits, but also trigger sign...

The hominin-bearing Middle Palaeolithic [MP] Layer C of Tabun Cave, Mount Carmel, Israel, has been extensively studied for over 90 years, but many questions about its chronology, the identity of its hominin remains and the nature of its formation remain open. Tabun Layer C, part of the 13-m thick MP deposits at the cave, presents a complex sediment...

The 33rd excavation season at Tel Dor (License No. G-75/2016; map ref. 1922-27/7246-50) was carried out in July 2016. The excavation was directed by I. Sharon (the Hebrew University), A. Gilboa (the University of Haifa), A. Yasur-Landau (the University of Haifa) and S.R. Martin (Boston University). The staff included A. Ratzlaff (Area D5 supervisio...

Pottery from Submerged Neolithic/Early Chalcolithic Settlements of the Carmel Coast, Israel: A Microarchaeological Study of Raw Material Procurement and Firing Technology

In the past few decades the field of submerged prehistory has produced important data highlighting ancient coastal habitation across the globe. Most prehistoric underwater sites are discovered by chance (e.g., by industry, fishermen or recreational divers). New methods for detecting submerged prehistoric settlements have been developed using sophis...

During October 2018 and February 2019, the first two excavation seasons were conducted at the site of Dor South (License Nos. G-74/2018, G-12/2019; map ref. 192397–657/721977–3061). The excavation, undertaken on behalf of the Recanati Institute of Maritime Studies and the Department of Maritime Civilizations at the University of Haifa, was directed...

The Negev Highlands (Israel) are characterized by a rich settlement history over the last millennia. To sustain life in this arid environment, measures to collect and store water were introduced. Two types of installations to collect and store runoff water were built in the region: open reservoirs, and more elaborate subterranean rock-cut cisterns....

Middle Pleistocene Homo in the Levant Our understanding of the origin, distribution, and evolution of early humans and their close relatives has been greatly refined by recent new information. Adding to this trend, Hershkovitz et al. have uncovered evidence of a previously unknown archaic Homo population, the “Nesher Ramla Homo ” (see the Perspecti...

While abundant evidence for the use of fire has been identified for the Paleolithic period in the Levant, little evidence has come from open-air sites. This scarcity has brought into question the preservation potential of fragile fire remains at this type of site, which is normally exposed to wind deflation and fluvial erosion, and whether or not f...

The coast of the Carmel is a treasure trove for the study of submerged Pottery Neolithic sites. During the last 30 years such sites have been the focus of research primarily conducted though underwater survey and less through underwater excavations. The site of Habonim North, a recently discovered submerged Pottery Neolithic site, was chosen as a c...

Sustainable resource management is of central importance among agrarian societies in marginal drylands. In the Negev Desert, Israel, research on agropastoral resource management during Late Antiquity emphasizes intramural settlement contexts and landscape features. The importance of hinterland trash deposits as diachronic archives of resource use a...

For years there has been much speculation surrounding the abandonment of the Middle Bronze Age IIB palace of Tel Kabri, ca. 1700 BCE. There are no weapons, hoards of money and jewelry, or visible evidence for fire, which rules out hostile attack or conquest. There are also no indications of drought or environmental degradation that might have force...

Ash pseudomorphs and dung spherulites are calcitic micro-remains. The former is found in large quantities in wood ash and the latter in animal dung. In this chapter, we describe the formation and composition of these micro-remains and discuss their significance for archaeological interpretation. Additionally, we describe the methods used for their...

Technological and social practices can be deciphered by deployment of multiple techniques that have been developed in the last years for the study of sun-dried and heated mud bricks. This research analyzed for the first time the chain of operational processes involved in the manufacture of heated mud bricks in the Neolithic of the Southern Levant....

The production of lime plaster is considered as one of the hallmarks of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B [PPNB] period in the Southern Levant, where lime plaster has been used not only in architectural but also in mortuary contexts. In this study we investigate the technology used to produce plaster associated with an infant burial found in the PPNB lay...

Destruction of valuables is a common behavior in human history. Ethnographic data show the polysemic, but fundamentally symbolic, nature of this act. Yet, research aimed at exploring symbolic destruction in prehistoric societies has underlined the difficulties in establishing unambiguous evidence for such behaviour. We present here the analysis of...

Over the last two decades, much of the recent efforts dedicated to the Levantine Middle Paleolithic has concentrated on the role of open-air sites in the settlement system in the region. Here focus on the site of ‘Ein Qashish as a cases study. Located in present-day northern Israel, the area of this site is estimated to have been >1300 m², of which...

Over the last two decades, much of the recent efforts dedicated to the Levantine Middle Paleolithic has concentrated on the role of open-air sites in the settlement system in the region. Here focus on the site of 'Ein Qashish as a cases study. Located in present-day northern Israel, the area of this site is estimated to have been >1300 m 2 , of whi...

Many Near Eastern destruction layers are characterized by burnt, partially collapsed, mud-brick structures. Despite the prominence of these layers in archaeological field research, the processes that generated these layers are little understood. In order to explain field observations and identify patterns that may be useful for archaeological inter...

This article presents a systematic methodological comparison of three archaeobotanical proxies (phytoliths, pollen and seeds) applied to an assemblage of dung pellets and corresponding archaeological refuse deposits from Early Islamic contexts at the site of Shivta. We set out with three main methodological questions: one, to evaluate the relative...

Significance Historians have long debated the role of climate in the rise and fall of empires of the 1st millennium CE. Drastic territorial contraction of the Byzantine Empire, societal decline, and beginning of the European Middle Ages have generally been linked to the Islamic conquests of the seventh century. This multidisciplinary archaeological...

Recent excavations in the historic centre of ancient Jerusalem have revealed evidence of an Abbasid (eighth- to tenth-century AD) marketplace. Refuse pits and cesspits have yielded an exceptionally well-preserved archaeobotanical assemblage - the first to be recovered from a Levantine marketplace, and the first in the region to be almost entirely p...

Abstract Salmonid resources currently foster socioeconomic prosperity in several nations, yet their importance to many ancient circumpolar societies is poorly understood due to insufficient fish bone preservation at archaeological sites. As a result, there are serious gaps in our knowledge concerning the antiquity of northern salmonid fisheries and...

The Social Archaeology of the Levant - edited by Assaf Yasur-Landau December 2018

A study of pithoi production technology at the Middle Bronze Age Canaanite palace at Tel Kabri, Israel, utilized experimental and analytical methods. Pithoi from two phases of the palace were produced using local alluvial raw material, by coil/slab technique, and finished on a slow wheel. Firing at c. 600°C for a short duration seems to be related...

Animal dung is increasingly a valuable resource for reconstructing ancient activity in archaeology. One of the most common archaeological indicators of dung in caves and arid environments are calcitic dung spherulites that form in the digestive system of a variety of animals. Although many aspects of their formation and taphonomy are understood, de...

Grasslands are one of the world's most extensive terrestrial biomes and are central to the survival of herders, their livestock and diverse communities of large wild mammals1-3. In Africa, tropical soils are predominantly nutrient-limited4-6 but productive grassy patches in wooded grassland savannah ecosystems2,4 grow on fertile soils created by ge...

In antiquity, the development of techniques to collect and store water was fundamental to sustain life in arid regions. One way to overcome the problem of water supply in the desert was to construct water reservoirs and cisterns which collect surface runoff during rare rain events. Indeed, open reservoirs and rock‐cut cisterns are widely spread ove...

This report presents first results of microarchaeological studies of hearths from the northwestern lower town of post-palatial (LH IIIC) Tiryns. By combining Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, phytolith analysis and other methods, we gained new insights on construction techniques and the use of hearths with sherd pavements. These heart...

Conventional theory described two settlement waves in the Negev Highlands in the third millennium BCE—in the EB II and the Intermediate Bronze Age— and a period with no evidence for stone architecture between them in the EB III. Arad in the Beer-sheba Valley was presented as an EB I–II site, which lay deserted in the EB III. Old and new radiocarbon...

This poster provides a detailed holistic study of sediments from the southern hinterland of Caesarea, Israel in order to explore the impact of an urban settlement on its periphery.

‘Ein Qashish is a Middle Palaeolithic open-air site in the southern Levant, encompassing an excavated area of several hundred square meters and a 4.5-m thick stratigraphic section. Its placement within a fluvial system, combined with the presence of Neanderthal skeletal remains and diverse material culture finds, presents possibilities for understa...

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...

Historical events are sometimes expressed in destruction layers. We present here a study in which aspects of construction, destruction, and chronostratigraphy of fired mud bricks were explored using archaeomagnetism, infrared spectroscopy, and micromorphology. We measured 88 oriented samples mostly collected from one stratum, dated ca. 1000 B.C.E.,...

This is a reply to a rejoinder to our work in the Negev Highlands (Shahack-Gross and Finkelstein 2015) recently published by Bruins and van der Plicht in this journal (2017a). It addresses archaeological method and practice related to the way evidence for the timing of dry farming in the arid Negev Highlands, Israel, has been obtained. We highlight...

Animal gathering enclosures are fenced areas where domestic animals are corralled. A common phenomenon in all types of animal gathering enclosures is the accumulation of dung deposits within roofed, semiroofed and unroofed structures. This chapter focuses on experimental, ethnoarchaeological and archaeological studies of stabling dung deposits. The...

Ichthyoarchaeological evidence is uncommon at ancient hunter-gatherer sites from various regions and timeframes. This research contributes to the development of microarchaeological techniques useful for identifying fishing economies in situations where classifiable bones are unavailable. Specifically, traces of heat altered bone mineral in domestic...

The late Middle Palaeolithic (MP) settlement patterns in the Levant included the repeated use of caves and open landscape sites. The fossil record shows that two types of hominins occupied the region during this period—Neandertals and Homo sapiens. Until recently, diagnostic fossil remains were found only at cave sites. Because the two populations...

Archaeological surveys of the Negev Highlands show that the settlement history of this arid environment oscillated widely over time. This observation is almost entirely based on scant sherd assemblages from surveys, with only a few chronometric ages from one or two archaeological features at a given site. The reasons for the scarcity of chronometri...

Since the influential work of Michael B. Schiffer on formation processes has been published in 1987, much has advanced on the part of environmental formation processes also known as N-transforms. Most new knowledge is the result of research conducted by geoarchaeologists. On the theoretical level, a huge leap forward was made with the realization t...

Modern archaeology in the Near East has paid little attention to construction materials and techniques of monumental architecture within the forming cities of the Bronze Age. We present here a study of plastered surfaces in a Middle Bronze Age palace located at Tel Kabri, a Canaanite polity in the southern Levant that was connected to the Aegean wo...

Obtaining accurate age determinations from minerals in archaeological ash is a major unsolved issue in radiocarbon ( ¹⁴ C) dating. This is because the original ¹⁴ C content of calcite, the main component of ash, is altered by isotopic exchange. Pyrogenic aragonite, another mineral phase recently discovered in ash, might preserve its ¹⁴ C signature...

Several micro-archaeological methods are suggested in this study in order to identify cess deposits. These methods were deployed at a Near Eastern mound (Megiddo, Israel), yet are applicable to any archaeological site anywhere in the world. The study presented here, was performed on a 2–3 mm thick yellowish fibrous material, ca. 40 × 15 cm in size,...

Many famous archaeological sites have been subjected to destructive fires, whether hostile or accidental, including Near Eastern cities constructed largely of mud-brick. But how long did it take to burn down a city The mud-bricks themselves provide a valuable record. By heating experimental bricks of different sizes, shapes and compositions to high...

Massive settlement activity characterizes the arid Negev Highlands during the Intermediate Bronze Age (ca. 2500–1950 BCE). However, the underlying subsistence basis of this population is poorly understood. Recent microarchaeological work at Iron Age sites in the Negev Highlands has shown the potential for recovering direct evidence for subsistence...

Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating is widely applied to sediments in paleoenvironmental sciences. However, there are only limited examples determining the age of archaeological stone structures by OSL using dust deposits. The age of dust deposits associated with ancient buildings may be used to date the onset of settlement (sediment bel...

Middle Paleolithic human occupation in the Levant (250–50 ka ago) has been recorded in roofed (cave and rockshelter) and open-air sites. Research at these different types of sites yielded different perspectives on the Middle Paleolithic human behavior and evolution. Until recently, open-air Middle Paleolithic sites in the Levant were found in three...

During the ongoing excavations of Area Q at Tel Megiddo, a variety of on-site geoarchaeological analytical methods have been used in the study of Iron Age occupations dating to the Iron Age IIA. The aim of this approach is to optimally combine macroarchaeology with microarchaeology in order to reconstruct activities that were carried out within an...

An intercommunity exercise was carried out between July 2011 and May 2013 among practitioners of archaeological micromorphology. The exercise was designed to quantitatively evaluate the accuracy of basic material identification using petrography only. Over 30 people participated. Participants were asked to provide general as well as detailed (miner...

Opaline phytoliths are important microfossils used for paleoecological and archaeological reconstructions that are primarily based on relative ratios of specific morphotypes. Recent studies have shown that phytolith assemblages are prone to post-depositional alteration involving partial dissolution, however, the manner in which partial dissolution...

Microarchaeological methods, especially those focused on geoarchaeology and radiocarbon dating, have revolutionized the manner in which the Iron Age settlement peak in the Negev Highlands is interpreted. We review here results from field and laboratory studies conducted at two Iron Age sites (Atar Haroa and Nahal Boqer) compared to one Byzantine/ E...