AMMAN — Neolithic mega-sites in Eastern Jordan (the Black Desert) emerged in the 9th millennium BP (around 7,000 BC) as, large seasonal, pastoral-foraging communities.

 

These sites featured dense, complex stone structures, including, corrals, and, "mega structures" used for ritual or community functions, reflecting a specialised economy based on, sheep/goat, pastoralism and hunting of gazelle by using tramps called desert kites.

 

The main mega-sites in the Black Desert are: Wisad Pools and Wadi Qattafi. There are other important sites in the area that Professor David Kennedy identified during his Google Earth searches: Dhuweilla, Ghirqa, Ghusayn and Bakhita.

 

Bakhita and Ghusayn rival Wisad Pool in terms of residential buildings discovered by archaeologists.

 

At the current stage of field research, it is not possible to estimate the population of any of the mega-sites, principally, because it can't be determined how many of the residences were occupied simultaneously, said Professor Emeritus Gary Rollefson.

 

Rollefson added that there seems to be identifiable communities of contemporaneous households during the Late Neolithic as evidenced by the presence of nine 7th millennium BC residential units on the south slope of Mesa 4 in the Wadi Qattafi.

 

"Eight millennium eleven hut-and-corral units cluster in the same area. On the other hand, it is puzzling, for example, why 287 houses - all constructed to similar plans - are scattered around Mesa 7," Rollefson said.

 

The professor noted that the distribution is not rand Black Desert raises the questions, why did they not occur earlier than the Late Neolithic? Why did they disappear?

 

Rainfall was about the same in the PPNB as during the Late Neolithic, and the severe drop in rainfall during the mid-4th millennium BC resulted that the area became a harsh desert.

 

The growth and persistence of Late Neolithic mega-sites in the 9th and 8th millennium BP probably emerged as a consequence of a new subsistence technology: An industrial scale killing of gazelles using kites as hunting traps.

 

"A strong indication of the efficacy of mass gazelle slaughter has been shown by the excavation of a kite-related camp dated to the very end of the 9th/beginning of the 8th millennium BP at Jibal Al Khashabiyeh at the eastern edge of the Jafr Basin in the limestone landscape, where a bone pit at the camp contained 148 animals, with gazelle accounting for 99 per cent of the bones," Rollefson underlined.

 

If gazella adults produce c. 15 kilogrammes of meat each, the bone pit represents about 2,200 kilogrammes of meat that, if suitable methods for preserving it, would last a group of 10 households 140-150 days at a consumption rate of 0.5 kg/day/adult, the professor calculated.

 

Since it seems that the LPPNB and Late Neolithic inhabitants of the Black Desert were herders of sheep and goats in addition to hunters of wild fauna, the butchering of their domestic herds would have been unnecessary with the abundant harvesting of gazelle.

 

"The success of using kites was enhanced using dogs that stampeded the animals into the traps. In addition to the massive amounts of meat, gazelle also provided hides, which were valuable trade items with farming communities to the west," Rollefson underscored.