Kristina S. Reed – New Perspectives on an Ancient Phenomenon: The Dolmens of the Southern Levant

"Cult and Interaction in the Early and Intermediate Bronze Ages"
An online workshop hosted by the RIAB Minerva Center and the Institute of Archaeology at Bar-Ilan University
22 April 2021

"New Perspectives on an Ancient Phenomenon: The Dolmens of the Southern Levant" by Kristina S. Reed, Bar-Ilan University

Abstract:
Dolmens appeared on foothills and rocky escarpments of the Southern Levant millennia ago and are an enigma on the landscape. Since being first documented in the early 1800s, many attempts have been made to understand these megalithic structures but there has yet to be a study devoted to dolmens as a regional phenomenon. Their function as burial structures is widely accepted, and current evidence supports dating the ones east of the Jordan Rift Valley to the EB I and those in the Golan Heights and Galilee to the IB/EB IV, but only a small number of intact assemblages have been studied, resulting in lack of concrete proof as to their true function and chronology.

Over the years, there has been a tendency to study dolmens in the Southern Levant as separate entities, rather than on a regional geographic and chronological scale, and some dolmen studies are biased by modern geo-political borders and development needs. My research aims at utilizing the rich corpus of material from past and current dolmen excavations in northern Israel and central Jordan and combining it into a solid foundation of contextual and interpretive data. This will allow better for determination of the dating and function of dolmens in the Southern Levant. To achieve good chronological control, absolute and relative chronology analyses will include pottery typology, 14C, aDNA, and OSL. By applying new methods to this ancient phenomenon, we can better understand the culture, beliefs, practices, and people of the EB and IB Southern Levant.

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