living space, temporality and community ...

Living Space, Temporality and Community Segmentation: Interpreting Late Neolithic Settlement in Northern Syria Peter M.M.G. Akkermans (Leiden University, Faculty of Archaeology)

This article considers the nature and scale of Late Neolithic communities in northern Syria, primarily on the basis of the excavations at Tell Sabi Abyad. Settlement in the 7th millennium cal. bce mainly occurred in the form of groupings of small and short-lived, spatially segregated occupations less than 1 ha in extent. The habitations frequently shifted back and forth over and between the sites, often within the span of a few decades or a single generation. Evidence for any form of institutionalized leadership is absent in these settlements, each of which was simply too small to permit much social differentiation between its inhabitants. Introduction

Our current understanding of culture and society in Syria and the Levant in the Neolithic period, ca. 9600-5300 cal. bce, has taken shape through excavation and survey within a relatively short period of time – a mere 80 to 90 years. The immense past brought back to memory, fragmentarily as it may be, has been given renewed meaning by us in line with the prevailing (predominantly western) beliefs concerning the development of society, emphasizing such matters as production, economic growth, ever-evolving social progress, and increasing community complexity. The received view tends to describe the Neolithic era as a momentous break with the past and the abandonment of the traditional, many thousands of years-old hunter-gatherer way of life, in favor of a reliance on food production by means of agriculture and stock raising in permanent villages. People allegedly consented to a ‘revolution’ in the field of subsistence and production, which in its turn enabled a ‘rise of civilization’ in the millennia that followed. Many authors see the change as the expression of a fundamental transformation of society set in motion in the 10th millennium cal. bce, involving an adjustment to a set of societal values and meanings wholly different from the previous period of forager culture. The most striking of these developments includes the appearance

of social and economic strategies for the taming of the wild, a changing perception of the relationship between humans and nature, an increase of notions of territoriality, and a shift in thinking that involved new types of settlement, burial, subsistence, and material (Hodder 1990; Watkins 1992; Cauvin 1994). Continuit y and change

The preceding perspective is not without its difficulties. There is, for example, good evidence that the shift from the Epipalaeolithic to the Neolithic periods in Syria and the Levant was much less distinct than is often believed (e.g., Akkermans 2004 and references therein). There can be little doubt that the pattern of settlement at the onset of the Neolithic showed considerable continuity with what had gone before, with the emphasis still on small and short-term, mobile occupation. For a very long time, the practice of settling down permanently seems to have concerned only a very small number of people. Between ca. 10,000 and 7500 cal. bce, the sedentary lifestyle remained limited to a handful of small and dispersed sites less than 1 ha in size with evidence of longlasting, though not necessarily year-round occupation. Most communities in the early part of the Neolithic period seem to have preferred mobility to permanent stay at fixed places (Akkermans and Schwartz 2003). In this respect, it is not surprising that a considerable continuity from the Epipalaeolithic to the Neolithic also involves the mode of subsistence, with the small Neolithic groups retaining traditional hunting and gathering as a primary means of food procurement for thousands of years. The work at sites such as Mureybet and Jerf al-Ahmar in Syria, Göbekli Tepe in Turkey, Nachcharini in Lebanon, Iraq ed-Dubb in Jordan and Netiv Hagdud in Israel has made it clear that up to the mid-8th millennium cal. bce people almost everywhere relied on the intensive exploitation of the wild to a very considerable extent, by collecting a wide range of wild plants with edible seeds or fruits, and by hunting a broad spectrum of

L i v i n g S p a c e , T e m p o r a l i t y a n d C o m m u n i t y S e g m e n t a t i o n : I n t e r p r e t i n g L a t e N e o l i t h i c S e ttl e m e n t i n N o r t h e r n S y r i a

I n t e r p r e t i n g t h e L a t e N e o li t h i c o f U p p e r M e s o p o t a mi a

Abstr act

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Figure 4.1. Map of Syria and the location of the main sites mentioned in Chapter 4.


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wild animals. Although agriculture is frequently accorded the paramount role in the development of the Neolithic, the introduction of a farming economy in its fully-fledged form took place relatively late in the Neolithic sequence, after ca. 7500 cal. bce. The few attempts at cereal cultivation in earlier periods must each have had highly restricted, local implications, as there is little or nothing to suggest an intensive, widespread use of domesticated cereals or any other domesticated resource at this time. Most communities were not tied to the farming economy at all or in a selective manner only, until very late in the Neolithic sequence. Another problem lies in the pace of change in the Neolithic and the intentionality thereof. The often-used phrase ‘Neolithic Revolution’ for the transition to farming and the range of changes in society that came with it at the beginning of the Holocene seems appropriate, when viewed against the preceding hundreds of thousands of years of hunting and gathering in small bands; the term emphasizes both the speed with which the shift took place – within a few millennia – and the fundamental effect that it had on human life in the long run (cf. Childe 1936; Redman 1978). However, the concept of a Neolithic revolution is of little or no relevance, if reviewed from what we may call the ‘human perspective,’ i.e., individuals and the duration of their lives – a few dozen years. If we accept an average life expectancy of about 25 to 35 years in the Neolithic (Cohen 1977, 1989), the completion of the Neolithic transition must have taken a hundred generations or more… Occupation sequences and associated trends in material culture at many sites confirm an overall very slow rate of (perceptible) change in the Neolithic, often reflected in the archaeological record not before the passing of many decades or even centuries. In this respect it can be questioned whether Neolithic people themselves were always aware of

the unfolding of many of the developments in economy, ideology, material culture or social organization, which we refer to as ‘Neolithization.’ The reasons for change may often have been temporary, individual or situational; and once the change was made, later generations may have carried on the lifestyle of their predecessors without concerning themselves with, or without having knowledge of, the reasons for its original implementation. Its consistency was then simply understood as ‘the way things are always done’ (cf. Wiessner 1984 and the various contributions in Stark 1998). Of course, this is not to say that the Neolithic communities were without a memory or past. There can be no doubt that the very slow rate of change by itself emphasizes the paramount role given by these groups to traditions, continuities, and past experiences. We should not underestimate the dynamics of the Neolithic communities, nor their abilities to actively modify both the natural and cultural environments, in which they played their part. People were knowledgeable and flexible, and capable of innovation. But it would also be wise not to overstate the case for deliberate change and ‘revolution’ (see also the discussion on the role of the earliest pottery in cultural transitions in the Late Neolithic; cf. Nieuwenhuyse, Akkermans and Van der Plicht 2010). The processes of change underlying the Neolithic transition, as we see it today, were often developments in the long term; however, it is important to realize that their conception and implementation combined the efforts of many individuals in succession. ‘It is the shorter-term changes which reproduce and create the longer-term’ (Hodder 1987:5). People themselves brought about the changes, although each for their own purposes. The reasons for a person or community to either adopt, modify or reject the change may often have been highly diverse and easily elude archaeological investigation. However, an emphasis on the long-term development, at

The 5 ha-mound of Tell Sabi Abyad I seen from the northwest. The excavations in the so-called Operation III in the northwestern part of the site are in full swing.

the expense of the short-term, human perspective, tends to conceal not only the people who set the changes in motion, but also their motives or the circumstances of transition. In this respect, it should come as no surprise that we still have difficulties in coming to terms with some of the major innovations in the Neolithic, such as the rise of the village community and the transition to farming. We usually look for rather stereotyped, unilateral causes and developments that supposedly hold true for very large regions and periods, without paying full tribute to the myriad of individual events, personal choices, short-term strategies and uncertain perspectives underlying the changes. Change was rarely wholesale, but usually selective and punctuated in space and time. For example, the shift to increased village life in Syria began in different places at different times. For a very long time, the sedentary lifestyle seems to have appealed only to a small number of people at a few locales until the mid-8th millennium cal. bce. Neolithic people preferred small, mobile forager communities to the relatively rare, isolated farming villages (Akkermans and Schwartz 2003). The making of the Neolithic involved the participation of thousands of people over a very long period of time – many people who may have had many reasons to change (or, of course, not to change) over many years. In the words of Colin Haselgrove (1995:82): ‘Failure to isolate individual processes at work (…) may be leading us both to confuse what may be relatively superficial and reversible changes with underlying structural transformation, and to unjustified generalization.’ Limited chronological control and other difficulties in reading the archaeological record tend to obscure the individual and his/her efforts in prehistory, yet people as a community left substantial traces of their activities in the form of many settlement mounds with often long histories and numerous ‘flat’ or thin sites with evidence of temporary occupation. Substantial proof in this respect comes from the valley of the Balikh river, a minor tributary of the Euphrates river in northern Syria. Although the region, about 100 km long

and 5-12 km wide, has a rather barren, degraded appearance today, it was characterized until the early decades of the 20th century by a highly diffuse river pattern dividing the river water into numerous channels, creating riverine forests and marshy areas (see e.g., the accounts by early travelers in the region, such as Sachau 1883 and Mallowan 1946). The area has been a major focus of archaeological inquiry over the last three decades, including regional survey as well as extensive excavation at a number of Neolithic sites, most noteworthy Tell Sabi Abyad. The purpose of the remainder of this paper is to briefly consider the nature and scale of Neolithic occupation in the Balikh region in the 7th millennium cal. bce and its implication for settlement of this period in other parts of Upper Mesopotamia and the northern Levant (Figure 4.1). In addition to a series of small, short-lived settlements, the Balikh basin also contained a few Late Neolithic sites with long sequences, considerable occupational continuity, and sometimes monumental visibility, such as Tell Sabi Abyad (Figure 4.2). It is tempting to ascribe regional importance to these sites, yet caution is required; as will be shown below, settlement was not always what it seems to have been at first sight. Si t e g r o u p i n g

Although Neolithic occupations in the Balikh region were sometimes isolated in the landscape, many sites of the 8th to early 6th millennium cal. bce did not conform to this norm. A main characteristic is the occurrence of settlement in groups, sometimes comprising up to seven or eight mounds. The clustering is perceptible from the very beginning of permanent settlement in the region and is maintained throughout the Neolithic period. The paired sites are usually found at a distance between a few dozen to, at most, a few hundred metres from each other (Akkermans 1993:163-165). The work at Tell Sabi Abyad provides a clear example. The group as we see it today consists of four small, discrete sites, Tells Sabi Abyad I to IV, located in a roughly linear northsouth orientation at very short intervals of 100-150 m (Figure



Figure 4.2.

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tained their spatial boundaries and their own, individual histories of development in terms of settlement, chronology, etc., as is shown by the excavations carried out at the various mounds. Contrary to the impression created at first sight, the large, 5 ha-Tell Sabi Abyad I was not a single, cohesive site, but consisted of several low, contiguous mounds, each with its own history of habitation and partly merged in the course of time (Figure 4.4). Four such small settlement mounds arose in the 7th millennium cal. bce, two of them in the early half of the period and another two mounds to the east of the original ones after 6200 cal. bce. Erosion layers and heavy Bronze-Age overburdens obscure the early deposits, fill in the saddles between the mounds, and add to the illusion of a single site (Akkermans et al. 2006). Altogether, it appears that Neolithic settlement at Tell Sabi Abyad comprised a scattering of at least seven small mounds, four mounds together comprising Tell Sabi Abyad I, plus the three sites of Tells Sabi Abyad II, III and IV, although the sites were not all used contemporaneously.


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Small-scale set tlement

Figure 4.3. The cluster of Neolithic mounds at Tell Sabi Abyad. The sites are at very short distance from each other.

4.3). Originally the sites may have been even closer, given that their earliest layers are deeply buried between 2-4 m of postNeolithic sediment. But despite their proximity, the sites re-

The various mounds together forming Tell Sabi Abyad were each small, between roughly 0.5 ha and 1 ha – a characteristic that they shared with most of the Neolithic sites elsewhere in the Balikh region (Akkermans 1993:146ff). Significantly, settlement at these sites appears to have been even more restricted, often comprising only a small portion of each mound, leaving large areas open and unused. The best evidence in this respect stems from the large exposure in the so-called Operation III on the northwestern mound of Tell Sabi Abyad I, with its long and continuous sequence of 7th-millennium cal. bce settlement unearthed over an area up to 2100 m2. Highly relevant were the upper buildTell Sabi Abyad I. Plan of the mound showing the location of the various Operations, as well as the four low, contiguous mounds, merged in the course of time. The two western mounds (investigated in Operations III-V) arose in the early 7th millennium bce, while the two eastern mounds (investigated in Operations I-II) arose mainly after 6200 bce.

Figure 4.4.

Figure 4.5. Tell Sabi Abyad I. View of the extensive excavations. The trenches cover an area of 40 m wide and 60 m deep. Neolithic architecture belonging to Level A3 is visible in the large trenches in the front.

0.25 ha in extent, have been found at the sites of Tell Sabi Abyad II (Verhoeven and Akkermans 2000) and, very recently, Tell Sabi Abyad III. The settlements had large open yards at their outskirts, which were used for the disposal of ashes and other domestic waste, as well as for the construction of often briefly used fireplaces and large, sometimes very deep pits. Extensive parts of these midden areas were characterized by the ramshackle, but partially still standing walls of earlier, ruined buildings. Similar vestiges of previous habitation often stood to some height between the architecture within the settlements. Former residential areas went unoccupied during later phases (and vice versa), habitation contracted and expanded briskly over various parts of the site, and the number of buildings in each phase of settlement was (sometimes highly) restricted. Figure 4.6. Tell Sabi Abyad I, Operation III. Plan of building Level A4B, showing the area of settlement and the associated architecture. This phase is radiocarbon-dated ca. 6430-6395 bce.



ing Levels A4 to A1, radiocarbon-dated between 6450 and 6220 cal. bce and excavated virtually in their entirety (Figure 4.5). These occupations were roughly between 1200 m2 (Level A1) and 2000 m2 (Level A4) in areal extent high on the northwestern mound, leaving the outskirts and gentle slopes of the site uninhabited. Probably there was another, contemporaneous sequence of habitations of more or less similar size on the southwestern mound, slightly farther to the south in what is termed Operations IV-V, spatially separated from Operation III by extensive open yards at the edges of the individual occupations and in the saddles between the mounds (cf. Akkermans et al. 2006). All in all, late 7th-millennium cal. bce settlement at Tell Sabi Abyad I may have comprised perhaps 0.5 ha, distributed over a site covering 2 ha. Similar tiny late 7th-millennium cal. bce occupations, each less than

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Tell Sabi Abyad I, Operation III. Plan of building Level A3B, showing the area of settlement and the associated architecture. This phase is radiocarbon-dated ca. 6395-6375 bce.


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Figure 4.7.

In the case of the extensive Operation III exposure on the northwestern mound of Tell Sabi Abyad I, building Level A4 had up to 14 mudbrick structures dated at about 6400 cal. bce, comprising both relatively small, single-roomed buildings covering about 15 m², as well as large, multi-roomed edifices up to 64 m² in extent (Figure 4.6); their layout is strongly reminiscent of the architecture at contemporary Bouqras on the Euphrates in eastern Syria (see Akkermans et al. 1983). In the next Levels A3 and A2, around 6400 to 6325 cal. bce, there were only five or six buildings differing little in size and shape from the preceding period (Figure 4.7). The upper Level A1, ca. 6325-6220 cal. bce, had about ten such dwellings. Although the buildings in Operation III were all freestanding, they tend to occur in groups of two to five structures, with large open yards and wide passages between these clusters (Figure 4.8). In some cases the groups were made of several tripartite, multi-roomed structures, roughly similar in layout and size, while in other instances they consisted of one or two large edifices surrounded by much smaller auxiliary features. Such clusters may each represent one or more households, of which the members shared living spaces and architectural constructions of different kinds. It is still difficult to establish the composition of these households, as well as the overall number of people that made use of the different occupations through time. Any estimates of population size should not be based on number and size of the individual buildings, but on the groups of related structures, each of which probably stands for a household consisting of a married couple and their children and, possibly, other relatives. When furthermore taking into account the small areas of settlement, the limited size of most buildings, and the general architectural variability, it seems reasonable to assume that the population per phase was restricted to a few dozen persons at the most, distributed over perhaps two to ten households. Current estimates range from about ten households in

Level A4, to four in Level A3, to two or three in Level A2, and to maximal nine in Level A1. A detailed analysis is underway (Kaneda in preparation). Usually the buildings within each cluster were erected piece by piece over the years and gradually evolved into the ultimate array of structures, reflecting the needs of the local households. There is good evidence that the composition of the groups of buildings was highly variable, as were the buildings themselves, in terms of layout, size and elaboration (interior white plaster, wall decoration, installations, etc.). Evidently the architecture at the site should not be viewed as consisting of uniform structures all used for roughly identical purposes; rather, it was made of many different buildings, occurring in ever-changing constellations and possibly serving many purposes through their use-life, from shelter and daily living, to manufacture and storage, and the expression of a wide spectrum of social relationships (in agreement with the often-voiced notion that houses have ‘biographies,’ as have their occupants; see e.g., Bailey 1990; Tringham 1991; Gerritsen 2003). Information similar to that from Operation III comes from the late phases in the large Operation I exposure on the southeastern mound of Tell Sabi Abyad I. For instance, the Level 6 Burnt Village with its rich inventories, destroyed by a violent fire at around 6000 cal. bce, was confined to at least 12 rectangular and round buildings over an area less than 1 ha on the southeastern mound, although another, much smaller, contemporaneous occupation of one or two houses was probably present on the northeastern mound (in Operation II; Akkermans et al. 2006). Subsequent Level 5 settlement in Operation I seems to have been limited to a kind of ribbon-building, about 0.5 ha in extent, along the southern slope of the southeastern mound. The next Level 4 village stretched over a larger area on the eastern and southern portion of the site, although its precise outline is still uncertain. The upper Levels 3-1 or Early Halaf habitations, ca.

5950-5850 cal. bce, occurred in two or three small, isolated nodes on the summits of the various mounds, altogether less than 1 ha in size (Akkermans et al. 2006:151). C o m m u n i t y s e g m e n tat i o n

The above has some important implications: Not only was the local community throughout the 7th and early 6th millennia cal. bce much smaller than it seemed to have been at first sight, but it also occurred in the shape of a number of contemporaneous, but spatially segregated occupations at (very) short distances of each other. Throughout the larger part of the 7th millennium cal. bce there were three or four such tiny, dispersed hamlets contemporaneously in use at the various Sabi Abyad mounds. After 6200 cal. bce the area of settlement contracted to the main site of Tell Sabi Abyad I, where there were several small habitations at different spots from one generation to another. We are still in the dark about the composition and nature of the social groups, which made use of the scattered dwelling places with their handful of houses, occupied for shorter or longer periods of time. It seems reasonable to assert that the small habitations, given their layout and discrete architecture for shelter, storage, etc., were each built around one or more households, which had chosen to live and work together in specific locales and which were primarily tied together along lines of kinship. Individual, kin-related groups may have intentionally distinguished themselves spatially from the other, nearby groups at the site of Tell Sabi Abyad as a whole, as it may have helped them to underscore aspects of descent, lineage, and the family collective. The spatial distinction may also reflect the relative autonomy and self-sufficiency of each group of households in terms of subsistence, production and storage, built upon the group’s shared labor and space. However, we should not consider the household groups to be each entirely independent or autarchic. In regard of their contemporaneity and very close proximity, the small occupa-

tions dispersed over the Sabi Abyad mounds must have formed, as it were, a single, larger community of their own, to be distinguished from similar communities at find spots elsewhere in the region. Moreover, the groups had chosen to remain together at the Sabi Abyad mounds for prolonged periods of time and not to settle individually and at free will elsewhere in the region – constant affiliation with the community at large, shared overall residence, and attachment to place, it seems, were important to them, despite the considerable autonomy that each household group had. In sum, habitation at Neolithic Tell Sabi Abyad from the very beginning was not in the form of a singular, consistent site, but comprised several dispersed occupations, each of which grew into a low, but distinct mound due to sustained (though not necessarily always continuous) settlement over often long periods of time. Living in small, separate groups, often within the frame of larger agglomerations, was probably a basic, structuring principle at the foundation of local Neolithic society. S h if t i n g s e t t l e m e n t

Although the Sabi Abyad mounds themselves were used continually for many hundreds of years, the excavations provide us with lengthy, complex sequences of Late Neolithic settlement in distinct areas, some partly contemporaneous, others wholly differentiating, with sometimes explicit hiatuses in the local stratigraphic record. Residential mobility, it seems, was very considerable, as buildings and their households rarely remained in a single location for the duration of more than one settlement phase or the span of a single generation (see below). Occupation at Tell Sabi Abyad regularly shifted back- and forward over the various mounds or from one mound to the other in the course of time; habitations were in use for a given period, then left to their fate, either for good or for reoccupation after sometimes long intervals. There were constant intra-site movements, localized abandonments and



Figure 4.8. Tell Sabi Abyad I, Operation III. The well-preserved house remains from Level A2B, radiocarbondated at about 6365-6335 bce.

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new foundations over the generations. In this respect, Tell Sabi Abyad compares to the small Halaf site of Fıstıklı Höyük in Southeastern Anatolia, roughly 0.5 ha in extent, with evidence of a series of periodically shifting hamlets, interspersed with short-lived camps (Bernbeck and Pollock et al. 2003). The work in the southeastern portion of Tell Sabi Abyad I (Operation I) may serve to illustrate this point. Excavation has revealed a sequence of at least ten building levels, radiocarbon dated between 6125-5845 cal. bce (Akkermans and Van der Plicht in press). With very few exceptions, these levels each show a developmental cycle of, first, the construction and use of architectural features; second, the abandonment of these buildings; and third, the gradual collapse and infill of the ruins with ashes, domestic waste, wall remnants, etc., until they were wholly covered and hidden from view. Subsequently new architecture returned and the entire cycle repeated itself. It is important to realize that the breaks between the individual levels were localized and not general; the common occurrence of ashes, sherds, animal bone (slaughter offal) and other refuse in the fill between the layers clearly shows that the site as a whole was not deserted. The people who discarded their waste, etc., in the formerly inhabited area must have lived at short distance elsewhere at the mound (although obviously outside the trenches under excavation). The implications are twofold. First, the repetitive pattern of habitation at one time and desertion at another time (and vice versa) clearly shows that people at the site did not always remain in the same place, but continually shifted in the course of generations from one area to another. Second, this constant intra-site shift in the area of occupation, in association with the segmented nature of the local community, implies that extensive parts of Tell Sabi Abyad were left unused at any given moment. However, there is another, third, implication related to the pattern of shifting settlement, which, as will be argued below, is the overall short-lived nature of the various occupations. S h o r t-t e r m s e t t l e m e n t

There can be little doubt that the occupational sequence established in Operation I at Tell Sabi Abyad is incomplete, in the sense that it does not (or, at the least, insufficiently) account for the ‘intermediate’ occupations, which brought their ashes and other domestic waste to the areas previously inhabited, but which lived themselves elsewhere at the site. At present, the Operation I sequence consists of minimally ten building levels, but it seems more feasible to assume a sequence comprising about twice as many levels. The emerging pattern entails frequent and highly dynamic change within very short time spans: While the current sequence with its ten building levels covers altogether about 350 years between roughly 6200 and 5850 cal. bce (Akkermans and Van der Plicht in press), or, say, 35 years per building phase, the adjusted, doubled sequence would allow for only 17.5 years per building level. Similar evidence comes from the work in Operation III at Tell Sabi Abyad I. Several hundreds of radiocarbon dates are

currently available from this Operation III, the occupational sequence of which has been extensively dated level by level (cf. Van der Plicht et al. 2011). On the basis of both these many radiocarbon dates and the detailed stratigraphic sequence, allowing for Bayesian statistics, it appears that a single building level at the site typically lasted between 15 and 40 years, with most levels occupied for periods on the order of 20-30 years and with a few outliers up to 80-90 years.1 The overall brevity of settlement is further emphasized when taking into account that each of these phases of, say, 20-30 years comprised the entire cycle of local habitation, from its foundation and daily use, to its final abandonment and lying waste for a sometimes prolonged span of time. In short, the use-life of most occupations appears to have been brief – a few decades within the span of a single generation. Although the mounds of Tell Sabi Abyad themselves remained in use virtually continuously for many hundreds of years, the life histories of the individual habitations and their architecture were entirely within a human lifetime. Houses were frequently modified over the years (repairs, renovations, etc.), but they were used for no more than one generation; they were tied to their specific occupants, who may have raised and used them; and at the time of the occupants’ death (or other event which ended the household life cycle) the buildings came to an end as well. Houses, it seems, did not survive their inhabitants, although there was no common practice of deliberate destruction. Once abandoned, the structures seem to have been simply left to their fate, thus contributing to the warren of ruins in various states of decay in the settlement areas. The houses that were left to fall into ruins usually gradually filled in with collapsed wall remnants, as well as ashes and other domestic waste thrown into them. Intentional, wholesale leveling of the former architecture took place in a few cases only, usually, it appears, with subsequent reconstruction in mind. As pointed out before, transience and the constant, generational relocation of dwellings over short distances was typical for the 7th-millennium cal. bce communities – a reflection of the practice of shifting settlement. It is important to realize that this practice of house abandonment after two or three decades at the most (and the associated need to build a new house) was undoubtedly perceived in social and cultural terms in the first place. Environmental or technical constraints must have had a minimal effect, since ethnographic parallels and comparisons with modern traditional architecture in Syria clearly show that the life-time of mudbrick houses can easily be extended for much longer than one generation, through regular maintenance and repair (e.g., Pütt 2005). 1

These outliers primarily comprise the lowest levels of settlement reached only in the small, but deep trenches, with the least insight into depositional variability and, hence, the least chronological control. Each of the lower levels should probably be subdivided into two or more sublevels, but further areal exposure is required to prove this assumption. While a use-life of 45-90 years has been suggested for buildings at Çatalhöyük in Central Anatolia (Cessford 2002), a span of 30-35 years per building level has been proposed for Fıstıklı Höyük in Southeastern Anatolia (Campbell 2007).

La r g e s i t e s , l a r g e s e t t l e m e n t s ?

Although most Neolithic settlements were undoubtedly small, there were in the early part of the period also a handful of large sites, such as Abu Hureyra in Syria, Ain Ghazal and Basta in Jordan, and Beisamoun in Palestine – places covering as many as 7 ha to 16 ha, which according to widespread opinion were major population centers and the focal points of social and economic innovation (e.g., Rollefson 1987; Moore, Hillman and Legge 2000). Similar substantial sites existed in the later part of the Neolithic, such as the 6th-millennium cal. bce sites of Mounbatah and Nisibin in northeastern Syria, and Domuztepe in southeastern Turkey (Akkermans 1993; Campbell et al. 1999; Nieuwenhuyse 2000). But were there ever such settlements over ten to twenty times the size of the usual community in Upper Mesopotamia in the Neolithic, or could it be that the pairing of sites accounts for their exceptional size? Do we perhaps confuse site size with settlement size? The issue is relevant, because we often ascribe regional importance and even political power to these large sites, and because we tend to associate them with hierarchy and centrality – cornerstones in the emergence of societal complexity. Yet it is astonishing not to find consistent signs of elite residences, differentiated wealth distribution, or other forms of ranking at the large sites (nor at any of the small sites, for that matter). It is often difficult to fully evaluate the layout of these large sites, because of their modern overburdens or because they are seriously damaged by agriculture, road works or other intrusions. Estimates of settlement areas are usually highly arbitrary. It is even more difficult to establish contemporaneity of occupation in these areas, other than in broad phases of sometimes several centuries in duration – time frames far beyond the temporalities of the individuals who created these communities. Often simultaneous settlement all over a site is simply assumed, rather than proven. Inspection of site plans reveals that many if not all large mounds are basically paired or merged sites with evidence of restricted, dispersed or shifting occupation, similar to the Sabi Abyad grouping. For example, Tell Mounbatah, with its 20 ha or more the largest Neolithic site in the Balikh region, com-

prises at least six individual, but merged mounds of different size and height, while 16 ha-Abu Hureyra on the Euphrates has four or five (if not more) of such merged mounds (cf. Akkermans 1993; Moore, Hillman and Legge 2000). Similar site clusters also occur elsewhere in Syria, such as at El Kerkh in the Idlib area, at El Kowm in the central desert, and at Kashkashok and Seker al-Aheimar in the Khabur headwaters (e.g., Dornemann 1986; Tsuneki et al. 1997; Nishiaki 2001; Nishiaki and Le Mière 2005). The very large 6th-millennium cal. bce, Halaf mound of Kazane Höyük in southeastern Turkey, 15 ha to 20 ha in extent, likewise gave for a dispersed settlement and a differentiated intensity of occupation over the site (Bernbeck, Pollock and Coursey 1999). These were extensive foci of settlement over the ages, although occupation frequently moved between and within the mounds and did not always include the sites in their entirety. The making of these large sites required long periods of time: many centuries and even more generations. Whatever such time frames tell us about the continuity of local settlement, they imply an endless process of construction, maintenance, use, elaboration, replacement and relocation, rather than single, stable occupations that remained unchanged for the larger part of their existence. Settlement was brought about gradually over the lifetimes of many individuals. Evidently, the number of residents usually bears a direct relationship to the area of occupation (the more people, the larger the site), yet such a link is less obvious, if time as a factor in the process of site formation is, as it were, unlimited. For example, let us imagine a settlement 0.5 ha in size, inhabited by seven or eight households, comprising altogether fifty people (taking the often-used figure of a hundred people per hectare as a starting point). Let us also assume that each of the households abandoned their compound once per generation, to rebuild it at another place nearby (because the principal members of the household had died, or because the mudbrick house itself had reached its maximum life-span). It is easy to calculate that this residential group of no more than fifty people would have been able to create a site 10 ha in size within a period of four hundred years or twenty generations. Whether or not we believe this to be a realistic scenario, the main point is that there is no a priori necessity to assume thousands of people in order to account for a large site; site size is defined by many variables, one of which is population, another the passage of time. The practice of counting in centuries and the broad-brush presentation of settlement development over the ages are part of the stock-in-trade of archaeology. We tend to devote relatively little attention to the ‘human perspective’ and change in the short term (i.e., within one or two generations), yet the effects thereof may be profound in the case of a constantly changing regional mosaic characterized by occupations rapidly founded and rapidly deserted. We still struggle with the question of whether the communities at some sites were truly as large (and, implicitly, as complex) as has been proposed, or whether other factors account for their very large size (such as the clustering of individual, though not always contemporaneous mounds). Neither option can be ruled out with certain-



Although houses usually had a restricted life-time, they were sometimes rebuilt once or twice in roughly the same place and on the same alignment over several generations, suggestive of an attachment to place and a concern with ancestry and lineage. The repetitive, multi-generational rebuildings may have been a means to legitimate territorial claims and rights to reoccupy locations (Bailey 1996). It is tempting to ascribe such ancestral rights primarily to groups that were related in kin and descent. Particular areas of settlement may have become a group’s ancestral place, which was associated with ‘the history as well as the future continuity of the descent group. (…) Building a new house (…) would have been simultaneously a strong symbolic expression of continuity and of a new beginning, especially if the old house was torn down before a new one was built’ (Gerritsen 1999:94).

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ty, yet I find little or no reason to believe that the large sites were inherently different from the other sites of this period in Syria. The large sites provide no evidence for leadership, elite buildings, or status differences – characteristics most archaeologists would predict in the case of their presumed role as regional centers. What seems most dramatic about the sites – their huge size – is less astonishing, once we distinguish site size from settlement size: Extensive sites in the form of clustered occupations are found in all parts of Syria and adjacent regions, but extensive settlements are not. E q ua l i t y o r c h i e f ly p o w e r ?

Some years ago Frank Hole has argued that the concept of site hierarchy may not be applicable to the Neolithic (Hole 2000). Aspects of architecture or material culture potentially useful in the recognition of social differentiation do not appear to have been restricted to the large sites or to specific quarters therein; sites large and small look quite alike. Hole (2000: 206207) concludes that ‘… to date, despite gross differences in size and even in apparent quality of constructions, there is no convincing evidence that any site served the function of a political or economic center. (…) There is no reason to think that large sites were organized differently from small settlements.’ To this we could add that the lack of such evidence for hierarchies or explicit socio-political differentiation is primarily due to the fact that the scale of the Neolithic communities was too small to permit a great deal of social distance between its members. There was no need for formally sanctioned institutions of power in communities, which for the larger part consisted of a handful of households only, such as at Tell Sabi Abyad. Let there be no misunderstanding: People were subjected to relations of dominance (the essence of every human society, from the parent-child relationship onwards), and some individuals, groups or families undoubtedly were more powerful than others for a variety of reasons, even in these often very small communities. Yet, any such dependencies were handled face-to-face, rather than in the shape of clear-cut chiefly ranking or a centralized village authority. Leadership in the Neolithic communities was probably temporary and situational, and vested in individuals, who shifted easily from one role to another as daily circumstances required. Authority rested primarily upon age and, perhaps, gender, and elders could assemble in a tribal or village council in times of need and return to domestic activities little different from those performed by the other members of the community. In principle, access to the highest positions, determined by age, would eventually have been open to all. A strongly egalitarian ethic was in force throughout the Neolithic, with broad social, economic and political networks based upon fluid alliances, the recognition of cultural unity, and a sense of shared history, and centuries of intergroup marriage and trade (cf. Hole 1983; Akkermans and Schwartz 2003). In view of the growing evidence for considerable geographical and cultural diversity, it would be wise not simply to judge sites everywhere alike without further questioning. However, I venture to maintain that most, if not all, of what

we consider to be large sites were in fact either the outcome of continuously shifting occupation over a restricted area, or simply extended, aggregated versions of the many small villages and hamlets, rather than prehistoric ‘urban centers’ with all their usual connotations (cf. Akkermans et al. 2006:151). In this perspective, the lack of consistent signs of a hierarchical social segmentation comes as no surprise. In addition, it appears that archaeologists sometimes simply assume the existence of such signs and the resulting complexity, rather than affirming them on the basis of the archaeological record. For example, seals and sealings are often linked to elites restricting access to goods for their own social and economic advantage, yet the evidence is tentative at best for the Neolithic period. It is difficult to reconcile the often vast number of different seals and seal impressions with the presence of a restricted elite group. Elsewhere it has been argued that the sealing system was a simple and flexible means of control over property, in the hands of either leaders or commoners (Akkermans and Duistermaat 1996; Duistermaat 2010). Conclusions

Concluding that Neolithic settlements were primarily small and without explicit, institutionalized leadership is, of course, far from saying that these communities were ‘primitive,’ ‘simple,’ or the like. There is good evidence for a dazzling social complexity, of which only a small portion has left its material imprint in the archaeological record. For example, ritual and ceremony were ubiquitous in the Neolithic, with the evidence sometimes spectacular in the case of the architecture or within the realm of the dead, particularly in the early part of the period until ca. 7000 cal. bce (cf. Akkermans and Schwartz 2003). The evidence is less pronounced in the period of our concern – the 7th millennium cal. bce – but not absent (see e.g., Verhoeven 2002). In the foregoing I have argued that segmentation was a main characteristic at the foundation of late Neolithic society. Living in small, dispersed groups was a basic, structuring principle of the period. The practice of segmentation gave shape to the occupations at individual sites, such as Tell Sabi Abyad, but it also had implications for the wider, regional patterns of settlement in northern Syria and adjacent regions. In some cases, occupations were camp sites without permanent installations, used intermittently or for special purposes – there is, I believe, little or no doubt that a considerable part of the Neolithic population relied on mobility to make a living (Akkermans and Schwartz 2003 and references therein). Others were hamlets or villages with a handful of houses in use for shorter or longer periods of time. It seems reasonable to assert that the communities were built around one or more households that also formed units of production and consumption in subsistence activities. While the smallest of these settlements may have been primarily tied together along lines of kinship, such linkages may have been less prominent in the larger villages, where people flow in and out frequently for a variety of reasons, sometimes forming larger aggregations, sometimes smaller groupings. Such a cycle of living together

Dispersion

suitable conditions for farming

exhaustion of the land

good hunting and gathering

depletion of the wild flora and fauna

abundance of local resources for construction and crafts

deterioration of house

search for marriage partners

increase of household

security and defensive alliances

diseases and epidemics

market place

insect infestation and other pests

shrines, shamans and spiritual leaders

sorcery accusations

community feasts

everyday social tensions and disputes

birth of child

death of a household member

in ‘central places’ and subsequently dispersing to new, smaller sites was probably a multi-year process, in view of the investments in house building and the working of the fields, yet there may have been many ad hoc reasons for people to go their own way (table 4.1). Often, the waxing and waning of villages may have depended on all sorts of ordinary, day-today concerns of their inhabitants, rather than on long-term, structural alteration of society over the ages. The dispersal of the population into many small groups probably implied a considerable social and economic autonomy at the site level, although the communities, often within sight of each other, unquestionably maintained regular contacts, practiced systems of exchange, and participated in intercommunity social activities like marriages, funerals, and initiations. Living in small, relatively autonomous groups may have had a considerable adaptive advantage in terms of community organization and subsistence, particularly in restricted or marginal, fragile environments, where resources were thin on the ground and depletion posed a permanent threat. The efficient, small-scale exploitation of such varied resources did not rely on a single, overall economic system, but required a diverse, flexible set of subsistence practices, depending on local circumstances, seasonality and community preferences. However, not only strategies of subsistence, but also traditions and styles in material culture were undoubtedly far less consistent and uniform than is often assumed. For example, the 6th millennium cal. bce Halaf tradition has long been seen as one of the most homogeneous assemblages in the prehistoric Near East, distributed over a region larger than modern states, but there is a growing amount of evidence for considerable regional and chronological diversity. Future research will make it increasingly clear that the Neolithic included a very wide range of economic and cultural variability, rather than being a unitary phenomenon over place and time. Any discrete, consistent ‘cultures’ or ‘culture areas’ as conventionally understood by archaeologists are past their best; instead we should think of models allowing for a vast array of crisscrossing, overlapping, and intersecting social networks of varying intensity, in which different types of social power were exercised by different groups, whether economic, ideological or political (Mann 1986; Shennan 1989). Although most settlements were not built to last forever, Neolithic people appear to have stayed at a number of localities for a prolonged time, turning them into what seem to have been centers of social engagement. Such places charac-

Table 4.1. Factors contributing to settlement aggregation and dispersion (after Vickers 1989).

terized by public architecture, storage buildings, ritual display, and so on, were not necessarily distinguished by occupation size, but primarily by their permanence and lengthy use over many generations and centuries. In a cultural environment to a considerable extent dominated by short-lived occupation, these sites with their long histories and sometimes monumental visibility added to a developing sense of place and descent; they may have created a notion of primary, ancestral communities – landmarks and meeting places full of history and memories, existing since time immemorial in the minds of the population. They were reminders of the social order, assuring a sense of stability and continuity in time and space. Such a role may well have been fulfilled by single small mounds less than 1 ha, like Jerf al-Ahmar or Dja’de alMughara on the Euphrates river, but also by much larger site aggregations such as Tell Sabi Abyad. The latter site cluster with its restricted, shifting occupation must have been characterized by extensive ruins of previous settlement, which, however, may still have carried social significance, for their associations with shrines, key ancestral figures, or family descent. The ruins themselves had historical meaning to certain groups and were probably recalled in oral histories and the maintenance of certain aspects of tenurial control (Fairhead and Leach 1996:105). The ruined villages were not forgotten, but actively remembered and rebuilt over and over again – they may have held a social prominence amidst a wider group of politically or economically allied communities. References

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