Tinshemet Cave Excavation 2018
Kia ora,
It has certainly been an eventful last few weeks!
On the terrace in front of the cave, Palaeolithic artefacts (worked flint) and bone had become embedded in breccia, and had to be chiselled out. This made the going quite slow.
Inside the Cave:
Last month I participated in an excavation at Tinshemet Cave, a Levantine Middle Palaeolithic archaeological site located in central Israel. The Arabic name for the site is Mughâret al-Watwat ('Cave of the Bat'; Stekelis 1942), for reasons illustrated in the following video:
As a (very basic!) background to the Levantine Middle Palaeolithic (the cited sources provide additional detail for those that are interested):
The Levant is a region comprising of roughly the modern countries and territories of Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, and Palestine. The Levantine Middle Palaeolithic spans a period from around 250,000 - 45,000 years ago (Nishiaki and Akazawa 2018; Shea 2001, 2003). The fossil record shows that during this period both Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) and early anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens) were present in the Levant. The archaeological signature of this region and period (associated with the fossils of both Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans) is the 'Levantine Mousterian' stone tool industry. One notable element of this industry is the use of the prepared-core, or Levallois, flaking technique. Preparation of the core in systematic ways meant that Middle Palaeolithic stone knappers were able to produce fairly standardised points and scrapers.
The Levant is a region comprising of roughly the modern countries and territories of Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, and Palestine. The Levantine Middle Palaeolithic spans a period from around 250,000 - 45,000 years ago (Nishiaki and Akazawa 2018; Shea 2001, 2003). The fossil record shows that during this period both Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) and early anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens) were present in the Levant. The archaeological signature of this region and period (associated with the fossils of both Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans) is the 'Levantine Mousterian' stone tool industry. One notable element of this industry is the use of the prepared-core, or Levallois, flaking technique. Preparation of the core in systematic ways meant that Middle Palaeolithic stone knappers were able to produce fairly standardised points and scrapers.
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| Levallois point production. For the source of this animation, click here. |
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| Levallois points and scrapers on display at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem (2018). |
The Levallois technique is often regarded as a significant milestone in human cognitive evolution, as it requires the knapper to plan several steps ahead to create the desired end-product. Many of the points would likely have been attached (hafted) to a wooden handle to produce spears.
As an aside, the stone tool industry of the roughly contemporaneous European Middle Palaeolithic is also referred to as the Mousterian. The terms Levallois and Mousterian are both derived from place names in France, where they were first recognised. The naming of the Middle Palaeolithic stone tool industry of the Levant region the 'Levantine Mousterian', on the basis of shared elements such as the use of the Levallois technique, is indicative of the wide influence of Western European scholarship in Palaeolithic archaeology. Consistent differences are also now recognised between the industries of the two regions (e.g. the Levallois technique tends to be a less common component of European assemblages; Shea 2003).
The 2018 season at Tinshemet Cave, co-directed by Dr. Yossi Zaidner (the Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Professor Israel Hershkovitz (Tel Aviv University), and Oz Varoner (Ben Gurion University of the Negev), was the third season of excavations at the site. During the first two seasons, human fossils had been discovered associated with a large amount of Middle Palaeolithic stone artefacts and faunal remains. The primary aims of the third season of excavation were the identification of the human species that inhabited the cave during the Middle Palaeolithic and the reconstruction of aspects of their behaviour.
Because the behaviour of Middle Palaeolithic Homo sapiens in the Levant is archaeologically almost indistinguishable from that of the Neanderthals (Shea 2001), identification of the human species inhabiting a Levantine Middle Palaeolithic site requires direct evidence, such as human fossils. Further human fossils were found in Middle Palaeolithic contexts during the 2018 excavations at Tinshemet Cave, and it is hoped that the post-excavation analysis will result in a conclusive identification of the species.
Here are a few general photos from the excavation (all taken by me unless otherwise noted). Please note that no specific finds are shown here, as I did not seek permission to do so ...
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| View on the first morning looking up the hill towards the cave (entrance obscured by a tree). |
On the terrace in front of the cave, Palaeolithic artefacts (worked flint) and bone had become embedded in breccia, and had to be chiselled out. This made the going quite slow.
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| Excavation director Dr Yossi Zaidner holding a dosimeter - a device used to measure background levels of ionizing radiation for luminescence dating. |
Inside the Cave:
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Overall, the dig was a great experience - as with most excavations this was thanks in a large part to the excavation team (fears on the flight over from New Zealand about what I may have gotten myself into were quickly dispelled!). In addition to a local contingent, other team members hailed from Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Switzerland and the United States. A big plus for this excavation was that I only had to pay to get over to Israel - unlike a lot of other opportunities to dig overseas I didn't have to pay anything for food and accommodation during the dig (neither of which were the worst I've experienced during fieldwork!).
This was certainly the oldest site I've excavated, by quite some time (even if it ultimately proves to date to the later part of the Middle Palaeolithic period - absolute dating of the site is in progress). Click here for a report from the oldest site I had excavated at before Tinshemet Cave.
Heoi anō tāku mō nāianei (that's all for now!),
Nick
Note: This blog entry has been edited slightly since it was first posted to correct some minor spelling and grammar errors that had crept into the original version, and to add the names of two excavation co-directors.
References (in-text hyperlinks also provided)
Nishiaki, Y., and Akazawa, T., 2018. Archeological issues in the Middle and Upper Paleolithic of the Levant and its neighbouring regions. In Y. Nishiaki and T. Akazawa (eds.), The Middle and Upper Paleolithic Archeology of the Levant and Beyond, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-6826-3
Shea, J. J., 2001. The Middle Paleolithic: early modern humans and Neandertals in the Levant. Near Eastern Archaeology, 64(1-2), pp. 38-64.
Shea, J. J., 2003. The Middle Paleolithic of the East Mediterranean Levant. Journal of World Prehistory, 17(4), pp. 313-394.
Stekelis, M., 1942. Preliminary report on soundings in prehistoric caves in Palestine. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, 86, pp. 2-10.
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