Zeidan Kafafi

Early pottery contexts from 'Ain Ghazal, Jordan

During the 1984 season of excavations at the Neolithic village of ʿAin Ghazal, the site yielded for the first time in situ pottery sherds assigned to the Late Neolithic period and ascribable to the Yarmoukian phase. This article presents a detailed study of the 1984 and 1985 excavated pottery assemblage at the south and central fields.

Khirbet Hammam: A PPNB Village in the Wadi el-Hasa, Southern Jordan

During the 1979 Wādī el-Ḥasā Survey, Khirbet Hammān was discovered on the southeastern slopes of the Wādī el-Ḥasā. Artifacts collected included chipped stone and groundstone assemblages that dated the site typologically to Pre-Pottery Neolithic B. Remnants of architecture and settlement evidence from the same period are discussed. The site has many features similar to late PPNB at Jericho, Beidha and ʿAīn Ghazāl.

Ain Ghazal 1993-1994

Two six-week excavation seasons at I Neolithic cAin Ghazal (on the outskirts of Amman) in 1993 and 1994 focused on Late Pre-Pottery Neolithic (LPPNB), PPNC, and Yarmoukian pottery Neolithic deposits in the north and central fields of the site. In contrast toother areas of CAin Ghazal, LPPNB (ca. 6500-6000 CE) layers in the north field were relatively undisturbed by later Neolithic activity. Two buildings were exposed that are particularly important. The first is a structure that underwent four phases of construction. The plan of the Phase 1 (P1) structure is unknown, since later phases obliterated all but a small part of the south wall and a patch of a redpainted lime plaster floor. The P2 south and north walls were straight, but between them was a curved wall to the west, built of chalk rather than flint boulders or hard limestone. Soon after construction the apsidal wall began to collapse, so a straight N-S wall was built on the P2 red-painted plaster floor, which changed the shape to a rectangular plan. Sometime later the P2-P3 floor was cut for the P4 building, which consisted of seven superimposed redpainted floors directly atop each other inside a circular wall that formed a room 2 m in diameter. A doorway led to an antechamber to the east, although this part of the P4 building was almost totally destroyed by erosion, possibly a late Neolithic phenomenon. The circular shape of the P4 room (extremely rare in the LPPNB) and the superimposed floors strongly suggest a ritual function for the building. This conclusion is supported by the presence The four-phase LPPNB cult building in the north field at cAin Ghazal, view to the west. Photograph by Y Zoubi.