2020-08-16 20:54:37
How did our ancestors honor their dead 10,000 years ago? The answer to this question is not easy, to find it it is necessary to search among the remains that the humans of that time left in specific places and that have been preserved until today. Among the many sites in which archaeologists strive to find the keys that allow us to know the way of life, customs, beliefs and technology of the Neolithic settlers, a cave in Israel known as Nahal Hemar stands out, a place where Remains have been found whose analysis has just been published in the Quarternary International magazine by researchers Ferran Borrell, Juan José Ibáñez José Ibáñez”: and Ofer Bar-Yosef. Today he tells us his story and the findings Juan José Ibáñez José Ibáñez”:, researcher at the CSIC and the Milà and Fontanals Institute for Humanities Research.
In the southern Judean desert, 11 km south of the modern city of Arad, in the bare wall of one of the banks of a dry river bed, there is a narrow opening through which the Nahal cave is accessed. Hemar. The cave was discovered and excavated in 1983 by the recently deceased Ofer Bar-Yosef. Despite the fact that the cave had been the prey of looters at the time of its discovery, there were still virgin areas whose excavation yielded one of the richest assemblies of tools, bones and artifacts used by pre-Pottery Neolithic humans: a stone mask , modeled skulls, remains of a statue and bone figurines, organic remains of mats and flint tools.
Among the abundant stone tools is an extraordinary collection of knives that, due to their shape, are called Nahal Hemar-type knives. They are very elaborate tools, double-edged and finished in a point with two opposite notches in what would correspond to the handle. Research carried out by Juan José Ibáñez and his colleagues now sheds new light on the use that ancient visitors to the cave made of these tools.
Since its discovery in 1983, the researchers came to the conclusion that the cave was not used as a dwelling but as a place dedicated to worship, either because all the accessories and paraphernalia used in ritual ceremonies were stored there or because these ceremonies They were held in the cave itself. It is known that about 10,000 years ago the inhabitants of the Near East used to honor their dead in various ways, in some places the deceased were buried inside the houses and in others it was common to dig up the dead after a while to extract and handling the skull or bones of the deceased. Sometimes the skull was used as a base to cover it with mortar and mold the nose, ears, eyes and, in general, the features of the deceased person on top.
Any tool, due to continued use, undergoes microscopic changes in its edge. Previous studies, carried out in the laboratory, have made it possible to identify these traces and determine not only if the tool was used or not, but also the materials on which it was worked. Thus, the study of the microscopic traces of a knife allows us to know if, for example, it was used to cut meat or wood. The team of scientists has carried out a microscopic analysis of the edges of Nahal Hemar’s knives and they have discovered traces that they were used and therefore they are not offerings or trousseau of the dead, but that they were used to cut meat. “Taking into account the very special context in which the studied tools appear and the set of objects and remains of which they are a part, we can interpret that the Nahal Hemar knives are related to human remains and that they could have been used for dismemberment activities. of the same” he comments Juan Jose Ibanez
The study also indicates, due to the technology of the tools found, that their creators were people dedicated to agriculture and did not belong to nomadic peoples.
I invite you to listen to Juan José Ibáñez, from the Institución Milà y Fontanals de Investigación en Humanidades and of the Superior Council of Scientific Investigations.
Reference:
Ferran Borrell, Juan José Ibáñez and Ofer Bar-Yosef. Cult paraphernalia or everyday items? Assessing the status and use of the flint artefacts from Nahal Hemar Cave Quarternary International. DOI: 10.1016/j.quaint.2020.05.007
Quarternary International.
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