Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-p9bg8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T03:51:26.082Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Large-scale storage of grain surplus in the sixth millennium BC: the silos of Tel Tsaf

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Yosef Garfınkel ,
David Ben-Shlomo  and
Tali Kuperman
Yosef Garfınkel
Affiliation:
Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem 91905, Israel (Email: garfinkel@mscc.huji.ac.il)
David Ben-Shlomo
Affiliation:
Weitzmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel (Email: febensh@weizmann.ac.il)
Tali Kuperman
Affiliation:
Department of Anatomy and Anthropology, Sackler School of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 69978, Israel (Email: natakup@gmail.com)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The authors report and describe the remarkable grain silos discovered at Tel Tsaf in the southern Levant. These tall, white, barrel-shaped towers seem to mark the first appearance of monuments of demonstrative surplus.

Keywords

LevantChalcolithicgrainagriculturestoragesilos
Type
Research
Information
Antiquity , Volume 83 , Issue 320 , June 2009 , pp. 309 - 325
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aldhouse-Green, M. 2004. Changing and shaming: images of defeat from Llyn Cerrig Bach to Sarmitzegetusa. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 23(3): 319–31.Google Scholar
Amiet, P. 1972. Glyptique susienne des origines à l'époque des Perses achéménides (Mémoires de la Délégation archéologique en Iran 43). Paris: Librarie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner.Google Scholar
Aurenche, O. 1981. La maison orientale: l'architecture du Proche Orient ancien des origines au milieu du quatrième millénaire. Paris: Librarie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner.Google Scholar
Bar-Yosef, O. & Ayalon, E.. 2001. Chalcolithic ossuaries - what do they imitate and why? Qadmoniot 34 (1): 34–43 (in Hebrew).Google Scholar
Beedle, P.L. 2001. Silos: an agricultural success story (Giving Old Barns New Life 4). Madison (WI): University of Wisconsin Extension.Google Scholar
Ben-Yehoshua, S. (ed.) 2005. Environmentally friendly technologies for agricultural produce quality. London: CRC Press & Boca Raton (FL): Taylor & Francis.Google Scholar
Bradley, R. 2003. A life less ordinary: the ritualization of the domestic sphere in later prehistoric Europe. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 13: 1: 5–23.Google Scholar
Bourdier, J.-P. & Minh-ha, T.T.. 1985. African spaces: designs for living in Upper Volta. New York: Africana Pub. Co.Google Scholar
Childe, V.G. 1950. The urban revolution. Town Planning Review 21: 3–17.Google Scholar
Currid, J.D. 1985. The beehive granaries of ancient Palestine. Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins 101: 97–109.Google Scholar
Dunand, M. 1973. Fouilles de Byblos, volume V. Paris: Librairie d'Amérique et d'Orient A. Maisonneuve.Google Scholar
Eisenberg, E., Gopher, A. & Greenberg, R.. 2001. Tel Te'o: a Neolithic, Chalcolithic, and Early Bronze Age site in the Hula Valley (Israel Antiquities Authority Report 13). Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority.Google Scholar
Garfinkel, Y. 1992. The pottery assemblages of Sha'ar Hagolan and Rabah stages from Munhata (Israel) (Centre de Recherche Française de Jerusalem Publication 6). Paris: Association Paléorient.Google Scholar
Garfinkel, Y. 1999. Neolithic and Chalcolithic pottery of the southern Levant (Qedem 39). Jerusalem: Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University.Google Scholar
Garfinkel, Y. 2004. The goddess of Sha'ar Hagolan. Excavations at a Neolithic site in Israel. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society.Google Scholar
Garfinkel, Y., Ben-Shlomo, D., Freikman, M. & Vered, A.. 2007a. Tel Tsaf: the 2004-2006 excavations seasons. Israel Exploration Journal 57/1: 1–33.Google Scholar
Garfinkel, Y., Ben-Shlomo, D. & Freikman, M.. 2007b. Tel Tsaf 2007 (notes and news). Israel Exploration Journal 57/2: 236–23.Google Scholar
Hole, F. 1991. Middle Khabur settlement and agriculture in the Ninevite 5 period. Canadian Society for Mesopotamian Studies Bulletin 21: 17–29.Google Scholar
Hole, F. 1999. Economic implications of possible storage structures at Tell Ziyade, NE Syria. Journal of Field Archaeology 26: 267–26.Google Scholar
Jacobsen, T. (Moran, W.H. ed.). 1970. Toward the image of Tammuz and other essays on Mesopotamian history and culture (Harvard Semitic Series 21). Cambridge (MA): Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Jacobsen, T. 1976. The treasures of darkness: a history of Mesopotamian religion. New Haven (CT) & London: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Lambot, B. 1998. Les morts d'Acy Romance (Ardennes) à La Tène finale: pratiques funéraires, aspects religieux et hiérarchie sociale, in Leman-Delerive, G. (ed.) Les Celtes: rites funéraires en Gaule du nord entre le VIe et le Ier sie'cle avant Je'sus-Christ (Etudes et Documents, Série Fouille 4): 75–87. Namur: Ministe're de la re'gion wallonne.Google Scholar
Levy, T.E. 1987. Shiqmim I: studies concerning Chalcolithic societies in the northern Negev Desert, Israel (1982-1984) (British Archaeological Reports International Series 356). Oxford: British Archaeological Reports.Google Scholar
Levy, T.E., Alon, D., Rowan, Y.M. & Kersel, M.. 2006. The sanctuary sequence: excavations at Gilat: 1975-77, 1989, 1990-92, in Levy, T.E. (ed.) Archaeology, anthropology and cult: the sanctuary at Gilat, Israel: 95–214. London: Equinox.Google Scholar
Lovata, T.R. 1997. Archaeological investigations at the silo site (41KA102), a prehistoric cemetery in Karnes County, Texas. Unpublished MA dissertation, University of Texas at Austin.Google Scholar
Marinatos, S. 1946. Greniers de l'Helladique ancien. Bulletin de Correspondance Hellénique 70: 337–33.Google Scholar
Mazar, A. 2001. The significance of the granary building at Beth Yerah, in Wolff, S.R. (ed.) Studies in the archaeology of Israel and the neighboring lands in memory of Douglas L. Esse (Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilizations 59; American Schools of Oriental Research Books 5): 447–44. Chicago (IL): Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.Google Scholar
Merpert, N. & Munchaev, K.. 1984. Soviet expedition's research at Yarim Tepe III: settlement in northwestern Iraq, 1978-1979. Sumer 43: 54–68.Google Scholar
Mettinger, T.N.D. 2001. The riddle of resurrection: ‘dying and rising gods' in the ancient Near East (Coniectanea Biblica Old Testament Series 50). Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International.Google Scholar
Perrot, J. 1955. The excavations at Tell Abu Matar, near Beersheba. Israel Exploration Journal 5: 17-40, 73-84, 167–89.Google Scholar
Pfälzner, P. 2002. Modes of storage and the development of economic systems in the Early Jezireh period, in Al-Gailani Werr, L., Curtis, J., Martin, H., McMahon, A., Oates, J. & Reade, J. (ed.) Of pots and plans: papers on the archaeology and history of Mesopotamia and Syria presented to David Oates in honour of his 75th birthday: 259–25. London: Nabu Publications.Google Scholar
Verhoeven, M. & Kranendonk, P.. 1996. The excavations: stratigraphy and architecture, in Akkermans, P.M.M.G. (ed.) Tell Sabi Abyad, late Neolithic settlement: report on the excavations of the University of Amsterdam (1988) and the National Museum of Antiquities Leiden (1991-1993) in Syria: 25–119. Istanbul: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut te Istanbul.Google Scholar
Watson, P.J. 1979. Archaeological ethnography in western Iran (Viking Fund Publications in Anthropology 57). Tucson (AZ): University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Wright, H. 1981. An early town on the Deh Luran Plain: excavations at Tepe Farukhabad (University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology Memoirs 13). Ann Arbor (MI): University of Michigan.Google Scholar
Yannai, E. 2006. 'En Esur ('Ein Asawir) I: excavations at a protohistoric site in the coastal plain of Israel (Israel Antiquities Authority Report 31). Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority.Google Scholar