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Excavations at the Mugharet Kebara, Mount Carmel, 1931: The Aurignacian Industries

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

Dorothy A. E. Garrod
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Extract

The cave known as the Mugharet Kebara opens at the western foot of Mount Carmel, 13 km. to the south of the Wady el-Mughara, and 1½ km. south of the railway station of Zikhron Yaaqov. It faces north-west on the 60 m. contour line, at 2½ km. from the sea, from which it is separated by a strip of marshy land and a wider belt of sand dunes.

The first sounding on this site was made in 1927 by Dr M. Stekelis, who was unable to continue owing to lack of funds. In 1930, unaware that Dr Stekelis had already tested the cave, I went over from the Wady el-Mughara with Dr Theodore McCown and spent one day in digging a trial trench (Garrod 1932), which revealed the presence of a Natufian layer with an underlying level containing an industry then unfamiliar, but since described under the name Kebaran (Turville-Petre, 1932). At the bottom of the trench we found a number of typical Aurignacian implements. In the summer of 1931 Francis Turville-Petre and Mrs C. A. Baynes undertook a three months' season at Kebara on behalf of the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem and the American School of Prehistoric Research. During this time they camped with us at the Wady el-Mughara, so the two expeditions were in close touch and able to compare results throughout the campaign. The work at Kebara revealed a very rich Lower Natufian horizon (Layer B) with a thin underlying level (Layer C) containing the new Kebaran industry. This culture, which has proved to be fairly widespread in Palestine, Lebanon and Syria, is Neuville's Upper Palaeolithic VI (Neuville, 1951). Turville-Petre published the material from Layers B and C in the year following the excavation (Turville-Petre, 1932), but the Aurignacian industries of Layers D and E which were dug to contact with an underlying Levalloiso-Mousterian, have for various reasons never been studied or described in print.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society , Volume 20 , Issue 2 , December 1955 , pp. 155 - 192
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1955

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References

REFERENCES

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