Investigations at Tor al-Tareeq: An Epipaleolithic Site in the Wadi el-Hasa, Jordan

Abstract

The Epipaleolithic site of Tor al-Tareeq (WHS 1065) was discovered in 1982 by Burton MacDonald's Wadi Hasa Survey in west-central Jordan, surface collected and tested in 1984, and partially excavated in 1992. The earliest and best represented occupation is an early Epipaleolithic industry, overlain in places by an ephemeral geometric industry identified by a higher incidence of geometric microliths. Six radiocarbon determinations span the period between 16,900 and 15,600 b.p. and confirm an early Epipaleolithic date but the subsequent geometric phase has not been dated. The site consists of a series of camps, near a collapsed rockshelter and a spring, and strung out along the shore of a mildly-alkaline, late Pleistocene lake. The permanent water and varied resource zones surely made the locale attractive in an otherwise arid landscape. Faunal remains and pollen from the site indicate diverse resources in conditions substantially different from those of today. This report examines a wide range of archaeological and paleoenvironmental data in order to understand aspects of the regional system of settlement and subsistence of which Tor al-Tareeq was a part. Continuing research in the eastern Hasa drainage seems likely to provoke a reassessment of current models of hunter-gatherer adaptation during the Epipaleolithic in the southern Levant.