Tell el-Kerkh as a Neolithic Mega Site

Abstract

The Levant has been a focus of attention for those studying the ultra-large (mega) Neolithic sites that appeared and developed during the Late PPNB period. However, some scholars are skeptical about the size of mega sites, believing that they merely appear to be large because of a sequential accumulation of smaller settlements and assert that there was no qualitative difference between mega sites and small settlements. Did the sites merely appear to be large, or were they truly so? The answer will condition the way we approach the past and our understanding of the development of complex societies. In this paper, I shall discuss the evidence for the Neolithic settlement patterns and settlement sizes in the Rouj Basin, northern Levant, where we have been working for twenty years. My focus is the site named Tell el-Kerkh, a Neolithic mega site in the Rouj Basin. After detailed investigation of the excavation results and surface collections, I reconstructed the settlement sizes and patterns of the Neolithic periods. At Tell el-Kerkh, the Neolithic settlement expanded to around 16 ha during the Late PPNB period; then reduced gradually to 8 ha, 6 ha, and finally to smaller than 1 ha during the Pottery Neolithic periods. The thickness of cultural layers during the LPPNB period indicates that most areas were occupied simultaneously and continuously and that the Late PPNB settlement at Tell el-Kerkh was not merely large but truly large, perhaps also indicating some levels of social complexity. Therefore, we may accurately call it a mega site.