Mobility And Pastoralism In The Egyptian Western Desert Steinpl Tze In The Holocene Regional Settlement Patterns

Revolutions in the Desert investigates the development of pastoral nomadism in the arid regions of the ancient Near East, challenging the prevailing notion that such societies left few remains appropriate for analytic study. Few prior studies have approached the deeper past of desert nomadic societies, which have been primarily recognized only as a complement to the study of sedentary agricultural societies in the region. Based on decades of archaeological field work in the Negev of southern Israel, both excavations and surveys, and integrating materials from adjacent regions, Revolutions in the Desert offers a deeper and more dynamic view of the rise of herding societies beyond the settled zone. Rosen offers the first archaeological analysis of the rise of herding in the desert, from the first introduction of domestic goats and sheep into the arid zones, more than eight millennia ago, to the evolution of more recent Bedouin societies. The adoption of domestic herds by hunter-gatherer societies, contemporary with and peripheral to the first farming settlements, revolutionized all aspects of desert life, including subsistence, trade, cult, social organization, and ecology. Inviting processual comparison to the agricultural revolution and the secondary spread of domestication beyond the Near East, this volume traces the evolution of nomadic societies in the archaeological record and examines their ecological, economic and social adaptations to the deserts of the Southern Levant. With maps and illustrations from the author’s own collection, Revolutions in the Desert is a thoughtful and engaging approach to the archaeology of desert nomadic societies.

Through an analysis of recently discovered Ptolemaic pottery from Mut al-Kharab, as well as a reexamination of pottery collected by the Dakhleh Oasis Project during the survey of the oasis from 1978–1987, this book challenges the common perception that Dakhleh Oasis experienced a sudden increase in agricultural exploitation and a dramatic rise in population during the Roman Period. It argues that such changes had already begun to take place during the Ptolemaic Period, likely as the result of a deliberate strategy directed toward this region by the Ptolemies. This book focuses on the ceramic remains in order to determine the extent of Ptolemaic settlement in the oases and to offer new insights into the nature of this settlement. It presents a corpus of Ptolemaic pottery and a catalogue of Ptolemaic sites from Dakhleh Oasis. It also presents a survey of Ptolemaic evidence from the oases of Kharga, Farafra, Bahariya and Siwa. It thus represents the first major synthesis of Ptolemaic Period activity in the Egyptian Western Desert.

There have been edited books on the archaeology of nomadism in various regions, and there have been individual archaeological and anthropological monographs, but nothing with the kind of coverage provided in this volume. Its strength and importance lies in the fact that it brings together a worldwide collection of studies of the archaeology of mobility. This book provides a ready-made reference to this worldwide phenomenon and is unique in that it tries to redefine pastoralism within a larger context by the term mobility. It presents many new ideas and thoughtful approaches, especially in the Central Asian region.

Negev focuses on two primary purposes, one theoretical/methodological and the second substantive. Briefly stated, the book comprises a case study of excavations at an early (ca. 2800 B.C.) pastoral site in the Negev, providing detailed analyses and a synthetic overview of a seasonal encampment from this early period in the evolution of desert pastoral societies. It thus both demonstrates the feasibility of an archaeology of early mobile pastoralism and grapples with the basic anthropological and methodological issues surrounding the subject. Substantively, both the architectural and material culture assemblages uncovered constitute the first detailed analysis of this early desert culture and include materials previously unreported for the region and period. Historically, the Camel Site is placed in a larger perspective of the beginnings of multiresource nomadism in relation to the rise of complex societies.

This is the only volume to present significant results of research into the Pleistocene of the Western Desert of Egypt. Research on Pleistocene prehistoric remains in Dakhleh Oasis began during survey in the 1978 Dakhleh Oasis Project (DOP) season, with discovery of the ubiquity of stone artefacts. Dedicated work by both prehistorians and environmentalists continued until 2011. Comparative DOP reconnaissance and geological work in Kharga Oasis began in 1987, which morphed into the Kharga Oasis Prehistory Project (KOPP) in 2001. Papers on the Pleistocene research are focused on geoarchaeological and palaeo-environmental data, reporting on different aspects of the off-site fieldwork conducted in the oases. Pleistocene finds and sequence are included. Detailed analyses of palaeolakes, the meteoritic Dakhleh Event, chronometric dating, and the 'empty desert hypothesis' employ state of the art research strategies and techniques to provide important information on Pleistocene human uses and habitability in the Western Desert. A summary paper and a Catalogue of Pleistocene localities recorded in the Dakhleh Oasis survey are provided. The volume will be a major contribution to the publication of the results of several decades of work in a region where fieldwork is now increasingly difficult. This will be the only volume in which the significant results of the research into the Pleistocene of the Western Desert of Egypt appear. This has been undertaken under the auspices of the Dakhleh Oasis Project and its off-shoot The Kharga Oasis Prehistory Project. The preliminary results have been presented at various conferences and in articles that have all been well received. They incorporate state of the art research strategies and dating techniques. The volume will be a major contribution to the publication of the results of several decades of work in a region where fieldwork is now increasingly difficult.

Egypt under the Romans (30 BCE–3rd century CE) was a period when local deserts experienced an unprecedented flurry of activity. In the Eastern Desert, a marked increase in desert traffic came from imperial prospecting/quarrying activities and caravans transporting wares to and from the Red Sea ports. In the Western Desert, resilient camels slowly became primary beasts of burden in desert travel, enabling caravaneers to lengthen daily marching distances across previously inhospitable dunes. Desert road archaeology has used satellite imaging, landscape studies and network analysis to plot desert trail networks with greater accuracy; however, it is often difficult to date roadside installations and thus assess how these networks evolved in scope and density in reaction to climatic, social and technological change. Roads in the Deserts of Roman Egypt examines evidence for desert roads in Roman Egypt and assesses Roman influence on the road density in two select desert areas: the central and southern section of the Eastern Desert and the central Marmarican Plateau and discusses geographical and social factors influencing road use in the period, demonstrating that Roman overseers of these lands adapted remarkably well to local desert conditions, improving roads and developing the trail network. Crucially, the author reconceptualises desert trails as linear corridor structures that follow expedient routes in the desert landscape, passing through at least two functional nodes attracting human traffic, be those water sources, farmlands, mines/quarries, trade hubs, military installations or actual settlements. The ‘route of least resistance’ across the desert varied from period to period according to the available road infrastructure and beasts of burden employed. Roman administration in Egypt not only increased the density of local desert ‘node’ networks, but also facilitated internodal connections with camel caravans and transformed the Sahara by establishing new, or embellishing existing, nodes, effectively funnelling desert traffic into discernible corridors.Significantly, not all desert areas of Egypt are equally suited for anthropogenic development, but almost all have been optimised in one way or another, with road installations built for added comfort and safety of travellers. Accordingly, the study of how Romans successfully adapted to desert travel is of wider significance to the study of deserts and ongoing expansion due to global warming.