Tel Tsaf
June 26 - July 15, 2022
israel
Portrait of a Middle Chalcolithic Society
Located near the city of Beit Shean in the Jordan Valley, less than an hour drive from the city of Haifa and the Mediterranean shore, the Middle Chalcolithic site of Tel Tsaf has long been considered one of the most promising sites for studying the transition to complex societies in the Near East. This large site is distinguished by its superb preservation of mudbrick architecture and organic materials, as well as by its burials, the earliest metal object in the southern Levant, and evidence for large-scale storage and long-distance trade.
A renewed multidisciplinary research project was initiated at Tel Tsaf, co-directed by Prof. Danny Rosenberg of the Zinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa, and Dr. Florian Klimscha of the Eurasia Department of the German Archaeological Institute, Berlin. The principal goals of the renewed project are to explore various aspects of social and economic organization at both the household and community levels during the Neolithic-Chalcolithic transition in the Near East and the establishment of the Mediterranean diet. The superb preservation of mudbrick architecture and organic remains at the sites offers ideal conditions to study these changes during the formative stages of the Late Chalcolithic period and the ecological settings of these changes.
The multinational team is composed of archaeologists, researchers, and experts in various fields, students, and volunteers from different countries around the globe that work shoulder to shoulder in the field and lab. This season they plan to continue in their efforts to retrieve bio-archaeological data to reconstruct the past environment in the Jordan Valley and better understand the site’s economy.
Details
Geographic Location
Central Jordan Valley, Northern Israel
Dates of the Dig
June 26 - July 15, 2022
Minimum Stay
1 Week
Application Due
Thursday, May 5, 2022
Academic Credit/Cost per Credit/Institution
Contact for more details.
Cost
Directors
Danny Rosenberg: University of Haifa.
Florian Klimscha: German Archaeological Institute.
Contact
Danny Rosenberg
[email protected]
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