Neolithic Revolution: New Perspectives on Southwest Asia in Light of Recent Discoveries on Cyprus

edited by Edgar Peltenburg and Alexander Wasse

The move towards a sedentary way of life had a profound effect on the human way of life: the development of complex societies can be directly attributed to the beginnings of farming in place of a nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyle. When Gordon Childe coined the term 'Neolithic revolution' he meant it to reflect these vast changes that had occurred in the near east. This book extends the reach of these changes to include Cyprus, presenting new evidence that shows that the island played host to settled farming communities at the same time as the mainland, pushing its habitation back by 2000 years.

List of figures; List of tables; Notes on contributors; Acknowledgements; Introduction: a revised Cypriot prehistory and some implications for the study of the Neolithic (Edgar Peltenburg); Bitter hippos of Cyprus: the island's first occupants and last endemic animals - setting the stage for colonization (Alan H Simmons); Island colonization, insularity or mainstream? (Bill Finlayson); Putting the colonization of Cyprus into context (Trevor Watkins); The domestic status of the early Neolithic fauna of Cyprus: a view from the mainland (Liora Kolska Horwitz, Eitan Tchernov and Hitomi Hongo); Reappraisal of the archaeobotanical evidence for the emergence and dispersal of the 'founder crops' (Sue Colledge); Abu Hureyra and the development of farming in western Asia: directions for future research (A M T Moore); Social space in early sedentary communities of Southwest Asia and Cyprus (Edgar Peltenburg); The emergence of the Mediterranean Fishing Village in the Levant and the anomaly of Neolithic Cyprus (Ehud Galili, Avi Gopher, Baruch Rosen and Liora Kolska Horwitz); Cypriot Neolithic chipped stone industries and the progress of regionalization (Carole McCartney); Hill and vale: understanding prehistoric lithic use in Cyprus (Sarah Tyrrell Stewart); Flint workshops of the Southern Beqa' Valley (Lebanon): preliminary results from Qar'oun (Maya Haidar-Boustani); Geometric patterns on pebbles: early identity symbols? (Anna Eirikh-Rose); Tools and toys or traces of trade: the problem of the enigmatic incised objects from Cyprus and the Levant (Sarah Tyrrell Stewart and David W Rupp); "Neolithique" and "Eneolithique" Byblos in Southern Levantine context (Yosef Garfinkel).