56-726: Fertile Crescent : Europe : Africa : Siberia : The Iberomaurusian is a backed bladelet lithic industry found near the coasts of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. It is also known from a single major site in Libya, the Haua Fteah , where the industry is locally known as the Eastern Oranian . The Iberomaurusian seems to have appeared around the time of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), somewhere between c. 25,000 and 23,000 cal BP. It would have lasted until
112-607: A 'pivot area' surrounded by an 'inner crescent', Alfred Thayer Mahan's Middle East , and Friedrich Naumann's Mitteleuropa . In current usage, the Fertile Crescent includes Israel , Palestine , Iraq , Syria , Lebanon , Egypt , and Jordan , as well as the surrounding portions of Turkey and Iran . In addition to the Tigris and Euphrates , riverwater sources include the Jordan River . The inner boundary
168-694: A Palaeolithic industry that included a microlithic toolkit: small and narrow instruments, variously retouched and with these, colouring substances, grinding tools, and hammerstones. However, this very industry, we have noticed it in the La Mouillah shelters, close to Marnia [western Algeria]: it includes hammerstones, cores, simple and backed [ à bord retaillés ] blades, notched blades, an excessive profusion of very small blades with retouch on their backs and very sharp points [ très petites lames à dos retouché et à pointe très aigüe [ sic ]], circular endscrapers, disks, alterative flake pebbles, and
224-505: A back-to-Africa migration from West Asia . A two-way admixture scenario using Natufian and modern sub-Saharan samples (including West Africans and the Tanzanian Hadza ) as reference populations, inferred that the seven Taforalt individuals are best modeled genetically as 63.5% West-Eurasian-related and 36.5% sub-Saharan ancestry (with the latter having both West African-like and Hadza-like affinities), with no apparent gene flow from
280-596: A full genome-wide analysis including Y-DNA from seven ancient individuals from the Taforalt site. The fossils were directly dated to between 15,100 and 13,900 calibrated years before present. All males at Taforalt belonged to haplogroup E1b1b1a1 (M-78). This haplogroup occurs most frequently in present-day North and East African populations. The closely related E1b1b1b (M-123) haplogroup has been reported for Epipaleolithic Natufians and Pre-Pottery Neolithic Levantines . Loosdrecht states: "Present-day North Africans share
336-509: A great impact of the paleolithic populations at the end of the Ice Age, creating post-glacial cultures such as the Azilian , Sauveterrian , Tardenoisian , and Maglemosian . In the past, French archaeologists had a general tendency to prefer the term "Epipaleolithic" to "Mesolithic", even for Western Europe. Where "Epipaleolithic" is still used for Europe, it is generally for areas close to
392-562: A long history of irrigation. Prehistoric seedless figs were discovered at Gilgal I in the Jordan Valley , suggesting that fig trees were being planted some 11,400 years ago. Cereals were already grown in Syria as long as 9,000 years ago. Small cats ( Felis silvestris ) also were domesticated in this region. Also, legumes including peas , lentils and chickpea were domesticated in this region. Domesticated animals include
448-661: A majority of their ancestry with present-day Near Easterners, but not with sub-Saharan Africans", although the predominant Y-DNA of the Maghreb is E-M81 (see Haplogroup E-Z827 ). Maternally, six individuals of the Taforalt remains bore the U6a haplogroup and one individual was of the M1b haplogroup, these Eurasian haplogroups proposed as markers for autochthonous Maghreb ancestry which might have been originally introduced into this region by
504-603: A natural evolutionary development – a progressive transformation from Paleolithic to Neolithic. In reality, the final phase of the Capsian , the Tardenoisian , the Azilian and the northern Maglemose industries are the posthumous descendants of the Palaeolithic ;... This early history of the term introduced the ambiguity and degree of confusion which has continued to surround its use, at least as relates to
560-616: A substantial incorporation of plant-based foods. This evidence challenges the prevailing notion of solely a high reliance on animal proteins in pre-agricultural human societies. Fertile Crescent The Fertile Crescent ( Arabic : الهلال الخصيب ) is a crescent-shaped region in the Middle East , spanning modern-day Iraq , Israel , Jordan , Lebanon , Palestine , and Syria , together with northern Kuwait , south-eastern Turkey , and western Iran . Some authors also include Cyprus and northern Egypt . The Fertile Crescent
616-444: A whole set of tools for grinding colours: pebbles in greenish rock, sandstone wheels, pebbles with median depressions, still impregnated with red colour, and as colouring substances, hematites, ocre, oligist iron. Finally, some boring tools in polished bone and objects of adornment: ellongated pebbles and shells pierced for suspension. But nothing in the way of polished stone or pottery . [...] What clearly distinguishes this industry
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#1732776744303672-460: Is believed to be the first region where settled farming emerged as people started the process of clearance and modification of natural vegetation to grow newly domesticated plants as crops . Early human civilizations such as Sumer in Mesopotamia flourished as a result. Technological advances in the region include the development of agriculture and the use of irrigation , of writing ,
728-653: Is delimited by the dry climate of the Syrian Desert to the south. Around the outer boundary are the Anatolian and Armenian highlands to the north, the Sahara Desert to the west, Sudan to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east. As crucial as rivers and marshlands were to the rise of civilization in the Fertile Crescent, they were not the only factor. The area is geographically important as
784-559: Is tentative. In 2005, the Mitochondrial DNA of 31 prehistoric skeletons dated from the site of Taforalt , Morocco in a cave called ‘Grotte des pigeons' was analyzed by the Tunisian geneticist Rym Kefi ( Pasteur Institute of Tunis ) and her team. The remains at Taforalt were dated between 23,000 YBP and 10,800 YBP (Ferembach 1985). Later analysis of bones and charcoals using a high precision radiocarbon chronology showed that
840-436: Is the smallness of the toolkit, especially the crescent-shaped backed blades of which one finds thousands of examples. True geometric pieces (in the shape of trapeziums) are excessively rare, barely three parts per thousand, whereas in the ancient Neolithic with pottery and polished stone, small pieces of flint with geometric shapes are very common. I named Ibero-Maurusian the period that characterises this industry. Because
896-471: The Basques and Canary Islanders of the same time period, as the studies demonstrate those ancient peoples to be "clearly associated with modern Europeans". Additionally, no evidence from the studies demonstrates Cro-Magnon influence, contrary to former suggestions. The studies further suggest a diffusion of this diverse population away from the Fertile Crescent, with the early migrants moving away from
952-522: The Bronze Age , the region's natural fertility has been greatly extended by irrigation works, upon which much of its agricultural production continues to depend. The last two millennia have seen repeated cycles of decline and recovery as past works have fallen into disrepair through the replacement of states, to be replaced under their successors. Another ongoing problem has been salination —gradual concentration of salt and other minerals in soils with
1008-539: The Epigravettian culture of Paleolithic southern Europe. However, the Sub-Saharan African DNA in Taforalt individuals was not found to have a good proxy in any present-day or ancient Holocene African groups. It was also found that if Iberomaurusians harbor sub-Saharan African-like ancestry, they would fail as a possible contributing source for Natufians or other Middle Eastern groups, except if
1064-625: The Epipalaeolithic or Epipaleolithic (sometimes Epi-paleolithic etc.) is a period occurring between the Upper Paleolithic and Neolithic during the Stone Age . Mesolithic also falls between these two periods, and the two are sometimes confused or used as synonyms. More often, they are distinct, referring to approximately the same period of time in different geographic areas. Epipaleolithic always includes this period in
1120-574: The Mediterranean , as with the Azilian industry. "Epipalaeolithic" stresses the continuity with the Upper Paleolithic. Alfonso Moure says in this respect: In the language of Prehistorical Archaeology, the most extended trend is to use the term "Epipaleolithic" for the industrial complexes of the post-glacial hunter-gatherer groups. Inversely, those that are in transitional ways towards artificial production of food are inscribed in
1176-525: The Near East —westward into Europe and North Africa , northward to Crimea , and northeastward to Mongolia . They took their agricultural practices with them and interbred with the hunter-gatherers whom they subsequently came in contact with while perpetuating their farming practices. This supports prior genetic and archaeological studies which have all arrived at the same conclusion. Consequently, contemporary in situ peoples absorbed
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#17327767443031232-1028: The Tigris–Euphrates river basin , including Sumer , Akkad , Babylonia , Assyria , and the Abbasid Caliphate . It is in this region where the first libraries appeared about 4,500 years ago. The oldest known libraries are found in Nippur (in Sumer) and Ebla (in Syria), both from c. 2500 BCE . Both the Tigris and Euphrates start in the Taurus Mountains of what is modern-day Turkey . Farmers in southern Mesopotamia had to protect their fields from flooding each year. Northern Mesopotamia had sufficient rain to make some farming possible. To protect against flooding they made levees. Since
1288-474: The cattle , sheep , goat , domestic pig , cat , and domestic goose . Mesopotamia Egypt Iran Anatolia The Levant Arabia Cosmology Modern analyses comparing 24 craniofacial measurements reveal a relatively diverse population within the pre- Neolithic , Neolithic and Bronze Age Fertile Crescent, supporting the view that several populations occupied this region during these time periods. Similar arguments do not hold true for
1344-582: The wheel , and glass , most emerging first in Mesopotamia . The term "Fertile Crescent" was popularized by archaeologist James Henry Breasted in Outlines of European History (1914) and Ancient Times, A History of the Early World (1916). He wrote: It lies like an army facing south, with one wing stretching along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean and the other reaching out to
1400-623: The "Mesolithic". In Europe, the Epipalaeolithic may be regarded as a period preceding the Early Mesolithic, or as locally constituting at least a part of it. Other authors treat the Epipalaeolithic as part of the Late Palaeolithic; the culture in southern Portugal between about 10,500 to 8,500 years ago is "variously labelled as 'Terminal Magdalenian' and 'Epipalaeolithic ' ". The different usages often reflect
1456-536: The "bridge" between North Africa and Eurasia , which has allowed it to retain a greater amount of biodiversity than either Europe or North Africa , where climate changes during the Ice Age led to repeated extinction events when ecosystems became squeezed against the waters of the Mediterranean Sea . The Saharan pump theory posits that this Middle Eastern land bridge was extremely important to
1512-656: The Epipaleolithic, defining it as follows: With Epipaleolithic I mean the period during the early days that followed the age of the reindeer, the one that retained Paleolithic customs. This period has two stages in Scandinavia, that of Maglemose and that of Kunda. ( Par époque épipaléolithique j'entends la période qui, pendant les premiers temps qui ont suivi l'âge du Renne, conserve les coutumes paléolithiques. Cette période présente deux étapes en Scandinavie, celle de Maglemose et de Kunda. ) Stjerna made no mention of
1568-651: The Iberomaurusian industry appeared in TAF at least 22,093–21,420 Cal BP (calibrated YBP) (Barton et al. 2013) . In 2016 she updated the research and wrote a new article which also included 8 skeletons from the Algerian Iberomaurusian site called 'Afalou'. The Afalou site is dated from 15,000 to 11,000 YBP. 23 individuals from the original 2005 Taforalt sample were determined in Kefi's 2016 article to be of
1624-618: The Levant and, often, the rest of the Near East . It sometimes includes parts of Southeast Europe , where Mesolithic is much more commonly used. Mesolithic very rarely includes the Levant or the Near East ; in Europe , Epipalaeolithic is used, though not very often, to refer to the early Mesolithic. The Epipalaeolithic has been defined as the "final Upper Palaeolithic industries occurring at
1680-644: The Mesolithic, and it is unclear if he intended his terms to replace that. His new terms were soon adopted by the German Hugo Obermaier , who in 1916 used them in El Hombre fósil (translated into English in 1924) as part of an attack on the concept of the Mesolithic, which he insisted was a period of "transition" and an "interim" rather than "transformation": But in my opinion this term is not justified, as it would be if these phases presented
1736-569: The Natufians had a total of 9.1% non-West Eurasian ancestry, and the explanation by the geneticist was because of their partial descent from the Paleolithic Iberomaurusians, who's contributions were estimated at 22% in Natufians. Martiniano et al. (2022) later reassigned all the Taforalt samples to haplogroup E-M78 and none to E-L618, the predecessor to EV13. D’Atanasio et al. (2023) found that Iberomaurusian-like ancestry
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1792-484: The Persian Gulf, while the center has its back against the northern mountains. The end of the western wing is Palestine; Assyria makes up a large part of the center; while the end of the eastern wing is Babylonia. [...] This great semicircle, for lack of a name, may be called the Fertile Crescent. There is no single term for this region in antiquity. At the time that Breasted was writing, it roughly corresponded with
1848-432: The agricultural way of life of those early migrants who ventured out of the Fertile Crescent. This is contrary to the suggestion that the spread of agriculture disseminated out of the Fertile Crescent by way of sharing of knowledge. Instead, the view now supported by a preponderance of evidence is that it occurred by actual migration out of the region, coupled with subsequent interbreeding with indigenous local populations whom
1904-759: The coming of 'true' Mesolithic technologies a few centuries later". The concept of the "Epipalaeolithic" arrived several decades after the main components of the three-age system , the Paleolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic. It was first proposed in 1910 by the Swedish archaeologist, Knut Stjerna , his initial example being a culture or sub-culture in Scandinavian archaeology, that would not be often called Epipalaeolithic today. This left stone-lined pit graves containing implements of bone, such as harpoon and javelin heads. Stjerna observed that they "persisted during
1960-624: The conclusion of Loosdrecht (2018) and argued instead that the Iberomaurusian population of Upper Paleolithic North Africa , represented by the Taforalt sample, "can be better modeled as an admixture between a Dzudzuana [West Eurasian] component and a sub-Saharan African component" (or an "Ancient North African" component, "that may represent an even earlier split than the Basal Eurasians "). Iosif Lazaridis et al. (2018) also argued that an Iberomaurusian/Taforalt-like population contributed to
2016-552: The degree of innovation and "economic intensification in the direction of domestication, sedentism or environmental modification" seen in the culture. If the Palaeolithic way of life continues with only adaptation to reflect changes in the types of wild food available, the culture may be called Epipalaeolithic. One writer, talking of Azilian microliths in Vasco-Cantabria talks of "some exceptions that seem to herald
2072-588: The earliest era of prehistory, this debate is unlikely to be resolved in the near future. The evidence that does exist suggests that, by the third millennium BCE and into the second, several language groups already existed in the region. These included: Links between Hurro-Urartian and Hattic and the indigenous languages of the Caucasus have frequently been suggested, but are not generally accepted. 36°N 40°E / 36°N 40°E / 36; 40 Epipaleolithic In archaeology,
2128-472: The early Holocene c. 11,000 cal BP. The name of the Iberomaurusian means "of Iberia and Mauretania ", the latter being a Latin name for Northwest Africa. Pallary (1909) coined this term to describe assemblages from the site of La Mouillah in the belief that the industry extended over the strait of Gibraltar into the Iberian Peninsula . This theory is now generally discounted (Garrod 1938), but
2184-547: The end of the final glaciation which appear to merge technologically into the Mesolithic ". The period is generally dated from c. 20,000 BP to 10,000 BP in the Levant, but later in Europe. If used as a synonym or equivalent for Mesolithic in Europe, it might end at about c. 5,000 BP or even later. In the Levant, the period may be subdivided into Early, Middle and Late Epipaleolithic,
2240-491: The evolution of many "r" type annual plants , which produce more edible seeds than "K" type perennial plants . The region's dramatic variety in elevation gave rise to many species of edible plants for early experiments in cultivation. Most importantly, the Fertile Crescent was home to the eight Neolithic founder crops important in early agriculture (i.e., wild progenitors to emmer wheat , einkorn , barley , flax , chick pea , pea , lentil , bitter vetch ), and four of
2296-460: The five most important species of domesticated animals— cows , goats , sheep , and pigs ; the fifth species, the horse , lived nearby. The Fertile Crescent flora comprises a high percentage of plants that can self-pollinate , but may also be cross-pollinated . These plants, called " selfers ", were one of the geographical advantages of the area because they did not depend on other plants for reproduction. As well as possessing many sites with
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2352-525: The genetic composition of Natufians "and not the other way around", and that this Iberomaurusian/Taforalt lineage also contributed around 13% ancestry to modern West Africans "rather than Taforalt having ancestry from an unknown Sub-Saharan African source". Fregel (2021) summarized: "More evidence will be needed to determine the specific origin of the North African Upper Paleolithic populations." Later, Iosif Lazardis documented that
2408-603: The last also being the Natufian . The preceding final Upper Paleolithic period is the Kebaran or "Upper Paleolithic Stage VI". Epipalaeolithic hunter-gatherers , generally nomadic , made relatively advanced tools from small flint or obsidian blades, known as microliths , that were hafted in wooden implements. There are settlements with "flimsy structures", probably not permanently occupied except at some rich sites, but used and returned to seasonally. In describing
2464-552: The maternal genetic lineage U6 and of Eurasian haplogroups H, U, R0 and at the Algerian Afalou site maternal groups were JT, J, T, H, R0a1 and U. This suggests genetic flow between North Africa and southern Mediterranean littoral since the Epipaleolithic . In a article entitled 'Pleistocene North African genomes link Near Eastern and sub-Saharan African human populations', Marieke Van de Loosdrecht et al. (2018) did
2520-455: The migrants came in contact with. The studies show also that not all present day Europeans share strong genetic affinities to the Neolithic and Bronze Age inhabitants of the Fertile Crescent; the closest ties to the Fertile Crescent rest with Southern Europeans. The same study further demonstrates all present-day Europeans to be closely related. Linguistically, the Fertile Crescent
2576-469: The modern distribution of Old World flora and fauna , including the spread of humanity . The area has borne the brunt of the tectonic divergence between the African and Arabian plates and the converging Arabian and Eurasian plates, which has made the region a very diverse zone of high snow-covered mountains. The Fertile Crescent had many diverse climates , and major climatic changes encouraged
2632-632: The name has stuck. In Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya, but not in Morocco, the industry is succeeded by the Capsian industry, whose origins are unclear. The Capsian is believed either to have spread into North Africa from the Near East , or to have evolved from the Iberomaurusian. In Morocco and Western Algeria, the Iberomaurusian is succeeded by the Cardial culture after a long hiatus. Mr. Luis Siret had already noticed in Southeastern Spain
2688-476: The name of the Iberomaurusian implies Afro-European cultural contact now generally discounted, researchers have proposed other names: What follows is a timeline of all published radiocarbon dates from reliably Iberomaurusian contexts, excluding a number of dates produced in the 1960s and 1970s considered "highly doubtful" (Barton et al. 2013). All dates, calibrated and Before Present , are according to Hogue and Barton (2016). The Tamar Hat date beyond 25,000 cal BP
2744-469: The period before the start of the Neolithic, "Epipaleolithic" is typically used for cultures in regions that were far from the glaciers of the Ice Age , so that the retreat of the glaciers made a less dramatic change to conditions. This was the case in the Levant . Conversely, the term "Mesolithic" is most likely to be used for Western Europe where climatic change and the extinction of the megafauna had
2800-652: The recent Paleolithic period and also during the Protoneolithic". Here he had used a new term, "Protoneolithic", which was according to him to be applied to the Danish kitchen-middens . Stjerna also said that the eastern culture "is attached to the Paleolithic civilization" ( "se trouve rattachée à la civilisation paléolithique" ). However, it was not intermediary and of its intermediates he said "we cannot discuss them here" ( "nous ne pouvons pas examiner ici "). This "attached" and non-transitional culture he chose to call
2856-473: The rivers Tigris and Euphrates , lies in the east of the Fertile Crescent), also saw the emergence of early complex societies during the succeeding Bronze Age . There is also early evidence from the region for writing and the formation of hierarchical state level societies. This has earned the region the nickname "The cradle of civilization ". From ancient times empires arose and fell in
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#17327767443032912-819: The skeletal and cultural remains of both pre-modern and early modern humans (e.g., at Tabun and Es Skhul caves), later Pleistocene hunter-gatherers , and Epipalaeolithic semi-sedentary hunter-gatherers (the Natufians ); the Fertile Crescent is most famous for its sites related to the origins of agriculture . The western zone around the Jordan and upper Euphrates rivers gave rise to the first known Neolithic farming settlements (referred to as Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA)), which date to around 9,000 BCE and includes very ancient sites such as Göbekli Tepe , Chogha Golan , and Jericho (Tell es-Sultan) . This region, alongside Mesopotamia (Greek for "between rivers", between
2968-489: The sub-Saharan African geneflow postdated Iberomaurusian geneflow into the Levant, or was a locally confined phenomenon. Jeong (2020) indicated that the Sub-Saharan African DNA of the Taforalt population has similarity with the remnant of a more basal African lineage (e.g. a basal Eurasian and/or basal West African lineage). Iosif Lazaridis et al. (2018), as summarized by Rosa Fregel (2021), contested
3024-589: The territories of the Ottoman Empire ceded to Britain and France in the Sykes–Picot Agreement . Historian Thomas Scheffler has noted that Breasted was following a trend in Western geography to "overwrite the classical geographical distinctions between continents, countries and landscapes with large, abstract spaces", drawing parallels with the work of Halford Mackinder , who conceptualised Eurasia as
3080-673: Was a region of great diversity. Historically, Semitic languages generally prevailed in the modern regions of Iraq , Syria , Jordan , Lebanon , Israel , Palestine , Sinai and the fringes of southeast Turkey and northwest Iran , as well as the Sumerian (a language isolate ) in Iraq, whilst in the mountainous areas to the east and north a number of generally unrelated language isolates were found, including; Elamite , Gutian and Kassite in Iran , and Hattic , Kaskian and Hurro-Urartian in Turkey. The precise affiliation of these, and their date of arrival, remain topics of scholarly discussion. However, given lack of textual evidence for
3136-492: Was characterizing for the unsampled "ancient Green Saharan" population about 12,000-5,000 years ago, and that modern-day Fula people derive around 30% of their ancestry from this ancient Saharan population, which was "modeled as a sister group of ancient Northern Africans, or alternatively, as an outgroup of all the “Eurasian-ancestry” enriched groups". Despite researchers thinking they ate mostly game meat being hunter-gatherers, further study has indicated that their diet included
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