Жаңа тас дәуірінің соңғы кезеңі: Таяу Шығыс аймағындағы эпипалеолит

none

The Epipalaeolithic Near East designates the Epipalaeolithic ("Final Old Stone Age", also known as Mesolithic) in the prehistory of the Near East. It is the period after the Upper Palaeolithic and before the Neolithic, between approximately 20,000 and 10,000 years Before Present (BP). The people of the Epipalaeolithic were nomadic hunter gatherers who generally lived in small, seasonal camps rather than permanent villages. They made sophisticated stone tools using microliths—small, finely produced blades that were hafted in wooden implements. These are the primary artifacts by which archaeologists recognise and classify Epipalaeolithic sites. The start of the Epipalaeolithic is defined by the appearance of microliths. Although this is an arbitrary boundary, the Epipalaeolithic does differ significantly from the preceding Upper Palaeolithic. Epipalaeolithic sites are more numerous, better preserved, and can be accurately radiocarbon dated. The period coincides with the gradual retreat of glacial climatic conditions between the Last Glacial Maximum and the start of the Holocene, and it is characterised by population growth and economic intensification. The period may be subdivided into Early, Middle and Late Epipalaeolithic: The Early Epipalaeolithic corresponds to the Kebaran culture, c. 20,000 to 14,500 years ago, the Middle Epipalaeolithic is the Geometric Kebaran or late phase of the Kebaran, and the Late Epipalaeolithic to the Natufian, 14,500–11,500 BP. The Natufian overlaps with the incipient Neolithic Revolution, the Pre Pottery Neolithic A.

The earliest evidence for the use of composite cereal harvesting tools are the glossed flint blades that have been found at the site of Ohalo II, a 23,000 year old fisher hunter gatherers’ camp on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, Northern Israel. The wear traces on the tools indicate that these were used for harvesting near ripe, semi green wild cereals, shortly before grains ripen enough to disperse naturally.

[[File:Engraved Plaquette with bird image from Ein Qashish South, Jezreel Valley, Israel, Kebaran and Geometric Kebaran deposits (ca. 23ka and ca. 16.5ka BP). jpg|upright=1.4|thumb|Engraved plaquette with bird image from Ein Qashish South, Jezreel Valley, Israel, Kebaran and Geometric Kebaran ca. 23,000 16,500 BP.

Until recently, it was thought that the Arabian Peninsula was too arid and inhospitable for human settlement in the Late Pleistocene. The earliest known sites belonged to the early Neolithic, c. 9000 to 8000 BP, and it was supposed that people were able to recolonise the region then due to the wetter climate of the early Holocene. However, in 2014, archaeologists working in the southern Nefud desert discovered an Epipalaeolithic site dating to between 12,000 and 10,000 BP. The site is located in the Jubbah basin, a palaeolake which retained water in the otherwise dry conditions of the Terminal Pleistocene. The stone tools found bore a close resemblance to the Geometric Kebaran, a Levantine industry associated with the Middle Epipalaeolithic. The excavators of the site, therefore, proposed that northern Arabia was colonised by foragers from the Levant around 15,000 years ago. These groups may then have been cut off by the drying climate and retreated to refugia like the Jubbah palaeolake.