Samuel White
Research Mentor: Kara Larson
Mentor Department: Anthropology; Museum of Anthropological Archaeology, LSA
Author(s): Samuel White, Kara Larson
Session: Session 1 (9:00 AM – 9:50 AM)
Presentation Type:
Abstract
During excavations conducted by the Lahav Archaeological Project in the 1970s and 1980s, large faunal assemblages dating to the Early Bronze Age were recovered from the Northern Negev Desert site of Tell Halif. These materials, originally identified by Dr. Melinda Zeder, include over 17,000 faunal remains analyzed using zooarchaeological methods, but the results of this identification work have never been synthesized. Examination of the demographic profiles of the assemblage provides insight into the animal management strategies used to provision food for inhabitants of Tell Halif and the broader Northern Negev Desert region during the Early Bronze Age, a period marked by the emergence of urban settlement and increasing pressure on local resources. The faunal data indicate that residents raised, culled, and butchered a range of livestock, primarily sheep, goats, and cattle. These activities appear to have taken place largely within domestic contexts rather than specialized butchery areas. These results are compared to the nearby site of Tell el-Hesi, which shows similar signs of household-based animal management and processing, providing broader insights into Early Bronze Age foodways of early urban locales in the Northern Negev Desert.
