A Late Iron Age settlement in Wādī Banī Ḫālid: First season of the joint Omani‐Italian archaeological project

Abstract

The activities of the joint Omani-Italian archaeological project in the Šarqiyyah In December 2018, the archaeological mission to Oman, led by the University of Naples 'L'Orientale', decided to implement field activities by moving from a study of the central Omani coastline to the inner al-Ḥaǧar oases and Iron Age settlements (Loreto, 2018: 19-65). In fact, between 2014 and 2017, the Early Iron Age (EIA) II coastal village of BMH2 (Bimah) was extensively investigated. BMH2 falls in the coastal area between Muscat and Raʾs al-Ḥadd, where several coastal sites dated to the EIA and Late Iron Age (LIA) are displayed, from northwest to southeast: Bandar Ǧissa, Yiti, Ḍībab, Bimah, Fins, Ṭīwī and Raʾs al Ḥadd HD21 (Fig. 1). The coastal economy discovered after the excavation of BMH2 is based on both sea exploitation and land usage (breeding and agriculture) at a small