Dust clouds, climate change and coins: consiliences of palaeoclimate and economy in the Late Antique southern Levant

Fuks, Daniel; Ackermann, Oren; Ayalon, Avner; Bar‐Matthews, Miryam; Bar-Oz, Guy; Levi, Yoav; Maeir, Aren M.; Weiss, Ehud; Zilberman, Tami; Safrai, Zeev

doi:10.1080/00758914.2017.1379181

Cited by 26 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 128 publications

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“… 2016 ; Fuks et al . 2017 ; Manning et al . 2017 ; Haldon and Rosen 2018 ; Izdebski A, Mordechai L, and White S. The costs of resilience in premodern societies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modelling Climate and Societal Resilience in the Eastern Mediterranean in the Last Millennium

Xoplaki

Luterbacher

Wagner³

et al. 2018

Hum Ecol

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This article analyses high-quality hydroclimate proxy records and spatial reconstructions from the Central and Eastern Mediterranean and compares them with two Earth System Model simulations (CCSM4, MPI-ESM-P) for the Crusader period in the Levant (1095–1290 CE), the Mamluk regime in Transjordan (1260–1516 CE) and the Ottoman crisis and Celâlî Rebellion (1580–1610 CE). During the three time intervals, environmental and climatic stress tested the resilience of complex societies. We find that the multidecadal precipitation and drought variations in the Central and Eastern Mediterranean cannot be explained by external forcings (solar variations, tropical volcanism); rather they were driven by internal climate dynamics. Our research emphasises the challenges, opportunities and limitations of linking proxy records, palaeoreconstructions and model simulations to better understand how climate can affect human history.

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“… 2016 ; Fuks et al . 2017 ; Manning et al . 2017 ; Haldon and Rosen 2018 ; Izdebski A, Mordechai L, and White S. The costs of resilience in premodern societies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modelling Climate and Societal Resilience in the Eastern Mediterranean in the Last Millennium

Xoplaki

Luterbacher

Wagner³

et al. 2018

Hum Ecol

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“…Recently coined the "Late Antique Little Ice Age," that decade was the coldest in Eurasia over the last 2,000 y (93,94). The outcome for the southern Levant was conceivably increased precipitation (95). Indeed, there is evidence for detrimentally increased flash flood intensity from Jordan (96,97), while sedimentation records throughout the Mediterranean suggest that the sixth century was a period of peak flooding (98).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The rise and fall of viticulture in the Late Antique Negev Highlands reconstructed from archaeobotanical and ceramic data

Fuks

Bar-Oz

Tepper

et al. 2020

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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The international scope of the Mediterranean wine trade in Late Antiquity raises important questions concerning sustainability in an ancient international economy and offers a valuable historical precedent to modern globalization. Such questions involve the role of intercontinental commerce in maintaining sustainable production within important supply regions and the vulnerability of peripheral regions believed to have been especially sensitive to environmental and political disturbances. We provide archaeobotanical evidence from trash mounds at three sites in the central Negev Desert, Israel, unraveling the rise and fall of viticulture over the second to eighth centuries of the common era (CE). Using quantitative ceramic data obtained in the same archaeological contexts, we further investigate connections between Negev viticulture and circum-Mediterranean trade. Our findings demonstrate interrelated growth in viticulture and involvement in Mediterranean trade reaching what appears to be a commercial scale in the fourth to mid-sixth centuries. Following a mid-sixth century peak, decline of this system is evident in the mid- to late sixth century, nearly a century before the Islamic conquest. These findings closely correspond with other archaeological evidence for social, economic, and urban growth in the fourth century and decline centered on the mid-sixth century. Contracting markets were a likely proximate cause for the decline; possible triggers include climate change, plague, and wider sociopolitical developments. In long-term historical perspective, the unprecedented commercial florescence of the Late Antique Negev appears to have been unsustainable, reverting to an age-old pattern of smaller-scale settlement and survival–subsistence strategies within a time frame of about two centuries.

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“…From a strictly technical perspective, new technologies and methodologies have vastly expanded the informative potential of broader landscape surveys. It is now possible to obtain more precise paleoclimatic and environmental data for specific regions (see, for instance: Büntgen et al 2016;Fuks et al 2017) as well as more refined dates of certain features, most notably terraces and connected structures-see, for instance, the use of OSL to date the phasing of terraces and fields in the Negev (Avni et al 2013). Similarly, archaeozoological and archaeobotanical studies, which are becoming more regularly included in archaeological projects, are of vital importance (for instance, Walker et al 2017, in particular, 202-226).…”

Section: Proposing An Integrated Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Different Fates of Architectures

Pini

2021

JIA

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This paper aims to problematize the issue of reuse and reoccupation of architectures and building materials in the Near East. So far, the vast majority of research and published work dealing with this topic (not only in the field of Islamic Archaeology and Art History) have focused on the monumental complexes of urban centres. In this framework, the concept of spolia has been at the centre of a long and still heated transdisciplinary debate. Vernacular architecture and rural contexts have, for the most part, been neglected. Frequent episodes of reoccupation of earlier structures, even if thoroughly described in archaeological reports are almost automatically branded as the result of pragmatic behaviour of local communities benefitting from the availability of abundant building materials from ruined structures. However, the vast number of ways in which reuse and reoccupation might have occurred is often overlooked. Even conceding that most of the evidence is likely due to some form or other of “pragmatism,” the different ways in which these appear need to be more fully explained and interpreted. This paper, which builds on existing scholarship of reuse and reoccupation, argues for a rethinking of the methodology. Other experiences, most notably those investigating the late Antique and early Medieval western Mediterranean, provide a useful point of reference for where to start the discussion. This paper will demonstrate how extending the perspective from the single building to the broader context, including the surrounding landscape, is ultimately the only way to fully comprehend the archaeological evidence and possibly better understand and explain the different “fates” of architectures.

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Dust clouds, climate change and coins: consiliences of palaeoclimate and economy in the Late Antique southern Levant

Cited by 26 publications

References 128 publications

Modelling Climate and Societal Resilience in the Eastern Mediterranean in the Last Millennium

Modelling Climate and Societal Resilience in the Eastern Mediterranean in the Last Millennium

The rise and fall of viticulture in the Late Antique Negev Highlands reconstructed from archaeobotanical and ceramic data

Different Fates of Architectures

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