by Suzanne Richard
My ACOR-CAORC Postdoctoral Fellowship, which I undertook in spring 2024, focused on the preparation of an upcoming volume entitled Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar and Its Environs, Vol. 2: Final Report on the Early Bronze IV Area B Settlements. The goal was to revise several chapters, one being a field report on one of the EB IV settlements at the site, specifically Phase B (the earlier of two major settlements in Area B). I was able to accomplish a complete revision and reanalysis of the Phase B chapter, along with much work finalizing the accompanying illustrations, as well as to work with my draftsman to finalize plates to go with two of my chapters on ceramics. Also, part of the work included assembling and editing specialist reports. Pulling all these materials together can be a herculean task normally taking years to process, analyze, and describe, all before writing up the materials. All of this is to say that finalizing an excavation field report for publication is no easy task.
For the purposes of this brief essay, I choose to discuss one exceptional discovery made during my residency at the American Center while researching and writing my chapter on “The Stratigraphy of Phase B.” The discovery concerned EB IV religion, cult, and ritual — an archaeological category thought nonexistent in the period — along with other aspects of complexity, e.g., trade, art, advanced technology, monumental architecture, complex society, defenses, planned sites, non-nucleated population density, economy, etc. The reason for this is that for a long time the EB IV was called a “dark age” and a “pastoral-nomadic interlude.” More recently, thanks to the excavation of Khirbat Iskandar and other permanent settlement sites, we know that the sedentary, agrarian-based populations were as important as the mobile pastoral ones during the period. I have written much about the site and the EB IV generally, hoping to convince the scholarly community of the significant level of social complexity in the period in almost all the above categories; now I can add religion to this complexity as well.
First, a little background on Khirbat Iskandar is in order. The site is located in the south-central plateau area of Jordan, some 4–5 miles north of Dhiban, on the north bank of the Wadi Wala. Strategically, the site sits astride the ancient “King’s Highway,” guarding the caravan route at the crossing of the bridge over the wadi. This Early Bronze Age site (ca. 3700–2000 BCE) is best known for its occupational phases stretching over a highly controversial historical and archaeological transition: the EB III (urban)–EB IV non-urban period. At 2500 cal BCE (the date is precise due to Bayesian radiocarbon modelling), urbanism (EB III) “collapsed,” ushering in the rural / non-urban / post-urban EB IV period. Scholars are still attempting to explain the causes of this highly debated and controversial topic. The view from Khirbat Iskandar and Jordan, generally, is one of cultural continuity amidst change. A recent season at Khirbat Iskandar has revealed unquestionable evidence for stratigraphic continuity between EB III and EB IV.
With that short background, I would like to discuss the two areas of cult and ritual at Khirbat Iskandar. While revising the Phase B materials, it became clear to me that the northern area (the public complex) and the western area (cultic features), if considered together, epitomized a sacred compound not unlike those known from the preceding urban EB II–III periods. This insight arose only after intensive research comparing the features and material culture discovered at the site with antecedent EBA materials. Thus, I am proposing a unique EB IV Sacred Complex at Khirbat Iskandar, not unlike those known from the EBA.
Along the northern fortifications, there is a Public Complex comprising a storage center / sanctuary, and along the western fortifications, there is a contiguous outdoor cult area. Of the eight-roomed Public Complex in the north, the two most important rooms and their features, the Central Room and the Bench Room, document what I believe is a small rural EB IV sanctuary / temple exhibiting linkages with antecedent EB III architectural, cultic, and ritual traditions and symbolism. The unique EB IV bench room was a repository for vessels used in the cult, both vessels used for libations and vessels used for storage of grains and oil (185 whole and restorable vessels, including many storage jars were found in the Public Complex). Most EBA sanctuaries / temples include a bench room for votives — a clear parallel for our bench room. The Central Room, reached by an impressive entrance of three steps at the end of a long pathway, included 12 cultic features: libation bin, hearth, firepit, mortar, stonework slab, offering table, niche with stepped platform, and favissa (cultic storage pit), along with additional features pointing to the importance of the room: pillar bases, pavement, plaster refinishing, etc. The Central Room matches EB II–III temples in being a broad room (door on the long side) with the axis point being the doorway straight across from the offering table and niche. The discovery of a favissa with the hoof of a bovine set into a decorative bowl and nearby goat horns exemplifies a ritual offering to the gods. Notably, there were 28 miniature vessels found in Phase B, most in the Public Complex—a sure sign of cultic practices as well. Additional evidence for the processing and preparation of foodstuffs for offerings are grains, legumes, and animal remains found in context.
New analysis and research brought to light a contiguous area along the western fortifications, which proved to be a sacred outdoor cult area consisting of: 1) a sacrificial platform (Fig. 1), 2) a pillar / offering table installation, 3) a second altar, possibly for butchering, 4) a basin with votive cups, 5) another pillar, 6) two massive pillar bases, 7) and elite objects / gifts (ceramic bull’s head, precious miniature bronze spearhead). In addition, it was possible to reconstruct an enclosure wall around this area. Now that all the disparate cultic features can be shown to be a sacred area separate from, but obviously associated with, the Sanctuary in the Public Complex, the parallels with antecedent EBA sacred complexes are more than apparent. Summarily, one can connect this combined outdoor cult area / sanctuary to EBA sites such as Betrawy, Zeraqoun, Bab adh-Dhra‘, Megiddo, and others. These sites have sacred areas comprising a broad-room temple, often with benches, perhaps standing stones, pillars, pits, and bins, and, significantly, an enclosed outdoor large stone sacrificial platform.
From my intense work at the center during my ACOR-CAORC fellowship, a new perspective on cult and ritual in the EB IV period emerged. It became clear that the two separate areas of sacred space described above (Sanctuary and Outdoor Cult Area), if combined, must be seen as a sacred compound, a conclusion that adds even more support to the view of complexity in the EB IV realm of cult / religion / ritual, as well as EB III/IV continuity at Khirbat Iskandar and in Jordan generally.
Suzanne Richard is Distinguished Professor of History and Archaeology at Gannon University in Erie, Pennsylvania, and directs the Collins Institute for Archaeology Research and the Archaeology Museum Gallery. She is the PI of the Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar and its Environs, Jordan, and co-director of the Madaba Regional Archaeological Museum Project (MRAMP). Her research focuses on the Early Bronze Age of the southern Levant, and with her CAORC fellowship at ACOR (spring 2024), she worked on preparing the following volume for publication: Archaeological Expedition to Khirbat Iskandar and Its Environs Vol. 2: Final Report on the Early Bronze IV Area B Settlements.