Ritual Practices in Neolithic Levant, Mesopotamia, Near East

Throughout Mesopotamian history humans found ways of relating to the world through the environment and supernatural entities. When we study the relationship Mesopotamians had with their world, we see a symbolic system of communication that developed from ideology and belief systems. These symbolic systems of communication can be called “rituals”, which were created differently in different areas and time periods, and which were always changing.As defined by Firth (1951), ritual is “a kind of patterned activity oriented towards the control of human affairs, primarily symbolic in character with a non-empirical referent, and as a rule socially sanctioned” (p.

222). Using archeological evidence from the Levantine Neolithic period to study rituals, we see an introduction of new ritual practices and their function in community management.In the Levant, ritual practices and their significance changed many times during the Neolithic, but using evidence retrieved from sites inhabited throughout this period we can identify patterns of ritual activity corresponding with specific time periods, and we can see how ritual practices were used to regulate social behaviors. Ritual has had many roles in Levantine Neolithic societies. Ritual activities included mortuary practices, production and use of figurines, communal production, and communal organization.

The role that ritual plays in each of these cases is to unite and organize the community through cohesive practices.Communal actions provided bases for establishing social regulation. The practices surrounding death created a system of social hierarchy through the use primary and secondary burials, the location of burials, and the treatment of skeletons. There are three burial ‘styles’ which represent status.

The first is subfloor and courtyard burials with decapitation, which indicates a high hierarchical status because of the amount of work it would have taken to replaster the floors after decapitation and then second burials. The second style is courtyard burials, skulls intact.Many bodies found in this style seem to have been “discarded into holes dug into trash deposits,” most without much room; these ‘trash burials’ make up about 25% of adult interments (Rollefson, 2000, p. 169). The third style is infant burials; no decapitations were found on individuals younger than 15 months.

In a few cases infants were found buried on top of other skeletons. There have been 81 human interments found under PPNA houses in ‘Ain Ghazal. One house had eight people, twelve counting skulls, which represented a 400+ year span (Rollefson, 2000, p. 168).

Considering all 81 bodies, the PPNA ‘death rate’ would have been one every nine years. Observably, only certain people were chosen for subfloor burials, indicating an important hierarchical position. The way skulls were manipulated in the PPNA may have also been indicative of social position. Skulls that were painted, black or red, or which had plaster moldings made from them may have been from noteworthy individuals.

Other plaster figures were made including statues and busts of certain individuals, possibly suggesting the highest level of hierarchy (as suggested by Rollefson, 2002, p. 185).Figurines were also produced, both of humans and of animals. Animal figurines have been found in different contexts, indicating their different uses. Some were probably used as toys, whereas others “appear in contexts that indicate controlled ritual usage” (Rollefson, 2000, p.

184) possibly for personal protection or prosperity. One example of ritual human-animal relationships is a bull figurine that was “ritually ‘killed’…before the clay had dried”, then after firing, it was placed (as two pieces) into a grave with a human; these pieces were “used in some solemn ritual” (Rollefson, 2000, p. 167).Rollefson believes the figurines were available to everyone because of their dispersal patterns, so they must be representative of the lowest hierarchical level for ritual activity (p. 167).

Human figurines have also been found in different contexts. The most common identifiable form from PPNA is a anthropomorphic ‘fertility’ figure. These figurines may have been symbolic guardians for women during their most dangerous years, pregnancy and birth (Rollefson, 2000, p. 167). The roles of ritual activities included more than mortuary practices and figurines, however those are examples that have been identified in many Levantine sites.

Rituals over time The site of ‘Ain Ghazal is a great way to analyze the changes in Neolithic ritual practices that occurred throughout different periods because the site was continuously inhabited for more than 2,000 years. The site saw four major phases of development: MPPNB, LPPNB, PPNC, and Yarmukian PN. The dramatic changes due to a growing population of farmers and herders in this area in the PPNA forced the community to adapt through cultural/social organization and management. One way we see these social adaptions is through changes in ritual practices. A wealth of material from MPPNB has been found related to ritual.Earlier Levantine traditions were maintained while amplifications occurred to accommodate the rapid growth during the late ninth and early eighth millennia (Rollefson, 2000, p.

185). From the use of figurines to burial practices and skull decorations (discussed earlier), Rollefson (2000) says there were (at least) three hierarchal levels in the settlement which “reflect to some degree the organization of social behavior on a day-to-day basis” (Rollefson, 2000, p. 183-4). From the PPNB to PPNC burial practices only changed by the integration of secondary burials.New evidence of ritual activity in the PPNB comes from the cult buildings/shrines and temple/sanctuary structures. Specifically, the circular cult buildings were small, suggesting they were not available for everyone’s use.

And the temple/sanctuary may have been for use by most, if not all, of ‘Ain Ghazal residents—represented by its large terrace wall and the large amount of labor needed for its construction (Rollefson, 2000, p. 175). Ritual traditions are evidenced to have changed quite dramatically from PPNB to PPNC through burial practices.Five prominent changes occurred: 1) decapitation of the deceased no longer occurred; 2) subfloor burials did not occur past the early PPNC, and instead burials were in courtyards; 3) there was a nearly equal number of primary and secondary burials which Rollefson says is suggestive of a large part of the village population as only part-time residents; 4) the production and use of figurines decreased dramatically, possibly indicating that individual levels of interactions with spirits decreased as a ritual practice; and 5) the pig bones found in (mostly secondary) burials may represent of the relationship the person had with animals such as full-time ‘Ain Ghazal resident farmers and pastoralists (Rollefson, 2000, p.

178-9).The last period that occurred in ‘Ain Ghazal was the Yarmukian, which had the lowest population level in over 2,000 years. Only a few figurines were found, seven humans and five identifiable animals (goat, sheep, cattle and birds). This smaller number of figurines may be suggestive of “a minor ritual role continued from the PPNC phase” (Rollefson, p. 181). In regards to burial practices, not a single Yarmukian burial has been found; presumably there is a cemetery that they have yet to discover.

Verhoeven (2002) has examined the changes that occurred from PPNB to PN in the Levant, Syria and South-East Anatolia. From the evidence he compiled, he has determined that secondary burial practices became rare in the PN as compared to the PPNB.He proposes that the changing burial practices suggest that ritual in the PN was focused on individuals and households compared to the community focus in the PPNB. He comes to this conclusion based on the idea that secondary burials are communally planned, in advance, “reinforcing collective values, collective identity, and community cohesion”, and that primary burials focus on the continuity of individual households (Verhoeven, 2002, p. 8) . Rituals and social segments Communal rituals were a symbolic system that helped create and maintain community structure and organization.

Rituals for the whole community came in many forms, including village meetings, constructing new buildings, and communal grinding and production.These ‘public rituals’ worked to “cement communities together, emphasizing the aspect of communality, in order to counterbalance the uncertainties of the PPNB way of life, and to reduce the chance of conflicts” (Verhoeven, 2002, p. 9). The role of ritual in communal organization and management is evidenced by structures that were created for communal uses. These structures have obvious differences from domestic structures and are found in many Neolithic Levant sites.

One extraordinary example was the discovery of structure O75 in Wadi Faynan, Jordan at site WF16. This structure was very large, with decorations, tiered benches, a large hearth/alter, and a floor painted red throughout four periods (each an expensive process, indicating re-floorings coinciding with special events (Rollefson, 2000, p. 175)).The mortars inside suggest collective grinding, broken stone bowls and goat/ibex bones suggest feasting, and smaller structures surrounding the structure show evidence of workshops for artifacts such as beads, and for food preparation and storage. Although the exact use of structure O75 is unknown, its size, form, and similar manner to other early Neolithic sites of northern Levant imply “communal activity in both its construction and use” (Mithen et al.

, 2011, p. 352). Ritual practices also functioned on a regional level in that many ritual activities were found in different Levant sites, suggestive of a “planned and complex ritual system” (Horwitz & Goring-Morris, 2004, p. 176).The site of Kfar Hahoresh is one which probably served as a “PPNB mortuary cult center” (Horwitz & Goring-Morris, 2004, p.

176). It’s unique in that there was no evidence of residential structures or activities, rather it must have served for neighboring villages. The human interments discovered here demonstrated intentional selection of animals as well as body parts, special arrangements of isolated bones, and the use of faunal elements for ritual acts. For example “the absence of animal skulls in both the ‘Bos pit’ and gazelle interment, associated in the former case with a human skeleton without a skull, and in the later with a modeled plaster skull” (Horwitz & Goring-Morris, 2004, p. 176).Aspects of ritual activities are apparent in multiple locations, such as the similarities between the nondomestic structures at ‘Ain Ghazal and the ritual buildings at Jericho.

This suggests that religious practices were shared throughout the large Near East sphere (Rollefson, 2000, p. 186). The use of human-animal burials and portrayals of animals in sacred frameworks is seen at Kfar Hahoresh as well as other Neolithic sites, also demonstrats a widespread ritual practice during the PPNB. Hershkovitz & Gopher (1988) summarize five widespread PPNB burial practices which contribute to our understanding of regional interconnection through ritual:1) The existence of primary and secondary burials within the same site. 2) Burials within the living quarters, generally beneath the floors.

) The flexed position of the dead in cases of primary burials. 4) Intact juvenile skeletons in their original graves. 5) Different ritual practices for adults and children mainly manifested by the detachment of adults’ skulls” (Hershkovitz & Gopher, 1988, p. 123) These characteristics of ritual activities demonstrate “a certain degree of homogeneity” for Levantine burial customs, suggesting that aspects of culture and ideology were shared throughout the Levant (Hershkovitz & Gopher, 1988, p. 123). Rituals were a primary part of human activity which created a system of regulating social, cultural, and economic behaviors and processes throughout Neolithic Levant (Verhoeven, 2002, p.

9).