The birth of the gods and the origins of agriculture.

The birth of the gods and the origins of agriculture. JACQUES CAUVIN. The birth of the gods and the origins ofagriculture (tr. Trevor Watkins). xviii+259 pages, 70 figures, 8 plates.2000. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press (known colloquially as CUP) is a publisher given a Royal Charter by Henry VIII in 1534, and one of the two privileged presses (the other being Oxford University Press). ; 0-521-65135-2 hardback37.50 [pounds sterling] & US$59.95. Western Asia has an extraordinarily rich record of the emergence ofagriculture and village life. Recent fieldwork has revealed a degree ofsocial complexity once thought to be confined to be in childbed.See also: Confine to only a few sites (e.g.Jericho, Catalhoyuk). New finds of statues, paintings, monumentalstelae, public buildings, human and animal burials, and even cemeteriesnow make it abundantly clear that, across western Asia, Neolithicvillages had elaborate social structures and complex ideologies. The wealth of new evidence has made it possible to pushconsideration of these matters forward and to transmit some of thesefindings to a wider readership, Ian Kuijt's Life in Neolithicfarming communities is an important step in this direction, bringingtogether interpretations advanced by American, Israeli and Frenchscholars, each of whom has directed an excavation of a major Neolithicsite in western Asia, from Iran to Israel. Much of the book focuses onthe Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA PPNA Power Plate North America Inc. (Chicago, IL), c. 10,450-8800 cal BC) and B (PPNB PPNB Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (era),c. 8800-6250 cal BC). Several articles centre on ritual. Rollefson's summarizes newdata on burials, plastered skulls, figurines, statue caches andnon-domestic buildings from PPNB `Ain Ghazal Ghaz´aln. 1. A kind of Oriental lyric, and usually erotic, poetry, written in recurring rhymes. (Jordan). For the MiddlePre-Pottery Neolithic B (MPPNB), most ritual activities seem to becentred on houses, and no `public' buildings are so far known forthis period at `Ain Ghazal. From the burial data, he argues(persuasively) that `Ain Ghazal was composed of nuclear-familyhouseholds organized in lineages, and (not as persuasively) that thestatue caches may represent lineage or clan founders. For subsequentperiods, he relates the changes in burials and the appearance of publicbuildings to economic shifts, particularly herding and mixed farming. Goring-Morris' chapter, one of the best in the book, presentsan overview of MPPNB burials and an account of the specialized mortuarysite at Kfar Hahoresh (Israel). Here, secondary human remains, sometimesassociated with carcasses of large wild animals WILD ANIMALS. Animals in a state of nature; animals ferae naturae. Vide Animals; Ferae naturae. , were covered by plaster(but not, in this case, structures). Goring-Morris makes an elegantargument that the use of plaster in both house floors andskull-portraits served to `physically and symbolically segregate seg��re��gate?v. seg��re��gat��ed, seg��re��gat��ing, seg��re��gatesv.tr.1. To separate or isolate from others or from a main body or group. See Synonyms at isolate.2. andintegrate the realms of the quick and the dead' (p. 126) and to`form a bridge between living communities and their forebears' (p.128). He contrasts these customs with later habits emphasizing gravegoods that accompanied the deceased into another world -- a stimulatingway of looking at the data that should be pursued further. Kuijt embraces the idea of mortuary practices as active agents ofsocial cohesion. He argues that skull removal, decoration andredeposition Noun 1. redeposition - deposition from one deposit to anotherdeposition, deposit - the natural process of laying down a deposit of something in theKoePPNB were collective activities that integrateddifferent households. In support of this, Kuijt suggests that many ormost of the skull caches come from outdoor or courtyard contexts. Butskull caches have also been found inside houses; and Kuijt admits thatthe contexts which he is calling courtyards at Jericho are somewhatambiguous. I am not sure I agree with Kuijt's conclusions but theline of inquiry is an important one. A second group of articles focus on space and social organization.Byrd's excellent article discusses the spatial organization ofsites from the Natufian to the MPPNB in Palestine and Jordan,concentrating on house sizes and features within houses. Byrd concludesthat nuclear families were the probable social units throughout thistime range. I find much to agree with here, though more discussion ofthe exterior contexts would have been useful. Rosenberg & Reddingpresent an interesting argument for the existence of feasting at HallanCemi (Turkey), based partly on the highly decorated ground stone toolsand vessels there. Elsewhere in sites of this age, such items appear ina variety of contexts suggesting everyday use by small groups, so I amnot sure whether an intepretation emphasizing feasting alone is entirelyjustified. This fine book would have been even better had it included work byForest, Banning and Hodder, all of whom have taken up a number of theseissues, and a chapter specifically on the remarkable evidence fromNevali Cori and Gobeklitepe. This aside, the book should be requiredreading for anyone interested in the Neolithic. Jacques Cauvin's The birth of the gods and the origins ofagriculture is an updated translation of his earlier work, which drewinspiration from Leroi-Gourhan, Levi-Strauss and Durkheim, thusanticipating the application of structuralist thought to Near Easternprehistory prehistory,period of human evolution before writing was invented and records kept. The term was coined by Daniel Wilson in 1851. It is followed by protohistory, the period for which we have some records but must still rely largely on archaeological evidence to . Cauvin presents a broad synthesis of the Neolithic of theLevant Levant(ləvănt`)[Ital.,=east], collective name for the countries of the eastern shore of the Mediterranean from Egypt to, and including, Turkey. and Anatolia, in the course of making an argument about theorigins of agriculture (cultural and ideological) and its spread (viadiffusion). Given the currency of questions about symbolism, migration,diffusion and long-term structures in archaeology generally, this book,written by an expert on the Near Eastern data, will be of interest to awide readership. Nevertheless, readers would be wise to view the dataand conclusions presented here with extreme caution, and to read thepostscript first. For whilst the book is enormously thought-provoking,the argument sometimes entails a very selective use of evidence and anoccasional tendency to fit the evidence to the theory. Briefly, Cauvin argues that the Neolithic economies emerged firstin the northern Euphrates, in and around the site which he himselfexcavated (Mureybet). The impetus for domestication domesticationProcess of hereditary reorganization of wild animals and plants into forms more accommodating to the interests of people. In its strictest sense, it refers to the initial stage of human mastery of wild animals and plants. of crops derivedfrom a symbolic revolution and the `advent of divinities', in whichan ideology based on goddesses and bulls emerged for the first time;climate change and ecology played no appreciable role in the process.This ideology was then responsible for the spread of PPNBagro-pastoralism from the northern Euphrates, Anatolia, Palestine,Cyprus, Europe, Iraq and Iran. This woman-and-bull religion was alsolong-lived, the underpinning of Bronze Age religions across the NearEast, as in Sumerian, Canaanite, Hittite and even Minoan cultures. Iwill take up each of these points in turn, summarizing only a few of thedifficulties. Neolithic economies emerged first in the northern Euphrates. Cauvinbases this argument on excavations at Mureybet and nearby Abu Hureyra. Arespectable body of opinion sees the early domestication of some (butnot all) crops in this region. However, Cauvin's dismissal of insitu In place. When something is "in situ," it is in its original location. domestication in the southern Levant depends on a chronology thatis nowhere near as precise as he seems to assume. Cauvin himself admitsthat `[PPNA] is a period of intense originality in which ... subsistencestrategies of amazing diversity coexisted' (p. 214). Precisely so. Climate change and ecology played no appreciable roles. Cauvinembraces collective psychology, cultural readiness and even progress asbetter explanations for the Neolithic transformation than any issues ofecology. However, Cauvin omits any real consideration of the impact ofthe Younger Dryas arid phase at precisely the time when evidence forcultivation appears in the record. That this was a region-widephenomenon is not in doubt. It does not seem to me essential toCauvin's basic thesis to dismiss, quite so emphatically, the roleof variables for which we do have some evidence (climate, demography),whilst giving so much space to those for which the evidence is unclear,to say the least (tectonics, mythology, psycho-cultural factors). The impetus for domestication of crops derived from a symbolicrevolution in which an ideology based on goddesses and bulls emerged forthe first time. The Neolithic revolution involved a proliferation ofanthropomorphic Having the characteristics of a human being. For example, an anthropomorphic robot has a head, arms and legs. art in the Near East. Many of the figurines aremanifestly female, but many are not; most are schematic, unassignable Adj. 1. unassignable - incapable of being transferrednontransferable, untransferableinalienable, unalienable - incapable of being repudiated or transferred to another; "endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights" asto sex. (Nor are female figurines unique to the Near Eastern Neolithic;what should we make of the European `Venuses'?) Even if, for thesake of argument, we accept that female figurines numerically dominatethis art, there is nothing to indicate that these images conveygoddesses. The statues from `Ain Ghazal are seen as `supernaturalbeings' and the presence of six toes on some individuals `confirmsthis' (p. 112). It is, of course, equally likely that these worksrepresent lineages. Cauvin also argues that, in contrast topre-Neolithic art, bulls were set up at the top of a hierarchy ofanimals. But, in fact, the species of animals represented are quitediverse. Nowhere is this clearer than at Gobeklitepe, where stelae andsculptures of lions, snakes, and birds are more common thanrepresentations of bulls, though Cauvin still insists that the latterare `dominant' (p. 218). Where Cauvin does acknowledge thediversity of species in Neolithic art, he insists that they are`substitutes for bulls' (p. 107), which seems like specialpleading SPECIAL PLEADING. The allegation of special or new matter, as distinguished from a direct denial of matter previously alleged on the opposite side. Gould on Pl. c. 1, s. 18; Co. Litt. 282; 3 Wheat. R. 246 Com. Dig. Pleader, E 15. . This ideology, seen as a `conquering' one, was thenresponsible for the spread of PPNB agro-pastoralism across the NearEast. The spread of PPNB culture from the northern Euphrates across theNear East (or, alternatively, the PPNB interaction sphere) depends ondocumenting a pre-7500 cal BC local culture in a given region, whichthen adopts elements of PPNB material culture, Neolithic economicstrategies and the woman-and-bull ideology. Although some of the datacan be pushed to fit this scenario, the available evidence as a wholestrongly hints at early local developments of Neolithic economies. The woman-and-bull religion was long-lived, the underpinning ofBronze Age religions across the Near East and even beyond. Cauvin arguesthat long-term ideological structures in the Near East persisted fromthe Neolithic to the Bronze Age. The argument reminds me of JosephCampbell's work in mythology, which makes somewhat similar claims,although Cauvin is far better informed about the archaeology. Actually,this kind of investigation deserves serious thought. Religiousideologies can be exceedingly conservative, lasting (though withmodifications) for millennia. But in support of this argument, Cauvinmakes brief, extremely selective allusions to a few examples ofMiddle-Late Bronze Age iconography (Canaanite, Hittite, Minoan).Cauvin's thesis would be more convincing if he tracked theiconography from the Neolithic into the Chalcolithic and Early Bronze.This might present some difficulties, though. In Palestine and Jordan,the dominant motif in zoomorphic zo��o��mor��phism?n.1. Attribution of animal characteristics or qualities to a god.2. Use of animal forms in symbolism, literature, or graphic representation. art from Ghassulian-Beersheva sites isthe ibex, whilst iconography of any kind from the Palestinian-JordanianEarly Bronze Age is rare. In Anatolia, stags are consistently the mostcommon zoomorphic theme in the Early Bronze Age, whilst Ubaid and Urukart in Mesopotamia displays very diverse motifs that include ibexes andbirds as well as other animals. In Early Dynastic Sumer, femalegoddesses and male gods associated with bulls can be documented in somereligious literature. But these archetypes existed in complex pantheonswhich were subject to local cultures and radical changes, whilstindividual cities were dedicated to specific divinities. Still,Cauvin's book is a welcome reminder of the possibilities foranalysis of Neolithic ideologies, even if those ideologies were far morecomplex than Cauvin envisions. Undoubtedly this book will -- as itshould -- stimulate debate and provoke deeper thought. KATHERINE. I. WRIGHT, Institute of Archaeology The Institute of Archaeology is an academic department of University College London (UCL), in the United Kingdom. The Institute is located in a separate building at the north end of Gordon Square, Bloomsbury. , University CollegeLondon “UCL” redirects here. For other uses, see UCL (disambiguation).University College London, commonly known as UCL, is the oldest multi-faculty constituent college of the University of London, one of the two original founding colleges, and the first British , 31-34 Gordon Square, London WC1H 0PY, England.