Syria: A Short History/3
PREHISTORIC ERAS
Just as in an iceberg the part visible above the surface of the water is but a small fraction of the huge mass, so in the history of Syria and the Syrians the historic period is a still smaller portion of the whole, dating only from about 3000 B.C., a mere fifty centuries ago. The pre-literary period, for the knowledge of which we have to depend upon archaeological remains rather than written records, goes back through the New Stone Age (Neolithic) to the Old Stone Age (Palaeolithic) tens of thousands of years. Recent excavations in the uninhabited wastes of northern and eastern Syria, the caves of Lebanon, the tells of Palestine and the sand-buried cities of Transjordan leave no doubt that this archaeologically long-neglected and little-known region was much more advanced in the earliest ages than was previously suspected.
Throughout all or most of the early Palaeolithic Age, there were presumably human beings living in Syria, but their bones have not been found. By the end of the early Palaeolithic, however, some 150,000 years ago, man had progressed sufficiently to leave recognizable traces, in the form of stone implements found in cave deposits or scattered over the surface. These tools and weapons consist of roughly chipped or irregularly flaked flints—at first fist hatchets, then scrapers and choppers, and finally hand axes.
The humans who left these stone traces of their existence were presumably a primitive and unspecialized type of white man, whose culture was still undifferentiated. They lived—at least at times—in caves as a measure of protection against rain, wild animals and other enemies. The climate was rainy and tropical, producing luxuriant vegetation in which lived animals now largely extinct, among them early forms of the rhinoceros, the hippopotamus and an elephant-like creature. At this time Europe was suffering from the rigours of the Ice Age, allowing the Near East an earlier start as a human habitat.
The only other surviving traces of early Palaeolithic man are some fragments of charcoal from one of the lowest levels in a Mount Carmel cave. In his slow and arduous ascent from lower mental levels primitive man presumably stumbled by accident upon occasional discoveries which stimulated and developed his dormant inventive faculty. For instance, he must have witnessed, and eventually learned to utilize, fires engendered by lightning and other natural occurrences. Bits of fresh meat, green fruit, edible roots must have fallen accidentally into such fires. The resulting tenderness and improved flavour no doubt invited experimentation on the part of the intellectually alert or curious. He must, too, repeatedly have experienced sparks and even blazes as he chipped or flaked flints and other hard stones. After unguessable generations some genius pondered this phenomenon and, by trial and error, learned how to generate and control it, thus making one of the greatest single advances in the progressive march of mankind. The value of a blaze was gradually realized, not only for preparing new dishes but also as a measure of protection against cold and as a means of warding off wild beasts and driving game out of woods.
The earliest known human skeletal remains in the Near East were found in Palestine, and date from the middle Palaeolithic Age, at least 100,000 years ago. They present an entire series of skeletal material ranging from short, stocky Neanderthal man through progressively higher forms to some Mount Carmel skeletons which show certain anatomical features of Homo sapiens. They thus seem to constitute a significant link in the evolution of man and mark Syria as the habitat of an intermediate between the primitive and the modern man.
Man in the middle Palaeolithic still lived in caves and subsisted on plants and animals in their natural condition. Expertly cracked human bones from which the coveted marrow was extracted point to cannibalistic practices. His implements, as before, are irregular flakes and rough chunks of flint which he employed as hand axes, scrapers, choppers and hammers. Social organization was rudimentary, centring on family groups.
This culture developed in a climate which was gradually becoming drier. Animal remains include, in addition to the rhinoceros and hippopotamus, the gazelle, spotted hyena, bear, camel, river hog and deer. Though the weather was warm and dry, permanent rivers still watered the country and some woody or scrubby areas persisted. In the later portion of the middle Palaeolithic a drastic alteration in climatic conditions took place involving heavy rainfall. Another wet period ensued, and lasted for tens of thousands of years, during which the fauna begins to assume a modern aspect. The scanty human traces from this rainy epoch are associated with rock shelters in Lebanon.
Throughout the long span of the late or upper Palaeolithic there is evidence of increased dryness interrupted by one damper interlude; warm and cool Mediterranean climates alternated. The culture is known from recent cave excavations near the Dog River, which have yielded human skeletal remains as well as those of deer, hyenas, rhinoceros, foxes and goats, with gazelle remains assuming a dominant place. While the industry in this epoch does not radically vary from the preceding, the stone implements manifest a tendency to diminish in size, indicating that man had begun to mount his tools in wooden or bone hafts. The wood, being perishable, left no traces, but bones suspected of such use have been discovered.
The Old Stone Age shades off imperceptibly into the New Stone Age, in which man used polished stone implements. The transitional period—termed Mesolithic, or Middle Stone Age—lasted some six thousand years beginning about 12,000 B.C. Not only did Mesolithic man polish flint, basalt and other stone weapons and tools and thus render them more effective, but for the first time he also exploited the resources of his environment to an appreciable extent. Mesolithic culture in Palestine—called Natufian after a wadi site—is associated with bones of a race smaller in stature than its Palaeolithic predecessors, slender and round-headed, evidently members of the same race to which the Hamites and Semites of later times belonged. Their industry is rich in worked and carved bones and notched arrow-heads.
The discovery of an almost complete skull of a large dog in a cave on Mount Carmel provides the first Syrian evidence of the domestication of animals—another major step in human progress. The dog was domesticated when man was still a food gatherer and hunter whose movements were dictated by those of the wild animals he sought for food. But Syria was the home of several animals adaptable for taming, which led to a life of herding with a more reliable supply of food than hunting. In this pastoral stage man remained a wanderer, but his movements now were governed by his quest of green pastures for his herds. The dog became the guardian of the flocks and the hearth and helped to dispose of offal.
Another innovation, which tended toward a sedentary mode of life and exercised an even more abiding influence on man, was the practice of agriculture, which began in the late Mesolithic or perhaps the early Neolithic period. Wheat and barley grew wild in North Syria and Palestine, and their nutritive value must have been discovered very early. Flint sickles and other implements left by Natufian cave-dwellers in considerable numbers prove that they and their North Syrian contemporaries were among the first in the Near East—and in the world—to till the ground.
Agriculture in Syria presumably began before 6000 B.C. as rude hoe culture, necessitating movement from place to place as the surface soil became exhausted. There is no evidence of agricultural practice by any other people so early in history; early Semitic migrants from Syria, for instance, evidently introduced both wheat and grape culture into Egypt. The principal cereals (wheat, barley and millet), fruits (olives, grapes and figs) and vegetables all were cultivated and improved before recorded history.
With the shift to stock and crop raising, the Mesolithic nomad became a settled villager. Caves and rock shelters in highlands were gradually abandoned in favour of clay huts or mud-brick houses in settlements on plains. Remnants of primitive habitations have been found in the earliest levels of the human occupation of Jericho, dating back to about 5000 B.C. No earlier settlements have been discovered anywhere else, so Jericho has perhaps the longest continuous existence of any city in the world.
Land ownership arose. Fixity of abode led to the accumulation of experience in the form of cultural tradition, and to the transmission of this tradition to subsequent generations. One important result of community life was the strong impetus it gave to the evolution of language, which Mesolithic man elaborated to an astounding degree. A comparison of modern colloquial Arabic, for example, with the reconstructed mother Semitic tongue reveals a continuing process of simplification from the high and remote prehistoric level.
Another relic of the higher life of Mesolithic man is belief in some deity or deities and a crude idea of some life for the departed person after death, as indicated by the presence of food vessels and offerings in burial places. The practice of agriculture and animal husbandry necessitated gods to watch over fields and flocks, instead of the spirits and magic on which hunters relied. Pastoral people were presumably devotees of the moon god, who in a warm country like Syria seemed more kindly disposed than did the sun. With the spread of agriculture, men came to associate growth with sunlight, and the sun began to take precedence over the moon. Besides the worship of the sun goddess, the worship of the Earth-Mother arose. Cultic symbolism and mythology associated with the goddess of fertility, which reached their full bloom later in the Adonis-Ishtar and the Osiris-Isis cycles of Phoenicia and Egypt, have their origins in this period.
Along with the religious growth of Mesolithic man went his artistic evolution. In its earliest manifestations art was closely linked with magic by representing animals to be hunted, by creating amulets of bone and stone for protection against forces man could not control and by making fertility and cult statuettes for use in rituals designed to increase by magic the produce of his herd or crop.
In the New Stone Age, which commenced around 6000 B.C. and lasted about two thousand years, marked advances were made in agriculture, animal breeding, the use of polished stone implements and settled life. This age also saw the invention of pottery and the discovery of metal. Pottery makes its appearance in Palestine in one of the lowest strata of Jericho, and may even have been invented there. Monochrome pottery in North Syria may date from about 5000 B.C. This was followed, after perhaps five centuries, by painted pottery from a mound north-east of Antioch. Prior to the invention of the potter's wheel, which must have antedated 4000 B.C., all pottery was hand-fashioned. The North Syrian ceramic artists were vase painters who evidently emulated the skilled products of basket makers and rug weavers. Technically and artistically their wares, including dishes, bowls, platters, jars and cups, rank among the finest hand-made fabrics of antiquity. They used intricate polychrome geometrical and floral designs which competent judges assert have never been surpassed in beauty. For this painted pottery era the largest number of settlements, the thickest deposits and the highest cultural remains come from North Syria and Mesopotamia, leaving no doubt that the main stream of civilization in western Asia flowed then through that region, leaving all surrounding zones relatively unaffected.
The invention of pottery was certainly a major step in man's cultural progress. Earthenware vessels soon replaced gourds, skins and hollowed-out pieces of stone or wood, enabling man to live some distance from the source of his water supply and—even more important—to store for future use any surplus food, as well as seeds. The food gatherer of the nomadic stage, who had turned food producer in the agricultural stage, now became, in addition, food conserver. This gave him respite from the constant time-consuming search for sustenance, and the resulting leisure was essential to the furtherance of human progress.
The addition of pottery to man's household goods serves incidentally a most useful scientific purpose. Pottery is imperishable, though it may be smashed into innumerable sherds. Its make and decoration reflect the tastes and fashions of the age as women's clothing does in our day; its distribution affords the best index of early trade relations. Therefore its study opens up before the modern scholar one of the widest windows through which he can peep into the obscure realm of the past. Metallurgy provides a later window. With ceramics and metallurgy we pass from prehistory to protohistory.
The actual discovery of metal may have been made in western Asia soon after the invention of pottery, but the supremacy of its first important representative, copper, must have been delayed a thousand years or so. In Syria copper began to be more or less widely used around 4000 B.C., but it did not displace stone as the dominant material for tools and weapons till after 3000 B.C. This millennium, the fourth, may be designated the Chalcolithic (copper-stone) Age; in it copper was utilized by the most progressive communities, but flint remained the principal material. Traces of Chalcolithic culture abound in Ugarit (near Latakia) and other sites in northern Syria and in Palestine. About 3000 B.C. the Copper Age begins, often wrongly designated the Bronze Age. The discovery about 2000 B.C. of ore deposits in Edom, south and east of the Dead Sea, completed the triumph of copper.
In the Chalcolithic as in the Neolithic period, northern Syria remains the main cultural focus of the entire Near East. From Syria the knowledge of copper was disseminated in all directions—to predynastic Egypt, to northern Mesopotamia and to Anatolia. The relics of man in this region indicate that he used first copper, later its harder alloy bronze, for the manufacture of weapons of war before he used it for tools of peaceful pursuit. Tribes or communities employing weapons of such malleable, ductile and tenacious metal obviously enjoyed a preponderant advantage over those employing stone. But the arts of peace benefited equally. The art of building markedly improved. Sizable structures make their appearance. Many Copper Age villages were encircled by a rude wall, for protection against enemies.
In the meantime impetus was given to agriculture and animal husbandry. The ox, sheep and goat, whose domestication began in the Neolithic, were now widely used, as evidenced by their frequent appearance on figurines. The pig was the preferred animal for sacrifice, and the dove was associated with the goddess of fertility. Almost all of the Chalcolithic settlements had their location in river valleys or alluvial plains and depended upon irrigation. In the realm of agriculture the outstanding Chalcolithic achievement thus came to be irrigation culture, involving the cultivation of several varieties of garden vegetables: lettuce, onions, garlic, chick-peas, horse-beans and condiments. This increase in the variety and quantity of available food is reflected in the noticeable rise of the median human stature in the late Chalcolithic. The ethnic composition of the population of the varied settlements, at this period before the arrival of the Semites, is not clear.
Art took a long stride forward when metal became available. Seals, jewelry articles and copper utensils from this period abound and manifest improved artistic quality. Sculpture flourished; mural paintings begin to appear. But it was ceramic decoration which continued to provide the artist with the best opportunity for the exercise of his talent. By the end of the fourth millennium the technique of glaze painting had reached early Minoan Crete and early dynastic Egypt from northern Syria. In a North Syria mound there has been found a hoard of cast copper statuettes, including a god and a goddess of fertility, the earliest known representation of the human form in metal.
The development of metallurgy and ceramics, which featured the late Chalcolithic and the early Copper Ages, gave rise to different trades, increased business relations between villages and towns and resulted in a higher degree of specialization in labour. Populous towns flourished in plains and valleys and in hitherto uninhabitable places. Trade began to assume international proportions. Expansion of commercial and cultural contacts between Syria, on the one hand, and Egypt and Babylonia, on the other, was a factor of primary significance for the further development of all these lands.
Only one great invention was lacking: writing. The first inscribed documents thus far discovered come from Sumer and date from about 3500 B.C. From lower Mesopotamia the art spread into northern Syria. It became well advanced in the early third millennium. With it and with the simultaneous arrival of the Semites, the historic period begins.