Reimagining Urban Origins: Social and Religious Landscapes at Bāb edh-Dhrāʿ in the Early Bronze Age Southern Levant | ||
| حوليات أداب عين شمس | ||
| Volume 53, Issue 11 - Serial Number 3, September 2025, Pages 219-238 PDF (632.19 K) | ||
| Document Type: المقالة الأصلية | ||
| DOI: 10.21608/aafu.2025.464508 | ||
| Author | ||
| Musallam R. Al-Rawahneh | ||
| Assoc. Prof. Dr. Musallam R. Al-Rawahneh, Department of Archaeology and Tourism, College of Social Sciences, Mutah University, Karak, Jordan. | ||
| Abstract | ||
| The archaeological site of Bāb edh-Dhrāʿ, situated southeast of the Dead Sea, is one of the largest archaeological sites in southern Jordan and is dated to the Early Bronze Age (3300-2000 BC). It was a special city reflecting the unity of social and religious organization and the architectural and spatial structure. Its purpose is to offer an analytical analysis of the social, religious, and urban institutions at Bāb edh-Dhrāʿ, drawing on the evidence from archaeological excavations, archaeological and funerary artifacts, architectural monuments, funerary practices, settlement systems, environmental surveys, and regional significance. It is also concerned with the design of the city: walls and fortifications; planning; the communal use of buildings; and the degree to which they project a central political authority and a single social system. The study focuses on the religious structure of these communities, which could be reconstructed from analysis of the elaborate funerary rituals at the unique mass graves at the Bāb edh-Dhrāʿ cemetery, counting thousands of burials in large stone mass graves, which is showing evidence for a complex system of beliefs and mass worship rituals connected with death. The evidence demonstrates that Bāb edh-Dhrāʿ was not just an agricultural village, but an urban and a religious center which is suggestive of an even more complicated human society and religious beliefs in earlier days of urban history in the southern Levant. | ||
| Keywords | ||
| Southern Levant; Jordan; Bāb edh-Dhrāʿ; Early Bronze Age; Social and Religious Organization; Funerary Rituals | ||
| References | ||
|
| ||
|
Statistics Article View: 9 PDF Download: 11 |
||
