Tell Aswad
تل الأسود · Tall Aswad · Tel Aswad · Tell el-Aswad
Pre-Pottery Neolithic B·Damascene PPNB (Aswadian)·🇸🇾 Rural Damascus Governorate, Syria
About
About Tell Aswad
PPNB mega-village (8700–7500 BCE, ~18 ha at peak) in the Damascus basin/ Ghuta, irrigated by the Barada, considered the place of the earliest fully domesticated emmer wheat and barley in the world. Danielle Stordeur's 2001–07 excavations uncovered reed-footed furnaces, plastered skulls, massive storage, and DNA evidence of morphologically domestic cereals by 10,200 cal BP, making Tell Aswad a reference sequence for Neolithization and arguably earlier than Jericho PPNA for true domestication.
Why it mattersEarliest unequivocal domestic wheat/barley; reference for Levantine Neolithic chronology (Aswadian).
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Was irrigation invented here to sustain early cereal plots?
- 02Relation to Tell Ramad and Ghoraifé cultural sequence
Theories
- 01Barada alluvial-fan irrigation allowed sedentary surplus
- 02Aswadian as independent domestication center
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- c.8700–7500 BCE (PPNB ancien → moyen)
- Period
- Pre-Pottery Neolithic B
- Culture
- Damascene PPNB (Aswadian)
- Builders
- Damascus basin early farmers
- Purpose
- Irrigated farming village and cereal domestication center
- Abandoned
- c.7500 BCE
- Rediscovered
- Excavated 2001–07 (CNRS Stordeur & Khawam)
- Excavation
- Partially excavated
2001
Stordeur resumes excavations
c.8200 BCE
Domestic emmer dominant
On the ground
Structures & features
33.4039° N · 36.5500° E · 600 m · 3 mapped features
PPNB plastered-floor house area
houseRectilinear mudbrick houses with plaster
33.4041° N · 36.5502° ECommunal storage zone
storageClay silos and bins
33.4037° N · 36.5498° EPlastered skull deposit
ritual depositModeled skull cache
33.4039° N · 36.5499° E