The Bronze Age In The Lebanon

This volume offers a selection of studies on the archaeology and chronology of Lebanon, Syria and Egypt. Scholarly articles present both new data and its interpretation, and a re-analysis and synthesis of already existing data, ranging from the Early Bronze Age through the beginning of the Late Bronze Age.

In Byblos in the Late Bronze Age, Marwan Kilani reconstructs the “biography” of the city of Byblos during the Late Bronze Age, exploring its interactions and development in relation with the contemporary local and macroregional cultural and geopolitical reality.

An up-to-date, systematic depiction of Bronze Age societies of the Levant, their evolution, and their interactions and entanglements with neighboring regions.

A unique monumental building dating to the early part of the Middle Bronze Age (ca. 1900-1700 BCE) was uncovered at the southern Lebanese coast by the joint Lebanese-German excavation project at Tell el-Burak. The impressive architecture of the building was exposed in eight excavation seasons during the years 2001-2011. Inside the largest room of the Monumental Building at Tell el-Burak the excavations brought to light the sensational discovery of Middle Bronze Age mural paintings in situ on lime plaster covering the inner faces of its completely preserved mud-brick walls. This volume edited by Jens Kamlah and Helene Sader consists of the final publications of all excavation results concerning the Middle Bronze Age at Tell el- Burak. It furthermore includes an introduction into the joint Lebanese-German excavation project, chapters related to the site and the final publication of the excavated remains of the Late Medieval Period.

The tradition of seals and sealing was probably first developed in Mesopotamia and was then adopted in the Levant. The first seals of northern Mesopotamia and northern Syria were not the cylinder but the stamp seals. --The cylinder seal first appeared about 3500 B.C. and remained in use until the 5th century B.C. The information available about Early Bronze Age Levantine cylinder seals comes mainly from preserved seals and impressions found on pottery. The significance of the study of the seals and seal impressions of the Early Bronze Age Levant is that it would shed light on social, economic and administrative aspects of communities of the region during that time period. --Early Bronze cylinder seals and impressions of the Levant have been comprehensively studied and discussed over the years with the exception of the Lebanese finds. The earliest examples of the use of seals in Lebanon come from the Necropole eneolithique in Byblos and from a surface find from Tell Fadous/Kfarabida The purpose of this study is to collect and present the Early Bronze Age Lebanese cylinder seals and seal impressions as a single corpus and to attempt to answer the questions considering the function of seals in Lebanon.