Ancient site · Settlement
ʿAin Ghazal
Also known as Ayn Ghazal
A large Neolithic farming town on the edge of modern Amman, Jordan, which around 7000 BCE covered 10–15 hectares and housed perhaps 3,000 people. It is famous for 15 statues and 15 busts of lime plaster built over reed frames, with staring eyes outlined in bitumen, found buried in two pits in 1983 and 1985.
Made between about 7200 and 6250 BCE, they are among the oldest large human figures ever found. Many are now in the Jordan Museum.
- Dates
- c. 7250–5000 BCE
- Still standing
- No, or only traces
- Location
- 31.99° N, 35.98° E
How we know
No writing existed; the village and its statues are dated by excavation and radiocarbon.
Nearby sites
- Jericho (Tell es-Sultan) c. 10,000 BCE – Persian period; tower and wall c. 8000 BCE
- Raqefet Cave c. 12,000–9700 BCE (Natufian burials)
- ʿAin Mallaha (Eynan) c. 12,400–10,200 BCE
- Petra c. 4th century BCE – 7th century CE; Treasury 1st century CE
- Palmyra early 2nd millennium BCE – 1932 CE; height 1st–3rd century CE
- Ugarit (Ras Shamra) c. 7000–1185 BCE; golden age c. 1500–1200 BCE
Related
- Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) archaeological culture