Archaeologists in Jordan have discovered a landscape of megalithic monuments that offer insight into how ancient societies responded to the tumultuous cultural transition into the Early Bronze Age.
The discovery was made by a team from the University of Copenhagen during an excavation at Murayghat, an archaeological site in the arid hills of central Jordan. The landscape consists of some 95 dolmens, or stone burial monuments dated to 4500–3700 BCE, when the Chalcolithic culture, also known as the Copper Age, ceded to the Early Bronze Age.
Construction of the dolmens began at the dawn of the Early Bronze Age, some 5,500 years ago, likely as a communal response to the collapse of Chalcolithic culture and climate change, according to Susanne Kerner, project leader and archaeologist at the University of Copenhagen. The findings, published in the journal Levant under the title “Dolmens, Standing Stones and Ritual in Murayghat,” suggest that the ancient humans who survived the transition developed new rituals and monumental architecture in its aftermath. As they sought to rebuild civilization from ruin, faith became their best tool.
“Instead of large residential settlements with small sanctuaries, our excavations at Murayghat uncovered clusters of dolmens, monoliths, and massive stone structures,” Kerner said in a statement. “These were not homes; they were gathering places for rituals and communal burials.”
Excavations have also unearthed Early Bronze Age pottery, large ceremonial bowls, millstones, flint tools, animal horns, and copper artifacts—all of which bolster the team’s theory that ritual activity and communal gatherings were commonly held around the stone structures.
“The monuments and their visibility across the landscape may have acted as markers of identity and territory,” Kerner said. “Murayghat gives us a glimpse into how early societies redefined themselves by building monuments and creating new forms of community when traditional systems failed.”
