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The Desert Fayum at 80: revisiting a Neolithic farmingcommunity in Egypt

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 September 2016

Noriyuki Shirai
Noriyuki Shirai*
Affiliation:
Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31–34 Gordon Square, London WC1H 0PY, UK (Email: noriyuki.shirai@ucl.ac.uk)
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Abstract

Since the seminal research by Caton-Thompson and Gardner over 80 years ago,the archaeology of the Desert Fayum has attracted significant interest asthe earliest known centre of agriculture in Egypt. Traditionalinterpretations of subsistence behaviour and residential mobility have drawnheavily on the studies of lithic assemblages and faunal remains. Theseinterpretations must now be reconsidered in light of lithic material, bothfrom the original excavations and from more recent fieldwork. It emergesthat Kom W, the type site for the Neolithic Fayum, was probably a permanentsettlement occupied by a community cultivating cereals, in addition tohaving long-standing practices of hunting and fishing.

Keywords

EgyptDesert FayumKom WNeolithicformal stone toolslogistical mobility

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Type
Research
Information
Antiquity , Volume 90 , Issue 353 , October 2016 , pp. 1181 - 1195
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd, 2016 

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