The Epipalaeolithic of Southwest Asia spanning the period from the Last Glacial Maximum to the end of the Pleistocene (~ 23,000–11,700 cal BP) is traditionally perceived as a profound transition from highly mobile foraging to sedentarising “complex” hunter-gatherer societies, which set the stage for the Neolithic Revolution of the Early Holocene. This period was characterised inter alia by population growth, resource intensification, increasing investment in residential sites and elaborate symbolic and mortuary practices, and nascent social differentiation, culminating in the Levantine Natufian, which marked the emergence of hunter-gatherer social complexity in the Levant and adjacent regions. In this paper, we present new securely dated evidence from our excavations at Ashkawta Rash Cave (Sulaymaniyah Province, Kurdistan Region of Iraq) indicating that in the northern Zagros, Epipalaeolithic behavioural and cultural innovations evolved following a very different trajectory, independent of cumulative shifts in demography, group size, architectural and social complexity, or resource ceilings.

First Author: Eleni Asouti

Co-Authors: Ceren Kabukcu, Douglas Baird, Hannah Morris, Amanj Amin

Keywords:
Epipalaeolithic
Zagros
Social complexity
Eastern Fertile Crescent
Southwest Asia
Kurdistan Region of Iraq