title: Composite Sickles and Cereal Harvesting Methods at 23,000-Years-Old Ohalo II, Israel.
abstract: Use-wear analysis of five glossed flint blades found at Ohalo II, a 23,000-years-old fisher-hunter-gatherers' camp on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, Northern Israel, provides the earliest evidence for the use of composite cereal harvesting tools. The wear traces indicate that tools were used for harvesting near-ripe semi-green wild cereals, shortly before grains are ripe and disperse naturally. The studied tools were not used intensively, and they reflect two harvesting modes: flint knives held by hand and inserts hafted in a handle. The finds shed new light on cereal harvesting techniques some 8,000 years before the Natufian and 12,000 years before the establishment of sedentary farming communities in the Near East. Furthermore, the new finds accord well with evidence for the earliest ever cereal cultivation at the site and the use of stone-made grinding implements.
authors.affiliation: The Use-Wear Analysis Laboratory, Zinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa, 199 Aba Khoushy Ave., Mount Carmel, Haifa, 3498838, Israel.
authors.forename: Iris
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5102-3163
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Groman-Yaroslavski
authors.affiliation: Martin (Szusz) Department of Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology, The Institute of Archaeology, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, 52900, Israel.
authors.forename: Ehud
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Weiss
authors.affiliation: Zinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa, 199 Aba Khoushy Ave., Mount Carmel, Haifa, 3498838, Israel.
authors.forename: Dani
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Nadel
mesh_terms: D000884:Anthropology, Cultural; D000069599:Crop Production / Q000266:history* / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods; D002523:Edible Grain; D049690:History, Ancient; D006801:Humans; D007557:Israel