Bone and ivory manufacturing at Ebla (Syria) during the Early and Middle Bronze Age (c. 2500–1600 BC)

Abstract

The corpus of bone tools and other objects from Tell Mardikh-Ebla constitutes a basis for studying the role and development of bone working at this urban centre between 2500 BC and 1600 BC. A preliminary assessment of bone artefact production that takes into account typology, distribution, and relation with other broad functional classes of items is presented, underlining trends and changes over time. During the Early Bronze Age III–IV a specific local production is attested through decorated bone sticks/pins. Decorated tubes are documented by three exemplars, showing that this kind of bone artefact — widespread in the Levant and Anatolia — was also present at Ebla. Bone tools were also widely used. Craft workers producing figurative and patterned inlays and beads preferred other materials, such as semi-precious stones and shell. A trend towards a dichotomy between the highly-specialized manufacture of valuable objects, such as inlays and incrustations linked to the ivory industry, and the production of tools that seem to have been focused upon spinning and weaving activities is evident during the Middle Bronze Age, when the number of bone tools decreased sharply.

Keywords:

• Ebla
• bone manufacture
• Northern Levant
• Early Bronze Age
• Middle Bronze Age

Notes

1 The animal bones were identified by Claudia Minniti of University of Salento, zooarchaeologist of the Ebla Expedition, who I sincerely thank; the identification of the ivory inlays from the Northern Palace was done by Barbara Wilkens.