This chert single-platform core is from the site of Saruq al-Hadid in the Emirate of Dubai.  The artefact was excavated from a bone midden dating to the Wadi Suq/Late Bronze Age, ca. 3750-3300 BP.

The artefact is curated by the Antiquities Department, Dubai Culture and Arts Authority.

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This chert single-platform core is from the bone midden at Saruq al Hadid.  It was excavated from context 2231 by a team from the University of New England (Australia), and is illustrated in Moore et al. 2022:Figure 14A.  The core is made on a small nodule of high-quality chert, possibly from the Jebel Faya region.  The nature of the cortex suggests that the nodule was collected from near the bedrock source.  Several flakes were first removed from one end, followed by rotation and striking flakes from an adjacent face using the prior flake scars as the platform.

See the annotations for technological details about this stone tool.

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Arabian Peninsula

The Arabian Peninsula was first occupied by hominins during a period of increased rainfall from 190,000-240,000 BP and again at 75,000-130,000 BP, which created a mosaic of rivers, lakes, and wetlands across the Arabian Peninsula.  These rich resources attracted early hominins—perhaps Homo heidelbergensis or a related archaic hominin species.  They carried an Acheulean stone technology and moved southeast from the Levant or directly east from sub-Saharan Africa across the Red Sea and into the Arabian interior.  You can view an Acheulean handaxe from Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates here.

Modern Homo sapiens dispersed through Arabia ca. 130,000-200,000 BP.  They also made handaxes—you can view one from Sharjah here—alongside prepared core Levallois stone technology.  These Middle Palaeolithic technologies are thought to be related to similar stone technologies in the Middle Stone Age of Africa.  The Faya Palaeolandscape is a UNESCO World Heritage site centred on the Palaeolithic site of Jebel Faya (Sharjah), preserving this important place.

From ca. 75,000 BP to 8000 BP people relied on a blade or blade-like lithic technology more similar to contemporary tools made in North Africa and Southwest Asia.  The period was marked by wet/dry cycles with extended periods when the interior of the peninsula was uninhabitable, followed by wet cycles with the formation of small lakes and playas.  The modern Persian Gulf was a large, well-watered river valley (the Ur-Schatt River) prior to the incursion of the rising sea ca. 12,000-7000 BP.

The Neolithic period, ca. 8500-6000 BP, saw the gradual transition from a Palaeolithic hunter-gatherer economy to strategies based on pastoralism and coastal fishing.  This shift was likely affected by the flooding of the Persian Gulf, combined with a period of climate amelioration known as the Early Holocene Humid Period, which dramatically changed the ecology of the region.  These changes are also thought to have strongly influenced the emergence of the Ubaid period agricultural communities of Mesopotamia by ca. 7000 years ago, at the northern end of the Gulf.  People during the Neolithic in southeastern Arabia practiced a stable settlement system based on coastal fishing, mixed with hunting and seasonal nomadic husbandry of domesticated animals.  Neolithic stone tools included distinctive elongated and stemmed stone arrowheads with a triangular (trihedral) cross section, along with bifacial arrowheads with affinities to arrowheads made at the northern end of the Gulf.  These were made by pressure flaking.  Neolithic people traded extensively with these northern people.

The ‘Dark Millennium’ marked the end of the Neolithic in southern and southeastern Arabia, when much of the area witnessed steep population decline between about 6000-5200 BP.  This is thought to have been caused by a period of extreme aridity.  Ameliorating conditions marked the cultural transition to the Hafit period, ca. 5200-4700 BP.  The first evidence of metal tools appears during the Hafit period, marking the beginning of the Bronze Age in southeast Arabia.  Circular beehive-shaped communal tombs were built for the first time, irrigation systems were established to support nascent agriculture, and people built a range of defensive and domestic structures from mud bricks.  Intensive trading and cultural connections were established with Mesopotamia.

The Umm Al Nar period of the Early Bronze Age, ca. 4700-4000 BP was characterised by round communal tombs made from carefully carved ‘ashlar’ stone blocks, complex architecture with large stone towers built around wells, and a distinctive regional culture focused on agriculture.  Umm Al Nar settlements on the Persian Gulf became important nodes in the trade between the Mesopotamian societies (Sumerians and Akkadians) and the Harappan culture of the Indus Valley.  Arid conditions from about 4200 BP contributed to a decline in settlement sites and changes in subsistence, including a greater emphasis on mobile pastoralism through inland regions.  Marine foods were intensively exploited and date palm agriculture continued to be practiced.

The shifts in the economic base and a decline in long-distance trade connections are implicated in the distinctive changes in material culture of the Middle and Late Bronze Ages (Wadi Suq) period, ca. 4000-3200 BP.  Early Bronze Age crafts, including metallurgy and soft stone (soapstone) vessel manufacture, continued through this period, and distinctive new types of artefacts were produced.
The Iron Age in southeastern Arabia, ca. 3200-2300 BP, was marked by economic and social changes arising from the domestication of the dromedary camel and the invention of the aflaj—a system of sophisticated aqueducts that spurred intensive agriculture, population growth, and an increase in settlement sites in both coastal and inland areas, possibly alongside more centralised political institutions.  Despite the name, metalwork during the Iron Age was dominated by the production of copper-based weapons and objects.

Saruq al Hadid

Saruq al Hadid is an archaeological site located on the edge of the Rub al Kali desert, about 45 km inland from the Persian Gulf.  The site is considered enigmatic because it was a location of intensive metallurgical production, particularly during the Iron Age, despite lacking both nearby metallurgical ore or sufficient fuel for smelting it.  All the material must have been transported there over great distances.  The site was discovered in 2002 by H. H. Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, Ruler of Dubai, when he noticed the slag-studded dunes from his helicopter.  The site is large, covering over 1 square kilometre, with archaeological materials incorporated into dunes up to 6 metres high.

Saruq al Hadid was persistently occupied from the Neolithic to the Islamic period.  Occupation was seasonal to take advantage of wetter and cooler months.  Domestic structures have not been identified at the site, although postholes suggest the use of tents or bough shelters, and fireplaces and stone-lined earth ovens are common.  Intensive occupation began at the site about 3950 BP, during the Bronze Age, and a metre-deep midden of animal bone accumulated from about 3750-3300 BP.  The midden contained more than one metric ton of bone fragments primarily from wild animals including dromedary camels, Arabian oryx and gazelles, hare, lizard, birds.  Domestic animal bones—goat and sheep—and marine fish and shellfish were also present.  Numerous Late Bronze Age metal arrowheads were found in the bone midden, along with Wadi Suq and Late Bronze Age pottery styles, soft stone vessel fragments, stone beads, and a stone technology involving the production of cutting tools and backed microliths.

The period of most intensive activity at the site spanned ca. 3250-2800 BP, during the Early Iron Age.  Snake decorations on pottery and small copper-based and gold-alloy snake images became plentiful at the site, along with numerous votive offerings left there, often including elaborate metal weapons and valuable materials such as semi-precious stone beads and silver and gold jewellery.  Many thousands of copper-based arrowheads, vessels, daggers, axes, bracelets or anklets, and items of personal adornment have been found in votive contexts.  Metal was also used to make anthropomorphic figurines and ritually-significant miniature bows, arrows, and quivers in copper and gold alloy.  Hundreds of gold alloy objects have been found, including beads, rings, gold sheets, ribbon, and wire.  Corroded masses of bronze arrowheads suggest the votive burial of full arrow quivers in pits.  Dozens of long swords made from copper-based metal and iron were interred at the site, with the iron probably originating from Iran.  Iron was not smelted or smithed at the site, so the ca. 200 kg of iron objects must have been transported there over time.  This varied evidence suggests that the site was of great cultural significance as a ‘snake cult’ site, for nearly 500 years, from ca. 3250-2800 years ago, in the Early Iron Age.  The seasonal visits may have resembled modern religious pilgrimages.  In addition to the votive sacrifices, the association of metal smelting and the production of valuable metal and other objects at Saruq al Hadid indicate that craftwork was an important element of these pilgrimages.  The richness of the artefacts combined with the evidence for craftwork makes it impossible for archaeologists to differentiate the sacred from the mundane activities at Saruq al Hadid during the Early Iron Age.  The cultic aspect of the activities declined after the Iron Age, although copper smelting activities continued there, sporadically, for hundreds of years.  Tools and objects were scavenged and reworked by later visitors, and in recent centuries the site was used by Bedouin people.

The Wadi Suq/Late Bronze Age  flaked stone technology is best represented in the bone midden dated to ca. 3750-3300 BP.  The stoneworkers mainly used small nodules (ca. 40-60 mm in diameter) of high-quality chert probably sourced from mountains at Jebel Faya and east of al-Ain, although chalcedony of various colours, perhaps from Jebel al-Ma’taradh, was also used.  These stone sources are up to ca. 60-100 km from Saruq al-Hadid.  Neolithic stone artefacts, probably scavenged from sites within about 10 km, were reused or further flaked.  Chert nodules were reduced by hard-hammer percussion flaking, sometimes supported on and anvil.  Core reduction was simple and the stones were frequently rotated during knapping.  Stone was rarely heat-treated, although some evidence for this is present.  Flake blanks were often retouched or used without modification.  Some of the larger flakes were deliberately broken into steep-edged, pie-shaped sections by setting the stone on an anvil and striking near the centre—referred to as ‘truncation’.  This may have been done to create very steep-angled edges for shaving and scraping, as well as blanks for microliths.  Thin chert tables were retouched to create ‘tablet knives’ (which were themselves broken by truncation late in their use-lives) and quartz pebbles were split using a bipolar techniques.

A notable aspect of the stone technology was the production of small, expertly-made backed microliths from the thinner, straight-sided flakes struck from the simple cores.  The backing techniques required high levels of skill.  Backing was done in two stages.  The early ‘attrition’ stage was done by aggressively trimming away the edge opposite the sharp edge, until the microlith was close to the desired width.  This trimming was done by hard-hammer percussion, with the flake supported on an anvil.  Final shaping was done using a light percussion or pressure technique, with the microlith supported on a curved anvil, such as the edge of a cobble.  The finished microliths are often shaped like a scalene triangle, and the backed surfaces are domed in section due to careful edge raking and refinement of the backed edges.  The function of these microliths is not certain, although they are contemporaneous with backed microliths mounted transversely on arrows, an approach seen across Egypt, Western Asia, Iran, and India, and illustrated in a relief carving from Yemen.  The recovery of the microliths within the hunting-related bone midden is further circumstantial evidence for the use of microliths as arrowheads in the Wadi Suq/Late Bronze Age.  They are contemporary with copper-based arrowheads at Saruq al Hadid and across the wider region, but it is presently unclear how they might have been integrated into hunting weaponry and strategies.