Yafteh
Encyclopedia
Yafteh is a Upper Paleolithic
cave
located at the foot of Yafteh Mountain, north-west of Khoramabad, Western Zagros, Iran
.
The site was found and later excavated by two American archaeologists, Frank Hole and Kent Flannery, in the 1960s. It contained a thick Upper Paleolithic sequence which yielded bladelets and tools. A number of C14 dates indicate that the site was occupied mainly between 30 to 35 thousands years ago. Hole and Flannery published some results of their excavation at Yafteh in a general paper about their excavations in prehistoric sites in Loristan and Dehluran. The lithic assemblages from 1967 excavations was re-analyzed in 2005 by Bordes & Shidrang and later these assemblages were the main subject of a MA thesis in 2007. The site was re-excavated in 2005 by a joint Belgian-Iranian team directed by Marcel Otte
and Fereidoun Biglari
and recently excavated again by Otte and Sonia Shidrang in 2008. Yafteh has yielded the largest number of C14 dates from a single Paleolithic site in Iran that are clustered around 28-35 thousands years ago. A rich collection of ornament
s made of marine shells, tooth and hematite has been discovered in the early Upper Paleolithic deposits in both early and recent excavations in the Yafteh cave. This rich collection was analyzed and published by Sonia Shidrang in the Iranian Journal of Archaeology and History.
Upper Paleolithic
The Upper Paleolithic is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age as it is understood in Europe, Africa and Asia. Very broadly it dates to between 40,000 and 10,000 years ago, roughly coinciding with the appearance of behavioral modernity and before the advent of...
cave
Cave
A cave or cavern is a natural underground space large enough for a human to enter. The term applies to natural cavities some part of which is in total darkness. The word cave also includes smaller spaces like rock shelters, sea caves, and grottos.Speleology is the science of exploration and study...
located at the foot of Yafteh Mountain, north-west of Khoramabad, Western Zagros, Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
.
The site was found and later excavated by two American archaeologists, Frank Hole and Kent Flannery, in the 1960s. It contained a thick Upper Paleolithic sequence which yielded bladelets and tools. A number of C14 dates indicate that the site was occupied mainly between 30 to 35 thousands years ago. Hole and Flannery published some results of their excavation at Yafteh in a general paper about their excavations in prehistoric sites in Loristan and Dehluran. The lithic assemblages from 1967 excavations was re-analyzed in 2005 by Bordes & Shidrang and later these assemblages were the main subject of a MA thesis in 2007. The site was re-excavated in 2005 by a joint Belgian-Iranian team directed by Marcel Otte
Marcel Otte
Marcel Otte is a professor of Prehistory at the Université de Liège, Belgium. He is a specialist in Religion, Arts, Sociobiology, and the Upper Palaeolithic times of Europe and Central Asia....
and Fereidoun Biglari
Fereidoun Biglari
-Career:Fereidoun Biglari is co-founder and head of the Paleolithic department in National Museum of Iran which established in 2001. His field of research covers Lower Paleolithic of Iran and western Asia and Middle Paleolithic of Iran in general and Zagros region in particular...
and recently excavated again by Otte and Sonia Shidrang in 2008. Yafteh has yielded the largest number of C14 dates from a single Paleolithic site in Iran that are clustered around 28-35 thousands years ago. A rich collection of ornament
Ornament
An ornament is something used for decoration.Ornament may also refer to:*Christmas ornaments, an ornament hung from a Christmas tree*Ornament , purely decorative elements in architecture and the decorative arts*Ornament *Ornamental plant...
s made of marine shells, tooth and hematite has been discovered in the early Upper Paleolithic deposits in both early and recent excavations in the Yafteh cave. This rich collection was analyzed and published by Sonia Shidrang in the Iranian Journal of Archaeology and History.