For years, the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B site of Kfar HaHoresh has been noted as a ritual site without occupation by the primary excavator, Goring-Morris, and others. The site, based on excavation reports published from 1991 to 1997 and subsequent analysis, the site is supposed to be a non-occupied area used by individuals from surrounding sites for burial and feasting.
However, this Yosef Garfinkel has published a paper (2006), titled The Burials of Kfar HaHoresh - A Regional or Local Phenomenon?, which seeks to challenge this interpretation. Garfinkel offers three strong refutations to the claims of Kfar HaHoresh’s ritual nature.
First, the assemblage at the site includes the common material remains from average Neolithic sites, including the presence of 120,000 flint objects, which have indicated that the chipped stone of the site does not significantly differ from other Neolithic sites in the area. This means that the site shows evidence of supporting human habitation similar to other sites in the region.
This is also supported by the faunal remains, which show distributions similar to other sites, including the hunted animals such as auerochsen which represent a small percent of those found. While the find of a pit containing a number of these animals does seem indicative of feasting, this by no means is outside the range of habitable sites found in the Near Eastern Neolithic.
Secondly, Garfinkel examines the major issue of the site, the lack of houses. Goring-Morris finds the sets of walls with floors to be evidence of ritual buildings, not homes. However, when looked at in comparison to other Neolithic sites, they match rectangular houses found throughout the PPNB. The only possible problem is the frequency of missing walls which are usually the North and West of the buildings. Garfinkel finds that this is easily explainable through erosion on the sloped site, as comparable to finds at the site of Yiftahel.
The point is also made that only about 5%-10% of the site has been excavated, and excavation was non-random, following finds of skulls and the like. This leads to a problem of sample size as to the representative nature of this 5%-10% to the remainder of the site. Certainly this occurs at many sites, but in this case adds clearly to the possibility that a full building might still be excavated.
Next, the burials at the site are nothing to write home about. The treatment of dead humans at Kfar HaHoresh is absolutely in line with other sites in the region during the PPNB, and do not lead to a conclusion that the site is different, special, or specialized.
Finally, I would point out Garfinkel’s conclusion, which reads
On the one hand, Kfar HaHoresh produced architecture, material culture, and burials similar to those uncovered at other Pre-Pottery Neolithic B sites in the Levant. On the other hand, typical cultic paraphernalia (beside the plastered skulls) was not found. The site suffers from various depositional processes that removed large parts of its architecture. The location on a slope probably accelerates the natural erosion, at work continually for over 9,000 years. The underground burials better resist such processes and are thus better preserved. This situation creates a preliminary impression that the site functioned as a specialized regional cultic center.
For those interested in Neolithic ritual sites, it is perhaps a better choice to look at something like Nehal Hemar, or individual buildings in sites, like the Jericho wall or the stones at Atlit Yam. Though, Kfar HaHoresh may have been an isolated ritual site, Garfinkel makes a strong case to the contrary.
Garfinkel, Yosef “The Burials of Kfar HaHoresh” in Journal of the Prehistoric Society 36 (2006): 109-116.
Goring-Morris, Nigel “A PPNB Settlement at Kfar Hahoresh in Lower Galilee: A Preliminary Report of the 1991 Season” in Journal of the Prehistoric Society 24 (1991) 77-101.
Goring-Morris et al ” The 1997 Season of excavation at the mortuary site of Kfar HaHoresh, Galilee, Israel” in Neo-Lithics (199
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Archaeozoo Funerals and Feasts in Pre-Pottery Neolithic B .