Story perspectives
Ancient wildfires likely drove Israel’s pottery invention
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Story summary
- Prof. Amos Frumkin (Hebrew University) published a study linking ancient wildfires to pottery invention in Israel.
- Frumkin proposes the speculative natural kiln hypothesis, suggesting Neolithic people learned to fire clay after wildfires.
- Sediment analysis identifies a fire-erosion episode 9,500–8,200 years ago that deposited clay in Jordan and Dead Sea valleys.
- Petrography confirms Yarmukian pottery used the locally redeposited terra rossa clay from that episode.