One week ago I found with my friend Ma'amoun Nawafleh some macro fossils in a strata, which contains many remnants of the Nabataean civilization. What was strange is that the fossils are not geologically from the mountains or areas surrounding Petra, does it mean that the Nabataean before 2000 years were interested in paleontology?
equivalent civilisations in the mediterranean realm (e.g. Minoan) used shells and certain fossils already as "money", or certain currency.
but also the mystic dimension of fossil finding as an actualistic step (comparison with the living world) enhanced possibly already the spiritual meaning and usage of objects found.
The greek observers of nature of that time already described fossils and discussed the "neptunism".
many thanks for the great and kind answer,,, well, it is an invitation for you and your colleagues to visit us in Petra
Thank you Helmut, What sort of observations these Greeks have made? And if you have an idea about the dated centuries of that era would be useful.
In fact fossils have been "collected" by humans since Palaeolithic times (so-called "non-utilitarian behaviour"). Please also see the attached articles for a Little Information from Antiquity and ethnography.
4. By the way, there is also an entire book on this subject: A. Mayor, The first fossil hunters: Paleontology in Greek and Roman times. Princeton University Press 2000 (and revised Edition 2010). I sent you one of her articles above.
anyway, from the one picture it cannot be seen at what degree the fossils are lithified. Apparently these macrofossils are shallow marine bivalves and gastropods e.g. Show them to a paleontologist to give a) an estimation on the age (probably Miocene) and look then on the distribution in geological maps, with preference on known ethnic exchanges.
Palaeolithic populations are given in the Cyclades and Crete, Cyprus and the East-Mediterranean coasts where such uplifted fossiliferous formation are quite common..
You can exclude that it was "just collected shells at the next beach"?
I certainly agree with Helmut - collecting fossils during all of Antiquity occured and most probably people had some Kind of ideas of their historical or mythical meaning....
Unfortunately I cannot recognise the fossils in the picture, but I would like to add another aspect of occurences of marine fossils at inland sites. We are just working in Tayma (Saudi Arabia) where Holocene marine-brackish snails, barnacles, foraminifers and ostracods occur. This site was an athalassic (i.e. not connected to the sea) salt lake. Marine organisms can travel by birds to such sites and dwell there if ecological conditions are suitable. However, such taxa should have a broad tolerance against salinity changes and possess ontogenetic stages easily to disperse. The phenomenon of athalassic salt lakes and their strange brackish water faunas is widespread but rarely investigated (e.g. Aral Sea).
Dear gentlemen I am with big interest following your discussion. You listed different possibilities of how fossils could be sedimented together with “cultural” layers. If we summarize all your suggestions we will see that there are several possibilities: 1. Ancient people collected fossils (usually shells) to use them as tools or decoration. They took fossils from the area where they lived or bring them from the other territories during migration. 2. People, birds or other animals used molluscs or mammals (etc) for food and with time shells or bones became fossilized. At inland sites (Southern Fore-Urals and Urals) we have some evidences for that. For example small shells of Theodoxus and Clessiniola were found during excavations of the Palaolithic site “Capova Cave”. Some shells have small holes. These shells are of the Late Pleistocene (Khvalynian) age and evidence that 1. people migrated from the North Caspian area or 2. people had some exchanges with the population from that territory. In your discussion I didn’t find any determination of the fossils which could give an age and you could conclude were they contemporaneous with the artefacts or they were really fossils. Thank you one more for the interesting discussion.
I would like to call your attention to the activity Pál Sümegi, University of Szeged, Hungary!
Dear Guzel,
Thank you for summing up and adding another aspect with an very interesting example: trading connections. I can underline this aspect. When studying archaeological sites of medieval age at the southern Baltic Sea coast, we found oyster shells as left over of food imported by the Hanse from North Sea, shells of Pecten probably brought from pilgrimage as well as ballast sands containing microfaunas indicating sand flats of the southern North Sea coast.
As you pointed out, knowledge on taxa and state of preservation of Mohammad's fossils would be crucial for interpretation. Maybe you could contribute this, Mohammad?
the fossils are in my office, once I am in the university I will photo them and send the pictures
Hello all,
In addition to previous answers, let me please put you at the picture of a current use of the shells related to fortunetelling that some gypsies coming from the areas nearby the Mediterranean basin are still doing. Although it is disappearing day by day but it did exist widely until few years ago and I believe it's a sustainability of an ancient habit by which they gained money by telling families about their relatives who sail for trade as well as for the traders who were waiting their ships to arrive. Nabateans where controlling almost the whole Arabia lands trade roots including seaports and had a fort on the southern beaches of Italy, so I strongly believe these fossils we found where kind of souvenirs or for prayers these Nabateans practiced.
As a result of all answers we shared, these fossils were products or a currency at the end which is a supper result I never thought off!
Just to constrain the allochthonous or "exotic" nature of such probably marine fossils.
The picture added show clearly a terrestrial sedimentary environment. Means the stratified sediments show more a fluvial (lower part) sequence with smaller grainsize conglomerates and more colluvial debris in the upper part. Just to exclude any lake or salt lake environment... that would provide totally different sediments.
Did you find maybe any pieces of wood? also with the shells you could consider age datations: C14-method ? ... to constrain about fossils relative to Petra times or our actual view.
Would be nice to visit in the field to discuss the discuss the ancient environment.
This layer where the fossil was found is full of Nabatean equipment such as pottery cups and plates as well as fine glass and some metals mixed with woulds and coal etc... Possibly will find some roman stuff because they came after the Nabatean's withdrawal of Petra, but surely some pieces of glass that I found are Byzantine from a later time when they came. These together with other reasons both Dr. Mohammad and I can tell have made us positive this was a residential area. It does amaze me to have such an addition to the discovery and you are all welcome to visit if you arrange it with Dr. Mohammad.
Dear colleagues - It is clear that not a "natural" deposit is meant, but rather one made or caused by man. As mentioned before (and documented by the articles sent), humans really did collect fossils for whatever reasons that may have been. The Expression for the Palaeolithic period ("non-utilitarian" behaviour - i.e. not with evident practical use) is very careful to avoid any ritual conotation, but for later periods that is usually presumed. Some other possibilities are of course the use of fossils for jewellery (definitely documented for some of the Spondylus Shell ornaments of the Eneolithic in Europe), the transport via building materials (e.g. fossiliferous limestones), and as some of you have suggested by natural factors (e.g. rivers or mudslides - but this does not seem to be the case here). There are several more possibilities, but in order to decide anything more Details on the entire context would be necessary.
Although a residential area has already been mentioned it would be interessting to know whether fossils were found in only one area/house, or in several? Where they grouped in one spot (small hoard of "special objects"?) or distributed all over the place (e.g. workshop floor), etc. For the proper identification and possible (original) provenance, certainly palaeontologists need to be consulted, but that is probably something separate from the way and reason the fossils finally ended up in an archaeological layer.
There is a body of literature in the New World on "index objects" like fossils, unusual rocks, and other materials that were kept by Native American shamans and other religious practitioners as part of medicine bundles. Such a use obviously comes out of a very different cultural tradition than the one under discussion here. But the idea of taking unique items from a place a person has visited as "souvenirs" (as mentioned above) is analogous to this well-documented practice in the Americas. Fossils were commonly used in this way. See papers by Maria Nieves Zedeno on the topic.
It worth telling that this is the first project of it's kind in the regard of the Nabatean's history. This is following the discovery of the earliest astronomical reference to our now adays used star constellations and finding their researches area (Almanac). Time now came to reveal more peoples lifestyle and this fossil decided to be the first surprise, so looks like a wealth of surprises and knowledge are down here!
You might be interested to know that a couple of the rooms in Pueblo Bonito, a likely religious monumental structure in Chaco Canyon of the US Southwest, had thousands of fossil shells stockpiled. I have a side project looking at these fossils, and it's very likely that many if not most are not from the nearby geology, but were brought in from dozens of miles away.
Mohammad,
these are really lithified fossils! means lithified, stones! gastropods (snails) and echinoderma, one brachiopod(?)! still the sizes and wealth, I guess marine, shallow water Miocene. very nice story!
yes Helmut they are, I will try to collect as much as I can such fossils from archaeological strata, once we have a lot, may be we can study the real goal behind their collection by this civilization
Hi Mohammad,
Thank you for providing the photo. Helmut is right, these are real fossils, steinkerns (sediment infillings) of bivalves, gastropods and some irregular sea urchins in addition. I would guess that it is a marine shallow water association of Neogene age. Helmut was also right that the sediment section does not look like an aquatic environment, more like a debris flow or so, at least in larger parts.
It's puzzling to see a group of fossils giving an overview on a fauna but not a collection of nice strange stones - it looks more like somebody wanted to document them than to take a souvenir. So, it would be fascinating to collect more and document them hoping to find out the story behind.
I believe, if you give a number of these fossils to a palaeontologist working in the Mediterranean Neogene using marine macrofossils he could probably identify the origin of your amazing collection.
I suggest to take some samples of sediments in addition. This sediment could be washed over a 200 µm sieve and picked for microfossils under a binocular microscope. If your fossils were deposited with their original sediment you should find microfossils fitting age and environment. If there are no appropriate microfossils you could conclude that the macrofossils were really selected and then deposited.
It's a fascinating story. Congratulations!
Dear Mohammad,
some more suggestions.
provide a scale for your fossils (cm, a coin e.g.)
when you collect and find other such fossils dont mix them up. This one collection seems to come from one and the same site considering the limestone pattern and rather identic colour. Other findings may be from other origins.
You can also conclude that these fossils have a "mediterranean" nature, if searching the pathways.
Again: great! Have fun
lieber Helmut, es hat mich rechitg gefruet dass du dich daruber intersert hast,,, du best herzlich eingeladenum Petra zu besuchen,,, velleicht konnen wir irgend artcile zusammen machen
Dear Dr Mohammad Al Farajat,
First of all look please at the geological map of the Archaeological site surroundings. Are there Cretaceous, Palaeogene or Neogene deposits? Probably fossils belong to the deposits of one of these divisions. If you want to find somebody for consultations take photo of these fossils one more time but with the 1-2 cm scale as colleagues suggested to you. Please orient Gastropoda shells with top-apertura axis vertically and apertura hole must look at you while tahing photos. When you will work with the Echinoidea samples take photos from the top, bottom and from the side of each sample. It will help to a specialist to determine them better. If you want I can send you email address of my colleagues from Palaeontological institute from Moscow - they are specialists in gastropodes and echinoderms. You will contact to them by yourself.
Dear Guzel
it is so kind from you,,, well, this an invitation for you to visit our land to see closely the wonderful site of Petra, and to see the surrounding geology
Dear Dr Mohammad Al Farajat,
Thank you very much for your invitation.
In eastern Crimea, near Kerch, fossil whale bones were used as ornamentals and possibly as sacrificial items in the Bronze Age and Antiquity. These data have not been published.
Fossils were also found at Tell Sabi Abyad, Syria, both Neolithic and Late Bronze Age contexts. Team can be reached at Leiden University (Peter Akkermans). I do not think anybody has studied their fossils yet.
Dear Mohammad
I recommend a job that we have written together with Dr. Damborenea available on this Reseach Gate, entitled: Interaction and circulation of symbolic goods in Quebrada de La Cueva, Jujuy, Argentina: The fossil Weyla alata (von Buch).
Dra. Paola Ramundo
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