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The unrelenting Syrian desert spans more than 200,000 square miles of West Asia, including parts of Saudi Arabia, Syria, and 85% of Jordan's landmass. The Syrian desert is one of the most arid and hottest deserts in the world with summer temperatures frequently reaching over 100° F. The dry landscape in southeastern Jordan is made up of sandy plateaus occasionally broken up by mountain ranges and river valleys called wadis.
Today, most of the wadi riverbeds are dried up. While there's evidence of human activity in Jordan going back to the Paleolithic period, large sections of the country were first settled by nomadic tribes like the Canaanites and Shasu in the Bronze Age between 3200 and 1200 BC. These settlements were consolidated into kingdoms for hundreds of years until the classical period, when Jordan came under Greek and Roman influence. Not surprisingly, there's been a wealth of discoveries found beneath the sand of Jordan's deserts. The most famous is the rose city of Petra made up of rock-cut tombs and advanced water systems. In the north, the Roman city of Jerash was revealed to
contain a hippodrome and the Temple of Artemis. A team of archaeologists is busy at work in the southwestern Badia region of Jordan when they come across a surprising discovery. They were surveying an area between the Al-Jafr Basin and a nearby mountain range in a fairly open and flat section of the desert and discovered a circular enclosure made from rocks and stones with an altar-like formation in its center, as well as a stone hearth with traces of burnt charcoal. In addition to the altar and hearth, there were several smaller stones in the shape of animal figurines placed around the perimeter. But, the most striking thing inside the round rock formation
was two standing vertical stones called stelae, each with a human face carved into them. The first one stood around 2 ft 3 in tall and bore a simple set of eyes, nose, and mouth. The taller one at over 3 and 1/2 ft displayed a larger human face, along with a number of vertical lines carved beside it in a unique design or pattern. So, what were they for? And how long have they been standing here in the middle of nowhere? Samples from the structure are taken for radiocarbon dating. Over 15 samples were collected from the charcoal remains found among the hearth's rocks and stones. The results were uniformly consistent, putting the site at around 7,000 BC, which falls in
the early Neolithic period. The Neolithic era spans more than five millennia, from 10,000 to 4,500 BCE. So, it encompasses a lot of change in human activity. In Jordan, just like in other places, there was a slow transition from tribal hunter-gatherer societies to cultures with domesticated animals and agricultural settlements. Further examination of the strange formation reveals a possible clue. The circular arrangement of the structure, plus the altar-like formation in the center, suggested it may have been connected to an ancient ritual or ceremony. And that line of thinking was supported by the anthropomorphic nature of the two stone carvings.
The practice of giving human characteristics to non-human entities has been around for millennia, whether it's animals, deities, or completely inanimate objects such as rocks and stones. Many ancient cultures imposed human traits as a form of storytelling to pass down myths and folklore, but it also had a deep spiritual and religious significance. One of the earliest examples of this was found at Göbekli Tepe, a settlement in Mesopotamia in what we now call Turkey. It was inhabited from roughly 9500 to 8000 BC, also the Neolithic period, and it featured a large stone circle
with pillars decorated with carvings of human features like arms, hands, and clothing. The carvings provided archaeologists with rare insights into a possible prehistoric religion, as well as the iconography of the period. Since the stone circle at Göbekli Tepe didn't appear to have a function connected to hunting, farming, or dwelling, it was believed to be a communal or spiritual gathering place. If that were the case, it would make it one of the world's first known temples. So, is it possible that the strange discovery in Jordan served a similar purpose? A detailed analysis of the two stone carvings leads to a surprising connection.
The human faces depicted were carved in simple, clean lines consistent with other carvings of that period. But it was the curious pattern etched beside the face of the largest stone that became the focus. Two lines in a V-shape coming together to create an enclosed circle like a What could it mean? Well, given that the stone structure was carbon dated to 7,000 BC, the keyhole shape was ultimately identified as being the same shape as a Neolithic hunting trap called a desert kite. Desert kites were stone walls, often hundreds of feet long, that converged into a round contained space.
They were built by nomadic tribes during the hunter-gatherer phase of the early Neolithic period and used to trap animals like deer and gazelles. Hunting parties would drive herds into the open end of the kites and down into the confined space, where other members of the party corralled the animals for slaughter. They were named in the 1920s by British Royal Air Force pilots flying across the region. They remarked on their resemblance to kites, and the name stuck. To date, there have been over 6,000 of these ancient animal traps identified
across the Middle East. But were any of them connected to the southeastern body of rock circle? A larger survey is conducted to include the surrounding area, and it doesn't take long to find answers. Sure enough, the surrounding desert landscape showed evidence of multiple desert kites shaped much like the one carved next to the face on the stone. So, there's a strong connection between the items found inside the rock circle and the hunting methods of the Neolithic nomads who built it. The bigger picture that emerged was of a hunting campsite featuring several large desert kites. The rock circle served as the spiritual center for the hunters, a
place to engage in ceremonies or rituals connected to the upcoming hunt. The presence of the altar, hearth, and smaller carved animal figurines likely all played a role in these rituals. Whether it was to invoke supernatural forces for a successful hunt or to bring out an abundance of prey to capture. This remarkable Neolithic stone altar discovered in the Jordan desert represents a critical link between mass hunting and ritual performance and may be one of the earliest examples of art as an expression of faith.
