Amman: Archaeologists have discovered a ritualistic site which is 9,000 years old in a desert in Jordan.
The team of French and Jordanian experts also found more than 250 artifacts at the site, including animal statues that they believe were used in rituals to evoke supernatural powers for successful hunts.
The objects, which include two stone statues with carvings of human faces, are among the oldest artifacts found in the Middle East.
A large amount of gazelle bones were found in the area resulting from the processing of their hunting activities in that area, and research and excavation in this area provided new information and historical background about the social, economic and cultural life of the hunters.
“This is a unique site where large quantities of gazelles were hunted in complex rituals. It has no rival in the world from the stone age,”Reuters quoted Wael Abu Azizeh, the co-director of the French archeological team.
The team included archaeologists from Jordan’s Al Hussein Bin Talal University and the French Institute for the near East. The site was excavated during the last digging season in 2021.
Tourism Minister Nayef al-Fayez told Reuters that the discoveries were a wonderful addition to Jordan’s archaeological gems, which include the city of Petra hewn out of the desert rock, the Roman city of Jerash, and castles from the Middle Ages.
