Jabal es Saaïdé ( ar, جبل سعيدة), Jabal es Saaide, Jabal as Sa`idah, Jabal as Sa`īdah, Jebal Saaidé, Jebel Saaidé or Jabal Saaidé is a Mountain in Lebanon near the inhabited village of Saaïdé, approximately northeast of Baalbek,

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to Lebanon–Syria border, the north and east and Israel to Blue ...

. Saaidé I & Saaidé II are archaeological sites of note in this area. In the summer of 1966, the Lebanese Army dug a trench at Saaidé I, and recovered many tools and lithics including sickles, grinders, scrapers, chisels, awls and blades suggested to date to the

PPNB Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB) is part of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic, a Neolithic culture centered in upper Mesopotamia and the Levant, dating to years ago, that is, 8800–6500 BC. It was typed by British archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon duri ...

PPNA Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA) denotes the first stage of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic, in early Levantine and Anatolian Neolithic culture, dating to years ago, that is, 10,000–8,800 BCE. Archaeological remains are located in the Levantine and U ...

. Jacques Besançon & Francis Hours later discovered a

Palaeolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic (), also called the Old Stone Age (from Greek: παλαιός ''palaios'', "old" and λίθος '' lithos'', "stone"), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone to ...

layer below the

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several p ...

level, recovering

knives A knife ( : knives; from Old Norse 'knife, dirk') is a tool or weapon with a cutting edge or blade, usually attached to a handle or hilt. One of the earliest tools used by humanity, knives appeared at least 2.5 million years ago, as evidenced ...

arrowheads An arrowhead or point is the usually sharpened and hardened tip of an arrow, which contributes a majority of the projectile mass and is responsible for impacting and penetrating a target, as well as to fulfill some special purposes such as s ...

, scrapers and retouched blades along with a fragment of a small, flat, cutting

axe An axe ( sometimes ax in American English; see spelling differences) is an implement that has been used for millennia to shape, split and cut wood, to harvest timber, as a weapon, and as a ceremonial or heraldic symbol. The axe has ma ...

. Saaidé II, almost in size, was first excavated in 1969 by Bruce Schroeder from the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 ...

who found the site badly damaged by modern agriculture. Investigations have recovered a wide range of

mortars Mortar may refer to: * Mortar (weapon), an indirect-fire infantry weapon * Mortar (masonry), a material used to fill the gaps between blocks and bind them together * Mortar and pestle, a tool pair used to crush or grind * Mortar, Bihar, a villag ...

and pestles, scrapers,

chisels A chisel is a tool with a characteristically shaped cutting edge (such that wood chisels have lent part of their name to a particular grind) of blade on its end, for carving or cutting a hard material such as wood, stone, or metal by hand, stru ...

, borers, retouched

microliths A microlith is a small stone tool usually made of flint or chert and typically a centimetre or so in length and half a centimetre wide. They were made by humans from around 35,000 to 3,000 years ago, across Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia. Th ...

, geometric and non-geometric microliths. One grave was found with some tiny skull fragments from an adult aged 45–50 years. Local fauna consisted of turtles, birds (

duck Duck is the common name for numerous species of waterfowl in the family Anatidae. Ducks are generally smaller and shorter-necked than swans and geese, which are members of the same family. Divided among several subfamilies, they are a form ...

goose A goose ( : geese) is a bird of any of several waterfowl species in the family Anatidae. This group comprises the genera ''Anser'' (the grey geese and white geese) and '' Branta'' (the black geese). Some other birds, mostly related to the ...

eagle Eagle is the common name for many large birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of genera, some of which are closely related. Most of the 68 species of eagle are from Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, j ...

) and mammals (

badger Badgers are short-legged omnivores in the family Mustelidae (which also includes the otters, wolverines, martens, minks, polecats, weasels, and ferrets). Badgers are a polyphyletic rather than a natural taxonomic grouping, being united by ...

, lynx,

deer Deer or true deer are hoofed ruminant mammals forming the family Cervidae. The two main groups of deer are the Cervinae, including the muntjac, the elk (wapiti), the red deer, and the fallow deer; and the Capreolinae, including the re ...

, ox,

gazelle A gazelle is one of many antelope species in the genus ''Gazella'' . This article also deals with the seven species included in two further genera, '' Eudorcas'' and '' Nanger'', which were formerly considered subgenera of ''Gazella''. A third ...

sheep Sheep or domestic sheep (''Ovis aries'') are domesticated, ruminant mammals typically kept as livestock. Although the term ''sheep'' can apply to other species in the genus '' Ovis'', in everyday usage it almost always refers to domesticated ...

and

goat The goat or domestic goat (''Capra hircus'') is a domesticated species of goat-antelope typically kept as livestock. It was domesticated from the wild goat (''C. aegagrus'') of Southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the a ...

). Jebal Saaidé is the only pre-agricultural village found in

to date. Inhabitants seem to have hunted different animals including lynx, red deer, gazelle, and some aquatic and migratory birds.

Literature

* Besançon, J. Hours, F,. Une coupe dans le quaternaire récent. Saaidé I (Beqaa centrale, Liban), Hannon, 5, 29–61, 1970. * Hours, F,. L'épipaléolithique au Liban. Resultats acquis en 1975, Colloque III, UISPP 1976, 9ème Congrès de l'UISPP, Nice, 130–196, 1976. * Schroeder, H.B., Natufian in the Central Béqaa Valley, Lebanon, Bar-Yosef and Valla (eds.) 1991, The Natufian Culture in the Levant, 43–80, International Monographs in Prehistory, 1991. * Copeland, L., Natufian Sites in Lebanon, Bar-Yosef and Valla (eds.) 1991, The Natufian Culture in the Levant, 27–42,International Monographs in Prehistory, 1991 * Ofer Bar-Yosef, François Raymond Valla,. The Natufian culture in the Levant, International Monographs in Prehistory, 1991. * Soliveres, O., « Restes humains natoufiens du Jebal Saaidé (Epipaléolithique du Liban) », Paléorient, 3, p. 293-294, 1975-1976-1977. * Churcher, P., « The vertebrate fauna from the Natufian level at Jebel es-Saaïde (Saaïde II), Lebanon », Paléorient, 20/2, p. 35-58, 1994,

Footnotes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jabal Es Saaide 1966 archaeological discoveries Neolithic settlements Archaeological sites in Lebanon Neolithic sites of Asia Natufian sites Mountains of Lebanon Baalbek District Great Rift Valley Pre-Pottery Neolithic B Pre-Pottery Neolithic A