Of pots and weapons. Constructing the identities in the late 3rd Millennium BC in the Southern Levant

The Early Bronze IV period (c. 2300-2000 BC) in the Southern Levant is characterized by a marked ceramic regionalism. Nevertheless, while the distribution of ceramic types and styles highlights ‘cultural’ difference, weaponry seems to attest a major degree of homogeneity within the region. The spread of the so-called ‘warrior burials’ in the Southern Levant during the last phase of the Early Bronze Age is a phenomenon recognized since long time. The aim of the paper is to draw attention on the adoption, within those burials, of common sets of weapons, which cut across the differences expressed through pottery among sites belonging to different ceramic traditions during Early Bronze IV. While ceramic assemblages express local identities of the communities of the Southern Levant during the Early Bronze IV period, weapons equipment seem to define patterns of connectivity within the different sub-regional areas. Furthermore those ones highlight strong technological and – in broad terms – ‘cultural’ links with the neighbouring areas in both supra-regional and diachronic perspectives, which, in turn, might help to shed light on the dynamic interactions taking place within the whole Levant at the close of the 3rd millennium BC.