About stratigraphy, pottery and relative chronology. Some considerations for a refinement of the archaeological periodization of the Southern Levantine Early Bronze Age IV

There are several alternative schemes for phasing within the Early Bronze IV (EB IV) period in the southern Levant, traditionally dated to ca. 2300‒2000 B.C. Early research distinguished phases based on appreciable stylistic differences between sub-regional assemblages; later studies concentrated on sequences at individual sites rather than on a regional evaluation. The practice of dating a site’s assemblages and phases to the entire 300-year time span has also come into use, concealing diachronic changes and processes within the period. Influencing both the regional periodization and the traditionally held inter-regional correlations is the recent proposal of new absolute EB IV dates of 2500‒1950/1920 B.C., increasingly accepted by scholars. The longer time span for the southern Levantine EB IV compels us to re-evaluate sites for chronological markers and go beyond interpretations of the period as a static stage of collapse. This paper focuses on the longer EB IV stratigraphic and ceramic sequences available in order to identify chronological markers and, thus, propose some suggestions for a correlation and a periodization on a regional scale. With the proposed scheme, it will be possible to fit one-phase EB IV sites into the sequence and to sketch a preliminary diachronic picture of changes and developments within the period.