An Alternative Interpretation for the Material Imagery of the Yarmukian, a Neolithic Culture of the Sixth Millennium

This study describes material imagery portraying anthropomorphic subjects executed in stone and clay which appear on sites of the Yarmukian culture in the Southern Levant during the sixth millennium BC. Speculations are made and interpretations offered for the incised stone and clay images of persons and genitals as artefacts recording encoded information. It is suggested that some kinds of imagery are associated with age and reproductive status and relate to gender categorization, and yet other kinds could be related to socio-political discussion. Two prominent features of the material remains of the Yarmukian culture of the sixth millennium BC (uncalibrated C14 years) are the appearance of the earliest pottery assemblage in the Southern Levant, and a rich assemblage of both stone and clay items of material imagery.1 Imagery items include two major groups — incised pebbles and clay figurines. In this article, w