Carvings found in Saudi Arabia and Jordan show ancient hunting traps
Experts have found ancient engravings of vast animal traps in Jordan and Saudi Arabia, which could be the earliest known blueprints.
The “extremely precise” depictions on stone slabs show structures called desert kites, used to herd wild animals such as gazelles into enclosures where they could be slaughtered, a study published in the journal PLoS One said.
One carving found on a large rectangular slab at a Jordanian site is estimated to date back about 9,000 years. Two other engravings were found on a boulder at the base of a cliff in Saudi Arabia. They were created about 8,000 years ago, researchers said.
The findings are thought to be the oldest realistic building plans carved to scale on stone.
Desert kites were made of stone walls up to 5km long that narrowed into large pits.
The kites in their entirety are “only visible from the air”, said Remy Crassard, an archaeologist at the French National Centre for Scientific Research and one of the study’s authors.
“The extreme precision of these engravings is remarkable, representing gigantic neighbouring Neolithic stone structures, the whole design of which is impossible to grasp without seeing it from the air or without being their architect,” the researchers said.
“They reveal a widely underestimated mental mastery of space perception, hitherto never observed at this level of accuracy in such an early context.”
The findings shed new light on how ancient communities used space and how they approached group activities, researchers said.
The engraved slab from Jebel Al Khashabiyeh, Jordan, is stored at the French Institute for the Near East in Amman.
The artefact is expected to be moved to the Hussein bin Talal University exhibition room of the South-Eastern Badia Archaeological Project in Wadi Musa, south of the capital.
The engraved boulder in Saudi Arabia has not been moved from the site at Jebel az Zilliyat.
The edges of the limestone block were carved with a large, hard hammer, researchers said. The engraving was made using techniques including fine incisions and pecking.
Plans for buildings and boats were previously discovered. Most are from ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia and may be up to 7,000 years old.