Murayghat
Susanne Kerner

The project is run by Copenhagen University and started in 2014. Before our project commenced, only short visits (over the course of 200 years) and one brief survey have occurred.

The earliest and latest finds from the site date to the Neolithic Period (8000 BC) and the Islamic periods (AD 1500). The main periods of occupation are the Early Bronze Age and the Middle Bronze Age (ca. 3700-2000 BC). During the EBA the main features were built and then re-used during the MBA.

The site consists of several hills, which have large numbers of dolmens (structures made from large stone slabs, usually two long ones on each side, one very large stone slab as capstone on top and two shorter stones at each end). The dolmens were most likely originally used for burials. They have been constructed on the bedrock.

The dolmen fields center around a central knoll, where large standing stones form rectangular and horseshoe-shaped structures, which might have had a public/cultic function. Other excavation areas showed smaller-scale buildings, where between other things an EBA copper axe and some large pottery bowls have been found. These Murayghat bowls, now in the Madaba Archaeological Museum, are so large that they indicate food preparation for large groups of people.

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