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Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Prehistoric architecture found in Jordan from 20,000 years ago

Some of the earliest evidence of prehistoric architecture has been discovered in the Jordanian desert, providing archaeologists with a new perspective on how humans lived 20,000 years ago.

The ancient hut structures in eastern Jordan were discovered by a team of archaeologists including academics from The University of Nottingham. The finding suggests that the area was once intensively occupied and that the origins of architecture in the region date back 20 millennia, well before the emergence of agriculture.

The research by a joint British, Danish, American and Jordanian team, published recently in the peer-reviewed science journal PLoS One, describes huts that hunter-gatherers used as long-term homes and suggests that many behaviours associated with later cultures and communities, such as a growing attachment to a location and a far-reaching social network, existed up to 10,000 years earlier than previously thought.

Click here to read this article from History of the Ancient World