Study Tests “Natural Kiln Hypothesis”

JERUSALEM, ISRAEL—Wildfires may have inspired Neolithic communities in the southern Levant to make pottery, according to a statement released by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Amos Frumkin of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his colleagues gathered information about ancient wildfires from lake sediments and cave formations dated to between some 129,000 and 116,000 years ago, and again between about 11,000 and 7,000 years ago. Evidence of extensive wildfires and severe erosion was found for both periods. The most intense period of burning appears to have occurred between about 9,500 and 8,200 years ago, Frumkin said. He suggests that after this period of intense burning, a lack of vegetation and erosion exposed soils that were swept away by rain and runoff. Clay-rich soils carried in the runoff from hills were deposited in valleys and depressions, creating areas of rich soil where early farmers gathered. Pottery appeared in the region around this time, Frumkin explained. He thinks that early farmers who lived in these valleys may have discovered patches of clay that had been baked in wildfires. “One of humanity’s most important technologies may have emerged partly from people learning to imitate what they had already seen nature do,” he added. In the future, researchers could investigate whether ancient wildfires were hot enough to bake clay and look for layers of naturally baked clay. Read the original scholarly article about this research in Geomorphology. To read about how North American hunter-gatherers managed the landscape around them, go to "Letter from California: The Ancient Ecology of Fire."