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Houses and the Changing Residential Unit: Domestic Architecture at PPNB ‘Ain
Ghazal, Jordan

Article in Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society · January 1987

DOI: 10.1017/S0079497X00006241

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 Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 53, 1987, pp. 309-325

Houses ar:d the Changing Residential Unit:

Domestic Architecture at PPNB 'Ain Ghazal, Jordan
By E. B. BANNING' and BRIAN F. BYRD2

The exceptional preservation of structural detail at the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B site of'Ain Ghazal allows
analysis of techniques of house building, and of sequences of construction and modification of houses.
Frequent remodelling was common, with a trend towards smaller residential areas. The concept of the
'development cycle' is applied, to explain the structural modifications in terms of the changing nature of the co-
residential group.

The study of domestic architecture in the Near East
has typically been viewed statically, and examples
of architecture are compared in terms of temporal or
regional typology (e.g. Aurenche r98r, 185-204;
Amiran r978, r6; Braemer r982; Shiloh r970). Yet
architecture is dynamic and can be modified
constantly by its inhabitants. It is therefore an
important source of data in any attempt to gain
insight into the lives of its prehistoric inhabitants,
and requires the recovery of detailed
microstratigraphic evidence (Wilcox r 975).
In this paper we explore the potential of viewing
architecture in a dynamic sense with a case study from
the Pre-Pottery Neolithic site of 'Ain Ghazal, Jordan.
The paper's four sections will cover the background of
the research, a detailed discussion of house construc
tion, renovation case histories, and finally a discussion
of the social implications of these renovations.
_J
BACKGROUND
'Ain Ghazal is a large Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB)
site situated in the upper reaches of the Wadi Zarqa,
near'Amman, Jordan (fig. r). There, during the late
eighth and early seventh millennia be, honses were
sited on artificial terraces strung along the west slope
of the Zarqa over a length of about 600 m, and at
least some houses also occupied parts of the east
slope. On the west
1 Department of Anthropology, UniVersity of Virginia, Charlottes
ville, VA 22903, USA.
2
Department of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson,
AZ 8572,, USA.
slope later PPNB and Pottery Neolithic deposits also
occur. The site closely parallels Jericho (Kenyon r9
57; r98r), 50km to the west, during these periods, but
the neolithic deposits are not buried nearly so deeply.
Recent excavations at "Ain Ghazal have focused on
two areas and tested several others over the course of
four seasons of excavation. The largest and best under
stood exposure, with which this paper is mainly con
cerned, was initially the target of salvage excavations
in early r982, when winter rains threatened burials and
houses exposed in a road cut (Rollefson et al. r984).
Further work in r983 and r984 (Rollefson and Sim
mons r985; r986) achieved broader exposures in this
area and included detailed recording of the sections
made by the road cut, enhancing our ability to discuss
the structure of, and variations in, houses of "Ain
Ghazal's PPNB strata. (In this paper four-digit
numbers refer to 5 X 5 m grid squares on the site.
Stratigraphic units have three-digit numbers, assigned
consecutively within each grid square during
excavation. They follow the associated grid number
and a decimal point except where the grid designation
is ·obvious. For ease of reference we have assigned
'house' numbers to the structures mentioned in the
article, some of which occupy more than one grid
square.)
Some features of the PPNB architecture at 'Ain Gha
zal are of more than casual interest, and the case
histories of house remodelling and renovation, in
parti cular, have intriguing theoretical implications.
In discussion of these implications, it is useful to
employ the concept of vernacular architecture, that is,
architecture which owes its design to tradition and

309
 9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE
_/;
sy
'
"
'\.I;
fl
AIN
JERICHO
J,cil m•
-/
I
I I
I 249,
JO RDA N
I
I Ghazal evidence contradicts Kenyon's assumption that
I plaster lining was unsuitable for hearths.
I
Fig. l
·Regional map showing the locations of Jericho and
'Ain Ghazal in the southern Levant
social consensus rather than to an architect. It is fairly
easy to recognize a standard type of PPNB house at
'Ain Ghazal and adherence to a standard house model
with only minor variations is typical of pre-industrial
verna cular architecture (Rapoport 1969, 4-5).
At 'Ain Ghazal, as at Jericho, this standard house
type appears to be a long rectangular room, with its
entrance on one end, and with internal space open
except for an almost symmetrical arrangement of
masonry 'piers' (Kenyon r957, 53, 75; r98r, 71, 73,
80, r3 3, 184-85) or, alternatively, posts (see figure 2).
This is the building-type which Garstang interpreted as
a 'megaron' or shrine (Garstang and Garstang 1948,
59-62). Occasionally at Jericho, thin walls built
between piers subdivided portions of interior space.
Although such dividing walls have not been found at
'Ain Ghazal, it is of course possible that the posts and
piers supported light screens. In general, however, the
AT 'AIN
walls may be secondary modifications (e.g. Kenyon
Damascus 1981, r33). It is possible that this house-type was
widespread in the southern Levant. Certainly it differs
from the standard plan of more northerly PPNB struc r ,,
R A tures (e.g. Moore r985, r9).
A central basin hearth was another standard house
feature. Jericho builders may sometimes have omitted
this feature since the warmer Jordan Valley climate
did not as frequently demand artificial heat in sleeping
rooms (Garstang and Garstang r948, 60). None the
'··1·
GHAZAL
less, on analogy to 'Ain Ghazal, it appears that all of
the circular and rectangular 'plastered basins', which
are sunk into floors or low platforms at Jericho, are in
fact hearths (e.g. the 'temple' basin in Trench I, Stage
XV!a; the 'yellow bricky' square in MI, Stage XV; and
the 'plastered bin' inEI-V, StageX; Kenyon r98r, rr,
290). A rectangular basin at Jericho was even 'strongly
scorched by fire' (Kenyon r98r, 73), and the 'Ain
That there was a standard house type at 'Ain Ghazal
through much of the PPNB, or that very similar house
types occurred at contemporary Jericho, does not
0 100 KM imply that all the houses are identical. Within the
broad outlines of the pier house there was much room
for individual variation, as the following will indicate.
At 'Ain Ghazal, at least, much of this variation may
owe its existence to periodic renovations during the
'domestic cycle' of the co-resident group (cf. Goody
r962b). Thus, part of the variation may be due, not to
static differ ences in cultural affiliation or economic
status, but to the dynamics of house use. Further
discussion of intra-site and inter-site vanat10n in
domestic architecture, from the perspective of 'Ain
Ghazal, will appear elsewhere.-.
HOUSE CONSTRUCTION
It is impossible to be certain, in many cases, of the
exact sequence and details of house construction. The
general sequence, allowing for the fact that some
construction activities could have occurred
simultaneously, is fairly clear. The result was a
rectangular structure combining rigid enclosure and
skeleton consttuction, as is still
plan was quite open, and even at Jericho the screen
 THE PREHISTORIC
common among flat beam, rectangular houses in the
Levant (e.g. Ragette r974, 22).

Site preparation
House consttuction began with selection and
prepara tion of a site. In most examples of
modern vernacular

3
 9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT 'AIN

• ••
OH•
• •
'

■ • _' ,

A, - It
I r

...
•

• • .,

"
5

METERS

B •••

OH

C
D
r -

Fig.2
Four partially reconstructed plans of typical PPNB houses at 'Ain Ghazal and Jericho: (a) the four-post House 4
in 'Ain Ghazal3 08 3 and 3283; (b) House 208, Garstang's 'shrine', atJericho (after Garstang and Garstang I
948, 59); (c) a house with screen walls at Jericho (after Kenyon 1981, pl. 286b); (d) the four-pier House
12in'Ain Ghazal 3073 and3 273. The letter 'H' marks the location of basin hearths and probable hearth
platforms. Post holes appear as solid circles, and reconstructed walls are indicated by cross-hatching

3II
 THE PREHISTORIC

architecture this involves some kind of ritual (e.g. surface of the flattened terrace, Foundation where a
Lord Raglan r964, r-14; Freedman r69; cf. Erich trenches do not occur except in so far as the interior house is
r959-60; r965) or is carried out in consultation with faces of some walls,
dug
other members of the community (Fraser r968, 8;
into the
Rapoport r969, 5). This is common in tightly-knit
hillside,
communities because the 'act of siting a house to
were
one's own advan tage may be to the detriment of
built
others' (Freedman r969, 7). The archaeological
against
evidence, unfortunately, provides few if any clues
earth.
for anything but the more mundane aspects of these In all
activities. cases
The prime locations for houses at 'Ain Ghazal, it the
appears, bordered the edges of the Zarqa floodplain. interior
Since the slope of the hillside in these locations is in floors
the order of ro creation of a reasonably level surface
0
,
were
for house construction required considerable very
earthmoving (cf. Aurenche r98r;99-roo). At 'Ain close to,
Ghazal this invol ved digging deeply into the hillside, or even
at least on pre viously unterraced plots, and almost below,
certainly the earth removed in this operation was used the
as fill on the down hill side of the terrace. Presumably level of
a stone retaining wall to the east held this fill in place. the
Road construction which damaged houses excavated in walls'
the r982.-85 sea sons removed their eastern portions bases,
but in three houses fills occurred beneath the eastern except
ends of floors. Terrace walls which were uncovered when
during these excavations (e.g. in 3078) did not lie old
beneath the eastern walls of houses. walls
On account of terracing, most house floors slope
only were
slightly to the east. In one instance, however, a house reused
terrace retained considerable slope (cf. Kenyon r98r, (e.g.
7r, 79). A floor in House I2. is so steeply sloped that House
unusual curbs (04r) moulded in the floor plaster may 7,
have functioned to drain water through a doorway House
(pl. r3a). The slope is almost 6° over 5.8 m. But this II).
floor, constructed over cultural debris, is unusual at These
'Ain Ghazal. walls
consiste
Wall construction d of
Once a reasonably flat terrace was ready, the next step courses
probably involved marking the course of walls on the of field
soil with chalk, lime, charcoal, or sharp stick. Again stones,
we lack any evidence of this at 'Ain Ghazal, but this some
was a common practice in Palestinian vernacular times
architecture in the early twentieth century (Cana'an showin
r933, r) and occurs elsewhere in the Middle East (e.g. g signs
Aurenche r98r, 95; Wulff r966, ro8). Perhaps future of
work will reveal evidence of this practice. water-
The stone walls were then built directly on the rolling.
The
3
 9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT 'AIN

I
builders of bearing walls generally arranged two parallel
rows of 'leaves' of the larger stones, 2.0 to 40 cm in length,
with their flattest sides outwards to provide reasonably
[
uni form, vertical surfaces on both sides of the finished wall. r
A core of mud mortar and some smaller stones filled the '1i,
.
irregular space between the parallel leaves of each course, I
and mud mortar and occasional chinking stones served to
adhere the outer stones and fill the interstices between I
them. In some courses, occasional 'tie' stones were arranged,
not parallel to the wall faces, but per pendicular to them,
thus bonding the leaves together and reducing the
probability that the wall would split vertically. The
finished masonry sometimes exceeded 60 cm in thickness
at the walls' bases, tapering slightly upward. Many walls
had a preserved height of r m or more, and there is no
evidence to suggest that the upper portions of walls
differed in construction or materials from the preserved
portion. In some cases the upper portions of walls fell
directly forward, with even wall plaster intact, and these
suggest similar construction for at least an additional metre
of height (e.g. Housq). Most of the bearing walls formed
the rigid, exterior enclosure; some short walls, often less
than 2 m in length, formed 'piers' or interior structural
supports.

Post supports
But walls were not the only structural supports for the
roof. There is abundant evidence at 'Ain Ghazal for the use
of wooden posts as structural members arranged either
adjacent to walls (e.g. House II, Banning and Byrd r984,
fig. 3) or in pairs or groups of four in more central
locations (e.g. House 4, fig. 36). In the former case the
posts were each about r 3-17 cm in diameter and probably
supported primary roof beams to reduce stress on the
associated wall. In the latter, heavier posts were sunk as
the primary supports for the beams which spanned large
rooms (in the case of House 4, the room was more than 5
min width). As such, the posts appear to have functioned
as structural alternatives to masonry 'piers'.
All these posts, and the primary roof beams which
must have tied them together, formed an interior skeleton
for the house. It is possible that construction of this
wooden skeleton coincided with, or even preceded,
 THE PREHISTORIC
construction of the exterior walls, but we uncovered no
instances of posts which had been incorporated into
walls. At 'Ain Ghazal the outer posts of the skeleton
are often built against the interior faces of walls as
though they were erected after them (e.g. Honse n).
Presum ably the independence of the skeleton from the
rigid enclosure allowed the timber structure to shift
slightly, in response to subsidence or settling, without
putting stress on walls or roof (Ragette 1974, 25).
Roofing
With all the structural supports in place, the house was
ready to receive its roof. Our evidence for roofing is
limited to small fragments of light-coloured clay in
the debris from ruined houses, including some reed
impressed clay from House 12, which may represent
the packed mud with which the builders finished a flat
roof. It is likely that the primary roof beams supported
lighter crossbeams, which in turn supported branches,
bush, and a layer of dry earth, as in recent flat beam
houses (e.g. el-Khoury 1975, 4; Ragette 1974, 22-25).
Reeds or reed matting, when available, are a good
underlayer for the brush, and poplar provides the most
favoured material for roof beams in modern houses.
The inhabi tants of 'Ain Ghazal probably found these
materials along the nearby Zarqa. The smooth clay
surface of the roof, of which we have only fragments,
is the result of ramming or rolling the earthen roof with
a large stone after it rains. In modern examples this
closes any cracks and compresses the wet earth to
prevent leaks (el Khoury 1975, 4; Ragette 1974, 25).
Plaster floors
But the floor is the most remarkable surface in a house
at 'Ain Ghazal. Thick, hard, smooth plaster floors are
the hallmark ofFPNB structures (Kenyon 19 57, 72).
One operation which usually preceded laying of a
new floor was the digging of a shallow, circular pit
wherever the house-builder wanted to place a hearth.
In the case of replasterings, a newly modelled hearth
was usually formed in the depression left by the old
one.
It is possible that some ritual preparation also pre
ceded or accompanied the laying of plaster for one of
these floors, as there is some evidence to suggest that
the plaster covered foundation deposits. Foundation
offer ings were common in Palestinian houses earlier in
this century (Cana 'an 1933; Dalman 1942, 90££.). At
'Ain Ghazal potential evidence of foundation deposits
con sists of two apparently intentional interments.
3 quantities of ash, limestone chunks and lime occurred
One of the possible foundation offerings consists of
utilitarian artefacts. The floor of House 13 in 2871
sealed a cache of tightly bundled flint blades. A
number of competing hypotheses could explain this
blade cache. It is possible that it represents the
accidental loss of blade blanks by one of the house's
builders. Alterna tively it may be a deliberate cache
after floor construc tion - one floor replastering was
visible although we could not detect a pit - and could
even be associated with an unpreserved human burial.
These are unverifi able possibilities. In light of the
common practice of foundation deposits in both late
Neolithic and Bronze Age structures of Eastern Europe
and the Near East (Gailis 1985; Makkay 1983) and in
more recent verna cular construction in Palestine and
throughout the world (e.g. Dalman 1942, 91;
Loewenthal 1978, 7), we cannot dismiss the alternative
that there was an ideo logical motive for interring the
blades.
Another example of a possible foundation deposit
came from below a stone and plaster pavement in the
south-west corner of House4 (fig. 36). There someone
had placed two clay animal figurines pierced with
many sharp blade fragments (Rollefson and Simmons
1986).
The plaster which made up the thick floors consisted
of lime (calcium carbonate, CaCO3) mixed with a
'temper' of small stones and quartz sand (K. Tubb,
pers. comm.; Cf. Aurenche 1981, 23-26; Gourdin and
Kingery 1975, 137; Thuesen and Gwozdz 1982, roo)
and sometimes fragments of destroyed plaster
floors. Many of the floors display the further
elaboration of a burnished red-ochre (haematite or
ferric oxide, Fe,O3) pigment.
Garstang assumed that floors like these at Jericho
were beds of small stones or limestone chips mixed
with unslaked lime 'which the action of moisture
tended to weld into a hard mass' (Garstang 1936, 69).
But subse quent analyses have shown that these floors
were in fact technologically sophisticated.
Production of such floors required heating limestone
to temperatures of 750°-850°C to convert it to a mix
ture of calcium carbonate and calcium oxide, CaO
(Gourdin and Kingery 1975, 134-37). At 'Ain Ghazal
we do have some evidence for this part of the process.
A pit in 3081, dug into the subsoil and reddened
by oxidation at high temperature, was filled with ash,
lime, limestone chips and stones, and about a cubic
metre of lime-ash mixture spilled over into a wall
robbing trench in nearby 3082. A smaller, stone-lined
pit in 3077 was also filled with ash and lime, and large
9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT 'AIN

313
 THE PREHISTORIC

in a locus in 4048. Some or all of these may have been Kingery 1975, 137).
crude lime-kilns; the former may have utilized stones
robbed from the western wall of House 6 as raw
material.
With the limestone disintegrated to powdered lime
and small uncalcined chips of calcium carbonate, it
was still not ready for use as plaster. It was necessary
to mix it with water, and the hydration process which
followed released considerable heat (Gourdin and
Kingery 1975, 137). lt is at this stage that it is useful to
add quartz sand or calcite to the paste as a temper. We
might expect this part of the plaster preparation to
leave evidence in the form of shallow 'plaster-lined
pits' which are the loci of plaster mixing and heat
release. So far excavations at 'Ain Ghazal have not
revealed clear examples of pits of this kind.
Now the house-builders were ready to lay the floor.
Since the lower portion of each floor appears to be
coarser, it is likely that they began by spreading a
layer of dry limestone chips, pebbles, flint debitage,
or old plaster fragments over the surface as a
foundation up to 4 cm in depth. They then poured and
spread a lime paste over this foundation, so that it
would penetrate the interstices of the stones and
floor fragments. Having made this layer reasonably
smooth and flat, and prob ably having let it dry
partially so as to absorb carbon dioxide, they
burnished it with a stone and sometimes painted it.
An upper lamina visible in the plaster con tains no
large inclusions, and ranges from about 1-5 mm in
thickness. Garstang (1935, 167) suggested that this
'coherent skin' was formed by wetting with paint and
frequent polishing during the house's use. The analogy
of modern cement suggests the possibility that the
upper lamina is a 'float' formed by the settling of
larger particles and the rise of small ones suspended in
water.
While spreading and smoothing the plaster, .the
builders moulded it, where necessary, to cover up
walls and posts to heights of as much as 15 cm, to
round out corners, to raise up special curbs (pl. 1p), to
form the circular basins of hearths, and in some
instances to ring hearths with a low rim. At least one
builder built up this rim with clay and stones before
covering it with plaster (3079.on in House 8), much as
Jericho's inhabitants sometimes built up the whole
hearth.
As the water in the new floor evaporated, the plaster
lost its plasticity and absorbed carbon dioxide from the
air to set as avery hard, fine-grained, artificial limestone
which was resistant to water seepage (Gourdin and
31
 9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT 'Arn

Wall plaster with red floors also had red paint on at least the lower
Plaster also covered the walls. Wall plaster at parts of interior walls (e.g. Housen). In House 7 the
'Ain Ghazal consists of a coat of mud, wall surfaces around a doorway were painted with
serving to smooth out irregularities in the decorative geometric designs.
wall faces and to fill interstices of the stones,
and a thin finishing layer of white lime. It is RENOVATION IN 'AIN GHAZAL HOUSES
relatively soft and lacks the polished finish, At 'Ain Ghazal one of the most intriguing aspects of
but on interior surfaces, where we have the PPNB domestic architecture was the frequency
fonnd it, wall plaster probably brightened the with
rooms and made them easier to keep clean
(cf. el-Khoury 1975, 3; Miller 1982, 4).
These interior wall surfaces are remarkably
similar to those in modern Levantine
vernacular houses, where a mud plaster of
loam and chaff is covered with a thin coat of
lime, and rounds out corners and coves with
the floor to facilitate sweeping (Kenyon
1957, 55; Ragette 1974, 22-23). It is possible
that exterior surfaces of 'Ain Ghazal's houses
also received a coat of wall plaster, or at least
mud plaster, as this would help to reduce
seepage of water into the walls during rains.
Slight traces of mud plaster were visible on
the west face of wall 3083.107, which served
as an exterior face only during the final phase
of Housq (fig. 46).

Decoration
It was common to colour floor surfaces with
red haema tite before burnishing it to a hard
finish. Exactly how one applied the pigment
is uncertain in most respects. It may have
been possible to pour a mixture of haematite
and water or oil over the floors to brush it
on to create the most usual treatment, an
entirely red surface. There are rarer
examples of white floors which exhibit red
splashes of paint or patterns of dots (Banning
and Byrd 1984, 18), while two floors in
House 12 and one in House2 (3 285) had
spectacular coloured designs. Some of the
floors have merely white burnished
surfaces except for very infrequent drips of
paint which may have been accidental, or
special decoration of hearths. In some
instances the entire hearth was coloured red;
in one phase of Housq (fig. 3b) only a faint
band of brown pigment traced the hearth
rim.
Our evidence for the decoration of wall
surfaces is more limited, but many rooms
 THE PREHISTORIC
which rooms were altered or demolished. At both 'Ain
Ghazal and Jericho in the PPNB, in spite of the labour
presumably required to dismantle a roof, demolish a
wall, build a new wall, and replace the roof, quite
substantial modifications in house plans were
common. Most cases also involved replastering
although this was probably a frequent maintenance
activity anyway.
It was not uncommon for 'Ain Ghazal's inhabitants
to reuse walls after a period of abandonment. This
generally involved the laying of a new floor on top of
considerable debris that had accumulated on the
weathered, original floor of the building. In all the
cases which follow, however, the evidence is clear that
the renovations occurred over a relatively brief period.
The plaster floors quickly deteriorate when exposed to
one or more rainy season, as we have observed at
eAin Ghazal. These renovations involve rebuildings
and replasterings directly over clean, well preserved
floors, without intervening fill or debris. We
accordingly sug gest that there was no significant
period of abandon ment.
House4
This house, exposed in squares 3083 and 3283, pro
vides the most complete example, both spatially and
temporally, of house renovation at 'Ain Ghazal.
Remodelling in this house involved major changes in
the size and nature of the structure through a series of
distinct architectural phases.
The initial construction phase (fig. 3a), founded on a
terrace dug into the subsoil, is associated with floor
3083.033. A large room, 5.8mx 6.6m. was enclosed
by single-leaf stone walls and bad a skeletal support of
three large posts in a triangular arrangement. Near the
room's centre was a hearth basin, and a storage pit
occurred. An unusual feature was the extension of the
floor to the south-east, where there may have been an
opening or broad doorway (cf. Kenyon 1981, 80,
pis 222-24).
The first remodelling included thickening the
exterior walls by the addition of an inner leaf and
dividing the large room by construction of two short
interior walls or 'piers'. One abutted the south wall and
the other was some 60 cm short of touching the north
wall. This had the effect of leaving two doorways
II between the two portions of the room. Along with
thickening the outer
walls, the builders walled off the southern extension of
I
I the floor by extending the southern wall to the east.
II An additional storage pit in the west room
apparently
! completed the renovations of this phase·. 31
I
The next phase involved the seemingly drastic
change of removing the entire house floor. The house's
renova tors cut out all of the plaster which the piers
and the inner leaf of the exterior walls had not covered,
along with 6- rn cm of underlying soil and the tops of
six burials which had been interred beneath floor 033.
The new structural support for the roof employed four
large posts, in addition to the existing piers, and the
surface of the newly-laid plaster floor, 3083.156, was
in fact considerably lower than the original floor 033
had been (cf. Kenyon 1981, 68). The hearth was
replaced by a slightly larger and much deeper one.
Later, the house's occupants resurfaced the floor with a
layer of plaster, 055, and remodelled the
accompanying hearth to be smaller and shallower (fig.
36).
Subsequently the west room of House 4 was aban
doned, its roof dismantled and its walls knocked in.
Packed earth and some mud brick augmented the
stones from the ruined walls to create an elevated
terrace over the former west room, A semi-circular
revetment wall built over the hearth served to keep
terrace fill or slopewash from spilling through the
central doorway into the east room, and this now
became an exterior entrance (fig.46). Yellow clay
served to patch the exposed hollow of the hearth and
badly worn portions of floor 055 in the semi-circular
entrance area, which were now exposed to the
elements and heavy traffic, and to make the coving
from floor o55 up the side of the revetment wall, The
renovation also blocked the nar row doorway between
the northern pier and exterior wall (pl. 136). This
converted the doorway into a small plastered niche,
that similarly kept fill out of the east room but also
created a possible storage or display space. Rows of
stones in the area north of the revetment helped to
stabilize the fill behind the niche and provided steps up
to the ground surface. A possible pathway led from the
door, over packed mud and stones from the ruined
south wall, up to a gap broken through the remnants of
this wall, and on to the terrace west of House 6. Heavy
traffic along this path was probably responsible for the
extreme wear on floor o55 and the yellow clay
patching, located immediately south-west of the
doorway.
The east room's floor received a new surface (029)
which overlapped the previous floor (o 55) at the
threshold. Along with this surface a hearth, probably
new, was present about a metre east of the doorway.
The curved revetment and fill in an abandoned room
is not without precedent (Kenyon 1957, 54). It appears
that a similar curved wall at Jericho, wall NQ in
 9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT 'Arn

ij 315
 THE PREHISTORIC
i
I

edge of I,;

•
roadcut

I1
ii '''

GN

oheocth

basal
-

.o
clay

plaster floor
storage
pit

a
0
2 M

_,_ edge of
roadcut

••
I

• •
heocth

0
plaster floor

basal

clay

a'Qw
l
,> N);:'l''',',J,-
flagstones

-
Fig. 3
Plans of Housq in'Ain Ghazal 3083 and 3282, (a) during its initial phase, and (b) during the
phasepreceding abandonment of the west room

31
PLATE 13

(a) Upper. 'Curb' 041

moulded into the
plaster of floor
3073.032 in House 12.
(Photo: B. F. Byrd)

(b) Lower. Niche

formed from blocked
doorway (080) in the
north-west corner of
House 4 in 3083.
(Photo: C. Blair)
Overhead views of House 12 in 3073 and
3273 (a) Upper left, before and (b) Upper
right, after blocking of the door between
the western piers.
(Photo: C. Blair)

(c) Lower. Coving of the floor plaster

(arrow) clearly marks the location of a wall
even after all the wall stones have been
removed. View of House 8 in 3079 and
3080 after removal of 3079.007, the latest
northern wall.
(Photo: C. Blair)
 0

DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT AIN GHAZAL

9. E. B. Banning and B. F.

court
yard
"""e' I
edge of

_j
road cut

terrace

f
fill

of
edge
excavation

--

plaster
House AI

I
floor

terrace
f i!I
I
pit

---------------
0 2 M
\I 0 IM
a b
Fig.4
Two examples of retaining walls outside doorways: (a) wall NQ with its associated hearth outside the exit
from House A at Jericho (after Kenyon 1981, pl. 263b-c); (b) wall 034 with its associated grinding stones in
the final phase of House4 in 3083 at 'Ain Ghazal. The arrows represent hypothetical flow of traffic

Trench III, also served as a revetment and step outside
a doorway which lay very close to terrace wall NR
(Kenyon 1981, 183; fig.4a). This permitted access
berween House A and House B, whose floor was some
50 cm higher (Kenyon 1981, 182).
The semi-circular wall, while helping to keep the
doorway open and to prevent upslope debris from
washing into the house, may also have been the focus
of some household economic activities. Possibly the
better lighting and the height of the new terrace in
House 4, about 50 cm, encouraged use of the revetment
wall as a seating and working area. The presence of II
grinding
stones on the floor of the enclosed area points to its
probable use as a food preparation area prior to aban
donment. The example in Trench III at Jericho, simi
larly, encloses an exterior hearth which conld have
been the focus of cooking activities.
House 6
The sequence in this house is similar, in most respects,
to the last one. The western portion of a large structure
occupying areas 3082 and part of 3081 experienced
two major remodelling episodes (fig. 5).

317

21
 THE PREHISTORIC

A Q A b A C

•
edge of
roadcut
'I
••
.hecctho
clay

••
plaster
floor

•
A' A'

Fig. 5
Plans of House 6 in 3081 and 3082 at'Ain Ghazal, (a) in its initial phase; (b) after room contraction and floor
replastering; (c) after wall realignment and niche blocking

The original structure was built on a terrace dug into enclosed the old hearth and presumably allowed it to continue
the day of the hillside and was 5.9 min width (fig. sa), to
Part of its northern wall as built directly on floor
3083.033, where this floor extended southward from
House 4, and this securely places the foundation date
of House 6 sometime later. The circular hearth near
the centre of its plaster floor had a raised sill.
The first remodelling involved moving the western
wall eastward some 2. 5 m, and filling the vacated
cavity with earth to support the back of the new wall
and to level the ground surface west of the house (fig.
5b). The. new west wall included two large, curved
niches. The smaller niche in the new north-west corner
of the room parallels the small niche in neighbouring
House 4 dur ing its final phase. The larger central one

3
function, at least for a time. A later
replastering of the floor covered the basin of
the hearth.
During a subsequent remodelling, the
northern por tion of the west wall was rebuilt
and shifred slightly to the east, blocking the
niche in the north-west corner (fig. 5c).
House 8
Further south the remnant of a structure
occupied square 3079 and 3080. The eastern
end is not preserved and the western portion,
in 32 79, remains unexcavated. Apart from
several replasterings and hearth remodell
ing, two major phases of renovation
occurred.
We know very little about the western
area, but it appears that it was abandoned
when the excavated room was rebuilt. This
remodelling involved at least

31
 9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT 'Am GHAZAL

.
THE PREHISTORIC

House 7

---

plaster floor

0
edge of

·•
road cut
• plaster floor
hea cth

o hearth

•
GN

a b 0 I 2 M

Fig. 6
Plans of House 8 in3 079 and 3080 at•Ain Ghazal, {a) before and (b) after contraction of the central room

partial demolition of the walls and a recutting of the
floor terrace some 15 cm into the basal clay, thus
obliterating any traces of the original floor except in
the abandoned portion and in places beneath the new
west wall (fig. 6a). The new floor, consequently, was
lower than the floor of the abandoned area. The
abandoned portion of the structure, as in Houses 4
and 6, was artificially filled with clay.
At some point the northern wall of the excavated
room was moved more than one metre to the south,
effectively reducing the building's width from 5.1 to
3.6 m (fig. 6b; pl. 14c). The hearth, to retain a
central location in the room, shifted to the south. It
appears that this size reduction facilitated the

3
construction of another house, which was fitted tightly Following abandonment, this smaller room, too, was
between this one and House 6. levelled with artificial fill.

House I2
House 12, which occupied 3273 and the western por
tion of 3073, was founded on cultural debris and is
probably later in date than tbe first phases of the other
houses. The house is a classic example of the PPNB
house, subdivided by two pairs of piers into three
room areas. The most easterly of these is very badly
damaged, and the stones of all but the most westerly
walls have been robbed, but the coved edges of the
plaster floors clearly reveal the floor plan (pl. 14a).
The central room, excavated in 1983, contained the
usu ! basin hearth, and an unusual curb-like modelling
(pl. 1p) was pre sent in the floor of the doorway
between the central and

31
 THE PREHISTORIC

east rooms. The interior width of the building was dissatisfaction, as shown in contemporary sociological studies, is
4.0 m, and the distance between the two pairs of piers often attributed to insufficient space (e.g. Cheven 1971; Morris
was 2.2m. and Winter 1978, 179-80); few have considered the problem of
The western pair of piers was joined to the north excessive space, which
and south walls by niches which opened onto the
western room. This room had been further partitioned
by the addition of low rows of stone which demarcated
two bin-like areas, one in the north and one in the
south of the room. At least the northern one functioned
to store barley, peas and lentils, which a chance
burning of the room carbonized. Identification of the
southern area as a storage bin is more doubtful.
Later, the doorway which connected this room to
the central one was blocked (pl. 146), but the room
was not necessarily abandoned. The plaster floor in
the western room extends to the south beyond the
interior wall-line of the central room, much like the
southern extension of the original House4 floor. It is
possible that this repre sents an alternative doorway.
Following the abandonment of this building, a later
occupation reused its north wall. Unfortunately,
remn.ants of two plaster floors with elaborate red
paint ing preserved litrle evidence for the organization
of this later structure.
Summary of renovations at 'Ain Ghazal
Some patterns of remodification in 'Ain Ghazal's
houses are identifiable. These patterns concern
changes in the size of rooms and houses, in the
circulation paths within houses, and in access to
neighbouring houses. But the change in size is the
most obvious pattern.
One of the virtues of rectangular architecture is that
it facilitates agglutinative, and not only subtractive,
strategies for creating new rooms (Rapoport 1969, 36;
Flannery 1972, 39. Rapoport refers to structures which
grow by adjoining rooms to outer walls as
agglutinative architecture. The subtractive
architectural strategy, in contrast, involves creation of
rooms by internal subdi vision). It is somewhat
surprising, therefore, that the trend at 'Ain Ghazal is
for renovation to result not in larger, but in smaller,
domestic units. The reduction in floor area is
especially marked when rooms are the unit of interest,
although contraction of walls on the long axis of
buildings (e.g. House 8) and abandonment of whole
rooms suggest that reduction in the size of houses, too,
was substantial (see figs 3, 5, 6). Housing

32
 0

9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT AIN

might lead a house's occupants to seek this phase by a new structure on the east side (Kenyon
smaller quarters (yet see Goodman 1974). 1981,
One strategy for reducing room size, without sub 291).
stantially reducing house size, is the subtractive strategy At 'Ain Ghazal the abandoned space may sometimes
(Rapoport 169, 36). House owners merely have remained open for a time (e.g. House 8), but in 'n!
erect screen walls inside the rigid enclosure ost cases was filled soon after demolition to the height
to subdivide the enclosed space. At Jericho of a new terrace (e.g. Houses 4 and 6).
this strategy was common, and screen walls Earlier in the century Near Eastern archaeologists
between the piers frequenrly created small recognized that domestic areas in modern Iraqi
chambers flanking the front entrance to a villages, as in their Early Dynastic counterparts,
house (fig. 2c). At 'Ain Ghazal, however, contained numerous abandoned and ruined rooms
this type of screen wall is unknown. Most which gradu ally accumulated domestic rubbish or
examples of the subtractive strategy are were filled and
those where the piers abut the rigid enclo
sure on both sides, leaving only a metre-
wide doorway for traffic between two
portions of a former room. We have seen
examples of this type of division in House
4 and House 12.
But the size modification which often follows
subdi
vision of the house causes not only
contraction in individual room size, but
presumably contraction of the entire house.
This modification must have involved
dismantling the roof as well as the
demolition of one or more walls in each
case. Following demolition, either a whole
room, previously created by subtraction,
was abandoned and filled to the height of a
new terrace (e.g. House 4), or the walls
were rebuilt along a line as much as 2.6 m
inside the previous wall line (Houses 7 and
8). This could result in a reduction in house
area of some 25 m2. in the former and at
least 10 m2. in the latter case. Similar
modifications occurred at Jericho.
Kenyon (1981, 290) recognized one
example of the second strategy in EI-V,
StageX, where wall Ero2, appa rently,
was demolished and the replacement wall,
Ero 8, was built farther west, 'on top of the
plastered floor' of the original room. This
room continued in use, although its
width was reduced from 4.6 m to 4 m and it
appareutly lost its central hearth. The
room shrank further with construction of
wall Ero9, immediately west of Ero8 and
replacing it in phase xxxviii. The space
ceded by the original room was occupied in
3
 THE PREHISTORIC

levelled to provide usable space. Constant rebuildings, to addi tions to the household, or to the fission of
often incorporating such abandoned rooms, contri the household
buted to differences of as much as a metre in the floor
levels of adjacent, contemporary rooms (e.g. Frankfort
1934, 5-6). Here at 'Ain Ghazal we see evidence for
the antiquity of the practice of recycling abandoned
rooms as terraces.

DISCUSSION

Social implications of remodelling

Archaeologists often assume that the construction of
architecture involves such a substantial investment of
labour and materials that it must be associated with
permanence (e.g. Braidwood 1967, rr8; Redman 1978,
109). Given this materialistic assumption, it is sur
prising that the substantial PPNB architecture provides
so much evidence of major modification during the
use-lives of individual structures.
Ironically, socio-cultural anthropologists tend to
assume quite the opposite. Some anthropologists
characterize houses as 'the material expression of a
matrix of sociocultural influences' (Lawrence 1982,
104) and expect house form, location, or both to
change along with changes in household size,
composition and organization.
One way in which kinship achieves . . . expression can be
through houses themselvese [sic]. The mobility of houses
symbolizes the extent of land rights and substance as the
residential group expands or dwindles, and emphasizes the
importance of housing as a symbol of coresidence in trans
lating substance into land (Rodman 1985, 69-70),
It is true that societies in which domestic architecture
most closely reflects changes in social structure have
houses of goat hair, wood, thatch or bamboo. Houses
of brick or stone, of course, would be more difficult to
modify, and it is usually easier to rearrange their occu
pants than to reconstruct their walls. Consequently the
literature on dissatisfaction with existing houses con
centrates, not on modifying them, but on moving out
into more satisfactory situations (e.g. Cheven 1971;
Clark et al. 1984; Morris and Winter 1978, 165-89).
But there are, none the less, societies in which
modi fications similar in nature to those found in
PPNB houses .are comffion responses to changes in
domestic social relations. Among the Lodagaba of the
African Gold Coast, for instance, the rather substantial
mud construction of homesteads does not deter their
owners from making major modifications in response

32
 0

9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT AIN

groups involved in food production or food preparation

(Goody 1962b, 82-84).
As in other societies the buildings reflect the composition of the
dwelling group. But the fit is much closer in a society where the
houses are built from mud than when they are made from more
permanent materials such as stone. On account of the heavy
rains repair work is an annual affair. And if a room is not
required because of the death or departure of its occupant, it will
soon fall into ruins. The plan of the homestead acts therefore as
a fairly exact map of the social relations of the
members of the dwelling group ... (Goody 19626, So; yet cf.
Hillier et al. 1976, 180).
Nor is mud-wall technology an impediment to renova tion
in northern Ghana, where the house owner 'not only
determines the house's original form, but, as he lives in it,
constantly alters and improves upon it' (Agorsah 1985,
105). Modifications in modern Iranian villages, too,
especially door-blackings and niche openings, are
relatively simple (Horne 1983, 19).
Where a house plan begins with a rectangular shell or
enclosure, as at 'Ain Ghazal, the principal strategies for
alterations are either to adjoin rooms to the outer walls or
to subdivide the rectangle by the erection of screen walls.
The first strategy requires space for expansion around the
original room and may eventually result in dense clusters
of rooms with little opporrunity for further expansion. The
second strategy involves sub tracting space from the
original larger room. It is the subtractive strategy that is
most typical at 'Ain Ghazal and Jericho.

The development cycle

While we lack specific archaeological evidence for the
motive behind these renovations, the most likely
hypothesis for changes in the size, form or organization of
a domestic structure is that they were responses to
changes in the co-residential group. These groups are not
static, but are continually developing through a process
commonly known as the 'developmental cycle' (Goody
1962a).
In the American South-west, a number of
archaeologists have employed the concept of the domestic
cycle and discussed its effect on house size and room
communication (Adams 1983; Ciolek-Torrello and Reid
1974; Dean 1969; Howard 1985; Huntington
1986, 34-36; Reid 1974; Rock 1974; Wilcox 1975;
Wilcox et al. 1981). Fletcher (1977, 142) has explored the
social dimension of variability in South-western domestic
architecture, but not within the framework of the
domestic cycle.

3
 THE PREHISTORIC

Few archaeologists outside the American South-west At 'Ain Ghazal and Jericho, however, we are prob ably
appear to have given the developmental cycle explicit missing the evidence linking outdoor activity areas-with
attention. Flannery (r972, 39) mentions it in the con particular households. If, as Kenyon sugges-
text of both room addition and room abandonment..
Kramer (r982, 67r) notes that this cycle 'is one of the
factors responsible for modifications made in residen
tial architecture', but cautions that such modifications
sometimes eliminate the physical evidence for earlier
structural states or earlier alterations. We are fortunate
that at 'Ain Ghazal this type of evidence is abundant.
If we attempt to relate the variations in house form
at 'Ain Ghazal to the domestic cycle, we are hindered
by our inability to determine with confidence the
bound aries of the domestic group. The problem of
defining these boundaries is difficult enough in the
study of present-day populations (Sanjek r982), and
is espe cially tenuous when dealing with the
archaeological record, even when we are certain of
the exact contem poraneity of the. units (Wilcox
r975; 198r, 25-26).
Thus the assumption that a house, as a spatial unit,
adequately reflects the residential unit of interest
remains unproven. The failure of this assumption
could result either from the incomplete recovery of the
rooms of individual houses, or from cultural behaviour
which dispersed the roomholdings of each household
among several structures.
Horne (I 982) has discussed inheritance rules that
can result in household property being dispersed
through out a village. If, as she suggests, the resident
of one house could own rooms in other houses or
compounds, household boundaries would be more
difficult to deter mine.
If we were dealing with 'complex plan' (Aurench
r98r, r99-203), multi-mom structures which are typi
cal in more northerly sites such as Bouqras or
Abu Hureyra, failure to recover all the rooms or to
group them correctly could also result in misleading
residen tial boundaries.
Fortunately the typical house at 'Ain Ghazal and
Jericho during this period appears to have been a
single large rectangle only loosely subdivided, and the
prob ability that agglutinated rooms were present and
are missing from our data seems very low. The
apparent lack of 'complex', multi-room structures at
'Ain Ghazal also minimizes the probability of the kind
of dispersion Horne describes. None the less these are
problems which future research should address.

32
 0

9. E. B. Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT AIN

ted (r957, 54), houses were grouped around which are used in ritual are dismantled or destroyed
cour tyards, the household could following their use (Blacking r969, 2r6). Kenyon
correspond to a courtyard group, each (r98r, 307) suggested that at least the more unusual
house representing only a portion of the architectural alterations at Jericho 'may be evidence
co-residential group. Courtyard groups of elaborate ritual practices'. Of course this type of
have been the focus of some studies in the hypothesis is archaeologically very difficult to test,
New World (e.g. Flannery r976, 75; Howard and further speculation on religious motives for the
r985). The linear settlement along terraces renovations is probably futile. These conjectures can
at 'Ain Ghazal is not particularly amenable be no more than fascinating possibili
to courtyard clusters, but we cannot discount ties.
this possibil ity completely.
If we make the preliminary assumption
that the house does correspond closely to the
household, it seems most probable that the
original house layout, with the most open
plan, is associated with the 'establishment
stage' beginning with occupation by a couple
(or small family group) after marriage. The
'expansion stage' during which offspring are
heavily dependent on their parents could be
associated with some subdivision of the
house by longer piers or screen walls; we
might also expect an increase in storage
capacicy,. During the third 'fission stage',
when offspring begin to form their
own,house holds, it is possible that the
original house would give up unnecessary
space, especially if it facilitated con struction
of neighbouring structures. Conceivably
these newer structures could have housed the
families of the children or their cousins, still
closely tied to the parent household.
Of course the development cycle does not
have a fixed, universal form, and the simple
sequence of stages just mentioned may not
represent accurately the form of domestic
changes in a given culture or a given house
hold. Alternative variations to the pattern
could include movement of aged parents into
the house of a son or daughter, and changes
in the function of rooms or structures (e.g.
Crawford r977, 35; Horne 1983, 20).

Alternative explanations
Among the alternatives to hypotheses
dependent on the developmental cycle is
the hypothesis that house remodellings
were motivated by ideological beliefs.
Among the Venda of Zimbabwe, for
example, objects, including whole buildings,
3
 9. E. B..Banning and B. F. Byrd. DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE AT 'Arn

Other possible alternatives could include architectu settlement, but is dynamic and subject to constant
ral changes dictated by physical damage or deteriora change. Analysis of these changes provides
tion and consequent practical considerations. If water important data for archaeological research, but
seepage or decay of wooden structural supports requires the use of microstratigraphic excavation
increased the maintenance requirements for a particular techniques. It is hoped
room subsequentially, this might be sufficient motive
to demolish existing roof, walls, or both, in the
offending room. Garstang and Garstang (1948, 57)
suggested that excessive damp at Jericho 'may explain
to some extent why the earlier buildings are found to
have been fre quently rebuilt'. An unusual stone and
plaster pavement in the south-west and north-west
corners of House 4 at 'Ain Ghazal, in a room later
abandoned, could also be a response to damp or
water seepage.
A third alternative, 'more closely related to the
domestic cycle, is that houses or the plots on which
they were built were private property which became
sub divided through inheritance. Much as in the
modern Iranian village described by Horne (1982),
individual houses appear to have been heritable b
more than one parcener in Old Babylonian
Mesopotamia (e.g. Jones 1951; Charpin 1980;
Koshurnikov and Yoffee, n.d.; cf. Driver and Miles
1952, 331, 335-36). There are earlier archaeological
suggestions for the practice in the Early Dynastic
period (Crawford 1977, 37). Kenyon (I981, I 85)
hinted at the possibility of house partition in the PPNB
as well, in the case of neighbouring Houses A and Bin
Trench III at Jericho.

CONCLUSION
At 'Ain Ghazal it is possible that the evidence for
renovation is more visible than at many Middle
Eastern sites simply because the durable floor plaster,
where it once coved up the bases of walls, preserves
the pattern of wall layouts long after the walls
themselves have vanished (pl. I4c). Traces of wall
plaster, similarly, make it easier to detect blocked
doorways since those responsible for the blocking did
not always bother to remove the plaster from the
former door-jambs. For these reasons we would expect
similar visibility of renovations at other PPNB sites.
This study, utilizing the admittedly spectacular state
of preservation of PPNB structures, and particularly
their floors, has attempted to show that domestic
architecture is not a static construction feature at a

32
that in future there will be much more completeTHE ana
PREHISTORIC
lyses
of architectural modifications, and that these analyses will
generate more specific hypotheses asso ciating the
renovations with possible changes in the size and
composition of social groups.
Since social changes are integral to a number of
hypotheses concerning the development of village economy
and more complex political systems (e.g. Flannery 1972;
Moore I985, 6I; Redman I978), this type of evidence
should not be overlooked. If PPNB villages, like 'Ain
Ghazal, are examples of communities which failed to create
the socio-political mechanisms we associate with
urbanism, surely comparisons of evidence for the social
systems of PPNB communities and their more successful
Mesopotamian counterparts would be enlightening.

Acknowledgements. The 'Ain Ghazal Archaeological Project has

been sponsored by the Institute of Archaeology and
Anthropology of Yarrnouk University, the National Geo graphic
Society, the Department of Antiquities of Jordan, the Royal
Jordanian Airlines, the Wenner-Gren Foundation, San Diego State
University, the University of Kansas, and the Cobb Institute of
Archaeology at Mississippi State University. The co-directors in
1982 were Dr G, Rollefson (San Diego State University), and Dr
A. Leonard (Univ. of Arizona); and in the other seasons were Dr
G. Rollefson and Dr A. Simmons (Desert Research Institute, Reno,
Nevada). Excavation super visors in the area of the site discussed
here included the authors, K. Abu Ghuneima, K. Cheronis, M.
Donaldson,
W. Erskine, W. Gillespie, C. Johnson-Leonard, V. Matthias,
E. McAdam, D. Petocz, N. Qadi, D. Rahimi, St J. Simpson,
E. Suleiman, and L. Villiers.
We are grateful to G. 0. Rollefson, A.H. Simmons, D.R.
Wilcox, M. Faught, ].Lowell, J.J. Reid, and N. Yoffee for
reading and commenting on an earlier draft of this paper. We
thank K. Tubb (Institute of Archaeology, University of Lon don)
for information regarding the composition of paint and plaster
floors from 'Ain Ghazal. S. Maltby and R. Stromberg helped with
proof-reading.

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