The Early Bronze Age IV Site at Sha‘ar Ha-Golan (with a contribution by Steven A. Rosen) (pp. 1–73)

Excavations undertaken in two separate areas (100, 200) at Sha‘ar Ha-Golan, revealed the remains of domestic structures dating to Early Bronze Age IV. These represent the remains of a single-stratum rural settlement that extended over some 200 dunams, one of the largest settlements of this period that have been exposed so far in the country. The structures are multi-roomed rectilinear buildings, with dwelling units comprising three or more rooms. The plans of the buildings are not unified; most of them have a large central broadroom, its roof sometimes supported by columns, which stood on stone bases. Additional elements, such as benches along the walls and stone mortars sunk into the floors, point to a relationship with earlier architectural traditions in the southern Levant during the third millennium BCE. The pottery from Sha‘ar Ha-Golan was attributed to Dever’s Family NC, and includes storage jars, cooking pots, kraters and bowls. The pottery types indicate that food storage was a major priority, clearly expressing the sedentary nature of the settlement. The model of an unfortified rural settlement dispersed over a wide area attests to the drastic changes that took place in the fabric of society following the disappearance of the earlier urban culture.