Shir (German transcription according to the German Oriental Society [DMG]: Šīr/Arabic: شير) is a Late Neolithic site in western Syria, located 12 km northwest of Hama, capital of the province by the same name. The settlement of Shir is situated upon a 30-m high terrace formation above the Nahr as-Sārūt, a tributary of the Orontes River (Arabic: Nahr al-‛Asi).
History of research
The settlement of Shir was discovered in 2005 during a local survey in the central Orontes area and archaeologically investigated from 2006 to 2010 within the framework of a cooperation project by the Damascus Branch of the Orient Department of the German Archaeological Institute (DAI) and the Direction Générale des Antiquités et des Musées de la Syrie. The natural conditions of the central Orontes characterise the region as one of the favourable areas in the Near East, which must have played a decisive role during the process of Neolithisation (Neolithisation: the transition from economical forms marked by hunting/gathering nomadic way of life to food producing sedentism, which occurred between 10,000 and 7000 B.C.). Comparatively few Neolithic sites are known in this region thus far.
Settlement
According to radiocarbon datings, the settlement of Shir was inhabited between 7000 and 6200/6100 calBC (calibrated data). The site was abandoned towards the end of the 7thmillennium B.C. and thereafter – possibly due to climatic change – never permanently populated again. Because of this circumstance, particular areas of the 4-ha large settlement could be excavated extensively, allowing specific lines of inquiries to be followed. Thus, in the southern area the stratigraphic sequence was investigated over a surface of 400 m2; in the central area the two latest settlement layers covering a surface of 1,000 m2 were exposed; and in the northeastern area two buildings with specific functions and encompassing some 700 m2 were examined.
Architecture
For the time span between 7000 and 6450 B.C. the stratigraphic sequence in the southern area covers six subsequent building phases, each showing diverse sub-phases. A differentiated settlement development could be confirmed in this area, which is characterised by its distinct conceptual planning. Particularly remarkable is the fact that at a later time stone material was removed from all layers and evidently reused. Building activities noted in younger layers of the central area are characterized by numerous heterogeneous forms of house complexes, whose relationship to one another is disturbed by pits. These buildings date back to ca. 6300/6200 B.C. In the northeastern area an apparently planned building complex consisting of two northwest–southeast oriented structures with altogether 16 rooms was recorded; it was presumably abandoned around 6200/6100 B.C. These buildings were probably two-storied. The structure and room contents of the preserved and excavated ground floors indicate their primary usage as storerooms, which could be accessed only through the upper floors with the help of ladders. These buildings could have functioned as communal storerooms as well as a combination of living and storage space for a person or a group of persons of high social status.
As a rule, the foundation walls of the buildings in Shir are built of limestone, which occurs naturally in this region, while the few remains of the brick walls are generally made of clay or rammed earth (pisé). Most remarkable in all layers are the massive, carefully created lime plaster floors. The technique in floors was already known in the Early Neolithic (10th–8th century B.C.) and is characterized by a high demand on burning material. Consequently, a certain degree of environmental destruction in settlement's vicinity cannot be excluded.