Three cemeteries and a Byzantine Church: a ritual landscape at Yasieleh, Jordan.

Three cemeteries and a Byzantine Church: a ritual landscape at Yasieleh, Jordan. Introduction The Byzantine period in Jordan can be taken to run from AD 324 whenConstantine defeated his rival Licinius and gained control over theeastern empire (Sauer 1973), until AD 634 when the Moslem forces annexedit. During the Byzantine Period, all of the major cities of the Romanera continued to flourish, but Christianity spread and churches andchapels began to spring up, especially during the reign of EmperorJustinian (AD 527-565). There were of course setbacks: plague in 542(Conrad 1981, 1986), earthquakes (Russel 1985; Amiran et al. 1994), andthe Sassanians who had invaded Persia and Iraq during the early thirdcentury and who had a strong negative impact on the Jordanian population(Parker 1999). Many ethnic groups inhabited Jordan and Palestine during theByzantine period, such as Arabs, Aramaics and Greeks. The ethnic andlinguistic diversity was paralleled by religious diversity and includedJudaism, Samaritanism, Christianity and paganism Early Christianity developed in an era of the Roman Empire during which many religions were practiced. The intermingling and interaction of peoples and cultures facilitated by the Pax Romana resulted in the competition and cross-fertilization of religions. . Such intellectualdiversity, as well as the varied landscapes and climate of Jordan(Piccirillo 1985) created some regionalism re��gion��al��ism?n.1. a. Political division of an area into partially autonomous regions.b. Advocacy of such a political system.2. Loyalty to the interests of a particular region.3. in the area (Meyers et al.1976; 1981). But all of these ethnic groups were ruled by the ChristianByzantines and employed by them in building churches. The ArabGhassanids, for example, were employed to build and design many of thechurches and their names still appear on the mosaic floor of severalchurches, such as the church of Ya'amoun excavated by Jerome Rosein 1999. Whatever the ethnic group that inhabited the area during theByzantine period, Byzantine culture dominated over them and left itsimprint until today. Landscape and societies Landscape as defined by Knapp and Ashmore (1999) is the"backdrop against which archaeological remains are plotted. Itprovides resources, refuge and risks that impel im��pel?tr.v. im��pelled, im��pel��ling, im��pels1. To urge to action through moral pressure; drive: I was impelled by events to take a stand.2. To drive forward; propel. and impact on humanactions and situations. It is an entity that exists by virtue of itsbeing perceived, experienced, and contextualised by people".Through landscape, we can interpret societies. Besides being a metaphorfor people's actions; landscape also plays a significant role incultural relations (Ashmore 1991; Lyton 1995; Schmidt 1997). Landscapehas long been known as an active component in our experience (Alcock1993, 1994; Alcock & Osborne 1994; Edlund 1987; de Polignac 1991,1994; Tilley 1994), and we shape, modify and invest in it mainly througharchitecture. The investigation of the relationship between landscape and itsassociated architecture also has the potential to draw out a picture ofcult practice (Steinspar 1999). For example, at Chaco Canyon, USA, Steinand Lekson (1992) argued that concepts expressed in architecture at sitelevel reflected the organisation of communities, and were replicated inthe Chacoan landscape as a whole. Following the same concept, this paperemploys landscape and the associated architecture in one of theByzantine sites in north Jordan to throw light on the socialorganisation of that community. The Byzantine site Yasieleh and its landscape Archaeological sites of the Byzantine period in Jordan can bedivided into two major categories: villages fortified fortified (fôrt´fīd),adj containing additives more potent than the principal ingredient. by enclosures orbuilt near military installations, mainly founded in the plain, andagricultural villages founded on fertile landscapes and close to waterresources (Piccirillo 1985). Their location was influenced by those ofprevious Roman cities, and by proximity to water, their principalrationale being agricultural (Al-Shorman 2002). The site of Yasieleh,located 9 km east of the city of Irbid and occupied from the Late Romanto the beginning of the Islamic Period (Al-Muheisen 1991), provides auseful example of a Byzantine landscape. The presence of many waterreservoirs, many irrigation irrigation,in agriculture, artificial watering of the land. Although used chiefly in regions with annual rainfall of less than 20 in. (51 cm), it is also used in wetter areas to grow certain crops, e.g., rice. canals, and a dam indicates a tremendousamount of rain fall during the occupation period. Because of thesefavourable climate conditions; moister than today (Shehadeh 1985; Koucky1987; Rehav 1989; Kuniholm 1990), agriculture productivity could havebeen on a very large scale. This is endorsed by the discovery of hugewinepresses of multiple chambers, big storage areas, and basalt cerealgrinding articles; while depictions on the mosaic floor of the church atYasieleh show that olives, grapes and cereals were the main crops(Figure 1). [FIGURE 1 OMITTED] The ruins of the church in Yasieleh are located near the mainvalley (Wadi Warran) that carried water to the Shallalah stream a fewkilometres to the north. According to the study of Al-Muhiesen andEl-Naijar (1994), the church was built in AD 528. Terraced slopessurround it on all sides, and situated in these terraces are threecemeteries of late Roman to Byzantine date. On the south side is acemetery of multiple tombs (Figure 2) carved in limestone rocks; whileon the western and the northern sides, hidden from the view of thechurch are cemeteries of single shaft tombs (vertical or horizontal). [FIGURE 2 OMITTED] Despite the fact that the three cemeteries are of the same date andlocated within the same settlement area, they differ in theirarchitecture. The tombs in the southern cemetery are arranged in tiersand cut horizontally in the hillside and most of them have arcasolia,quadrasolia, loculi and stone-cut graves. The northern cemetery consistsof graves arranged in regular rows and cut vertically into the ground ontop of the hill. The western cemetery is the lowest in elevation andcontains tombs cut vertically or horizontally into the ground. Thepresence of different tomb types could be inferred as a temporal changein cultural practices, but, as explored below, the most likelyinterpretation lies in the social organisation of the Yasielehcommunity. The southern cemetery is not only located in view of the church,but in the area where grapes were processed for wine production and thecrop yields of cereals were stored. The winepresses and the watercisterns were constructed at the maximum run off locations to obtainsufficient amounts of running water from Wadi Warran and winterrainfall. This area of high activity contrasts with the northern and thewestern cemeteries which are visually hidden from the church, andlocated adjacent to agricultural land. Interpretation The construction of the multiple tombs of the southern cemetery hadrequired extensive labour and energy, which theoretically should havereflected the social rank of the people buried there. Binford (1971),Saxe (1970) and Tainter (1975) state that a greater amount of energy inthe construction of monumental memorials corresponds to higher socialrank. Wealthy people of the pagan Roman Period were buried in huge tombswhile the poor were mostly laid in the ground in an extended position(Toynbee 1980). The central chamber in most of the Roman tombs in Jordanmimics the structure of the traditional Roman home (Waterhouse 1998).According to Roman law, all burials were to be placed outside the city(Toynbee 1980). By contrast with pagan practice, Roman Christianity is a religionconcerned with death, burial and rebirth as a way of imitating Christ(Green 1977; Rush 1941). Bringing death into the centre of the city wasa proclamation of dominance expressed in terms of architectural space bythe Christian church (Davies 1999). Unlike the Romans, the Byzantinepeople did not regard death as a pollutant, so the various architecturalfeatures on their landscape are likely to have been spatially arrangedin a different way. The use of the multiple tombs in the Byzantineperiod must therefore imply a new attitude to their location. The church was sited with a view to embracing the high rankingsouthern cemetery and the area of high production activity. Theproximity of these high-ranking tombs to the site centre could be viewedas a reflection of frequent visits to the cemetery and/or the regularmortuary ceremonies that might have been practised there. The activearea here conforms to the definition of post-mortem space by Tilley(1994), which is the medium of actions. It is also the place for actionswhere meaning is created through social interaction (Giddens 1979). Inthe North American Middle Archaic, Buikstra and Charles (1999)emphasised social order in the landscape, wherein the dead are buried inspecific locales marking the roles in social and natural worlds.Kealhofer (1999) in studying the seventeenth century AD gardens inTidewater, Virginia, concluded that landscape created controlled spaceto reinforce hierarchical relationships between the elite, their land,the slaves and the freeholders. By the same argument it is expected that people buried in thenorthern and western cemeteries, located more remotely from the areascontaining the winepresses, the cisterns, and the church, were of lowersocial rank, since little energy was expended on carving their tombs. One could therefore argue that social stratification among theByzantines is maintained at death and shaped their landscape. TheByzantines arranged their architectural features at Yasielehdeliberately, using both practical and social factors. Though the churchwas constructed at a lower elevation, it received minimum water runoff,something which protected its mosaic floor from erosion and has assuredits survival (Figure 3). Water was needed at the church for baptismpurposes, so building it near Wadi Warran might also have related toindividuals' initiation and baptism at that time. [FIGURE 3 OMITTED] The tombs in the three cemeteries are located on higher altitudescompared to the church. This represents a change from the Roman period,when sanctuaries were located at higher altitudes to settlements anddedicated to sky gods (Steinspar 1998). Though low altitude sanctuariesduring the Roman Period were not common, they allowed others to view theceremonies and the cult celebrations held in the area from the top ofthe hills (Steinspar 1998). Such an idea may have been adapted by theChristian church. The location of a church in a depression surrounded byhills with higher slopes on all sides (Figure 4) is obviously meant tocontrol access to the area as a sacred and active one. This assumptionis also supported by the location of the church at Sa'ad (a LateByzantine church), which although located at an altitude of about 870 mabove sea level, is surrounded by hills on all sides, and has cemeteriessituated at altitudes higher than 880 m. [FIGURE 4 OMITTED] The position of the active area at the centre of the site mighthave been done purposefully by the high status people and/or thereligious officials at the church to control wine production, olive oilproduction or social matters. If the southern cemetery is associatedwith this output, the two cemeteries of lower rank may be associatedwith the more rural end of agricultural production. The agriculturallandscape extends for many miles in four directions and is part of theHouran Plains. If we consider the agricultural area as a metaphor forproductivity and fertility, burying the low status people (who might beagricultural workers) in this area symbolises their contribution toproductivity and fertility. Conclusions The Yasieleh people thus viewed their landscape as the sum of thesacred and the non- sacred sites. Whatever the Christians' belief,social stratification during life was preserved in death and burial. Thespatial distribution of the various architectural features at the sitewere intentionally planned and aimed at maintaining differences in thesocial hierarchy. The various grades and roles of labour were embeddedin the landscape. Unlike in the Roman view of death, the deceased,particularly those of high status ones, appear to be considered asliving, influential figures. Acknowledgements I ant grateful to Professor Zaydoon Al-Muhiesen who directed theexcavations at Yasieleh and to Professor Jerome Rose for his valuablecomments. 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Abdulla Al-Shorman (1) (1) Faculty of Archaeology and Anthropology, Department ofAnthropology Yarmouk University. Jordan (Email: abedakam@yahoo.com)