Epipalaeolithic Near East

Although the appearance of microliths is an arbitrary boundary, the Epipalaeolithic does differ significantly from the preceding Upper Palaeolithic. Epipalaeolithic sites are more numerous, better preserved, and can be accurately radiocarbon dated. The period coincides with the gradual retreat of glacial climatic conditions between the Last Glacial Maximum and the start of the Holocene, and it is characterised by population growth and economic intensification. The Epipalaeolithic ended with the "Neolithic Revolution" and the onset of domestication, food production, and sedentism, although archaeologists now recognise that these trends began in the Epipalaeolithic.

The period is subdivided into Early (c. 25,000–19,000 BP), Middle (19,000–15,000 BP) and Late (15,000–11,500 BP) phases. In the Mediterranean Levant, the Early Epipalaeolithic is characterised by the Kebaran culture, the Middle Epipalaeolithic by the Geometric Kebaran culture, and the Late Epipalaeolithic by the Natufian culture. In Mesopotamia, the Zagros, and the Iranian plateau, the entire period is associated with the Zarzian culture. The Epipalaeolithic of Anatolia is relatively poorly documented but displays cultural similarities to both the Levantine Epipalaeolithic and Aegean Mesolithic. With a few exceptions that resemble the Geometric Kebaran, the Arabian Peninsula is thought to have been largely uninhabitable during this period.

Levant

Early Epipalaeolithic

The Early Epipalaeolithic, also known as the Kebaran culture, lasted from 20,000 to 12,150 BP. It followed the Levantine Aurignacian, formerly called the "Antelian period", throughout the Levant. By the end of the Levantine Aurignacian, gradual changes occurred in stone industries. Small stone tools called microliths and retouched bladelets can be found for the first time. The microliths of this culture period differ markedly from the Aurignacian artifacts.

By 18,000 BP, the climate and environment had changed and a transition period had started. The Levant became more arid, and the forest vegetation retreated to be replaced by steppes. The cool and dry period ended at the beginning of Mesolithic 1. The hunter-gatherers of the Aurignacian would have had to modify their way of living and their pattern of settlement to adapt to the changing conditions. The crystallization of these new patterns resulted in Mesolithic 1. The people developed new types of settlements and new stone industries.

The inhabitants of a small Mesolithic 1 site in the Levant left little more than their chipped stone tools behind. The industry was small tools made of bladelets struck off single-platform cores. Besides bladelets, burins and end-scrapers have been found. A few bone tools and some ground stones have also been found. These so-called Mesolithic sites of Asia are far less numerous than those of the Neolithic, and the archeological remains are very poor.

The type site is Kebara Cave south of Haifa. The Kebaran was characterized by small, geometric microliths. The people were thought to lack the specialized grinders and pounders in later Near Eastern cultures. The Kebaran is preceded by the Athlitian phase of the Levantine Aurignacian and followed by the proto-agrarian Natufian culture of the Epipalaeolithic. The appearance of the Kebaran culture of microlithic type implies a significant rupture in the cultural continuity of the local Upper Paleolithic. The Kebaran culture, with its use of microliths, is also associated with the use of the bow and arrow and the domestication of the dog. The Kebaran is also characterised by the earliest collecting and processing of wild cereals, known due to the excavation of grain-grinding tools. This was the first step towards the Neolithic Revolution. The Kebaran people are believed to have migrated seasonally, dispersing to upland environments in the summer, and gathering in caves and rock shelters near lowland lakes in the winter. This diversity of environments may be the reason for the variety of tools in their toolkits.

The Kebaran is generally considered ancestral to the later Natufian culture, which occupied much of the same range.

Harvesting of cereals

The earliest evidence for the use of composite cereal harvesting tools are the glossed flint blades that have been found at the site of Ohalo II, a 23,000-year-old fisher-hunter-gatherers' camp on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, Northern Israel. The Ohalo site is dated at the junction of the Upper Paleolithic and the Early Epipalaeolithic, and has been attributed to both periods. The wear traces on the tools indicate that these were used for harvesting near-ripe, semi-green wild cereals, shortly before grains ripen enough to disperse naturally. The study shows that the tools were not used intensively, and they reflect two harvesting modes: flint knives held by hand and inserts hafted into a handle. The finds reveal the existence of cereal harvesting techniques and tools some 8000 years before the Natufian and 12,000 years before the establishment of sedentary farming communities in the Near East during the Neolithic Revolution. Furthermore, the new finds accord well with evidence for the earliest ever cereal cultivation at the site, and for the use of stone-made grinding implements.

Artistic expression in the Kebaran culture

Evidence for symbolic behavior of Late Pleistocene foragers in the Levant has been found in engraved limestone plaquettes from the Epipalaeolithic open-air site Ein Qashish South in the Jezreel Valley of the Northern District of Israel. The engravings were uncovered in Kebaran and Geometric Kebaran deposits (ca. 23,000 and ca. 16,500 BP), and include the image of a bird, the first figurative representation known so far from a pre-Natufian Epipalaeolithic site, together with geometric motifs such as chevrons, cross-hatchings, and ladders. Some of the engravings closely resemble roughly contemporary European finds and may be interpreted as "systems of notations" or "artificial memory systems" related to the timing of seasonal resources and related important events for nomadic groups.

Similar-looking signs and patterns are well known from the context of the local Natufian, a final Epipalaeolithic period when sedentary or semi-sedentary foragers started practicing agriculture.

Late Epipalaeolithic

The Late Epipalaeolithic is also called the Natufian culture. This period is characterized by the early rise of agriculture, which later emerged more fully in the Neolithic period. Radiocarbon dating places the Natufian culture between 12,500 and 9500 BCE, just before the end of the Pleistocene. This period is characterised by the beginning of agriculture.

The Natufian culture is commonly split into two subperiods: Early Natufian (12,500–10,800 BCE) (Christopher Delage gives c. 13,000–11,500 BP uncalibrated, equivalent to c. 13,700–11,500 BCE) and Late Natufian (10,800–9500 BCE). The Late Natufian most likely occurred in tandem with the Younger Dryas. The following period is often called the Pre-Pottery Neolithic and includes the Khiamian culture (9700 to 8600 BCE).