Why Painted? The Decorated Stone Tools from Fazael 4, an Early Bronze Age I Site in the Jordan Valley

Abstract

The current paper discusses three painted ground stone tools—two upper grinding stones and a bowlet—from the Early Bronze Age Ia2 rural settlement Fazael 4. All three items are utilitarian and potentially linked to food processing (particularly grinding stones). Their working surfaces were brush painted with a basket-like design composed of intersecting lines. While the decorations are frail, the items are complete and suitable for use, implying that the painting deliberately took them out of service. So far, this phenomenon is unparalleled in the contemporary southern Levant. We suggest that it underscores the tools’ social and symbolic significance as food processors and discuss this hypothesis as part of a broader phenomenon of food processing tools’ secondary use and decoration observed throughout late prehistory.