Chronology of ancient water installations and the history of human activity in the Negev Highlands, Israel

In antiquity, the development of techniques to collect and store water was fundamental to sustain life in arid regions. One way to overcome the problem of water supply in the desert was to construct water reservoirs and cisterns which collect surface runoff during rare rain events. Indeed, open reservoirs and rock-cut cisterns are widely spread over the arid zone of the Negev Highlands / Israel. They were an important component of human activity in the area. Today, they can serve as sedimentary archives for archaeological and paleoenvironmental reconstruction. Here we provide the final assessment of a large-scale optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating project of water installations in the arid Negev Highlands. By sampling spoil piles, feeding channels, and accumulation of sediments within reservoirs and cisterns, the construction, the phases of maintenance and abandonment were dated. The significance of these results for reconstructing the history of human activity in the region is discussed.