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RABAH, WADI (M.R. 144167). The name of one of the tributaries of the Yarkon river and of a site situated on its S bank, about 1 km E of Tell Ras el-˓Ain (M.R. 143168). Two Chalcolithic levels and mixed remains of the two Neolithic phases (Jericho IX and Yarmukian) have been identified there.
On the mound of Tell Ras el-˓Ain itself, no remains earlier than the EB were found; thus, it appears that the earlier Wadi Rabah site was abandoned sometime toward the end of the Chalcolithic period and that settlement resumed further W on virgin soil close to a spring, constituting the earliest settlement at Tell Ras el-˓Ain. For a discussion of the excavations on the mound of Ras el-˓Ain, see ANTIPATRIS. The Wadi Rabah site was excavated in November 1952. Stratum I was found to belong to the Ghassulian phase of the Chalcolithic, while stratum II belonged to a pre-Ghassulian phase.
Stratum II is significant in that its pottery is formally similar to that of Jericho VIII; however, there is a larger amount of slipped and decorated ware at Wadi Rabah than at Jericho VIII. Most of the Wadi Rabah pottery is burnished, whereas burnishing appears only on bowls at Jericho VIII, and there is no evidence of burnishing whatsoever at Tuleilat Ghassul, suggesting that the finds associated with Wadi Rabah level II not only antedate the Ghassulian culture of Palestine (which occurred ca. 3500 b.c.) but also that associated with Jericho VIII. In all these three phases of the Chalcolithic age—Rabah II, Jericho VIII, and Ghassulian—the pottery shows uninterrupted development. Finds similar to those of Wadi Rabah stratum II have been found in other excavations, such as those at ha-Bashan Street in Tel Aviv (EAEHL 4: 1161), at Lod (area B), in stratum IIIc of Tuleilat el-Batashi (area B), and at ˓Ein el-Jarba. Based on radiocarbon dates of the Wadi Rabah stratum at ˓Ein el-Jarba, it appears that the earliest possible limits for this culture is 4000 b.c. See BATASHI, TULEILAT EL-; JARBA, ˓EIN EL-; and LOD. The wide geographical horizon of this culture is reinforced by recent surveys in Galilee, where some sites demonstrate close affinities to the Wadi Rabah culture (Frankel and Gophna 1980).
Some of the pottery of these three Chalcolithic phases can be compared with Halafian ware (particularly the Halafian ware and its imitations occurring in strata XVI–XIX at Mersin in Cilicia), and a correlation can be established between the Middle Chalcolithic of Mersin and the Chalcolithic of Palestine (Kaplan 1960). Since, however, certain shapes and ornamentation characteristic of the Wadi Rabah ware were encountered only in Mersin XIX, the Wadi Rabah culture can be placed in the same horizon as that stratum; i.e., it is a Chalcolithic, not a Neolithic culture, even though no copper has been found among the Wadi Rabah repertoire of objects.
Bibliography
Frankel, R., and Gophna, R. 1980. Chalcolithic Pottery from a Cave in Western Galilee. TA 7: 65069.
Kaplan, J. 1958. The Excavations at Wadi Rabah. IEJ 8: 149–60.
———. 1960. The Relation of the Chalcolithic Pottery of Palestine to Halafian Ware. BASOR 159: 32–36.
Jacob Kaplan
Freedman, D. N. (1996, c1992). The Anchor Bible Dictionary (5:598). New York: Doubleday.
