Baaz Rockshelter is a prehistoric

archaeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology a ...

in Syria. Located in the foothills of the

Anti-Lebanon Mountains The Anti-Lebanon Mountains ( ar, جبال لبنان الشرقية, Jibāl Lubnān ash-Sharqiyyah, Eastern Mountains of Lebanon; Lebanese Arabic: , , "Eastern Mountains") are a southwest–northeast-trending mountain range that forms most of t ...

about 50 km northeast of Damascus, the site consists of a small (6 x 10 m) rock shelter favourably situated overlooking the nearby plains and springs. Excavations have revealed that it was intermittently occupied during the

Upper Palaeolithic The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...

( 34,000 to 32,000 years ago and 23,000 to 21,000 years ago),

Late Epipalaeolithic The Epipalaeolithic Near East designates the Epipalaeolithic ("Final Old Stone Age", also known as Mesolithic) in the prehistory of the Near East. It is the period after the Upper Palaeolithic and before the Neolithic, between approximately 20,00 ...

( 11,200 to 10,200 years ago), and Pre-Pottery and

Pottery Neolithic In the archaeology of Southwest Asia, the Late Neolithic, also known as the Ceramic Neolithic or Pottery Neolithic, is the final part of the Neolithic period, following on from the Pre-Pottery Neolithic and preceding the Chalcolithic. It is some ...

. The site was discovered in 1999 and excavated by a team from the

University of Tübingen The University of Tübingen, officially the Eberhard Karl University of Tübingen (german: Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen; la, Universitas Eberhardina Carolina), is a public research university located in the city of Tübingen, Baden-W� ...

between 1999 and 2004.

References

{{archaeology-stub 1999 archaeological discoveries Archaeological sites in Syria Upper Paleolithic sites Natufian sites Neolithic sites in Syria Pre-Pottery Neolithic Rock shelters

Further reading

References