Dear readers!
The Middle East is full of fascinating archaeological locations, and recently we shared news about the amazing architectural complex of Göbekli Tepe. This certainly striking megalithic complex reminded us about another curious monument in the Middle East: The Wheel of Giants – Rujum El Hiri (a.k.a. “Wheel of Spirits” or “Wheel of Ghosts”).
Enthusiastic by the idea of discovering more about this archaeological site we went to Dr. Michael Freikman, a leader and a participant of numerous archaeological excavations in Israel, a lecturer, and teacher, with a Ph.D. from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Archaeology and currently working on his postdoctoral research at the Ariel University. Dr. Freikman devoted his dissertation to that megalithic complex and lead multiple archaeological excavations in that location. The TakeinMind team thanks him for his time and effort in writing the following article about one of the most mysterious and interesting ancient sites of the Middle East.
Rujum el Hiri – by Dr. Michael Freikman
Rujum el Hiri, also known as Gilgal Ref`im or the Wheel of Giants, is a huge monument located in the central part of the Golan Plateau. This is an architectural complex consisting of five concentric walls of different diameters, thicknesses, and heights, built around a central mound with a narrow corridor leading to the round chamber. The diameter of the outer wall reaches 156m, and the height of the central mound was about six meters at the time of the construction completion. The total mass of stones that were used in the construction reaches almost 50,000 tons of basalt.
Rujum el Hiri was first discovered in 1967 shortly after The Six-Day War. Several expeditions conducted archaeological surveys on its territory, and two more expeditions (including the author of the article) completed several excavation seasons. Findings on its territory were very scarce: only a few pottery shards dating from different periods from the chalcolithic period to the Iron Age. Inside the central chamber, archeologists discovered the remains of a looted burial of the Late Bronze Age, which were not related to the period of the monument construction.
Based on these few findings, over the past decades, several hypotheses have been put forward regarding Rujum’s dating and purpose. Various scientists dated this monument to the Early Bronze Age (three thousand BC) or the Late Bronze Age (two thousand BC). It was assumed that Rudzhum el-Hiri was built as a fortified settlement: an observation tower, a temple, a tomb of an important nobleman, etc. All these theories were based only on the analysis of finds made among the walls of the Rujum, but since these findings were extremely scarce, theories remained only assumptions.
After two seasons of excavation inside the complex, I came to the same dead end. It was clear that to understand this exceptional monument a different approach is required. Perhaps the key to understanding Rujum was precisely in its size and lack of finds. According to various estimates, the construction of the monument (including the delivery of building materials and the construction itself) required from 250,000 to more than a million workdays. Hundreds of people had to work for several years. They needed to live somewhere near Rujum (archaeological surveys carried out within a radius of 300 meters from him did not reveal the remains of dwellings), they needed to be provided with food and tools. In other words, such a project required a sufficiently large number of people living near Rujum.
I analyzed the results of a very detailed reconnaissance of the Golan, carried out by Moshe Artal team in the 1990s, and came to unexpected conclusions. The fact is that since the end of the third millennium BC. and until the end of 2 thousand (i.e., from Transitional to Late Bronze), a very small number of settlements were found within a radius of 10km from the monument (i.e., theoretically, the maximum distance of the day passage at which builders could live). During the Early Bronze Age (4-3 thousand), the number of people who could go to construction sites daily was slightly larger, but the main surprise was the Chalcolithic period (5-4 thousand), during which there were about 47 settlements, many of which were count hundreds of inhabitants!
Moreover, the picture is even more eloquent when analyzing the landscape surrounding Rujum within a radius of 2km: at this distance, the Bronze Age settlement is either absent or located on the periphery of this site. However, the settlements of the Chalcolithic period show a completely different pattern: dozens of residential buildings of this period (clearly visible on the surface even without excavations) are built on low basalt ridges around Rujum, which is located approximately in the center of this imaginary circle.
Intelligence also showed that around Rujum (but not next to it) were concentrated more than 200 megalithic burials (dolmens), which by their design were essentially reduced copies of the central burial mound in Rujum. Eight of them were excavated by our expedition, and the few materials that were found under their foundations were dated exclusively to the period of chalcolithic.
Subsequently, land samples were taken for the absolute dating of the monument, which was supposed to confirm or refute the relationship between Rujum and the Chalcolithic period. Due to difficult microclimatic conditions, the chances of finding an organic material suitable for carbon analysis were negligible, so I used the help of Naomi Porat from the Institute of Geology to date the soil using luminescence / OSL (optically stimulated luminescence) – which allows you to determine the time when the sample was last exposed direct sunlight. According to the results, the central chamber of the Rujum was already standing until 3750 BC, i.e. during the Late Chalcolithic period.
Thus, we get not just a lonely (albeit a large) building standing in the field, but a monument, which was the very heart of a whole landscape unit: at some distance from Rujum there were villages where people who built the monument and served it after construction lived and their graves. For them, the place where Rujum was built was the center of their microworld.
However, not one of these buildings was built closer to this point than a few hundred meters. Apparently, this site was a kind of taboo that prohibited any other construction on the “sacred” territory.
According to the intentions of the builders, the position of Rujum in the landscape was not limited to his connection with the surrounding buildings. The various elements of the monument were also oriented with respect to the noticeable natural elements of the landscape, as well as with respect to the sun: an observer standing in the center of the monument on the equinox could observe the rising sun through a “slot” between two huge stones, specially set in this way in the eastern part of its outer wall, and on the day of the summer solstice, a ray of the sun penetrated through a narrow gap into the central chamber.
Moreover, the two outer gates of Rujum are oriented to two high mountains of volcanic origin: Tel Fares and Tel Saki. This position is particularly interesting in light of the fact that in many of the most ancient mythologies, it is the mountain peaks that are the gates through which the souls of the dead can enter the other world.
Thus, we can conclude that Rujum was not only the central point on which the inhabitants (both living and dead!) were oriented during the Chalcolithic period. At the same time, Rujum itself was oriented towards distant elements of both the earthly and celestial landscape, thus being a connecting element between the physical and metaphysical worlds, and apparently being an important element of local mythology.
Without a doubt, there are still many aspects of the architecture of Rujum el Hiri and the cult that reflected it, which remain incomprehensible to us, and we will never recognize many of its elements. However, now we can date this complex, see how its exceptional significance is reflected in the local landscape, and even understand some elements of the religious ideology of the people who built it.
It is hoped that future research will provide a deeper understanding of prehistoric architecture and the associated ancient cult.
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Featured image by Abraham Graicer.