Greasing the Wheels of Urbanism: Innovating Early Bronze Age Olive Oil Production in the Northern Jordan Valley

Initial phases of urbanization are messy, with innovations leading to successes and failures. How people changed their resource production strategies to meet developing needs during urbanizing periods is a foundational aspect of understanding the emergence of early cities. This article focuses on Site WZ130, a late 4th millennium b.c. olive-processing site in northern Jordan that was active during the Early Bronze Age (EBA, 3800-2000 b.c.), when the first urban societies emerged in the southern Levant. Site WZ130 provides a tangible example of the infrastructural innovations that were necessary to support early urbanism. The site's three phases demonstrate successive innovation in olive-pressing technology, from layering pulp in a pit, a technique used since the Neolithic, to beam pressing, which survived into the 20th century a.d. These changes in olive-processing methods demonstrate that people responded to socio-economic and political changes brought on by early urbanization through innovation and experimentation in olive oil production.