ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the development of metallurgy in the southern Levant within a specific framework of broadly defined sub-phases by examining broad trends in material culture. There is a consistent pattern in the ceramic assemblages of the Chalcolithic wherein the earliest levels of certain sites contain pottery forms demonstrating overlap with the Wadi Rabah/late Neolithic. The radiocarbon dates available from the Chalcolithic sites generally tend to support this chronological framework. The radiocarbon data attest to the fact that complex metals, such as copper with arsenic and antimony, were generally restricted to this later Beer Sheva phase. It may also be possible to outline a third and terminal phase of the Chalcolithic, characterized by the transition to the Early Bronze Age, beginning sometime after ca. 3500 BC. Evidence for earlier contact between the people of the northern Negev and Egypt has also been discovered along the coast of the northeastern Sinai, at site R-48, west of Yamit.
