Shark fishing

During the 2018 excavation campaign at the Ashkelon site, archaeologists from the Israel Antiquity Authority (IAA) found a 6,000-year-old copper fish hook used for catching sharks or other large fish, such as the salmon.

The site, dating back to the Copper Age, emerged in the layers underlying the Agamim district from new investigations aimed at studying the oldest phases of the settlement.
In fact, the structures from the Roman era were already known, dating from the 1st to the 7th century, when the port of Ashkelon was known for the export of wine and oil.
According to Yael Abadi-Reiss, co-director of the excavations, in the IAA press release: “This unique find is 6.5 cm long and 4 cm wide. The large size makes it suitable for fishing for sharks 2 to 3 meters long. or for large tuna fish».

Some of these large fish such as brown shark (Carcharhinus obscurus) and gray shark (Carcharhinus plumbeus) are present on the Mediterranean coasts between November and May. «Many of the ancient hooks found previously, continues Yael Abadi-Reiss, are made of bone and smaller than this one. Copper begins to be used in the Chalcolithic. It is fascinating to discover how these scientific innovations were applied in antiquity to produce fish hooks for fishermen along the Mediterranean coast".

Indeed, in this period, known as the Chalcolithic or Copper Age, along the coast there were large villages of farmers and breeders, who could resort to hunting and fishing to supplement their food resources. Archaeologists have discovered at the site the remains of animal bones in a garbage heap, grass seeds in ovens and tools for processing food derived from hunting, gathering and fishing, such as arrowheads and a large number of vascular shapes. Among these objects there are also rare fish hooks, such as the copper one which, exhibited for the first time at the 48th Annual Archaeological Congress in Israel, will be the object of targeted research by Yael Abadi-Reiss and Magda Batiashvili with the use of new analytical techniques.

Agnese Picco
NP May 2023