This work is the result of decades of research on the Early Bronze Age I skeletal material from the archaeological site of Bâb Edh-Dhrâ' in Jordan. Bâb Edh-Dhrâ' is home to one of the Near East's largest and most carefully documented collections of human skeletal material, which is one of the few sources of information about the inhabitants of this pre-biblical world in the late-fourth and third millennia B.C. This definitive study by physical anthropologists will be consulted for decades by archaeologists and anthropologists working in the Levant, Egypt and Mesopotamia, as well as anyone studying ancient Near Eastern migration patterns, skeletal changes, and incidences of diseases.

"Donald Ortner and Bruno Frohlich provide a model and set a new standard for ancient Near Eastern bioarchaeological or osteoarchaeological research and publication with this volume on the shaft tombs and Charner House burials excavated in 1977, 1979, and 1981 from Jordan....This volume benefits osteological and dental specialists as well as those who study history and culture." - Journal of the American Oriental Society