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Showing early cereal cultivation (including early domesticated wheat/barley traits), Anatolian obsidian imports, stone‑built oval and rectilinear house evidence, and rich archaeobotanical datasets. Ghoraifé has pieces central to studies of agricultural and architecture origins in the southern Levant.

Rather than the Mediterranean ocean; Jordan, or Fertile crescent rivers, Tell Ghoraifé lies 22 km east of Damascus, on the Damascus Basin floor, near former lake margins and seasonal wadis
The setting provided access to both lowland alluvial and nearby Mediterranean‑hill resources.

Archaeobotanical work records cereals, pistachio and acorn/woodland taxa in the region
Losely related to those from Aswad II. The prevailing cereals found is emmer wheat (Triticum dicoccum), accompanied by free-threshing wheat (Triticum durum/aestivum) and two-row barley (Hordeum distichumi. Similar vegetables, field pea (pisum sativum) and lentil (Lens culinaris), are grown; while chick-pea (Cicer arietinumi) occurs. The scientists do not not feel sure that these were fully domesticated though. And, flax (Linum usitatissimumi) was always cultivated for linseed oil.
Gathering still included pistachio (Pistacia), fig (Ficus) and hawthorn (Crataegus).

Chronology and economy
Occupations span the 9th to 7th millennia BC (or, PPNA to PPNB phases), with a long, stratified sequence useful for tracking domestication processes. These data pieces place Ghoraifé within the regional shift from wild‑resource dependence to farming.

Significant finds and exotic materials
A measurable fraction of the lithic assemblage is obsidian linked to Anatolian sources (such as Çiftlik and Nemrut Dağ). Other finds include white‑ware fragments, bone tools, figurines and rich groundstone assemblages.

Architecture, burials and ritual evidence
Excavations record stone foundations and impressions of mud‑and‑reed huts with oval/curvilinear plans in earlier layers, as well as more substantial stone features in later PPNB deposits. Including benches, hearths and pit features.

Burial rites and structured pits occur in the sequence, but no single monumental ritual house like Dja’de’s painted building is reported
Plans and occupation layers are illustrated in the site monograph. (1)

The site was investigated by Henri de Contenson and published in his monograph Aswad et Ghoraifé (IFAPO). Archaeobotanical specialists W. van Zeist and J.A.H. Bakker‑Heeres produced the detailed plant analyses. Major syntheses appear in the ‘de Contenson monograph’ and the Palaeohistoria archaeobotany paper.

Ghoraifé shares many traits with Tell Aswad, and Ramad but differs from Euphrates‑valley PPN sites in material culture and local vegetation signatures. its long sequence makes it especially valuable for tracking the transition to cultivation and early domesticated cereals in the southern Levant. Check it out with some more neolithic architecture today.

Citation: (1) Contenson, Henri de, “Aswad et Ghoraifé: sites néolithiques en Damascène (Syrie) aux IXème et VIIIème millénaires avant l’ère chrétienne” (1995). Archive of Mesopotamian Archaeological Reports (AMAR). 124.https://commons.library.stonybrook.edu/amar/124

References: van Zeist & Bakker‑Heeres, Archaeobotanical Studies in the Levant I (Palaeohistoria 1982);

Moore, The Neolithic of the Levant, 1978

Wikipedia Tell Ghoraifé – Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tell_Ghoraif%C3%A9

Rijksuniversiteit Groningen Archaeobotanical studies in the Levant: I. Neolithic sites in the Damascus basin: Aswad, Ghoraife, Ramad | Palaeohistoria https://ugp.rug.nl/Palaeohistoria/article/view/24836

ResearchGate The Neolithic of the Southern Levant – ResearchGate https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Katheryn-Twiss/publication/264666578_The_Neolithic_of_the_Southern_Levant/links/5fc62379299bf1a422c7e7df/The-Neolithic-of-the-Southern-Levant.pdf

The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of the Levant … – Oxford Academic https://academic.oup.com/edited-volume/34497