Adapting to increasing aridity: the cuvette of Palmyra from Late Pleistocene to Early Holocene.

Evidence of late Pleistocene to early Holocene occupation of the region surrounding the oasis of Palmyra (central Syria) consists of geometric Kebaran, Natufian and Pre-Pottery Neolithic A and B archaeological sites. These are distributed along the margin of the Sabkhat al Mouh and in the Abu Fawares area, in connection with lacustrine deposits, suggesting a period with a humid climate. Wet environmental conditions presumably turned to aridity in corresponding to the late PPNB (c. 8th millennium cal. B.P.), and later archaeological sites were concentrated in the area of the present-day oasis and marginally within the Abu Fawares basin.