Shelters date to Stone Age

Hunter-gatherers hung out in huts long before farmers built villages

The remains of a couple of nearly 20,000-year-old huts, excavated in a Jordanian desert basin, add to evidence that hunter-gatherers built long-term dwellings 10,000 years before farming villages debuted in the Middle East.

HUT TWO Remains of a pair of almost 20,000-year-old huts, indicated here by dotted lines, support an emerging scenario in which Middle Eastern hunter-gatherers built long-term dwellings 10,000 years before the appearance of farming villages.