Francesca Manclossi is an archaeologist specializing in the study of stone tools in the Metal Ages, from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age. She received her BA degree at the Università degli Studi di Pisa (Italy), her MA at the Université Paris Oust Nanterre- La Défense (France), and her PhD (with honors) in a joint program between the University of Paris-Nanterre and the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (Israel). Her research mainly focuses on one of the most important technological changes in the history of mankind, the shift from stone to metal. She has published more than 20 papers, among which the most significant have been published in the Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, Paléorient and Lithic Technology; she organized a conference during the 2018 UISSP in Paris and she edited the volume Stone in Metal Ages (ArchaeoPress, 2020).

Steven A Rosen is the Canada Professor of Ancient Near Eastern Archaeology in the Department of Bible, Archaeology, and Ancient Near Eastern Studies at Ben-Gurion University. He received his doctorate from the University of Chicago and worked as a field archaeologist for the Negev Emergency Survey before moving to Ben-Gurion University full-time in 1988. He has published six books and over 200 professional papers. His most recent book is Revolutions in the Desert: The Rise of Mobile Pastoral Societies in the Negev and the Arid Zones of the Southern Levant (Routledge, 2017).