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Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1983

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

J. N. Postgate
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Extract

Preliminary report on the eighth season's work in spring, 1983. Principal results can be summarized as: new information on the nature and extent of the building in Area A (? late ED palace); completion of excavation of Grave 162 which contained 5 equid skeletons; excavation in ED II housing and cross-section through ED II city wall on east side of Main Mound; recovery of another 4,000 sq m of city plan north of Area E, locating streets and house plans and identifying the north-eastern corner of the Central Complex.

The work of the British Archaeological Expedition to Iraq at Abu Salabikh was resumed at the beginning of March, 1983, and the team left the site on 7th May. Many thanks are once again due to the State Organization for Antiquities and Heritage under their President, Dr. Muayad Sa'id Damerji, and to Dr. Abd-as-Sittar al-Azzawi, Director-General for the Southern Region. We were fortunate to have with us as Representatives of the Organization Sd. Kamil Alwan Shehab and Sd. Hassan Khdheyr Hashim, to whose good-humoured patience we were all much indebted, and we are also very grateful for the benevolent assistance of Sd. Muhammad Yahya, of the Diwaniyah Inspectorate. As in previous seasons we received generous support from the British Academy, the British Museum, and the National Geographic Society, Washington DC, and once again we also received very material support from Dragage S.A. at Shomeli. A great debt is owed to the staff of the Expedition for their support and hospitality in Baghdad.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 46 , Issue 2 , Autumn 1984 , pp. 95 - 113
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1984

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References

1 The members of the team were: Jane Moon [Killick] (Assistant Director), Patricia Fox (Pottery Assistant), Salvatore Garfi (Photographer), Barbara Garfi (Draughtswoman), Fiona Macalister (Conservator), Rebecca Payne (Cataloguer), Dr. Jeremy Black, Wayne Cocroft, Dr. Harriet Crawford, Marie Parayre, Timothy Potts, David Rowswell (Archaeologists), Michael Charles (Archaeobotanist), Gill Clark (Archaeozoologist).

2 Drs. Michael Roaf and Jeremy Black, and Robert Killick.

3 It was at this point, in the side of the grave cut, that we recovered the sole epigraphical find of the season, a minute cuneiform tablet recording cows (AbS 2208), in the stratified debris from an earlier hearth into which the grave chamber had been cut.

4 Cf. the southern part of Area A, where C-14 dates for a layer only 1 m below the ED III floor of Room 4 suggest a date of 2900 B.C., and a long passage of time without a big rise in the level of the building. The plano-convex bricks of the presumed palace at Tell al-Wilayah (whether one assigns them to the Early Dynastic period or to early in the Akkadian Dynasty) are also an instance of the obvious fact that public buildings may have stood for a century or more without radical reconstruction.

5 The objects in Plate VI b are all of copper (or a copper alloy). In front, spear-head AbS 2189 (L. 38·2; W. of blade 2·9 cm; weight: 0·3225 kg), On the left, two adzes, AbS 2187 (still with encrustation; weight: 1·264 kg), and AbS 2188 (behind; conserved; weight: 1·277 kg). On right, group of 3 decorative dress pins (AbS 2190; 2191 (with lapis lazuli and silver head); 2192), stuck to 3 plain needles by corrosion (AbS 2193).

6 In Plate VII d the gutter (5I98:197) measures 71 × 16 cm, and 7 cm high. Front right is a group of small fragments of bitumen (5I98: 62), next to a larger piece (5I98 1217; 8·3 × 8·3 cm). Left of the bitumen is the pestle (5198:55), and behind these from left and right are 3 pieces of volcanic grindstone (5I98: 199, 13·0 × 9·7; 5I98:53, 10 × 3·5; and 5I98:78, 11·5 × 5·7 cm). Back right, a large grey stone tool with traces of wear, 5198:56 (11·5 × 9·5 × 6·5 cm).

7 Of the contents of the room fill we illustrate only two items which may be of interest: a bowl profile (Fig. 7:5), and a terracotta figurine, chosen because firmly dated ED II examples are a rarity (Fig. 5; AbS 2168). Extant height 8·0; extant width 6·0 cm; all that survives is the torso, with head and limbs broken; the body spreads out behind to a flat base which may have been present in front as well, and in which there was a small hole (di. 0·2 cm) entering the body to about 3 cm up from the base. Where head and left arm were broken, a thick application of bitumen, presumably an ancient repair. Marks on stomach may indicate navel; the ends of three tresses of hair survive on the upper body and shoulders. Hand-made. Noticeably larger than the human clay figurines of ED III date from other parts of the site.

8 With the expansion of operations into new areas of the mound, it has been necessary to start a new sequence of room numbers. The old system will be retained in Areas A and E, but in future numbering will start afresh for each 100 metre grid-square; these room numbers are therefore to be taken as “Room 6H:65”, etc.