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Some Inscribed Urartian Bronze Armour

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

O. Aytuğ Taşyürek
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Extract

Students of the history of Urartu and its art encounter some difficulty in associating the surviving Urartian artefacts with the chronology as known from the epigraphic record. The collections of cuneiform inscriptions of König and Melikishvili which serve as a basis for the chronology are in need of some revision and up-dating, while the Hieroglyphic script occasionally employed, to which Barnett has recently drawn attention, in the absence of a decipherment affords no assistance. In recent years archaeologists conducting research into Urartian civilization have begun a series of scientific excavations in the area, and it is to be hoped that these will result in a considerable expansion of knowledge on this subject. In the meantime any additional information in the shape of inscribed objects is to be welcomed.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 37 , Issue 2 , Autumn 1975 , pp. 151 - 155
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1975

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References

1 König, F. W., Handbuch der chaldischen Inschriften (AfO Beiheft 8; Graz, 1955–1957)Google Scholar; Melikishvili, G. A., Urartskie Klinoobraznye Nadpisi (Moscow, 1960)Google Scholar.

2 See below, note 16.

3 For Aznavurtepe, see C. A. Burney and G. R. J. Lawson, Measured Plans of Urartian Fortresses (An. St. 10 (1960), 192 f.)Google Scholar; Boysal, Y., Aznavurda definecilerin ortaya cikardiǧi Urartu eserleri (Belleten 25 (1961), 199 ff.)Google Scholar. The first two objects were brought to the Museum by Mehmet Nevfel Mendi, an antiquities dealer from Van, and the rest by Ahmet Soydan another dealer from Adana. We are pleased to record our gratitude to both of these.

4 Cf. Burney, C. A., A first season of excavation of Kayahdere (An. St. 16 (1966), Plate XlXc)Google Scholar; Azarpay, G., Urartian Art and Artifacts (Ankara, 1968), Plate 42Google Scholar.

5 The silver bowls will be published with the bronze bowls and other objects which have been purchased by the Adana Regional Museum.

6 For help with the reading of the inscription and the English of the present article, we are grateful to J. D. Hawkins. We would also like to thank Filiz Aytan, philological assistant at Adana Regional Museum, and the archaeologist Rifat Ergeç who made the drawings.

7 Cf. Piotrovsky, B., Urartu (London, 1969), Plate 79Google Scholar; id., Karmir Blur (Leningrad, 1970), Plate 56.

8 Ghirshman, R., Artibus Asiae 27 (1964), Figs. 1-2CrossRefGoogle Scholar; G. Azarpay, op. cit., Plate 1.

9 See footnote 7.

10 Cf. Özguç, T., Excavations at Altintepe (Belleten 25 (1961), Plate 287)Google Scholar; Ghirshman, R., Artibus Asiae 28 (1967), Figs. 1–2Google Scholar; G. Azarpay, op. cit., Plate 143, Fig. 2, 10A; Plate 2, 22; B. Piotrovsky, Urartu, Plate 77, id., Karmir Blur, Plate 57.

11 Compare the discs on a late Hittite chariot, Akurgal, E., The Art of the Hittites (London, 1962), Plate 124Google Scholar.

12 Strommenger, Compare E., The Art of Mesopotamia (London 1964), Plate 218Google Scholar.

13 For the Giyimli hoard and the excavations of Giyimli, see Erzen, A., Giyimli Kazisi (Belleten 38 (1974), 191 ff.)Google Scholar. I would like to thank Bay Cevat Bozkurtlar, director of Van Regional Museum, for giving me permission to photograph the object. It is published in Van Il Yilliǧi 1973, 31Google Scholar. There are more than 100 pieces of these Giyimli offering plaques in Adana Regional Museum as well as about twenty in Gaziantep, ten in Maras, thirty in Ankara Anatolian Culture Museum, ten in Istanbul Archaeological Museum, and about thirty in Van Regional Museum. It would seem, that Urartian craftsmen made these plaques to offer them in the temples. The plaque, Plate XXXVIb, is in Adana Regional Museum, inventory no. 117.7.1971, height g.6 cm.

14 See B. Piotrovsky, Urartu, Plates 122–3; idem, Karmir Blur, Plates 85–6.

15 Akurgal, Compare E., Urartaische und altiranische Kunstzentren (Ankara, 1968), Abb. 24-30Google Scholar.

16 The Hieroglyphic Writing of Urartu, (Anatolian Studies presented to H. G. Güterbock; Istanbul, 1974, 43 ff.Google Scholar).