Section 5.3 - Archaeology of Territory: Surveys in Southern Mesopotamia - (min. 18:33)

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En provenance du cours de Sapienza University of Rome

Recovering the Humankind's Past and Saving the Universal Heritage

132 notes

Sapienza University of Rome

Recovering the Humankind's Past and Saving the Universal Heritage

132 notes

Archaeology is, among human sciences, the discipline with the strongest importance for the rediscovery, but also for the preservation and protection of cultural heritage, as Humankind’s universal patrimony. You will be introduced to the way we ourselves reflect on and are engaged with the study of human past: from the practical and material recovery of ancient traces in the field to the study and interpretation. On the other hand, the discovery of human past implies the correct conservation and presentation for both experts and general public: the study and protection of the past we share every day prevent from any possible destruction, misuse, abuse and thus cancellation of human memory. “Recovering the Humankind's Past and Saving the Universal Heritage” presents to a large public Archaeology as a historical discipline: through an inter-disciplinary perspective you will follow the evolution and change of archaeology to the moment when natural sciences contributed to make the historical reconstructions scientifically sound; the aid of informatics and of virtual reconstructions gives new fascination to the already strong suggestion of Archaeology, as the discipline of discovery par excellence. Within this frame, Ebla, which is the glory of the Sapienza school of Oriental archaeology, will have an exemplary meaning in the course development as a long lasting experience on the field and an excellent example of the scientific results of combined researches and disciplines. Moreover, the course will focus on actual, innovative instruments to preserve, monitor and give value to cultural heritage through a multidisciplinary approach, based on a deep archaeological and historical knowledge but also on ICT technologies. The wide adoption of ICT technologies in our daily life is also impacting in the way in which we interact with our cultural heritage in particular in terms of preservation and dissemination of cultural objects. In this course you will learn the basic techniques to digitize cultural objects and obtain 3D digital copies of a physical objects such as statues, vases or archaeological sites. We will also discuss how to structure the raw data in order to facilitate and make effective the access to digital contents. In particular, we will present the European Data Model, a framework for collecting, connecting and enriching data on cultural objects provided by a number of museum, archives, sites and libraries in Europe.

À partir de la leçon

Week 5 - The birth of archaeology and its role in the contemporary world.

This module focuses on scientific research and knowledge dissemination.The specificities of the past pose a problem in respect of popularization and simplification. The operational chain is made of exploration, dig, publication, conservation, dissemination, protection. However, the need for a legitimacy of the present has led also to political readings of the retrieval of the past. Present cultural identity is grounded in the retrieved past. The “past of the other” has often been refused throughout history down to modern times. Our perception of the past is made manifest in its material and virtual reconstruction starting from ruins. Further, “excessive exploitation” of the past represent a modern destruction. The archaeological excavation of Ebla (Syria) will be analyzed as case study. It is in fact an example of a research framed within historical archaeology, which, in the course of fifty years of research, turned into a global perspective. Homework available since Dic.: Quiz week 5

Section 5.1 - Pioneer Archaeology: The Case of Nineveh - (min. 18:33)17:31

Section 5.2 - Historical Archaeology: The Case of Ebla - (min. 18:18)18:18

Section 5.3 - Archaeology of Territory: Surveys in Southern Mesopotamia - (min. 18:33)18:33

Rencontrer les enseignants

Paolo Matthiae
Emeritus Professor of Archaeology
Dipartimento delle Scienze dell'Antichità
Davide Nadali
PhD in Near Eastern Archaeology
Andrea Vitaletti
Ph.D. in Computer Science
Computer Science
Emanuel Demetrescu
PhD candidate

The third case of archaeological research we will take into account today concerns

surveys instead of excavations, as in the previous cases of Nineveh and Ebla.

In contemporary archaeology, survey is a basic typology of field research,

which, without accomplishing a real excavation,

aims at gathering every type of evidence from the surface,

most of all in order to define the chronological succession,

topographic extension and functional characterization of settlements.

This type of research, particularly if it is integrated

with studies of bioarchaeology, as usually happens nowadays,

may offer quite precious, sound enough information,

without excavating, about the historical development of one region,

about successive phases of urbanization, ruralization, and abandonment.

Moreover, surveys are absolutely necessary as a base for

archaeological charts,

namely for the topographic researches which register any presence of the past

in any landscape of the present.

Thus, it is quite evident that this kind of research is nowadays of basic importance

for the preventive protection of areas of archaeological and historical purport

also where visible, more well preserved,

architectural evidences of the past do not appear on surface.

The basic tool for the archaeological surveys is the analytical

study of pottery fragments, which can be found on surface, and

belong to every life period of the buried settlements.

Of course, these pottery fragments which appear on surface,

are scattered on the surface of the archaeological site,

following quite different dynamics,

not easy to detect.

The amount of pottery sherds collected, and their concentration or

dispersal over individual sectors of the sites surfaces

are elements which might lead to dating with a good approximation

the successive settlements of one archaeological site.

Thus, surveys are a basic type of research for

the knowledge of the history of a territory,

and the contributions they can provide are completely different from

those of an excavation.

As is quite patent, and excavation leads to the knowledge,

sometimes quite exhaustive, not only of the history of an individual settlement,

but also of the architectural, material culture, and artistic evidences,

thus allowing to build up the history of the site diachronically,

as well as synchronically, providing basic evidence for

the meaning, and role of that settlement.

On the other hand, the survey is not able to

provide similar results for an individual site,

but it can satisfactory shape, the history of a territory,

throwing light on the main phases of development of an area,

on the periods of decline, on the dynamics of peoples displacements

in that area, on when people concentration took place,

leading to a growth on one or more settlement size, on people

decrease, or even on the abandonment of settlements.

Thus it's quite clear that surveys are most important and irreplaceable,

not only for the knowledge of one territory, but also for

the phenomenon of changes in territory use;

it's also quite patent that, if surveys are implemented

by bioarchaeological investigations, most of all, by Paleobotanic and Archaeozoology,

these methods of research become a formidable tool for

the reconstruction of economy and society of an individual territorial unit.

The case we will discuss today

concerns one of the most important historical contributions

the world of the ancient Near East, gave to humankind:

the formation of the first towns in history,

which took place in southern Mesopotamia, south of Baghdad,

in the crucial centuries of the second half of the 4th millennium BC,

in the alluvial valleys of Euphrates and Tigris.

In the same centuries, the first territorial state of the planet,

the Kingdom of Egypt Pharaohs, was shaping itself in the Nile Valley.

The surveys in sectors of Lower Mesopotamia,

which made history for the amount of new information they provided,

started in 1965, by Robert McC. Adams in the region of the Diyala,

a left tributary reaching the Tigris

in the region of Baghdad.

Afterwards, they went on in the central region of the alluvium of Babylonia,

always led by the same American scholar,

and were finally accomplished with

similar researches in the region of ancient Uruk,

believed to be the first town in history,

jointly led by R. McC. Adams and Hans J. Nissen.

The surveys in the Uruk region allowed

to study the dialectic relation between the surrounding rural environment, and

Uruk development, at beginning, in the formation periods, and

later on, in the phases of consolidation of urban life:

in the late phases of Obeyd before the Protourban period of Uruk,

rural settlements were quite large, but not exceeding 10 ha,

quite homogenous in size and uniform in their location.

This is a situation of the rural settlements of the Uruk catchment,

which was considered as being between ca. 60 by 30 km in size,

remains oddly constant during the Protourban period,

when Uruk dramatically grows, in surface, and

hosts a population estimated between 40,000 and 50,000 persons.

Thus, the formation of the urban center of Uruk,

apparently didn't weaken the surrounding rural milieu for

several centuries, between ca. 3600 and 3100 BC.

Oddly, when Uruk was already a well developed town,

with its fortified walls, which a tradition attributed to

the mythical hero Gilgamesh, and it's huge two monumental centers,

the Uruk catchment started to become progressively poorer,

with a progressive afflux of population towards the great urban center.

This trend will continue during the so-

called Early Dynastic Period,

between 2900 and 2350 BC.

As often happens in the interpretation of population fluctuation

over the territory the explanation for this phenomenon is problematic:

were people from the villages progressively attracted towards the town,

a typical urbanization phenomenon?

Or was it a phenomenon of dialectic between urban centre, and

rural catchment at an organizational and administrative level?

It was probably rightly proposed that the depletion of the rural area,

and the slow disappearance of smaller settlements of similar size,

was a consequence of a new organization of the territory,

made by the urban elite of Uruk, leading to a pyramidal organization,

with a progressive hierarchization of settlements, aiming at a rationalization

of the administration of the rural area in favor of the urban center.

On the other hand, in a larger area of the alluvial plain, between Baghdad

and Basra,

the progressive depopulation of rural centers,

particularity during the initial and central phases

of Early Dynastic between 2900 and 2500 BC,

were certainly related with the birth of new urban centers,

like Shuruppak, Umma, Larsa, Bad Tibira.

These towns were born as a consequence of the classical well known phenomenon

of urbanization, the afflux of population from country to town.

Two many reasons may be considered, to be at the origin of this phenomenon,

which led to the creation of the first towns of history:

on the one hand, economic factors, like the attraction of specialized work forms,

typical of urban centers, and unknown in rural centers,

and, on the other hand, social factors, like the importance

of the security offered by the towns surrounded by walls,

in situations of growing conflict, and therefore of wars among the city-states.

The surveys made over large areas of Southern Mesopotamia revealed,

unexpectedly, that the territorial dynamics of the centuries

of the first towns formation, were quite likely different

even in geographic territories quite close to one another.

So, for instance, the urban center of ancient Eridu

was apparently created in an initial phase of the Protourban Period,

for the extended rural colonization of the Chalcolithic Period,

whereas nearby Ur was apparently created only

in the years around 3000 BC, more slowly, and

without important alterations of the settlement situation of the rural background.

These situations look quite peculiar of the land of Sumer,

the southernmost part of Lower Mesopotamia;

on the other hand,

the situation, at least in the north-eastern part of the land of Akkad,

the northern region of Lower Mesopotamia, appears quite different.

In fact, in the region of the river Diyala,

the rural settlements of chalcolithic origin grow in number and

size during the whole Protourban Period, and for

a large part of the Early Dynastic period, along lines which are those

of the ancient canals, and at quite regular distances from one another.

These topographic increases,

which contrast the decrease of rural centers in the land of Sumer

during the same centuries, may be probably explained

taking into account the different urban development of this area

of the Land of Akkad, where there were no large urban centers,

but only smaller towns, not exceeding 30 ha,

in the probably pervasive administrative

articulation, pivoting on the ancient rural centers.

These observations about the different territorial reality of different areas

of Lower Mesopotamia in the centuries of the so-called “First Urbanization”,

clearly shows that in Babylonia, where the first towns of history developed,

there were not univocal processes of town formation.

On the contrary, even in areas quite close to one another,

and certainly quite homogenous as concerned environmental conditions,

the aggregation, diffusion, and hierarchization processes unexpectedly

followed quite different, and sometimes clearly contradictory trajectories.

The reasons for these differences must still be made clear

and are object of interpretations, which are also quite differentiated.

In fact, in global archaeology, the plurality of explications for

the evidences provided by field archaeology, coming from excavations

as well as from surveys, descends from the plurality of

methodological approaches used in the name of the advocated contamination

of archaeology with a wide range of different humanistic disciplines,

which, as already maintained, is typical of contemporary archaeology.

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