Settlement Patterns and Political Landscapes in the Upper Tigris River Valley PDF Download

Author: Rodolfo Brancato
Publisher: Arbor Sapientiae Editore
ISBN: 9788897805564
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Author: Ömür Harmanşah
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107311187
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 373

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This book investigates the founding and building of cities in the ancient Near East. The creation of new cities was imagined as an ideological project or a divine intervention in the political narratives and mythologies of Near Eastern cultures, often masking the complex processes behind the social production of urban space. During the Early Iron Age (c.1200–850 BCE), Assyrian and Syro-Hittite rulers developed a highly performative official discourse that revolved around constructing cities, cultivating landscapes, building watercourses, erecting monuments and initiating public festivals. This volume combs through archaeological, epigraphic, visual, architectural and environmental evidence to tell the story of a region from the perspective of its spatial practices, landscape history and architectural technologies. It argues that the cultural processes of the making of urban spaces shape collective memory and identity as well as sites of political performance and state spectacle.

Author: Rocco Palermo
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317300459
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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On the Edge of Empires explores the mixed culture of North Mesopotamia in the Roman period. This volatile region at the eastern edge of the Roman world became during the imperial period the theater of confrontation for multiple political entities: Rome, Parthia, Sasanian Persia. Roman presence is only recognizable through military installations – forts, barracks, military camps – yet these fascinating lands tell a story of frontier people and soldiers, of trade despite war, and daily life between the Empires. This volume combines archaeological and historical, literary and environmental evidence in order to explore this important borderland between east and west. On the Edge of Empires is a valuable addition to researchers engaged in the historical and archaeological reconstruction of the frontier areas of the Roman Empire, and a fascinating study for students and scholars of the Romans and their neighbours, borderlands in antiquity, and the history and archaeology of empires.

Author: Dominik Bonatz
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110266407
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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This book, consisting of 12 contributions, amalgamates the most recent results from archaeological research in the Upper Mesopotamian piedmont. Under the growing influence of expanding territorial states which had become established during the 2nd millennium BC, this region experienced a substantial change in social and political life during that time. The discussion is centered around settlement shapes, developments in the material culture, as well as written documents that attest to this change. In summary, this book emphasizes the significant roll of archaeological research in the reconstruction of models concerning the formation and transformation of political space in the ancient world.

Author: Edgar Peltenberg
Publisher: Oxbow Books
ISBN: 178297511X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 503

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Pre-state ceremonial monuments, rich mortuary arrangements, forts, walled settlements and temples: all these occur in a narrow stretch of the Euphrates River valley prior to the rise of Carchemish, one of the major capital cities of the Ancient Near East. This well-illustrated book examines recently discovered evidence from the hinterlands of archaeologically inaccessible Carchemish in its regional context. Amongst the 18 contributors Tony Wilkinson characterizes the neighbouring regions of Carchemish, Guy Bunnens elaborates on a site hierarchy within the valley and Gioacchino Falsone appraises unpublished records from excavations at Carchemish itself. These material culture studies are important for those interested in the emergence of complex societies that do not conform to the Mesopotamian paradigm.

Author: Rémi Jean-Paul Berthon
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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The prehistory and ancient history of the Upper Tigris River valley (in southern Turkey) was poorly known until recently, due to a lack of archaeological researches. Since the last decade, numerous research projects are taking place in this area in order to document the cultural heritage which will be flooded by the lake of the Ilısu Dam in a near future. Despite the recent growth of archaeological investigations between the cities of Bismil and Siirt, many important fields of research haven't been targeted yet. It is the case for one of the main socioeconomic components of ancient societies: the exploitation of resources from animal origin. This large field of research encompasses many issues related to, among others, the use of the landscape, the economic system and the existence of cultural constraints. In order to answer these questions, the faunal remains from seven settlements were studied. These sites are located on the banks of the Tigris, Botan and Bitlis Rivers. Assemblages were selected from layers dated from the 3rd to the 1st millennia BC. This chronological range has the advantage to be represented in all the selected sites. It was also a period of rapid changes in the political background of the region, with well-defined economic and cultural entities. The study of the faunal remains enables to compare all these settlements in terms of subsistence strategies and socioeconomic choices. It appeared that a diversity of animal exploitation patterns existed in all the chronological phases considered. Besides the exploitation of the main domestic mammals such as cattle, pig and sheep and goat, the exploitations of red deer and equid were important variables. It is argued here that this variability is related to peculiar choices made by the communities inhabiting these settlements. Depending on the period, these choices seem to have been influenced by local environmental conditions on one hand and economic specializations on another hand. The variability in the patterns of animal exploitation should be taken into account when the issue of subsistence strategy is discussed at an inter-regional scale. Indeed, the Upper Tigris area, and especially the small rural settlements studied here, shows a picture much less homogeneous than expected. It is also argued that small settlements embedded in a rural environment should be also studied beside the main large urban settlements. These smaller settlements played an important role in the socioeconomic complexity of the Bronze and Iron Age. Finally, it is argued that small faunal assemblages have a great analytical value when they are studied by the same researcher in order to increase the possibility to compare them with each other. Considering several assemblages together, as it is possible in case of large-scale salvage programs, enables, with the help of multivariate analyses, to confirm the reliability of the patterns observed.

Author: Alessio Palmisano
Publisher: Archaeopress Publishing Ltd
ISBN: 1784919268
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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A reassessment of the Old-Assyrian trade network in Upper Mesopotamia and Central Anatolia during the Middle Bronze Age, this volume examines exchange networks and economic strategies, continuity and discontinuity of specific trade circuits and routes, and the evolution of political landscapes throughout the Near East.

Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Middle East
Languages : en
Pages : 548

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Author: Bleda S. Düring
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107189705
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 385

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This book examines the poorly understood transformations in rural landscapes and societies that formed the backbone of ancient empires.

Author: Tony J. Wilkinson
Publisher: University of Arizona Press
ISBN: 9780816521739
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 282

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Many fundamental studies of the origins of states have built upon landscape data, but an overall study of the Near Eastern landscape itself has never been attempted. Spanning thousands of years of history, the ancient Near East presents a bewildering range of landscapes, the understanding of which can greatly enhance our ability to infer past political and social systems. Tony Wilkinson now shows that throughout the Holocene humans altered the Near Eastern environment so thoroughly that the land has become a human artifact, albeit one that retains the power to shape human societies. In this trailblazing bookÑthe first to describe and explain the development of the Near Eastern landscape using archaeological dataÑWilkinson identifies specific landscape signatures for various regions and periods, from the early stages of complex societies in the fifth to sixth millennium B.C. to the close of the Early Islamic period around the tenth century A.D. From Bronze Age city-states to colonized steppes, these signature landscapes of irrigation systems, tells, and other features changed through time along with changes in social, economic, political, and environmental conditions. By weaving together the record of the human landscape with evidence of settlement, the environment, and social and economic conditions, Wilkinson provides a holistic view of the ancient Near East that complements archaeological excavations, cuneiform texts, and other conventional sources. Through this overview, culled from thirty years' research, Wilkinson establishes a new framework for understanding the economic and physical infrastructure of the region. By describing the basic attributes of the ancient cultural landscape and placing their development within the context of a dynamic environment, he breaks new ground in landscape archaeology and offers a new context for understanding the ancient Near East.