Qatna

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Coordinates: 34 ° 50 ′ 6 ″  N , 36 ° 51 ′ 57 ″  E

Relief Map: Syria
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Qatna​
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Syria

Qatna (Akkadian URU Qa-ṭà-na, URU Qàṭ-aṭ-na) was the capital of a city kingdom in Syria . It was located on Tell Mischrife, about one square kilometer in size, in western Syria, about 18 km northeast of Homs and about 180 km northeast of the Syrian capital Damascus . Qatna was an important trading metropolis in the 2nd millennium BC; it controlled the most important trade routes in the area, especially between Egypt and Mesopotamia and probably the Hittite Empire . Qatna was founded in 1340 BC. Destroyed by the Hittites . In the Iron Age there was a smaller settlement here that lasted until the Byzantine period .

history

Syria in the 2nd millennium BC Chr.

The city is perhaps identical to the Ga-da-nu / ni Ki of the Mari texts. The ruling house was probably Amurri . At the end of the third millennium BC There was only one unfortified Bronze Age settlement on the site of the city. The city centers of Ebla and Emar were already in the north of what is now Syria . In the second half of the 18th century BC This northern region formed the state of Jamchad with the capital Aleppo . To the east was the city-state of Mari. Another important state arose around Qatna, Palmyra and Byblos in the south of what is now Syria. Mari was under the influence of Shamjiadad of the Old Assyrian Empire , and Qatna was permanently enemies with Aleppo. A campaign that Qatna carried out together with Shamschiadad of Assur failed. As a sign of the alliance, the Assyrian king had his crown prince Išme-Dagan I of Ekallatum married a princess from Qatna.

The first mention in Egyptian sources comes from the 33rd year of Thutmose III's reign . (around 1446 BC). During this time, Qatna was only one of several minor kingdoms under the influence of Mitanni . During the Hittite conquests around 1340 BC Qatna perished, possibly also as a victim of a small war between the vassal states. The royal palace burned down. Under Assurnasirpal I (after 1050 BC) Qaṭna was part of Nuḫašše . Linguistically, an increasing Hurrian influence is noticeable. In New Assyrian times (after 911 BC) the settlement belonged to the area of Hamath .

Research history

The settlement mound is over 100 hectares in size and contains the remains of a larger Bronze Age city from the middle to the end of the 3rd millennium BC. The first excavations in the 1920s took place under the direction of Du Mesnil du Buisson . They brought only a few finds from the Bronze Age. In addition to 40 skeletons, copper and bronze weapons and a large number of pottery were found in a shaft grave. The city was fortified by an earth wall with gateways in the east and west. The finds include the remains of an Egyptian sphinx from the Middle Bronze Age (around 1900 BC), which was dedicated to Princess Ita, a daughter of Amenemhet II . During the excavations at that time, a palace from the 14th century BC was also found. Discovered.

An archaeological team from Tübingen has been carrying out excavations in Mischrife since 1999 , under the direction of the Tübingen professor for Near Eastern Archeology Peter Pfälzner . The excavations are carried out as part of an international cooperation with the University of Udine / Italy, under the direction of Daniele Morandi Bonacossi, and the Syrian Antiquities Service, under the direction of Michel al-Maqdissi. The team focuses its work on the palace in the center of the city. In 2002 it discovered the intact tombs of its kings. The Qatna clay tablet archive, priceless, was also found. On September 21, 2009, the press announced that the Tübingen researchers discovered a 3,500 year old burial chamber on August 8, 2009, which had not been looted by grave robbers.

Archaeologists from the University of Tübingen canceled the planned continuation of their excavations in 2011 because of the political unrest. A statement said that the reason for this is the unclear situation in the country in the Middle East. The planned construction of an excavation house could not be realized either. The campaign that has been going on for years in the ancient city of Qatna was supposed to be continued.

city

Restored foundation walls of a small palace to the north; in the background the outer defensive wall, in the breach was the northern city gate
Excavation area southwest of the ceremonial hall (Hall A, its restored outer wall on the right rear) at the end of the 2009 season

The square area of ​​approx. 110 ha was surrounded by walls with sides of 1000 meters, which were still standing at a height of 15-20 m. A city ​​gate once stood in the middle of each side .

palace

The palace was built at the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC and has an area of ​​around 18,000 square meters. This makes him one of the largest of his time in the ancient Orient. A central hall with almost 1296 m², the roof of which rested on four pillars, is just as impressive as the throne room with a length of 40 meters, which makes it the most extensive room of its kind in the Near Eastern Bronze Age , and a ceremonial hall. They were by the Hittites in the conquest pillaged , which contributed to its exceptional preservation. In a side room, well-preserved frescoes were found that are somewhat reminiscent of Minoan wall paintings, from which the archaeologists derive a cultural connection to the Aegean Sea.

The west wing of the palace was uncovered in 2008 and was unusually well preserved. The mud brick walls of the lower two floors with a height of up to 5.30 meters still stand from the originally three-story structure. This makes this building the first multi-storey structure in the Middle East that has been discovered so far. Four doors with arches made of adobe bricks are arranged in a straight line . In the Middle East they are among the best-preserved arches from the Bronze Age.

Due to the damp storage, large quantities of wood have been preserved in the fountain of the palace. The ceiling beams and wooden floorboards left behind when the palace was destroyed in 1340 BC. Chr. Fell into the well, show the precise carpentry technique of that time.

Crypt

A multi-room crypt was surrounded by defensive walls up to 20 m high. The crypt was at the end of a 40 m long underground corridor that led from the ceremonial hall down to a not robbed royal crypt with an anteroom and several burial chambers. There was a well-secured door in the corridor itself. The wooden door frames had burned along with the roof beams and fell to the floor. The corridor was guarded by two stone sculptures, probably ancestral statues in royal costume, in front of which were the remains of offerings. The burial chamber itself contained up to 2000 artefacts of the royal burial equipment: weapons, clothing, furniture decorations, gold jewelry, jewelry made of stones, vessels of various materials, for example amber , cylinder seals and other gems.

The burial chamber, newly discovered in 2009, called Crypt VII by archaeologists, was located under the north-west wing of the palace. It is a rock chamber that was connected to the brick-built basement. It contained Egyptian finds, especially gabbro and alabaster vessels , which are 1000 years older, but were probably only later negotiated in the Levant . There were also bones of at least 30 people, grave goods of great value, gold sheets, jewelry, ceramics and figurative representations. The meaning of this much smaller crypt is still being discussed, possibly it is a reburial from the larger royal crypt.

Finds

Clay tablets

During the excavations at the University of Tübingen , Tell Mischrife u. a. 73 cuneiform tablets discovered in the underground corridor of the palace that branches off from the throne room. You probably fell from a higher floor when the palace was destroyed. The archaeologists had to work their way through several layers of burned wood until they found the cuneiform tablets in the middle of the rubble.

These must have belonged to King Idanda's archives . He ruled around 1400 BC. Over the city and the kingdom of Qatna. So far, almost nothing was known about him. The panels depict the king's correspondence and report on the political and economic situation in Syria at that time. They represent the first cuneiform tablets found in Syria that provide information about the political events of that time. The tablets made it clear that the kings of Qatna, like other rulers of their time, had an intelligence service through which they were informed about political events and developments of the time.

At that time the Syrian area was in the political area of ​​tension between Egypt, Mesopotamia and the Hittite Empire of Asia Minor. The great empires tried to conquer the small states in this area, but they never fully succeeded. Changing alliances and conquests shifted the balance of power in the second millennium BC. Chr. Constantly. The reports on the cuneiform tablets complement those from Mari and Tell el-Amarna .

In addition to the royal letters, the royal archive also contained administrative documents such as inventory lists and legal documents and provides an insight into life and activities in a royal palace from the Bronze Age in Syria.

The texts are written in a mixture of Akkadian and Hurrian ; these languages ​​are likely to have marked the culture of the court of Qatna.

Elephant bones

The bones of elephants that must have lived in the swamps of the Orontestal west of Qatna were found in two rooms of the royal palace . It is said to have been a subspecies of the Asian elephant, the Syrian elephant (Elephas maximus asurus ), which is now extinct . Reports by the Egyptian pharaohs Thutmose I and Thutmose III also relate to this . about elephant hunts in what is now western Syria. With the bone finds, the hunt for elephants can for the first time also be documented for the kings of Qatna.

Ruler

Movies

  • Flames over Qatna - A sunken palace in Syria. Documentation, Germany 2005, 45 minutes, director: Jens Afflerbach, production: ZDF , first broadcast: November 20, 2005, video clips
  • Qatna - discovery in the royal tomb. Documentation, Germany, 2009, 43:39 minutes, director: Simone Schillinger, production: ZDF, first broadcast: February 7, 2010.

literature

  • Ali Abou Assaf: Mishrifeh. In: The Oxford encyclopedia of archeology in the Near East. Vol. 4. Oxford 1997, pp. 35-36. ISBN 0-19-511218-0
  • Alexander Ahrens: Scarabs and scarab prints from Tall Mišrife / Qatna. Some observations on the intercultural exchange between the Levant and Egypt. In: Ugarit research. Münster 35.2003, pp. 1–28. ISSN  0342-2356
  • Alexander Ahrens: A Journey's End - Two Egyptian Stone Vessels with Hieroglyphic Inscriptions from the Royal Tomb at Tell Mišrife / Qatna. In: Egypt and Levante / Egypt and the Levant 16 (2006), 15-36. ISSN  1015-5104
  • Alexander Ahrens: A Stone Vessel of Princess Itakayet of the 12th Dynasty from Tomb VII at Tell Mišrife / Qatna (Syria) In: Egypt und Levante / Egypt and the Levant 20 (2010), 15-29. ISSN  1015-5104
  • Alexander Ahrens: A Clay Sealing with the Throne Name of Amenhotep IV-Akhenaten from the Royal Palace at Tell Mišrife / Qatna (Syria) , Egypt and the Near East - The Crossroads. International Workshop on the Relations between Egypt and the Near East in the Bronze Age (Prague, September 1-3, 2010), abstracts (PDF; 254 kB)
  • Alexander Ahrens: A Stone Vessel with Hieroglyphic Inscription from Tomb VII at Tell Mišrife / Qatna (Syria): Yet Another Object Naming a Princess of the Middle Kingdom (12th Dynasty) in the Northern Levant , Egypt and the Near East - The Crossroads. International Workshop on the Relations between Egypt and the Near East in the Bronze Age (Prague, September 1—3, 2010)
  • Alexander Ahrens - Heike Dohmann-Pfälzner - Peter Pfälzner: New Light on the Amarna Period from the Northern Levant. A Clay Sealing with the Throne Name of Amenhotep IV / Akhenaten from the Royal Palace at Tall Mišrife / Qaṭna , Zeitschrift für Orient- Aräologie 5 (2012), 233-248.
  • Robert du Mesnil du Buisson: Le site archéologique de Mishrife-Qatna. Paris 1935.
  • Gabriele Elsen-Novák: The ancient Syriac glyptic from Qaṭna - a first classification . In: Messages from the German Orient Society (MDOG). Berlin 134.2001, pp. 257-274. ISSN  0342-118X
  • Horst Klengel : Qaṭna - a historical overview . In: Messages from the German Orient Society (MDOG). Berlin 132.2000, pp. 239-252. ISSN  0342-118X
  • Michel al-Maqdissi, M. Luciani, D. Morandi, Mirko Novák, Peter Pfälzner: Excavating Qatna I - Preliminary Report on the 1999 and 2000 Campaigns of the Joint Syrian-Italian-German Archaeological Research Project at Mishrife. Deutsche Orientgesellschaft, Damascus / Berlin 2002. ISBN 3-00-010490-9
  • Daniele Morandi Bonacossi, M. Luciani, A. Barro, A. Canci, M. Cremaschi, M. Da Ros, J. Eidem, I. Finzi Contini, M. Iamoni, A. Intilia, L. Trombino, A. Sala, V. Valsecchi: Tell Mishrifeh / Qatna 1999-2002. A Preliminary Report of the Italian Component of the Joint Syrian-Italian-German Project. Part 1. in: Akkadica. Brussels 124.2003,1, pp. 65–120.
  • Mirko Novák : Foundation techniques in the palace of Qaṭna. In: E. Czerny, I. Hein, H. Hunger, D. Melman, A. Schwab (Eds.): Timelines. Studies in Honor of Manfred Bietak III . In: Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 149.3. Leuven 2006, pp. 63-71. ( online )
  • Mirko Novák: The Chronology of the Bronze Age Palace of Qatna . In: Egypt and Levant. Vienna 14.2004, pp. 299-317. ISSN  1015-5104 ( online )
  • Mirko Novák, Peter Pfälzner : Excavations in the Bronze Age palace of Tall Mishrife / Qaṭna 2002. Preliminary report on the German component of the international project . In: Messages from the German Orient Society (MDOG). Berlin 135.2003, pp. 135-165. ISSN  0342-118X
  • Thomas Richter, Sarah Lange: The Archive of Idadda. The cuneiform texts from the German-Syrian excavations 2001–2003 in the Royal Palace of Qaṭna. With a contribution by Peter Pfälzner (Qaṭna Studies 3). Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2012. ISBN 978-3-447-06709-6
  • Landesmuseum Württemberg (ed.): Treasures of Ancient Syria. The discovery of the Kingdom of Qatna . Published by the Landesmuseum Württemberg, Stuttgart, in collaboration with Michel Al-Maqdissi, Daniele Morandi Bonacossi and Peter Pfälzner. Theiss, Stuttgart 2009, ISBN 978-3-8062-2272-2 .
  • THEN . The magazine for history and culture. Leinfelden-Echterdingen 41.2009, 11. ISSN  0011-5908 ( special issue with several articles on Qatna)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Judge: Qatna. In: Reallexikon der Assyriologie und Vorderasiatischen Aräologie (RLA). Volume 11, 1/2. de Gruyter, Berlin 2006, pp. 159–170.
  2. ↑ You Mesnil du Buisson: Compte rendu de la quatrième campagne de fouilles a Mishrifé-Qatna. In: Syria. Beyruth 11.1930, 2, ISSN  0039-7946 , pp. 146-163.
  3. ↑ (dpa): Archeology: University of Tübingen cancels excavations. In: Südkurier of June 16, 2011.
  4. ↑ Palace Fountain of Qatna
  5. ↑ Treasures of Ancient Syria. The discovery of the Kingdom of Qatna - Great State Exhibition October 17, 2009 to March 14, 2010 Baden-Württemberg in the State Museum Stuttgart (Old Castle)
  6. ↑ Ulf von Rauchhaupt: That was once a king and his retinue. in: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Frankfurt am Main, September 21, 2009.
  7. ↑ Thomas Richter: The "Archive of Idanda". Reports on inscription finds from the 2002 excavation campaign in Mišrife / Qaṭna . In: Mitteilungen der Deutschen Orientgesellschaft 135 (2003), pp. 167–188.
  8. ↑ Choudhury, A., Lahiri Choudhury, DK, Desai, A., Duckworth, JW, Easa, PS, Johnsingh, AJT, Fernando, P., Hedges, S., Gunawardena, M., Kurt, F., Karanth, U., Lister, A., Menon, V., Riddle, H., Rübel, A. & Wikramanayake, E. 2008. Elephas maximus . In: IUCN 2010. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2010.4. Last accessed on April 23, 2011
  9. ↑ Video Terra X: Qatna - Discovery in the Royal Crypt (June 15, 2013, 6:45 p.m., 43:11 min.)  In the ZDFmediathek , accessed on February 6, 2014.