Habuba Kabira
Habuba-Kabira is an archaeological site of the Chalcolithic on the Euphrates in the area of Tabqa Dam in Syria . It is the Uruk culture attributed to the km further downstream, in about 1300 in southern Iraq lying Uruk is located. Habuba Kabira was researched between 1969 and 1975 as part of a rescue excavation by a team from the German Orient Society headed by Ernst Heinrich and Eva Strommenger . A hill of ruins called Tall Qannās , located south of the city limits, was examined by a Belgian team under the direction of André Finet .
Plant of the settlement
Habuba Kabira was born in the middle of the 4th millennium BC. Founded in BC and abandoned after about one to two centuries. This made it possible to expose larger areas of this settlement, as these were not covered by any later overbuilding. Habuba Kabira measured about 18 hectares, of which 10 hectares were surrounded by a city wall. This wall was 3 meters thick and regularly had towers. There was at least one other wall in front of her. The city was accessible through two gates secured with guard rooms , both of which were the subject of German excavations. The main roads within the settlement were laid out either in north-south or east-west directions and carefully paved with crushed stone and gravel - an indication that Habuba Kabira is a planned prehistoric town . This is also indicated by the settlement's ingenious drainage system, which consisted of ceramic sewer pipes.
Finds and Findings
There are numerous architectural remains in Habuba Kabira. The buildings were almost exclusively straps used. Middle hall houses are strongly represented among the buildings .
The individual finds are also closely linked to the South Mesopotamian Uruk culture and consist of the typical bell pots , mass-produced ceramics, clay tablets with numerical symbols, clay bulls and cylinder seals . In particular, the representations on the cylinder seals correspond to South Mesopotamian motifs.
Tall Qannās
In addition to the extensive settlement with the site name Habuba Süd and the medium-sized rubble hill Habuba-Tall , which has not been investigated in more detail, there was also a smaller, but overall tallest hill within the city limits called Tall Qannās , which turned out to be the center of Habuba Kabira. There was monumental architecture in a central hall construction, which was decorated with the pillar niche dector , which is actually typical of southern Mesopotamia , and with clay-pen mosaics .
meaning
The discovery of Habuba Kabira made it clear that the Uruk culture, as the first known urban culture to this day , extended far beyond southern Mesopotamia. This phenomenon is known as Uruk expansion and is still the subject of archaeological research and regularly recurring debates. It is assumed that the Uruk people founded colonies / enclaves outside their heartland in order to enforce their economic interests there.
The discovery of the site Ǧebel Aruda , 8 km from Habuba Kabira, led to the conclusion that these colonies were subject to a hierarchy, with Jebel Aruda being the upper center assigned to Habuba Kabira. The later discovered Uruk colonies in Tell el-Haji , Mureybet , Hadidi and Sheikh-Hassan could have been subordinate to this.
Further research in Habuba Kabira and its surroundings is no longer possible today, as the entire region is covered by the Tabqa reservoir, which was dammed up in 1973.
literature
- Peter MMG Akkermans, Glenn M. Schwartz: The Archeology of Syria. From complex Hunter-Gatherers to Early Urban Societies. (c. 16,000-300 BC). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2003, ISBN 0-521-79230-4 .
- Eva Strommenger : Habuba Kabira. A city 5000 years ago. Excavations of the German Orient Society on the Euphrates in Habuba Kabira, Syria (= message of the German Orient Society. 12). von Zabern, Mainz 1980, ISBN 3-8053-0449-8 .
- Dietrich Sürenhagen : Ceramic production in Ḥabūba Kabira-Süd. Investigations into the ceramic production within the late-primeval settlement Ḥabūba Kabira-Süd in northern Syria. Bruno Hessling, Berlin 1978, ISBN 3-7769-0190-X .
