Tell Halaf

Tell Halaf is an archaeological site in the Al Hasakah governorate of northeastern Syria, near the Turkish border. It was the first find of a Neolithic culture, subsequently dubbed the Halafian culture, characterized by glazed pottery painted with geometric and animal designs. The site dates back to the 6th millennium BCE and was later the location of the Aramaean city-state of Guzana.

Discovery and excavation

The site is located near the village of R'as al 'Ayn in the fertile Khabur valley (Nahr al Khabur) through which the Khabur river flows, close to the modern border with Turkey. It was discovered in 1899 by Baron Max von Oppenheim, a German engineer, while he was surveying the area to build the now-defunct Berlin-Baghdad railway. (At the time, Syria was under the rule of the Ottoman Empire.) He returned to excavate the site from 1911 to 1913, and took many of the artifacts found back to Berlin. The site was also excavated in 1927 and 1929 under French stewardship following the creation of modern Syria. The name Tell Halaf is a local Arabic placename, tell meaning "hill" in Arabic; what its original inhabitants called their settlement is not known.

Von Oppenheim founded the Tell Halaf museum in Berlin to house his discoveries from the site. The museum was wrecked in a massive aerial bombardment in World War II and many of the rare artifacts were damaged or destroyed, in what is considered one of the worst losses to have occurred in Near Eastern archaeology. However, 80 cubic meters of basalt fragments were later rescued and stored away in the Pergamon Museum. In 2001, a restoration project commenced in Germany which has made some headway in reconstructing some of the damaged artifacts.

History

The site flourished from about 5050 to 4300 BC. This period of time is sometimes referred to as the Halafian period. The Halafian culture was succeeded in northern Mesopotamia by the Ubaid culture.

In 894 BC, the Assyrian king Adad-nirari II recorded it in his archives as a tributary Aramaean city-state. After a short period of independence, Semiramis sacked the city in 808 BCE and reduced the surrounding area to a province of the Assyrian Empire.

Economy

Dry farming was practiced by the population. This type of farming was based on exploiting natural rainfall without the help of irrigation, in a similar practice to that still practiced today by the Hopi people of Arizona. Emmer wheat, two rowed barley and flax were grown. They kept cattle, sheep and goats.

Halaf pottery has been found in other parts of the Northern Mesopotamia, such as at Nineveh and Tepe Gawra, Chagar Bazar and many sites in Anatolia that it was widely used in the region. In addition, the Halaf communities made partially baked clay and stone female figurines and the Stamp seal of stone, (see also Impression seal). The seals are thought to mark the development of concepts of personal property, as similar seals were used for this purpose in later times. [http://ancientneareast.tripod.com/Halaf_Culture.html The Halafians used tools made of stone and clay. Copper was also known, but was not used for tools.

Culture

Architecture

Although no Halaf settlement has been extensively excavated some buildings have been excavated: the tholoi of Arpachiyah, circular domed structures approached through long rectangular anterooms ^*. Only a few of these structures were ever excavated. They were constructed of mud-brick sometimes on stone foundations and may have been for ritual use (one contained a large number of female figurines). Other circular buildings were probably just houses.

Pottery

The most well known pottery of Tell Halaf, called Halaf ware, can be painted, sometimes with more than two colors (called polychrome) with geometric and animal motifs. Other types of Halaf pottery are known, including unpainted, cooking ware and surface burnished. There are many theories about why the distinctive pottery style developed. The theory is that the pottery came about due to regional copying and that it was exchanged as a prestige item between local elites is now disputed. The Polychrome painted Halaf pottery has been proposed to be a "trade pottery" i.e. pottery produced for export however, the predominance of locally produced painted potter in all areas of Halaf sites including potters settlement questions that theory.

References

"The History of the Ancient Near East Electronic Compendium". Retrieved May 27, 2005.

Archaeological sites in Syria | Aramaeans

تل حلف | Tell Halaf | Halaf | Халафская культура | Halaf