2024-03-07

HUMAN OCCUPATION ALONG THE FOOTHILLS OF NORTHWESTERN ZAGROS DURING THE LATE PLEISTOCENE AND THE HOLOCENE IN THE RANIA AND PESHDAR PLAINS

The south-western foothills of the Zagros range, in Iraqi Kurdistan, have long been largely unexplored because it has been impossible for archaeologists to carry out fieldwork research in this area for more than half a century.

2024-01-29

Late Prehistoric Investigations at Shakar Tepe, the Shahrizor Plain, Iraqi Kurdistan: Preliminary Results of the First Season (2019)

Grdi-Shakar Tapa on the Sharazor plain in Iraq's Kurdistan Region has revealed a new episode of the Neolithic discovery Shakar Tapa has been known as a conspicuous archaeological site in the south of the Shahrazor Plain since the mid-20th century. It has an oval plan consisting of a low northeastern mound and a high conical southwestern mound with a flat top. The Darband-i Khan Dam Lake is adjacent to the north of the site and its water occasionally reaches the skirt of the mound, causing crucial erosion of the northern edge of the mound. Many archaeological materials were collected on the surface of Shakar Tapa in the past. Although most of them can be dated to the historical ages, such as the Early-to-Middle Bronze Age, the Iron Age, and the Parthian-Sasanian Period, some artefacts were certainly dated to the prehistoric period. In 2019 a Japanese archaeological team (directed by Takahiro Odaka, Kanazawa University) started the excavations of Shakar Tapa to investigate its late prehistoric occupation. The first operation of a step trench was set at the northwestern skirt of the high mound and yielded the Ubaid deposit and the Late Neolithic stratigraphic sequence covering ca. 6400-6000 BC. Virgin soil was reached at the northwestern end of the trench about 5 m below the highest level of this trench. The second season carried out in 2023 revealed the younger Late Chalcolithic deposit at the area near the trench in 2019. In addition, a few low satellite mounds were identified west of the main mound and another late prehistoric deposit was uncovered at one of them.

2024-03-28

PRELIMINARY REPORT OF THE CHARMO (JARMO) PREHISTORIC INVESTIGATIONS, 2022

The archaeological mission from the University of Tsukuba began to investigate the Neolithic sites in the Iraqi-Kurdistan region in 2014. The purpose of our investigations was to reconsider the issue of Neolithization in Iraqi-Kurdistan, where research began in the 1940s and 50s and was stalled by political issues starting in the 1960s. With the full support of the Directorate General of Cultural Heritage of the Ministry of Culture of the Kurdistan Regional Government and the Slemani Department of Cultural Heritage, we first began our research at the Qalat Said Ahmadan site, located in the Pshdar Plain. We were able to identify the cultural deposits of the end of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic period, those of the Hassuna, Samarra, Halaf, Ubaid, and Iron Age, and have clarified the nature of the Neolithic site located at the edge of the fan deposits [Tsuneki et al. 2015, 2016, 2019].

10,000 years ago one of the earliest villages on the Shahrizor Plain was built and lived in at the nearby settlement mound of Bestansur

Early Settled Communities

10,000 years ago one of the earliest villages on the Shahrizor Plain was built and lived in at the nearby settlement mound of Bestansur. At that time communities were developing new ways of living that form the foundation of our lives today. Communities were changing from mobile hunter-gathering ways of life to larger communities living in well-built mud brick houses supported by early agriculture, growing crops and managing and domesticating animals, while continuing to use a wide range of wild plant and animal resources.

The site was first surveyed by the Iraqi Directorate of Antiquities and Heritage in 1943. From 2012 large scale archaeological excavations have been conducted by a joint team from Slemani Directorate of Antiquities and Heritage, and the University of Reading, UK.

Abundant Water and Biodiverse Environments

The large spring here is fed by clear underground waters from the mountains. These plentiful waters and the fertile soils and hills have provided bio diverse environments for people, plants, and animals for many thousands of years.

This area attracted the earliest farmers here 10,000 years ago. They fished, hunted wild boar and harvested reeds in the marshes and river. They grew crops, herded goat and gathered wild plants and snails on the plain and hilly slopes.

Today only 4% of the total mammal biomass on the planet is wild. To preserve these rich water-supplies, farmlands and wildlife, we need to protect them from climate change, pollution and other threats.

Daily Life in the Neolithic

The people who first lived here made their houses from mud bricks and built clay ovens to cook their food and keep warm. They used large pestles and mortars to grind plants, nuts, and grain, and they shaped tools and knives from chert and obsidian (volcanic glass). People harvested reeds from the river to make baskets and mats. They used bone needles to sew materials such as animal skins, often using their teeth as a ‘third hand’.

People were connected 10,000 years ago through networks of communities who exchanged materials, technologies, and ideas. The Neolithic villagers of Bestansur used locally available materials for everyday life and resources from hundreds of kilometers away. At Bestansur we find stones such as obsidian and carnelian from Türkiye and Iran, and shells from the Red Sea.

People in the Neolithic village used natural materials for their daily life and repaired objects when they broke. Such practices were more sustainable and better for the environment than the plastics that we use today and then throw away.