The strict form of the temple city has often been seen as the prototype of the political and economic constitution of the whole country and for the whole of the early periods, an inadmissible generalization. It rather represents a counterpart to the concept of the centralized state that is very precisely fixed in time and possibly also in place. Further political development did not allow the “temple city” to survive for very long as a form of state, because developments toward the centralized state had already progressed too far. Thus, we cannot hope for any written evidence that would tell us whether the form would have been capable of surviving for a longer period. Only a few years after the “Reform texts,” the area of Lagash, along with the rest of southern and central Babylonia, fell victim to the conquests of Lugalzaggesi, who himself came from the south—probably from Umma—and was able, after a short time, to unite quite large parts of Babylonia under his rule.
For this phase too, our information is, unfortunately, very sparse, but one piece of information about the way this ruler proceeded is striking. In a text from Girsu, there are moving lamentations by Urukagina about the way Lugalzaggesi destroyed the temples in the places he captured during his conquests. This sacrilege is reported in shocked tones, and the text ends with, “May Nidaba, the goddess of Lugalzaggesi, carry this sin on her head.” This is a perfectly natural utterance for someone who himself stood by the concept that the ruler was only the instrument of the city god’s will. But suppose Lugalzaggesi did not see himself fitting in with this concept at all, if the destruction of the temples, quite apart from the booty to be expected from it, occurred not as the result of hybris, but because of his insight into the fact that it was precisely these temples that were the centers of resistance to his plans?
What has been said makes it clear that it was, at the latest, during the time of the last rulers of the Early Dynastic period, that the contrasts between the various fundamental political tendencies manifested themselves. As already suggested, the extent to which the whole period covered in this chapter—Early Dynastic II and Early Dynastic III—must have been characterized by inner tensions is here once again clearly revealed. Even for the short segment of the late Early Dynastic period just dealt with, it can be seen that situations that seem possible to reconstruct from texts from the end of this phase should on no account be projected backwards even into periods that are only slightly earlier, of which we know little or nothing.
If we look for help from archaeological sources, the result is not much better. For several reasons, our information about this period comes mainly from excavations outside the actual Babylonian area. Practically no remains from this period were uncovered in Uruk and the excavations at Girsu were carried out too long ago, using methods that do not allow answers to our present-day questions. Excavations of Kish and Ur carried out research mainly on burial places of this period, and the results of the excavations in Nippur have not yet been completely published. Tell Asmar, Khafaji, and Tell Ajrab, three larger projects in the area that borders on the northeast, which is traversed by the Diyala River, have made a wealth of material available that seems to stand so directly in the line of Babylonian development that it has been used again and again to fill in gaps in our knowledge about Babylonia itself. However, more exact comparisons of smaller groups of finds from the Diyala area and Babylonia itself, such as, for example, cylinder seals, make it probable that there were fundamental local differences.
We do not, unfortunately, have the sort of complex of archaeological information for this period that Uruk provides for the one immediately preceding it, for which we had material from different contexts in the same region that could shed light on the multifaceted developments taking place under the same external conditions. For the Early Dynastic II and III periods we must therefore assemble a composite picture whose individual parts come from different regions and from different contexts and depend on the information provided by different types of finds. Because such a procedure is only possible if we accept the fiction that there were neither regional, social, nor economic differences, it is, of course, not to be expected that we shall derive information about individual development from that sort of material. This is why we do not see the great social conflicts of this time reflected in works of art or in other archaeologically tangible evidence.
Figure 57. Cylinder seal and impression dating to the Early Dynastic II period. Height 2.8 cm. Collection of the Seminar für Vorderasiatische Altertumskunde, Freie Universität, Berlin. Photo M. Nissen. (Cf. U. Moortgat-Correns, “Die ehem. Rollsiegel-Sammlung E. Oppenländer,” Baghd. Mitt. 4 [1968], no. 30.)
But there is yet another aspect that restricts our ability to evaluate archaeological data using a similar approach to the one employed for the earlier period. For it is, of course, also true for this period that the social conditions at a given time—with their ideas of value and their necessities—have influenced the form, appearance, and order of the things we can retrieve archaeologically, and thus that these conditions can to a certain extent be read from these objects. Thus, for example, it is now only possible in a few isolated cases clearly to trace changes in our archaeological material back to technical innovations or connect them with changes in society. It is not only that all the more important technical innovations took place in the previous period; so did the formulation of ways of using these new tools or technological aids. Thus, pottery now consisted almost exclusively of mass-produced wares. In the production of seals, “fast” mechanical tools such as the drill and the cutting wheel and “slow” tools such as the engraver were used in combination with such virtuosity that even complicated scenes could be cut into the stone cylinder relatively quickly (fig. 58). Any differentiation between “cheap” and “expensive” seals thus no longer plays a significant role in interpretation. Thus, from this period, we know only of such an infinitesimal number of abstracts—that is, scarcely individualized seals—that we may assume that they definitely no longer had the same significance as in the previous period.
In spite of this, study of the seals can nonetheless provide significant insights. From the latter part of the Early Dynastic II period, we find, among the cylinder seals and impressions from Fara, the first examples of seals with personal names inscribed on them. This, the highest form of individualization of a seal, makes it clear not only that people still felt a desire for individualization—or felt under pressure to achieve it—but also that they had reached the limits of the possibilities of individualization afforded by varying the decorations on seals. This is understandable for a time in which, because of an increasing population, progressive urbanization—which presumably increased the number of large economic undertakings in the country—and above all the close mutual ties both within Babylonia itself, but also with the outside world, the number of those who needed a seal in order to carry out their daily work must have increased. Increased trade, especially, must have demanded a more abstract means of identification tied to knowledge of a supraregional convention and not necessarily to knowledge of the small-scale conventions of the local community.
Relationships with the outside world are paraded before our eyes in an exemplary fashion in the finds from the so-called royal graves of Ur, which date from the beginning of the Early Dynastic III period. The wealth of objects made of precious metals such as gold and silver, of copper and bronze weapons and jewelry, of vessels, tools, and jewelry made of semiprecious and precious stones and other colored stones is almost inexhaustible. Even if we cannot in every case say precisely where the raw materials came from, we do know that they must all have been brought from outside Babylonia. Where their origins can be established, they are found to come from the areas that are now Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, or the areas around the Gulf. The origins of the metals in particular are still not clear. The same is also true for the large amounts of timber needed for the countless representative buildings, because the only timber locally available for building, the trunk of the date palm, is not suitable fo
r the roofing of larger rooms; the trunks bend far too easily. It is only at the end of the Early Dynastic III period that we have some scant evidence about the provenance of wood for building from the “silver mountains,” a name later used to refer to the mountains of Lebanon and western Syria.
Figure 58. Seals from the Early Dynastic II and III periods, from Babylonia. After (a) E. Heinrich, Fara (Berlin, 1931), pl. 42; (b) H. v. D. Osten, Collection B. Brett OIP 37 (Chicago, 1936), no. 21. Courtesy, Oriental Institute, University of Chicago; (c) C. L. Wbolley, The Royal Cemetery, Ur Excavations II (London, 1934), pls. 194, 22; (d) ibid., pls. 197, 57; (e) A. Parrot, “Temple d’Ishtar,” Miss. Archaeol. de Mari 1 (Paris, 1956), pls. 66, 545.
Figure 59. Finds from the Royal Cemetery at Ur (Iraq): (a) inlaid panels, (b) gold helmet of Meskalamdug, (c) gold dagger in sheath. From C. L. Woolley, The Royal Cemetery, Ur Excavations II (London, 1934), frontispiece, pls. 91, 92, 151.
Of course, trade with the neighboring regions had also been very lively in the period before this, as the examples from the era of early high civilization show. However, the rapid progress of urbanization, encouraging places that had formerly been quite small to grow to the size of centers, with the corresponding power structures that implies, must surely have made the scope of these exchanges considerably greater than it had formerly been. This trade was now definitely of the kind that had no need of a trading station, or of some sort of protection for trade routes, but was run along the lines of a mutual commercial enterprise.
This is, of course, quite natural for a period in which the trading partnership was no longer that between a highly civilized urban society on the one hand and societies with a considerably lower level of organizational structure on the other, but between two urban partners who differed from each other only in degree. The best example of one of these other partners has been known to us for only a short time—from the magnificent finds from Tell Mardikh, ancient Ebla, in northern Syria. However, we shall return to this later.
The finds from the so-called royal cemeteries of Ur and Kish allow us to cast a glance at an aspect we otherwise come across in isolated cases—the level of craftsmanship, primarily as shown in the sphere of the court, but also beyond it. We do not know which to admire most, the filigree techniques, the granulated dagger sheaths, the technique and craftsmanship of the inlaid work, or the artistry and taste involved in the execution of relief or sculpted objects made of materials of different colors and types.
Here, we see the result of a long tradition of craftsmanship. We would surely not be wrong if we were to regard these objects as evidence of a trend toward extreme specialization, whose main exponents were definitely in the direct employ of the ruling house.
The fact that these grave finds throw light on only a short part of a long tradition can clearly be seen in a sequence of finds, spectacular in a different way, made during excavations in the Diyala area. In several places in temple buildings that stretch in a long succession from the Jamdet Nasr period to the period of the Akkad Dynasty, excavators found repositories of statues that clearly belonged to the inventory of the respective temple up to a certain point in time, but then had to give way to new concepts or new statues and were interred in the temple area (fig. 60). The quantity alone prevents us from assuming that these could have been cult statues, just as, on the other hand, a comparison with the same type of statue from a later period makes it an attractive theory that we are here dealing with so-called “prayer statues.” As we know from later inscriptions, these were put up in a temple by individuals in order to pray for the life of the benefactor in the sight of the god and in direct contact with him. Because such finds have not been made in the earlier levels there, we can assume that it is highly probable that the custom of setting up statues in temples with this intention began in the Early Dynastic period. This observation is of interest insofar as it certainly reflects a change in religious ideas. A notion of a god that makes it conceivable that the god can be influenced in this way differs fundamentally from one that sees in the god only what is spiritually elevated. It is a humanization of the divine image such as we have already seen as a precondition for the theological speculations about a pantheon in which the ranking order of the gods among themselves was expressed in the form of family relationships. The astonishing thing is that it was not merely members of the upper class in a particular place who donated statues, for the finds are from small shrines in normal residential areas, not the familiar large-scale buildings of a town’s main places of worship. From this we can draw the conclusion that the custom of setting up “prayer statues”—and this obviously involved first having them made—must have been a very general one. That also means that this period quite clearly enjoyed a great demand for artists as well as for raw materials, an observation that can clearly be placed in the context of the steady growth in specialization.
Figure 60. Statues found at Tell Asmar (Iraq), dating to the Early Dynastic II period. From H. Frankfort, Oriental Institute Discoveries in Iraq, 1933–34, Oriental Inst. Communications 19 (Chicago, 1935), fig. 63. Courtesy, Oriental Institute, University of Chicago.
We also see a change in the type of relief sculpture through its expansion into the area of historical relief. It is not pure chance that this occurs at the same time in which the first historical inscriptions are known to us. The best example—also, unfortunately, almost the only example—is the so-called “Vulture Stela” of Eannatum of Lagash (fig. 61). A long text tells us about the history and the details of the border conflict between the centers of Lagash and Umma, which is also known to us from other sources. This text is accompanied by the pictorial representation of some of the high points of this conflict. The departure of several army units under the leadership of the ruler (the largest fragment from the stela, which is illustrated here); the taking of prisoners among the enemy by Ningirsu, the god of Girsu; the burial of the dead of Lagash; and vultures carrying away the limbs of dead enemies—hence the title given to the stela—are all scenes from the parts of the stela that are preserved. Unfortunately, these only make up just a third of the original relief surfaces. The individual pictures, like the method of composition as a whole, set individual scenes side by side as if they were a picture-sheet, with hardly any relation to each other. Neither the figures in a scene, nor the attributes of individual persons, nor the parts of the bodies are in any way related to one another in the way they are presented. The extreme example of this can be seen in the presentation of the phalanx marching behind the ruler. The number of heads which are visible above the wall of shields corresponds neither to the number of arms protruding from this wall and holding spears nor to the number of feet.
Since the stela was not found in the place where it was originally set up, it is difficult to say anything about its function. Judging by the contents of the inscription, it is the documentation of a battle that was supposed to set the seal on the final victory of Lagash over Umma. The fact that this was an illusion is shown by an inscription by Eannatum’s grandson, Entemena, who was also ruler of Lagash, which reports a resumption of the conflict. We may well assume that a period so full of internal political tensions that had a mode of expression like the historical relief surely made use of this medium to a greater extent than the surviving material lets us assume.
Figure 61. One side of the largest fragment of Eannatums “Stela of the Vultures” from Tello, dating from the Early Dynastic III period. From E. Strommenger and M. Hirmer, 5 Jahrtausende Mesopotamien (Munich, 1962), fig. 66. Courtesy, Hirmer Photoarchiv, Munich.
Interim results allow us to recognize the dilemma in which we find ourselves in dealing with a period from which the first completely historically evaluable written information is available, but that, as a whole, still lies in the realm of early writing. For the first time we think we can put a precise name to larger-scale relationships, only to be confronted immediately by tremendous restrictions because of our still inadequate material.
Naturally, i
n a case like this there is a great temptation to apply the statements made in such texts retroactively so as to fill in the gaps left by our lack of information. However, our knowledge is just sufficient to confirm that the vehemence of the changes in all areas was clearly so great, and the developments so varied and complex, that generalizations from texts that are only slightly more recent can only lead to errors of judgment.
If we now turn to the areas neighboring Babylonia, we encounter the same difficulties in an even more pronounced form because there the situation with regard to sources is even more inadequate. In most cases we can do no more than guess that these periods were as marked by violent changes and internal tensions as they were in Babylonia. One factor that makes the recovery of historical contexts even more impossible for the neighboring regions must be repeatedly considered. This is the practice of drawing conclusions from texts from one place or from finds in one excavation and applying them to a larger area or the whole region. Because of its collective dependence on the Euphrates as the source of its irrigation system, Babylonia was forced to move toward greater internal cooperation in spite of all its local differences. However, in contrast to this, centers in the flat areas of northern Mesopotamia and Syria, whose economies were based on extensive forms of agriculture, lay further apart and could thus unfold and develop far more independently of one another. Common factors thus only had to reach as far as was desired.
The Early History of the Ancient Near East (9000-2000 BC) Page 18