The Early History of the Ancient Near East (9000-2000 BC)

by Hans J Nissen

  In other areas, such as Anatolia or Iran, topographical difficulties like those represented by the high, dividing mountain chains were an additional factor. At the end of chapter 4, we saw how it was precisely these geographical differences that brought about the separate developments that affected Babylonia and the neighboring regions. Pushed in more than one respect by the external conditions, Babylonia was able to build up new, more effective forms of organization, and the continuous stream of new challenges that it faced furthered development. The neighboring regions, which were not as intensively confronted with new problems, saw no reason, and also no opportunity, to follow in Babylonia’s footsteps. The limited number of finds in these widely scattered areas might lead us to take the view that development stagnated in the neighboring areas and thus that the gap between Babylonia and these regions grew ever wider. However, this would quite definitely be a mistaken conclusion and a false interpretation of a gap in research. In any case, a few examples do show us that in the neighboring regions a further steady development did take place, visible to us first in the later part of the Early Dynastic period, that led to the flourishing of urban centers with characteristics that in every case allow us to point out a pronounced local development.

  The most important development took place in the Syrian area, as is evident in the magnificent finds from ancient Ebla. Here, a community that, according to all our criteria, must be called an urban center had reached such a level of organization by the time of the Early Dynastic III period that both writing and parts of its higher literature were taken over from Babylonia. The Babylonian writing system was also adapted for use in reproducing the Semitic language of Ebla. Writing was used for literary compositions and, above all, for keeping a record of business. Just as in the beginning of the development of writing in Babylonia, the forms of economic organization in Ebla had clearly become so complex that it required some written record. However, in assessing these parallels, we must not underestimate the effects of the example of Babylonian civilization. Writing was patently an integral part of that civilization, and this alone cried out for it to be imitated.

  In all of this, it must be noted first of all that what has been said about the high level of development in Ebla only holds good for the late phase of the Early Dynastic period because the written finds only stem from this period. The remains of earlier levels could only be excavated to a very limited extent, so that obviously nothing can be said about the degree of organization of the settlements in those periods, and it must inevitably appear to us as if the complexity of the phase that used writing was the consequence of a very rapid development. However, here we must once again refer back to what was said about the first appearance of writing in Babylonia. Writing first appears, or is first taken over, when a city’s own development has progressed so far that the introduction of writing solves urgent and already existing problems. Thus, the level of development, mainly in the economic sphere, but also in other aspects of the period before the introduction of writing, must have already been considerable. This means that we are completely justified in assuming that the Early Bronze II period at Ebla, which corresponds approximately to Early Dynastic II and III periods in Babylonia, and that is, as yet, hardly known to us from finds, was in no way as poorly developed as it may appear to have been at first glance.

  Figure 62. Isometric view of the late Early Dynastic III palace G at Ebla (Syria). Shaded areas are the find spots of the archives of texts. After P. Matthiae, I tesori di Ebla (Rome, 1984), pl. 6a, and G. Pettinato, Ebla, un impero inciso nell’ argilla (Rome, 1979), fig. II.1.

  How far this level of development can also be expected for other places in the Syrian area cannot yet be answered. The fact that no texts were found, for example, in the excavations at Hama and Tell Huera, which have revealed remains from the same period, cannot be used as a negative answer to this question. In Ebla it needed ten years of intensive work before the first written documents were found. Thus it is simply an exaggeration on the part of the excavators, albeit a legitimate one, when they take Ebla to be the center of Syria at that time.

  Unfortunately, in this area, the problem is not only that very few excavations have been carried out, but also that the processing of what has been found is still in its infancy. Thus, the question of what belongs to the line of local development in Ebla or Tell Huera and what can be traced back to Babylonian influence cannot yet be answered with any degree of satisfaction, although this is necessary in order to fix some sort of chronological bracketing with Babylonia. Moreover, we could speak more precisely about the relations between these two regions only if we had a basic knowledge of this chronological framework. Fascinated by the fact that in so distant a place as northern Syria objects have been found that undoubtedly originated in, or were influenced by, Babylonia, scholars have until now discussed only these obvious relationships, while giving insufficient attention to the independent local development. The question of a counter influence exerted on Babylonia by the civilization of the centers in the west has seldom been discussed, and then only with caution. Quite apart from the fact that such a reciprocal influence must have taken place, this question can clearly be answered in the affirmative, at least in one sector, that of literary composition. Among the texts from the Babylonian sites of Shuruppak and Abu Salabikh from the beginning of the Early Dynastic III period, there are a few we now identify very clearly as copies of Eblaitic originals. Likewise, as was noted earlier, the transformation of writing into an instrument by which complicated texts with all the nuances of spoken language could be written at the beginning of the Early Dynastic III period could only be achieved with the assistance of non-Sumerian-speaking groups. Among these, in addition to the early Akkadians in Babylonia itself, groups such as the Semitic Eblaites must definitely have played a part, because of the necessity in each case of transforming the system of writing in order to reproduce their own language. A more significant reciprocal influence can hardly be imagined, since it is only after the transformation of Babylonian writing that the texts begin to be our main source of information about Babylonian civilization. The fact that, for the time being, we have not been able to perceive any traces of this reciprocal influence in other spheres, such as, for example, in archaeological remains, is thus clearly the consequence of considerable gaps in our knowledge.

  According to evidence provided by pottery, the Anatolia of the Early Bronze period—as the period from the Early Dynastic I period through the period of the Third Dynasty of Ur is called in the terminology for Syria and Anatolia—had close commercial connections with the Syrian plains through a variety of pottery imports. However, the fact that we have hardly anything other than pottery for the Early Bronze II period—which corresponds approximately to the Early Dynastic II and III periods in Babylonia—already shows on what comparatively rough evidence any statements we make about this region must rest. The situation with regard to finds hardly allows us to draw any conclusions other than that on the whole we are clearly dealing with a continuous local development.

  This also seems to be confirmed by an observation we can make based on material from the Early Bronze III period, which corresponds to the Akkad and Ur III phases. By examining a succession of strata on the same sites, we are able in this period to determine a change in the concentration of power that can be detected archaeologically and is exhibited in the development of mansions of a sort that had not previously existed in this sense. We shall deal with this in chapter 6.

  The situation with regard to sources is equally inadequate for the western Iranian area, the Zagros region. Although remains from this period have been found in several places, in every case they were in such a limited area that only pottery is available for evaluation. From this evidence we may also reckon with a continuous local development in all fields. We do not find any visible signs for contacts with the western foreland plains in the data about the settlements, but we do know from other sources that such relationships must have existed. We
have already mentioned that Tepe Yahya in southern central Iran was clearly at this time a center for the production of relief vessels made of chlorite. Their unique appearance made possible the identification—as Iranian—of a succession of such vessels, which have been found at Babylonian sites in levels from the Early Dynastic period.

  The uncovering of cemeteries in Luristan, in the central Zagros area, has provided us with a second argument for close affiliations. The graves from the numerous cemeteries, which were often furnished with rich grave goods, probably define the areas in which copper was mined. Objects that stem from the chief area buying this raw material, Babylonia, are to be found here in large numbers and cover the whole period of Babylonian history from the Ubaid period onwards. A whole series of pieces imported from the Babylonia of the Early Dynastic II and III periods provide irrefutable evidence of the existence of very direct contacts.

  The two remaining areas, Susiana and northern Mesopotamia, again show very much closer contacts with Babylonia, even if in a different way. The decline of settlement in Susiana, which had already begun in the Uruk period, had reached the point in the Early Dynastic II period where only very few places were actually inhabited apart from Susa, which, judging from the central terrace uncovered there, was clearly still an important center. However, we can see how distant Susa was from the development in Babylonia from the almost complete lack of written evidence, apart from a few “line inscriptions,” which are not very productive for us, either in their numbers or in their content. At the end of the previous era—the Early Dynastic I period in Babylonian terms—the written tradition had ceased, and the tradition of painted pottery was revived. The latter had come to a complete standstill when the Babylonian unpainted pottery of the Late Uruk period had been taken over, but then a complete renunciation of Babylonian development becomes clearly visible. After this, in the late Early Dynastic period, the signs of direct Babylonian influence now begin to increase again.

  This new development is especially tangible in that, in the cylinder seals that now again begin to appear more frequently, the same graphic content is used as in Babylonia. Above all, the pictures are subject to the same changes as in Babylonia. Toward the end of this phase, in the Early Dynastic III period, but above all in the period following that, the time of the Akkad Dynasty, writing was now once again taken over from Babylonia. In contrast to the first occasion, during the period of early high civilization, it was not merely the idea of writing and its technique that was drawn upon in order to write Elamite with the aid of their own writing system. Language and writing were now both taken over. Thus, the texts in Susa were now composed in Sumerian, and somewhat later in Akkadian. A few texts in Elamite do, however, show that the Elamites also knew how to transcribe their own language. When we hear, at the time of the Akkad Dynasty, that Elam, with its capital Susa, was numbered among their permanent foreign possessions and when the ruler in Susa refers to himself in his own writings as servant of the ruler of Akkad, this is not really a new development, but could also describe the situation in the later Early Dynastic period.

  Conditions in northern Mesopotamia are different, and, for the time being, hardly accessible to us. In the foregoing period of early high civilization in Babylonia, local traditions and settlements influenced by southern Mesopotamia had coexisted. This component influenced by the south disappears, or is, at least after the Uruk period, no longer accessible to us, which may, however, be connected with the extremely poor situation as regards information. Local traditions such as, for example, the so-called Nineveh 5 pottery, with its characteristic style of painting, which was developed in the region, shape what is, on the whole, a rather vague image.

  It is a remarkable fact that this also holds true for the settlement of Nineveh, which provides us with our best examples of southern influence during the Late Uruk period, in the shape of Uruk pottery, bevel-rimmed bowls, and cylinder seals. Contacts with the south were certainly not broken off, in spite of the prominence of the older, local tradition. Thus we should not regard the late Early Dynastic period finds from levels H and G of the temple dedicated to the goddess Ishtar in Assur, which are for the most part—and this is specially true of the statues found there—unambiguously in the Babylonian tradition, as being as isolated as they now appear, but rather as a sign of these continuing contacts. But unfortunately our material is once again inadequate for more precise assessment of the development of northern Mesopotamia. At the risk of reading too much into the material, we might on the whole already see a tendency at work here that can only be confirmed later on. Of all Babylonia’s neighboring areas, only northern Mesopotamia—what was later Assyria—could perform and maintain the balancing act of continuing to participate in Babylonian development while at the same time maintaining some independence of its own. Whereas relations between Babylonia and other regions wavered between degrees of dependence and independence, relations between Babylonia and the north seem to have developed quietly and at a steady pace toward the state of distanced power-sharing that was later to govern the relationship between Babylonia and Assyria.

  With this treatment of Babylonia’s neighboring regions, our survey of the areas of the Near East is complete. Even if, unfortunately, it is also still filled with gaps that are all too large, we are at least left with the finding that there were considerable differences between the individual regions in cultural and economic development. Babylonia unambiguously represents the most highly developed form, so that, to our normally foreshortened way of viewing things, it might look as if Babylonia thus automatically also played the leading role politically. This is, however, erroneous. Although it may well be true that at times a direct imperial relationship existed for some of the regions immediately adjacent to Babylonia, such as northern Mesopotamia or Susiana, which always had a sort of love-hate relationship with Babylonia, the relationship between Babylonia and other regions of the Near East can hardly ever have been of that sort.

  Although it is not yet evident and cannot be pinpointed until the next phase of development, it is in the growth, during the Early Dynastic period, of centers of power outside Babylonia, which gradually acquired supraregional significance, that the kernel of the gradual decline of Babylonia’s position of preeminence is to be found. This may seem remarkable for a period in which Babylonia’s great invasions of neighboring regions for the sake of gaining more political power had yet to take place, but it is in no way as paradoxical as may at first appear.

  As will become clear in the following period with the conquests of the rulers of the Akkad and Ur Dynasties, it is precisely these invasions that demonstrate that it was now considered necessary to insist on a formerly unchallenged position of superiority. The attempts of these rulers to tie parts of the areas outside Babylonia politically with Babylonia itself did not thus mark the beginning of a phase in which Babylonia ruled the whole of the Near East. Rather, they signify the end of a period of preeminence for Babylonia. The neighboring areas became so fixed in their own forms of organization, linked, of course, with their own political ambitions, that in the final analysis Babylonia became only one center among many, some of which sometimes disposed of even greater power. Finally, Hammurapi’s Babylon was only protected from the new powers, which were advancing ever closer, by the protective mantle of a few buffer states. Misjudging the situation, Hammurapi conquered these buffer states and thus destroyed the protective shield, with the resultant loss of Babylonia’s position of preeminence. This spurred on the Hittite ruler Murshili to make war on Babylonia, thus ending the dynasty of Hammurapi. However, this was only the overt ending of a shift in power in the Near East that had already been long in the offing.

  SIX

  The Period of the First Territorial States (ca. 2350–2000 B.C.)

  We have thus far, in considering individual periods, been able to establish that in spite of all the differences and changes, which at times give the impression of an interruption of the tradition, there was on the whole a
n unbroken tradition in Babylonia. However, with the founding of the Akkad Dynasty, fundamental changes were apparent in more than one sphere, so that we may speak with some justification of a break with the past. In fact, the indications make it easy to regard all the differences from the foregoing Early Dynastic period as individual elements in one great change. It seems all too clear here that the contrast consists in the fact that, just as it seems justifiable to connect the civilization of the Early Dynastic period closely with the Sumerian ethnic group (hence the use of the term “Old Sumerian” for the Early Dynastic period), it seems accurate to associate the completely different style of the period of the Akkad Dynasty with the new holders of political power, the semitic Akkadians. It thus seems simple enough to reduce all the differences to the contrasts between Sumerians and Akkadians.

  The difference was substantial. Instead of rulers with Sumerian names, we are suddenly confronted with rulers with Akkadian names. Instead of the use of the Sumerian language in literary and economic texts, we now find the almost exclusive use of Akkadian. Instead of a large number of city-states, there was now a territorial state with Akkad as its capital. Instead of trade relationships and trading partly connected with individual centers, efforts were now made to draw trade to the city of Akkad by means of an import monopoly. Instead of clumsy, illproportioned human figures in art, slim, well-proportioned forms are depicted that display anatomical details. In place of the inhibition about leaving even the smallest portion of the surface area of a picture empty, we now find the intentional inclusion of empty background as a part of the composition. In place of a paratactic ordering of the elements in larger compositions, an attempt was now made to represent the relationships between the characters pictorially.