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Social Ideology and the Uruk Phenomenon Paul Thomas Collins Phd University College London

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Social Ideology and the Uruk Phenomenon Paul Thomas Collins Phd University College London Social Ideology and the Uruk Phenomenon Paul Thomas Collins PhD University College London Abstract From the middle of the fourth millennium BC the Uruk culture of south Mesopotamia expanded into the neighbouring areas of the Zagros Mountains, Syria and southeastern Anatolia, interacting with local societies by implanting settlements. The new interregional relations were partly the result of structural changes which had taken place throughout the region. However, the new Uruk settlements were created on the basis of a strong social ideology which may have emerged at the same time. While prehistoric cognitive systems cannot be reconstructed, the symbolic, ideological and cosmological systems (which together represent a social ideology) can be reconstructed and interpreted scientifically. Several lines of evidence suggest that the Uruk social ideology was an exaggerated version of the dualism apparent in later historic Mesopotamia - a contrast between ‘civilization’ and nature. The Uruk world was a society which valued an extreme normative order combined with control over the world. The elite managed such order by a rejection of the outside world and the exclusion of all non-Uruk social ideologies. This was maintained through the apparatus of redistribution, pilgrimages to ritual centres with offerings, and the control of nature expressed in architecture, iconography, ceramics and urbanization. The fourth millennium witnessed the large scale exploitation of resources throughout greater Mesopotamia and the southern expansion was almost certainly driven by the demands of the Uruk elite (though not chiefly for rare materials). There is no evidence that the Uruk settlements represent colonization, as in the European systems of recent centuries. Nor were they founded primarily as trading centres like the early second millennium BC Assyrian colonies in Anatolia, or created through military domination as under the late third millennium BC Agade rulers. By viewing the Uruk phenomenon as embodying a specific social ideology it is possible to suggest reasons for the appearance and, relatively abrupt, disappearance of the cultural implantation beyond Babylonia and the implications this had for the emergence of historic Mesopotamia. List of contents Page Number 1. Introduction 6. 2. Social Ideology and Archaeology 11. 2.1. Social Ideology 11. 2.2. Ideology, complex society, and archaeology 14. 2.3 Theories of social transformation and ideology 22. 3. Factors effecting the emergence of a social ideology with reference to fourth millennium BC Mesopotamia. 26. 3.1. Physical environment 27. 3.1.1. South Mesopotamia 28. 3.1.2. North Mesopotamia 30. 3.2. Social organization 31. 3.2.1. The family 31. 3.2.2. Too many chiefs? 33. 3.2.2.1. South Mesopotamia 3.2.2.11. North Mesopotamia 3.2.3. The ideology of third millennium Mesopotamia 39. 3.2.3.1. Kingship 3.2.3.11. Religious belief 3.2.4. Summary 3.3. Communication 46. 3.4. Population movement/growth 49. 3.4.1. Population and technology 52. 3.4.1.1. Agricultural developments 3.4.1.11. Ceramic production 3.4.1.iii. Metals 4. Chronology 57. 4.1. Geographical regions 59. 4.1.1. Southern Plain (Babylonia) 4.1.2. Northern regions 4.1.21 Middle Euphrates 4.1.2.ii. Upper Euphrates 4.1.2.iii. Habur 4!.2.iv. North Jazira 4.1.3. Iran 5. Society and material 69. 5.1. Monumental building 73. 5.2. Uruk Sites 74. 5.3. Settlement layout 98. 5.4. Organization of monumental architecture 100. 5.4.1. Platforms 100. 5.4.2. Orientation 102. 5.4.3. Standard units of measurement 104. 5.4.4. Building Materials 105. 5.4.4.1. Stone and gypsum 5.4.4.11. Mud brick 5.4.4.iii. Bitumen 5.4.5. Decoration 107. 5.4.5.1. Buttresses and niches 5.4.5.11. Cone mosaic Page Number 5.4.5.111. Paint decoration 5.5. Domestic architecture 112. 5.6. Associated indicators of a common ideology 114. 5.6.1. Pottery and food 114. 5.6.2. Images of ideology 120. 5.6.2.1. Seals and sealings 5.6.2.ii. Sculpture 5.6.2.111. Prestige vessels 6. Factors effecting and affecting the spread of a social ideology 131. 6.1. Management, administration and economy 131. 6.1.1. Seals and sealings 6.1.2. Tags, tablets and bullae 6.2. Trade and economy 141. 6.2.1. Trade 6.2.2. Economy 6.3. Urbanization 147. 6.4 Warfare 149. 7. Summary and conclusions 154. 7.1. The background to a social ideology 7.2. The social ideology 7.3. Uruk organization 7.4. The nature of power within the Uruk world 7.5. The Uruk expansion 7.6. The end of the Uruk phenomenon 7.7. The legacy of the Uruk phenomenon 7.8. Theoretical review 7.9 Future research References 170. Dlustrations Fig. 1.1. Fourth millennium BC sites mentioned in the text 10. 4.1. Range of Uruk ceramics 60. 5.1. Uruk sites of chapter 5 75. 5.2. The Uruk Mound, Abu Salabikh 76. 5.3. Uqair platform 79. 5.4. White Temple B-D 81. 5.5. Habuba Kabira Slid 84. 5.6. Tell Qannas 86 . 5.7. Jebel Aruda temple development 87. 5.8. Sheikh Hassan (level 6 and 7) 88 . 5.9. Sheikh Hassan 89. 5.10. ‘temple’ level 6 Sheikh Hassan 89. 5.11. ‘temple’ level 6 Sheikh Hassan 89. 5.12. Hassak Hoyiik 93. 5.13. Arslantepe Period VII 93. 5.14. Arslantepe Period VIA 94. 5.15. Tell Brak Eye Temple 95. 5.16. Godin Tepe level 5 97. Page Number 5.17. Uruk architectural forms 112. 5.18. ‘Mittelsaalhaus’ level 8 and 9 Sheikh Hassan 113. 5.19-22. Uruk glyptic 122. 5.23. Uruk glyptic 125. 5.24-25. Uruk figures from Susa 125. 5.26. Uruk glyptic 125. 5.27. Sculpture o f‘Priest King’ 126. 5.28. The Warka Vase relief 128. 6.1-2. Seals and impressions from Susa and Warka 152. Tables Table 1. Settled area during the Uruk Period 50. Table 2. Chronology of principle fourth millennium sites 68. Table 3. Orientation of Uruk monumental buildings 103. Table 4. Distribution of late fourth millennium accounting tools 138. Acknowledgments I would like to thank all those whose support and encouragement have made this thesis possible. First and foremost, my thanks go to Harriet Crawford for supervising the work over many years and patiently offering invaluable advice and criticisms. I am also grateful for the discussions with and advice from Fekri Hassan. My own continuing education students at Birkbeck College and Oxford University have contributed to the rich debate about the puzzles of the Uruk phenomenon for which I am very grateful. Other people have offered support in many different ways. Thanks are due to the staff of the British Museum’s Education Service, especially John Reeve and George Hart, and the Western Asiatic Department, in particular John Curtis. The help and encouragement of all my friends, particularly my erstwhile colleges of the BM’s Information service, has been invaluable. Finally, the greatest debt is to my parents and family. Without their constant support this thesis would never have been completed. Any remaining errors are entirely my own Social Ideology and the Uruk Phenomenon. "What happened? Fourth millennium specialists have a tendency to hide under their desks if they think that someone might ask them this question." (Johnson 1987: 126). 1. Introduction It has long been recognised that urban society and states arose first on the southern alluvial plains of Mesopotamia during the fourth millennium BC. This Uruk culture represents a development which emerges around 4000 BC in the form of a fusion of elements from regional traditions, resulting in a much more homogeneous material culture, so that sites can be recognized with little difficulty as Uruk. The common features that emerge relate to a dramatic development in the forms of social interaction and control. From around 3600 BC, this transformation was achieved over an area not matched again for over another millennium. Essentially, the area forms an arc running from Susa to the southern alluvial plain of Sumer, along the Euphrates and through north Syria to Brak, with connections onto Nineveh (Fig. 1.1). An understanding of the period has been influenced by a reliance on excavations in southern Mesopotamia which, although producing spectacular results, were limited in terms of space (primarily the site of Warka), nature (ceremonial buildings), and time (the major material dating to the second half of the fourth millennium BC). The picture that emerged of the region, essentially based on surface surveys, was one of increasing urbanisation and four tier hierarchies of settlement associated with monumental architecture, art, and accounting systems which would develop into writing. However, in the last thirty years knowledge of developments in north Mesopotamia has revolutionised perceptions of this period and it is now clear that a long tradition of complex society, including monumental architecture and accounting systems, existed parallel with the developing southern culture. With a few exceptions, (e.g., Fangipane 1993a,1997; Lupton 1996; Oates 1993; Stein 1994, 1996), the appreciation of the importance of the new material from north Mesopotamia has been diluted by a continuing emphasis on the south with its eventual move into history which appears to give a more accessible entry into ancient Mesopotamian civilisation. Studies have approached the problem of the genesis of the southern ‘Sumerian’ civilisation and the emergence of city-states from a variety of directions, including: the growth of urbanism (Adams 1981; Adams and Nissen 1972); the development of complex administration (Johnson 1987); social and political stratification (Zagarell 1986); interregional trade (Wright and Johnson 1975); economic exploitation of less developed areas (Algaze 1989; 1993); warfare (Wright et al 1975); and, the more traditional prime movers, agricultural intensification and population growth (Smith and Young 1972) and climatic change (Hole 1994).
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