Before the Islamic State: The Archaeologies of Ancient Mesopotamia MWF 1-1:50pm, Rhode Island Hall 008 6. End of the Neolithic Period The Neolithic Revolution: transformations of prehistoric societies (Pre-pottery Neolithic 9600-7000 BC Pottery Neolithic 7000-6000 BC) • New social relations in the context of the settled life: political contestation, family rivalry etc. Neolithicization as socialization. • New conceptions of the landscape: now partially cultivated, not entirely hostile environment • Beyond the hunt: Changing relationships between animals and humans. Domestication of sheep and goat, cattle... •Agricultural technologies: domestication of wheat and barley, legumes... •Pottery technologies: discovery of possibilities of clay, with the rising need of long term storage of footstuffs. •Architectural technologies: mudbrick building with extensive use of wood. Mud, mudbrick, pise. Cladding techniques such as plastering, white-washing, wall paintings. Three-dimesnional cult imagery incorporated into the architectonics of the house. Neolithic house as a space where most daily practices concentrate. •Textile production. •Figurines: stone, bone, clay. •Emergence of representationality through multiple media: textile patterns, pottery decoration, figurines, architectural sculpture, wall paintings... •New burial practices: intramural or in cemeteries. Deposition of grave goods. Differentiation of burials according to social status, age, gender, etc. Tell Sabi Abyad Tell Sabi Abyad II, ca. 7,000 BC Why study pottery? 1) Dating evidence 2) Distributional evidence, e.g., trade 3) Evidence for status and/or function Or, When? Where? For what? Why study pottery? 1) Dating evidence Seriation by F. Petrie Tell Baqrta, Iraq (Kurdistan) Surface collection Why study pottery? 2) Distributional evidence Early Transcaucasion Culture, 3rd mill. Why study pottery? 3) Evidence for status and/or function 15th C cauldrons from the Netherlands, bronze (left) and a ceramic skeuomorph (right) Iron Age ‘gadroon’ vessels from the ancient Near East V. Gordon Childe (1892-1957) and the Neolithic Revolution - Change in subsistence from hunter-gatherer society to agriculture - Domestication of plant and animal species - Change from mobility to sedentarism: villages and towns - Increase in population densities - Development of social hierarchies, specialized labor, political hierarchies, ideology, etc. - Invention of pottery to help cope with surplus food - “Ex orient lux” Odai Yamamoto Odai Yamamoto - 46 earthenware sherds - Dates to ca. 16,000 BP! - ‘Incipient Jōmon’ The Emerging Common Ground - Pottery predated agriculture and sedentarism by several millennia, well past the Neolithic/Holocene and into the Paleolithic/Pleistocene - Pottery is first associated with people leading hunter-gatherer lifestyles(!) - The knowledge of pottery technology existed long before it took off as a common feature of daily life - Pottery emerged either independently at roughly the same time in Japan, Far East Russia, and China; or, one of those three influencing the others - The Neolithic package model is wrong—but it’s still ex orient lux! Hassuna/Samarra: ca. 6500-6000 BC Hassuna Pottery “Samarra” pottery, late 7th mill. Halaf: ca. 6000-5200 BC A Tholos-style House Tholos House Reconstructed Polychrome Halaf Pottery.