In the beginning: Marhashi and the origins of Magan’s ceramic industry in the third millennium...

7/27/2019 In the beginning: Marhashi and the origins of Magans ceramic industry in the third millennium BC (DT Potts, 2005

1/12

In the beginning: Marhashi and the origins ofMagans ceramic industry in the thirdmillennium BC

IntroductionSeveral years ago, while conducting fieldwork in theJaz Muriyan basin of southeastern Iran, Hamideh

Choubak of the Iranian Cultural Heritage Organiza-tion (now Iranian Cultural Heritage & TourismOrganization) first uncovered the systematic lootingof a cemetery in the Jiroft plain (Fig. 1) which hassince attracted headlines around the world (1). Herperseverance led to the surrender by local residentsof large quantities of already looted objectsalabas-ter, ceramic and metal vessels, stamp seals, andabove all the elaborately carved serie ancienne orintercultural style soft-stone vesselswhich werepublished last year in a catalogue by Y. Majidzadeh(2). Comparable material was already well known

from excavations at Tepe Yahya (3), from numeroussites outside Iran (4) and from the art market (5). Themassive quantity from the Jiroft, and the proximityof the latter plain to Tepe Yahya, the only produc-tion centre yet identified (6), strongly suggests thatthe industry was indigenous to this region. But wecan go further and use this material to identify theancient name of this corner of southeastern Iran.Twenty years ago the Sumerologist Piotr Steinkellersuggested that the stone known in cuneiformsources as marh

6asu/marh

6usu took its name from

the geographical name Marhashi, denoting south-east Iranian soft stone (7). Moreover, he pointed tothe presence of two carved soft-stone vessel frag-

mentsone of unknown provenance in the Perga-mon Museum, Berlin (8) (Fig. 2) and one fromWoolleys excavations at Ur (9) (Fig. 3)which wereinscribed by the Old Akkadian king Rimush withthe text: Rimush, king of Kish, the slayer of Elamand Marhashi (Fig. 4). At the time Steinkeller raisedthe very likely possibility that both vessels had beentaken as booty from Marhashi, and this inference isalmost certainly confirmed by the shared decorationon the Berlin fragment and on numerous pieces fromthe Jiroft (Fig. 5). Southeastern Iranat least thatpart as far west as Tepe Yahya and as far east as the

Jiroft plaincan therefore be identified with ancientMarhashi (10). How far to the north, south, east andwest Marhashi may have extended is unknown atthis time.

Of course it has long been recognised that largenumbers of similar soft-stone vessels circulated inthe Gulf region as well. By far the greatest concen-tration comes from Tarut island in eastern SaudiArabia (11). In contrast, just a few pieces have turnedup over the years in the Oman peninsula. Theseinclude one fragment from a third-millennium

Ceramics from the Jiroft plain in southeastern Iran are compared withmaterial of Umm an-Nar-type dating to the mid- and late third millenniumBC in the Oman Peninsula. Technological and stylistic comparisons suggestthe strong possibility that potters from the Iranian side of the Straits ofHormuz may have been the instigators of Magans earliest ceramic industry.

Keywords: Iran, Oman, Ceramics, Bronze Age, Umm an-Nar

D.T. PottsUniversity of Sydney,Australia

Department of Archaeology, Univer-sity of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia.e-mail: [email protected]

Arab. arch. epig. 2005: 16: 6778 (2005)

Printed in Singapore. All rights reserved

67


2/12

grave on Umm an-Nar island (12) (Fig. 6) and sixfragments (five of which come from one vessel)from a second-millennium grave at Sharm in theEmirate of Fujairah (13) (Fig. 7). Additionally, two

very fine, complete vessels were discovered onBahrain in tombs at Saar (14) (Fig. 8) and al-Hajjar(15) (Fig. 9). Yet if the distribution of soft-stonevessels in the Oman peninsula and northeasternArabia attests to relations between Marhashi, Maganand Dilmun (of which Tarut was almost certainly apart), then it is equally true that the distribution ofceramics does as well. The ceramic evidence, more-over, points in the direction of an unexpected

insight.

Ceramic problemsCeramics have been interpreted as indicators of tiesbetween southeastern Iran and southeastern Arabiaever since Knud Thorvildsen recognised the strikingsimilarities between black-on-grey ware vesselsfrom the tombs on Umm an-Nar island and materialexcavated and collected on survey in IranianBaluchistan by Sir Aurel Stein during the early

Fig. 2.

VA 5298 in the Pergamon Museum, Berlin showing a snake

entwined around and attacking a feline, facing right (after

Klengel & Klengel, Zum Fragment: Abb. 1.

Fig. 3.U.231 from Ur (after Woolley L. The early periods. Philadelphia:

Ur Excavations, 4: 1956: Pl. 36).

Fig. 1.Map showing southeastern Iran and the Oman peninsula with

the main sites mentioned in the text. A Jiroft plain. B Tepe

Yahya. C Tell Abraq. D Umm an-Nar. E Hili/Jabal Hafit.

D.T. POTTS

68


3/12

1930s (16). To that extent, the discovery of yet more

material in the Jiroft with obvious parallels in theOman peninsula could be said to merely add to analready extant body of material illustrative of thisfact. What I wish to do here, however, is toreconsider the entire topic of ceramic origins insoutheastern Arabia in light of these strong parallels,asking the question, why do such strong parallelsexist between the ceramics of the Umm an-Narperiod and those of southeastern Iran? And whatis their particular significance in light of thewell-known archaeological record of ties between

southeastern Arabia and other regions? To beginwith, however, a brief review of what we knowabout ceramic origins in the region is necessary.

The prehistoric occupation of both coastal andinland southeastern Arabia has been investigated forroughly thirty years. Excavations at Ras al-Hamra(17); investigations around Al Ain (18) and in theWadi Wutayya (19); survey and sondage on theU.A.E. coast and offshore islands (20); and ongoingwork at Jabal Buhays (21) in the interior ofSharjahto name just a few of the more prominent

Fig. 6.

Mat-weave soft-stone fragment from tomb IX on Umm an-Nar

island (after al-Tikriti, Reconsideration of the late fourth and third

millennium BC.: Pl. 154B).

Fig. 4.

Text of Rimush inscribed on VA 5298 (after Klengel & Klengel,Zum Fragment: Abb. 3).

Fig. 5.

Complete soft-stone vessel from the Jiroft showing a snakeattacking a feline, facing left (after Majidzadeh, The earliest

Oriental civilization: 80; height 10 cm, rim dia. 16.5 cm).

MARHASHI AND THE ORIGINS OF MAGANS CERAMIC INDUSTRY

69


4/12

projectshave given us a wealth of data on life in thesixth and fifth (and less so the fourth) millennia BC.As the Uerpmanns have stressed, the earliest, mid-dle-Holocene inhabitants of the region arrivedand it is fairly clear they cannot have beenindigenous as there is no Palaeolithic or earlyHolocene evidence of occupationfrom another partof the Near East, bringing with them domesticatedsheep and goat (22). Similarities between the Qatar Bblade-arrowhead industry and Levantine lithic typesfirst suggested to Peder Mortensen many years ago

that a connection with the North Arabian-Syriandesert region was likely (23), and indeed the Uer-pmanns continue to see the southern Levant as themost likely source of the core population that arrivedwith domestic ovicaprids, stressing the fact thateastern Arabia lies well outside the natural habitat ofthe wild progenitors of either sheep or goat and that

both species must therefore have been introduced.Yet if a broadly Levantine/North Arabian originfor the earliest population of southeastern Arabia iscorrect (24), that population is unlikely to have beenmade up largely of town dwellers. Rather, they aremuch more likely to have been aceramic herders andhunter-gatherers. This is likely if only because, by60005000 BC, the use of ceramics was widespreadin the Levant. Yet it is clear that the vast majority ofmiddle-Holocene sites in southeastern Arabia areaceramic. No Levantine Chalcolithic ceramics haveappeared on sites anywhere in eastern Arabia.

Having said that, a small number of sites do showevidence of ceramics, albeit imported from southernMesopotamia rather than the southern Levant. Thepottery in question is of so-called Ubaid type, as firstdefined in southern Iraq (25).

A sizable literature has grown up in recent yearswhich examines and seeks to explain the diffusion ofUbaid pottery from sites like Ur and the eponymousal-Ubaid in southern Iraq to sites in Kuwait, easternSaudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar and the islands andcoast of the U.A.E. (26) Leaving aside the underlying

Fig. 9.Soft-stone vessel from al-Hajjar, Bahrain (after Lombard, ed.

Bahrain, the civilisation of the two seas: 93, no. 88.

Fig. 7.

Soft-stone vessel from Sharm, emirate of Fujairah (afterZiolkowski. The soft stone vessels: Fig. 1.

Fig. 8.

Soft-stone vessel from Saar, Bahrain (after Ministry of Informa-

tion. Calendar 1993. State of Bahrain, December).

D.T. POTTS

70


5/12

reasons for this diffusion, several points which relatespecifically to ceramics and ceramic manufacture areof particular interest. First, whenever analyses have

been undertaken, the result has always been thesame: the well-(often over)fired pottery with its clearparallels to Ubaid 24 material from southernMesopotamia is not just similar, rather it is compos-itionally identical to material from sites in Iraq,suggesting that all of it was imported (27). Second,only in northeastern Arabia (Eastern Province ofSaudi Arabia) and Kuwait do we find sherds of acoarse red ware which are compositionally distinctfrom the imported pottery with which it is associ-ated (28). Given the fact that this type of coarse redware is unknown in southern Iraq, and that kiln

wasters of this red ware were found at Dosariyah(29), it is safe to assume that this pottery wasmade locally (30). That it was made by visitingMesopotamians seems unlikely, particularly giventhe ceramic technology employed, strikingly differ-ent from what we find in contemporary southernMesopotamia. That it was possibly made by indi-genous, east Arabians (descendants of the earlierLevantine migrants), seeking to make ceramic con-tainers using local clays that would be functionally,if not stylistically, similar to the foreign Ubaid

vessels which reached the area, seems prima faciemore likely. However, the small quantity of suchmaterial and its very restricted distribution obligesone to draw two conclusions: 1) contact betweenaceramic east Arabians and their ceramic-usingMesopotamian neighbours did not result in technol-ogy transfer; 2) the experimental attempt to produceceramics (coarse red ware) locally was not sustainedand did not lead to the burgeoning of a localindustry. Thus, the first episode of ceramic contactbetween eastern Arabia and the outside world was,from an evolutionary perspective, unproductive.

Chronologically, the second episode of ceramiccontact involving southeastern Arabia is probablyindicated by the discovery, at Ras al-Hamra in thecapital area of Muscat, of a fragmentary, carinatedvessel of burnished grey ware, fragments of whichwere recovered between 1982 and 1985. Although Ioriginally queried whether this should indeed bedated to the fourth millennium BC, as suggested bythe excavators (31), let us assume for the sake ofargument that it is correctly dated. More than twodecades after its discovery, this vessel remains the

sole example of its kind. As in the case of the Ubaidcontact, the presence of the burnished grey ware atRas al-Hamra led nowhere from an evolutionary

point of view. It could well be that, unlike the Ubaiddiffusion which probably involved the actual move-ment of people, the burnished grey ware vessel wasnot brought by someone from southeastern Iran whounderstood ceramic manufacture. It may have beenacquired by a native of coastal Oman, by whatevermeans, arriving as a curiosity in an aceramiccommunity incapable of reproducing it or of recon-structing either the ceramic technology behind itsmanufacture or the pyrotechnology involved in itsfiring. Again, we seem to be faced with an evolu-tionary cul-de-sac, at least as far as ceramics go.

The third ceramic contact episode occurred at theend of the fourth millennium BC. Tombs of Hafittype, principally around Jabal Hafit but also at Jabalal-Emalah in the interior of Sharjah, have yielded anumber of squat, carinated jars which have longbeen compared with finds of Jamdat Nasr date fromsouthern Mesopotamia (32). Compositional analysesby Sophie Mery have confirmed that each of thevessels analysed is in fact of Mesopotamian origin(33). As no non-local ceramics co-occur with thesefinds in the Hafit graves (contemporary settlement

sites are still lacking), it must be concluded that thisthird episode of ceramic contact was, like the firsttwo, unproductive in an evolutionary sense.

Finally, the fourth ceramic contact episode whichwe can identify dates to the middle of the thirdmillennium BC. Typical southern Mesopotamianstorage jars of Early Dynastic III type appear onUmm an-Nar island (34) and, with lugs, at Hili 8(35). Most probably they were sent to southeasternArabia containing a liquid, perhaps oil, after whichthey were discarded. Neither from the perspective ofshape nor through the technology of manufacture

did these vessels make an impact locally. Further-more, the fact that some ended up in graves isintriguing. This may be an indication of the fact thatonce emptied of their original contents they wereconsidered unsuited to local utilitarian functionsand yet too exotic or symbolically valuable to simplythrow away.

On Umm an-Nar the Mesopotamian storagejars occurred together with a range of other pot-tery vessels. These included material whichcompositional analyses suggest was imported from


71


6/12

southeastern Iranincised grey ware and black-on-grey wareas well as typical Umm an-Nar-stylesandy reddish/orange and fine black-on-orange

wares. Merys analyses have shown that the lattertwo categories were made of local clays. Thus, allindications are that by the middle of the thirdmillenniumED II-III times in Mesopotamian chro-nological termsa local ceramic tradition hademerged in southeastern Arabia.

What do these observations mean? In essence,they mean that over 2000 years of contact betweenthe peoples of southeastern Arabia and the ceramic-using societies around them had failed to effecteither a transfer of technology to locals interested inceramic manufacture or the immigration and settle-

ment of foreign potters capable of starting a newtradition in what was otherwise an aceramic part ofthe Near East. The arrival of Ubaid ceramics,burnished grey ware from southeastern Iran, JamdatNasr pottery and Early Dynastic storage vessels allfailed to kick-start a local ceramic industry. I shallnot speculate on why this was the case, but clearlythere must have been no need for the sorts of firedcontainers then current in other parts of the NearEast. What sorts of containers made of perishablematerialsperhaps of basketry or woodmay have

existed we do not know.At any event, the failure of these early instances ofceramic contact to spark a local industry means thatwhen the earliest Umm an-Nar ceramics, which wesee clearly in the graves and settlement on Umman-Nar itself (36), were produced, this productionoccurred in a cultural milieu which, althoughexposed to Mesopotamian shapes and ceramic tech-nology in the form of the Early Dynastic storage jars,had no history of ceramic manufacture. In manyother parts of the Near East one can clearly chart theevolution of ceramics from the Neolithic onwards.

Not so in southeastern Arabia. I submit that theshapes, decorations and manufacturing techniquesof the earliest Umm an-Nar ceramic repertoirepresuppose an experienced and knowledgeablecommunity of potters. It is hardly credible that theyrepresent the first efforts of local potters and it isindefensible as an hypothesis when we consideragain just how close the technical, formal anddecorative resemblances are with the ceramics ofsoutheastern Iran where ceramics had been madesince the Neolithic (37). In short, I believe we must

conclude that the ceramic industry of the Umman-Nar period was started by migrant potters fromsoutheastern Iran. Moreover, I believe that the recent

discoveries in the Jiroft lend this conclusion addi-tional, robust support.

Jirofti ceramics and the Umm an-Nar traditionAs noted above, the very close similarities betweenfinds from the Umm an-Nar graves and sites insoutheastern Iran were first noted over forty yearsago. These correspondences, by themselves, mayindicate nothing more than trade. After all, Merysanalyses have shown that the black-on-grey andincised grey vessels found at a number of sites in

southeastern Arabia were all, in fact, manufacturedin southeastern Iran. Indeed, the material publishedby Majidzadeh includes three black-on-grey canis-ters of Bampur type (Figs 1012) which displaydecorative elements (stylised palm trees, hatchedMs, vertically hatched isosceles triangles) all foundon a vessel from the late Umm an-Nar tomb at TellAbraq (Figs 1314) and although the Tell Abraqexemplar has not been analysed, it is difficult toavoid the conclusion that it was an import (38).

Fig. 10.

Black-on-grey canister from Jiroft (after Majidzadeh, The earliest

Oriental civilization: 162; height 10.8 cm, rim dia. 9.2 cm).

D.T. POTTS

72


7/12

On the other hand, the squat canister is a shapewhich is far from common, generally speaking,across the Near East. The squat body, sharply

carinated, high shoulder and short, everted rim alsoappear in the local Umm an-Nar repertoire, but thepresumption must be that the direction of influence

Fig. 11.Black-on-grey canister from Jiroft (after Majidzadeh, The earliest


Fig. 12.

Black-on-grey canister from Jiroft (after Majidzadeh, The earliest


Fig. 13.Black-on-grey canister (TA 2209) from Tell Abraq (height

10.22 cm, rim dia. 8.04 cm, base dia. 10.134 cm).

Fig. 14.

Drawing of black-on-grey canister (TA 2209) from Tell Abraq.


73


8/12


9/12

some of the recently published material from theJiroft closely paralleled Umm an-Nar vessels, andthat the Jirofti specimens were made of what

Fig. 17.Black-on-orange jar (SM 3072) from Jabal Emalah (after Benton &

Potts, Jabal al-Emalah: Fig. 70; height 10.8 cm, rim dia. 6.2 cm,

base dia. 4.5 cm).

Fig. 18.

Black-on-grey jar from Jiroft (after Majidzadeh, The earliest

Oriental civilization: 161; height 7 cm, rim dia. 7.4 cm).

Fig. 19.Black-on-orange jar from Jiroft (after Majidzadeh, The earliest


Fig. 20.

Black-on-orange jar from Jiroft (after Majidzadeh, The earliest

Oriental civilization: 163; height 10.8 cm, rim dia. 5 cm).


75


10/12

analyses of comparable pieces have shown was alocal black-on-grey tradition, that the likelihood ofMarhashi being the source of Magans (at leastwestern Magans) ceramic industry became virtuallyunavoidable. We can see, moreover, that in addition

to potters moving into southeastern Arabia, trademust have continued across the Straits of Hormuz,for there are more and more vessels which seem tobe southeast Iranian imports in Umm an-Nar con-texts, not to mention of course the smaller numbersof serie ancienne or intercultural style soft stonefound in the Gulf region. At the same time, a vesselsuch as Figure 22, a fine orange canister on whichthe original black decoration has been almost totallyeffaced, looks very much like an Umm an-Nar typewhich has travelled in the opposite direction, fromMagan to Marhashi (40). Naturally only analyses

will tell if these attributions are correct. The mainpoint of this article, however, has been to under-score the observation that a ceramic industry of thesort we see in the Umm an-Nar period in the Omanpeninsula does not spring sui generis where littleexposure to foreign ceramic imports and no evi-dence of a prior industry exist. An external stimu-lusin the form of potters from southeastern Iransettling in the regionseems the best explanationfor the technological and stylistic sophistication seenin the Umm an-Nar ceramic repertoire from itsinception.

Fig. 22.

Orange (black paint no longer visible) canister from Jiroft (after

Majidzadeh, The earliest Oriental civilization: 163; height 12.8 cm,

rim dia. 5.7 cm).

Fig. 21.Black-on-orange jar (JE 2523) from Jabal Emalah (after Benton &

Potts, Jabal al-Emalah: Fig. 61; height 11.6 cm, rim broken, base

dia. 4.3 cm).

References1. See e.g. Lawler A. Rocking the cradle.

Smithsonian 35/2: 2004: 4048;Covington R. Irans archeologicalRenaissance. Saudi Aramco World Sept/Oct: 2004: 811.

2. Majidzadeh Y. Jiroft: The earliest Orien-tal civilization. Tehran: Printing andPublishing Organization of the

Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guid-ance, 2003.

3. See particularly Lamberg-KarlovskyCC. The Intercultural Style carvedvessels. IrAnt 23: 1988: 4595.

4. E.g. Kohl PL. The balance of trade insouthwestern Asia in the mid-thirdmillennium BC. Current Anthropology19: 1978: 463492; Potts TF.

Mesopotamia and the East: An archaeolo-gical and historical study of foreign rela-tions 34002000 BC. Oxford: OxfordUniversity Committee for ArchaeologyMonograph, 37: 1994, both withextensive earlier bibliography.

5. E.g. Pittman H. Art of the Bronze Age:Southeastern Iran, Western Central Asia

D.T. POTTS

76


11/12

and the Indus Valley. New York: Met-ropolitan Museum of Art, 1984.

6. Despite the analyses of material fromTarut (Kohl PL, Harbotte G & Sayre EV.

Physical and chemical analyses of soft-stone vessels from Southwest Asia.Archaeometry 21: 1979: 131159), I amnot convinced that it was a productioncentre ofserie ancienne soft stone duringthe third millennium. To begin with, aglance at the catalogue of soft-stonefinds from Tarut (Zarins J. Steatitevessels in the Riyadh Museum. Atlal 2:1978: 6593) shows that the bulldozingand sand mining on Tarut which ori-ginally brought the soft-stone findsthere to light revealed a large amountof later third-millennium Omani (serie

recente) as well as Hellenistic material.Just as the Omani material is demon-strably imported from the Oman pen-insula, where production wasprodigious, I cannot see that the serieancienne, so strikingly similar to theTepe Yahya and Jiroft material, couldbe anything but southeast Iranian inorigin. The alleged semi-finished andraw pieces of soft stone could well be ofHellenistic date. Furthermore, the x-raydiffraction analyses of Kohl, Harbottleand Sayre really only tell us aboutcompositional groups, not about pro-duction centres. In this regard, the factthat a Susa-Adab-Persian Gulf groupwas distinguished in no way necessi-tates the hypothesis of an Arabianmanufacturing centre on Tarut. Rather,it simply indicates that some vessels atSusa, Adab and Tarut may have comefrom a common source, wherever thatmay be. Given the small size of Masryssoundings in the fort on Tarut, oneshould not read too much into the factthat, No steatite objects were recov-ered from any stratum of the main test

trench (Masry AH. Prehistory of north-eastern Arabia: The problem of interre-gional interaction. Coconut Grove: FieldResearch Projects, 1974: 145). On theother hand, I think it very likely thatTarut was a production centre ofpseudo-serie ancienne using the inferiormuscovite schist which has a palebrown or sandy colour.

7. Steinkeller P. The question of Marh6

asi:A contribution to the historical geo-graphy of Iran in the third millenniumBC. ZA 72: 1982: 251.

8. Klengel E & Klengel H. Zum Fragmenteines Steatitgefaes mit einer Inschriftdes Rimus von Akkad. Rocznik Orien-talistyczny 41: 1980: 4551 (VA 5298).

9. Gadd CJ. Ur Excavations Texts. London:British Museum, 1: 1928: 3 and Pl. II.9;Woolley CL. Ur Excavations.Philadelphia: British Museum, 4: 1956:51, Pl. 36 (U.231).

10. Cf. Steinkeller P. Contacts betweenBabylonia, Makkan and southeasternIran (Marhashi) during the second halfof the third millennium BC. In press.My thanks to Prof. Steinkeller forproviding me with a copy of this paperprior to its publication.

11. In chronological order, see BurkholderG. Steatite carvings from Saudi Arabia.

Artibus Asiae 33: 1971: 306322; PoradaE. Excursus: Comments on steatitecarvings from Saudi Arabia and otherparts of the Ancient Near East. ArtibusAsiae 33: 1971: 323331; Zarins, Steatitevessels in the Riyadh Museum: 6593;Burkholder G. An Arabian collection.Boulder City: GB Publications, 1984;Potts DT. Miscellanea Hasaitica.Copenhagen: CNIP, 9: 1989, with earlierbibliography.

12. al-Tikriti WY. Reconsideration of the latefourth and third millennium B.C. in theArabian Gulf with special reference to theUnited Arab Emirates. Cambridge:Unpubl. PhD dissertation, 1981: Pls.130.I and 154.B. I am not including abell-shaped bowl from Al Sufouh or anundecorated canister from the Danishexcavations on Umm an-Nar as thesedo not have the typically naturalisticdecoration of the Jirofti examples.

13. Ziolkowski MC. The soft-stone vesselsfrom Sharm, Fujairah, United ArabEmirates. AAE 12: 2001: Figs 12.

14. Crawford H & Al Sindi K. A hut potin the National Museum, Bahrain. AAE

7: 1996: 140142.15. Lombard P, ed. Bahrain, the civilisationof the two seas: From Dilmun to Tylos .Paris: Institut du Monde Arabe, 1999:93, no. 88.

16. Thorvildsen K. Burial cairns onUmm-en Nar. Kuml 1962: 1963: 219.

17. See e.g. Biagi P. The prehistoric fish-ermen settlements of RH5 and RH6 atQurum, Sultanate of Oman. PSAS 17:1987: 731; Salvatori S. Death andritual in a population of coastal foodforagers in Oman. In: Afanasev E,

Cleuziou S, Lukacs JR & Tosi M, eds.The prehistory of Asia and Oceania. Forl:ABACO Edizioni, 1996: 205222.

18. Copeland L & Bergne P. Flint artifacts

from the Buraimi area, Eastern Arabia,and their relations with the NearEastern post-Palaeolithic. PSAS 6: 1976:4061.

19. Uerpmann M. Some remarks on LateStone Age industries from the coastalarea of northern Oman. In: Costa PM &Tosi M, eds. Oman Studies: Papers on thearchaeology and history of Oman. Rome:Serie Orientale Roma, 63: 1989: 169177.

20. E.g. Popescu ES. The Neolithic settle-ment sites on the islands of Dalma andMarawah, U.A.E. In: Potts D, Al

Naboodah H & Hellyer P, eds.Archaeology of the United Arab Emirates:Proceedings of the First InternationalConference on the Archaeology of theU.A.E. London: Trident, 2003: 4654;Beech, M. The development of fishingin the U.A.E.: A zooarchaeologicalperspective. In: Potts, Al Naboodah &Hellyer, eds. Archaeology of the UnitedArab Emirates: 290308, with biblio-graphy.

21. E.g. Uerpmann M, Uerpmann H-P &Jasim SA. Stone Age nomadism in SEArabiaPalaeo-economic considera-tions on the Neolithic site of Al-Buhais18 in the Emirate of Sharjah, UAE.PSAS 30: 2000: 229234; Kiesewetter H.The Neolithic population at JebelBuhais 18: Remarks on funerary prac-tices, palaeodemography and palaeo-pathology. In: Potts, Al Naboodah &Hellyer, eds. Archaeology of the UnitedArab Emirates: 3643.

22. Uerpmann, Uerpmann & Jasim, StoneAge nomadism; cf. Uerpmann M &Uerpmann H-P. Faunal remains ofal-Buhais 18, an aceramic Neolithic site

in the Emirate of Sharjah (SE-Arabia):Excavations 19951998. In: MashkourM, Choyke AM, Buitenhuis H & PoplinF, eds. Archaeozoology of the Near EastIVB. Groningen: ARC-Publicatie, 32:2000: 4049.

23. Apud Kapel H. Atlas of the Stone Agecultures of Qatar. Aarhus: JASP, 6: 1967:18.

24. There is Palaeolithic occupation muchfurther south in Oman, but to datethere is no evidence of populationcontinuity between the Palaeolithic/


77


12/12

Pleistocene population and the mid-Holocene occupants of the region. Forthe Palaeolithic in southern Oman seee.g. Biagi P. An early Palaeolithic site

near Saiwan (Sultanate of Oman). AAE5: 1994: 8188.

25. For a recent summary of the state ofknowledge on southern MesopotamianUbaid, see Oates J. Ubaid Mesopota-mia revisited. In: von Folsach K,Thrane H & Thuesen I, eds. Fromhandaxe to Khan: Essays presented toPeder Mortensen on the occasion of his70th birthday. Aarhus: Aarhus Univ.Press, 2004: 87104, with extensivebibliography.

26. Uerpmann M & Uerpmann H-P.Ubaid pottery in the eastern Gulf-

new evidence from Umm al-Qaiwain(U.A.E.). AAE 7: 1996: 125139, withearlier bibliography.

27. Although Roaf M & Galbraith J. Pot-tery and p-values: Seafaring mer-chants of Ur? re-examined. Antiquity68: 1994: 77083 concluded by notingthat the composition of the sherdsanalysed originally by Kamilli,McKerrell and Davidson might becompatible with a range of alternativeorigins, they admitted that most of theUbaid pottery found on the Gulf sitescould have been imported fromsouthern Mesopotamia. For addi-tional, more recent analyses, see MeryS & Schneider G. Mesopotamian pot-tery wares in Eastern Arabia from thefifth to the second millennium BC: Acontribution of archaeometry to theeconomic history. PSAS 26: 1996:7996.

28. Masry, Prehistory in northeasternArabia: 123, pale-reddish standardstraw-tempered coarse type, normallywith a blackened core occurring onvery irregularly shaped vessels. This

kind represents the bulk of this ware,approximately 80%. In fact, Masryalso distinguished a second coarseware, light to dark brownish, strawand chaff tempered type with a dis-tinct basket mark impression on theflat bases of vessels. This makes up theremaining part of the coarse ware.Overall, these coarse wares account for

4550% of the total surface ceramicinventory.

29. Roaf & Galbraith, Seafaring merchants:4 (preprint pagination). Joan Oates has

noted, Coarse chaff-tempered cookingware is found on all prehistoric sites inMesopotamia, but the distinctively redArabian ware would seem to be oflocal manufacture. See Oates J. Pre-history in northeastern Arabia. Anti-quity 50: 1976: 26.

30. If similar wares existed in anotherneighbouring region, e.g. in the south-ern Levant or across the Gulf in Iran,then of course this conclusion wouldnot be so inevitable, but such is not thecase.

31. Potts DT. The Arabian Gulf in Antiquity,

i. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990:6970. The main reason for my mis-givings was largely the fact that theexcavators were pointing to parallelswith burnished grey ware in south-eastern Iran (e.g. at Tepe Yahya), butthere is none that dates to the fourthmillennium. Rather, it is a productsolely of the third millennium BC. SeePotts DT. Excavations at Tepe Yahya,19671975: The third millennium. Cam-bridge: Bulletin of the American Schoolof Prehistoric Research, 45: 2001: 199.

32. For an overview of the material fromthe tombs at Jabal Hafit, see Potts DT.Eastern Arabia and the Omanpeninsula during the late fourth andearly third millennium BC. In: Fink-beiner U & Rollig W, eds. Gamdat Nas@r:Period or regional style? Wiesbaden:TAVO Beiheft B, 62: 1986: 121170,with earlier bibliography.

33. Mery S. Les ceramiques dOman et lAsiemoyenne: Une archeologie des echanges alAge du Bronze. Paris: Editions duCNRS, 2000: 169189.

34. E.g. Frifelt K. The island of Umm an-Nar,

vol. 1. Third millennium graves. Aarhus:JASP, 26/1: 1991: Figs 8689, 125;Frifelt K. The island of Umm an-Nar, vol.2. The third millennium settlement. Aar-hus: JASP, 26/2: 1995: Figs 164188.

35. Mery, Les ceramiques dOman: Fig. 105.36. As it happens, the graves on Umm an-

Nar were not only the first archaeolo-gical findspots of the Umm an-Nar

culture/period to be discovered andexplored, they also appear to havebeen the earliest, chronologicallyspeaking. For a tentative internal

chronology of the Umm an-Nar periodtombs excavated to date, see BentonJN. Excavations at Al Sufouh: A thirdmillennium site in the Emirate of Dubai.Turnhout: Abiel, 1: 1996: 8889.

37. E.g. at Tal-i Iblis and Tepe Yahya. SeeCaldwell JR, ed. Investigations at Tal-i-Iblis. Springfield: Illinois State MuseumPreliminary Reports, 9: 1967: 111ff;Beale TW. Excavations at Tepe Yahya,Iran, 19671975: The early periods.Cambridge: Bulletin of the AmericanSchool of Prehistoric Research, 38:1986: 39ff.

38. The Tell Abraq vessel is discussedin extenso in Potts DT. Tepe Yahya,Tell Abraq and the chronology of theBampur sequence. IrAnt 38: 2003: 111.

39. For example, Frifelt, Third millenniumgraves: Figs 59, 63, 67, 93, 96, 97; Mery,Les ceramiques dOman: Figs 49.5, 50.2,52.7 (all tomb A at Hili North) and 55.1(tomb M at Hili).

40. To the ceramic evidence we can alsoadd later third-millennium soft-stonewhich moved in both directions. Seee.g. Potts DT. A soft-stone genre fromsoutheastern Iran: Zig-zag bowlsfrom Magan to Margiana. In: Potts T,Roaf M & Stein D, eds. Ancient NearEastern culture through objects: Festschriftfor P.R.S. Moorey. Oxford: GriffithInstitute, 2003: 7791. Serie recente andtardive soft-stone vessels with single ordouble dotted-circle decoration, ahallmark of the Umm an-Nar and earlyWadi Suq periods (late third/earlysecond millennia BC) in the Omanpeninsula, has also been found on sitesin southeastern Iran, such as TepeYahya (Lamberg-Karlovsky CC. Urban

interaction on the Iranian Plateau:Excavations at Tepe Yahya, 19671973.Proceedings of the British Academy 59:1973: Fig. 5F) and Shahdad (Hakemi A.Shahdad: Archaeological excavations of aBronze Age center in Iran. Rome: IsMEO,1997: 617, Fm. 2 and 695, Ra. 4).

D.T. POTTS

78

In the beginning: Marhashi and the origins of Magan’s ceramic industry in the third millennium...

Documents

Transcript of In the beginning: Marhashi and the origins of Magan’s ceramic industry in the third millennium...