In Search of the First Empires
J. N. POSTGATE
Trinity College, Cambridge
United Kingdom
The correlation of archaeological evidence with political
phenomena is notoriously difficult and has rarely been seriously
addressed in a Mesopotamian context. Here the complex relations
between the political and cultural regions attested for early
historical times in ancient Mesopotamia are reviewed, and
how they might be reflected in the archaeological record is
considered. Two or three culturally defined regions (southern
Mesopotamia, the middle Euphrates, and northern Mesopotamia)
are recognized in the third and early second millennia B.C.,
and are compared with the political realities claimed in the
public statements of ruling dynasties. Cultural homogeneity
and political regimes of different kinds should have different
archaeological correlates, and we should be looking for them.
Such a comparison with the historical record may well suggest
interpretations for the effective prehistoric archaeology
of the formative Uruk period in the later fourth millennium.
The "Nordburg" of Megiddo:
A New Reconstruction on the Basis
of Schumacher's Plan
LORENZO NIGRO
Universitit degii Studi di Roma "La Sapienza"
Via Arco delia Pace, 5
1-00186 Roma, Italy
The so-called "Nordburg " of Megiddo, probably a palace
of the end of MB IIA, was excavated at the beginning of this
century by G. Schumacher and was reexplored by G. Loud 34
years later. Although he reexamined the structural sequence
of the area and ascribed it to Level XII, Loud did not produce
an overall plan of the building. That task was achieved for
the first time by I. Dunayevsky and A. Kempinski, even though
they did not focus their attention on the palace itself, but
on the adjoining sacred area. The subsequent interpretations
of the Nordburg were all more or less based on Loud's schematic
plan, putting aside the original plan of Schumacher. This
article draws up a new plan of the palace on the basis of
the accurate drawings and descriptions produced by its first
excavator, identifying its most characteristic features.
The Reading of KTU 1. 19:111:4 1:
The Burial of Aqhat
WAYNE T. PITARD
Program for the Study of Religion
University of Illinois
Urbana,IL 61801
The description of Aqhat's burial in KTU 1.19:iii:41 has
been the source of considerable controversy over the past
five decades. The primary issue has revolved around the uncertain
reading of the last word of the line. A new collation, supported
by macro-photographs, argues for reading the disputed word
as bknrt, instead of bknkn or bknkt.
The meaning of the word, knrt, however, remains obscure.
Trojan Grey Ware at Tel Miqne-Ekron
SUSAN HEUCK ALLEN
Classics Department
Yale University
New Haven, CT 06520
This article examines Grey Ware, a class of ceramics, characteristic
of Troy Periods VI and VIIA, associated with Homer's Troy.
Found in a well-stratified 13th century B. C. context at the
inland site of Tel Miqne-Ekron, it demonstrates material evidence
of contact between Troy and the Canaanite settlement shortly
after the accepted date of the Trojan War.
Early Greek Contacts with the Southern
Levant, ca. 1000-600 B.C.:
The Eastern Perspective
JANE C. WALDBAUM
Department of Art History
The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
P. 0. Box 413
Milwaukee, WI 53201
Studies of early Greek contacts with the Levant have focused
primarily on the presence in Greece of imported luxury goods
from the east and on the possible impact of those artifacts,
and perhaps their itinerant makers, on the development of
the Orientalizing style of Greek art. Alternatively, research
on Greek imports in the Levant has concentrated on specific
areas, including in particular Al Mina in Syria, Cyprus, and
the Egyptian Delta. The rest of the Levantine coast, south
of Syria, has been relatively neglected as a source of information
on relations between Greece and the East.
On the basis of finds from both new and old excavations,
this article examines the evidence for early Greek contacts
with the southern Levant, concentrating specifically on Greek
imports (primarily pottery) found in Palestine. The resulting
picture is compared both qualitatively and quantitatively
with contact patterns from better-known regions of the Mediterranean;
the possible role of some sites in the dissemination of Greek
pottery inland from the coast is assessed.
Maritime Trade and Royal Accountancy
in
an Erased Customs Account from 475 B.C.E.
on the Ahiqar Scroll from Elephantine
ADA YARDENI
72 Borochov Str.
Jerusalem 96622, Israel
The newly deciphered Aramaic text--the longest nonliterary
text discovered so far--is an erased customs account on 11
surviving fragments of the fifth centur B.C. E. Ahiqar scroll
from Elephantine. The customs were collected from Ionian and
Phoenician ships and handed over to the royal treasury. The
text records the dates (day and month) of the ships' arrivals
and departures during one sailing season of ten months. Arranging
the scroll fragments according to the dates enabled the reconstruction
of most of the fragmentary and missing columns of the customs
account as well as the rearrangement of the columns of the
Ahiqar proverbs. Information from the customs account concerning
the maritime trade includes the kinds of ships sailing to
and from Egypt and the kinds of goods they carried, as well
as the system of duty collection and royal accountancy in
Egypt in the early Persian period.
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February 1994