Arslantepe 2008 Overview

Federico Manuelli

The grant will support the publication of a monograph entitled “The Eastern Anatolian societies during the Late Bronze Age (1650 — 1200 B.C.). The Hittite influence at Arslantepe — Malatya (Turkey) and in the Upper Euphrates Valley as seen from pottery production”.

The topic of the book regards the analysis of the remarkable unpublished ceramic assemblages of the Late Bronze Age found at Arslantepe, Malatya, as well as their comparisons with the pottery production from other sites in the Upper Euphrates Valley, and with the materials from the Hittite centres in Central Anatolia.

Arslantepe, the lions hill, is the ancient Hittite city of Melid. The mound is located in Eastern Turkey, to the right of the Euphrates, in the district of Malatya, and is considered the most important site of the area.

During the Late Bronze Age (1650 — 1200 B.C.) the region of the Upper Euphrates Valley was progressively conquered by the expansion of the Hittite civilization developed in Central Anatolian. Actually, the Valley represented a peripheral area during this period, but crucial in many respects as it constituted a borderland of the Hittite Empire. The role of the local culture and population in the development of the new polities on the eastern periphery of the empire has not been thoroughly studied yet.

Arslantepe has been investigated for more than 45 years by the Italian Archaeological Mission of the University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’. The length of the archaeological researches has revealed a very long stratigraphic sequence covering more than five millennia. The most extensively investigated periods in recent times have been the middle and final phases of the Late Chalcolithic (about 3800 — 3000 B.C.) and the Early and Middle Bronze Age (3000 — 1800 B.C.), but important sections of the Late Bronze Age levels have been brought to light in the sixties and seventies.

The main excavation activities by the Italian team in the Late Bronze Age levels at Arslantepe took place on the north-eastern margins of the site, between 1961 and 1970. Here the dig has shown a complete stratigraphic sequence from the beginning of the Late Bronze Age to the Early Iron Age period bringing to light the monumental entrance to the city, which consisted of superimposed gates and town-walls. Further excavations made in the south-western zone of the site from 1971 to 1983, uncovered a new series of Late Bronze Age layers, mostly relating to domestic residential quarters.

Arslantepe pottery is an ideal source of information for observing the possible changes occurred in the local production in connection with the increasing Hittite pressure in the region and on the site. The study and its publication will greatly enhance our knowledge of the social, political and economic organization of the Eastern Anatolian area during the Late Bronze Age period. The camera-ready copy of the monograph will be ready for publishing in three years from the time the grant begins. It will be published in the specialized series Eothen.