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Architectural Representations on Steatite Vases1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

P. Delougaz
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Extract

Among the pre-Sargonid finds from several Mesopotamian sites as well ox as from Susa and Mari there are several complete or nearly complete stone vases carved with peculiar and intriguing decoration and numerous fragments of such vases. The material is nearly always a rather soft stone, varying in colour from pale bluish grey to dark brownish green, and is usually identified as steatite. Two shapes are prevalent, a cylindrical cup or vase with a flat base, the height of which is somewhat less than the diameter, and a relatively taller more graceful vase, also with a flat bottom, which is narrower at the mouth than at the base and has slightly incurving walls. We were fortunate in finding a specimen of each type in one room of Sin Temple IX at Khafajah. They are shown in Plates VIa and VII respectively.

One motif, perhaps the most common in the decoration of such vases, is obviously a representation of some sort of structure consisting chiefly of wicker-work. Sometimes it occupies the entire surface of the vessel (as in Plate VIa); occasionally it occurs in combination with other designs (as in Plate VII). It is with this motif that we are chiefly concerned here. A ubiquitous element in such representations is a panel formed by triple vertical bands on either side and a triple downcurving band at the top. Inside, at the bottom of each panel, there is what seems to be a screen consisting of a horizontal member with a crosshatched rectangle under it. Above the screen are fairly wide vertical bands which apparently are meant to be represented as being behind the screen. (In the vase shown in Plate VII they actually are carved on a somewhat deeper surface than either the frame or the screen.)

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 22 , Issue 1-2: Ur in Retrospect. In Memory of Sir C. Leonard Woolley , Spring-Autumn 1960 , pp. 90 - 95
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1960 

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Footnotes

1

The following is, in the main, part of a papet read before the Midwestern Branch of the American Oriental Society in Dubuque, Iowa, on April 5, 1957, under the title: “Some Aspects of Architectural Representations in Early Mesopotamian Art.”

References

2 Room Q 43:11 off the central court; see Delougaz, P. and Lloyd, Seton, Pre-Sargonid Temples in the Diyala Region. O.I.P. LVIII (1942), p. 69 and Pl. 11Google Scholar.

3 Plate VIa (Kh. IV–144) is 8·3 cm. in diameter and 6·3 cm. in height. Plate VII is Kh. IV–156. d. = 19·5 cm., h = 23 cm.

4 The writer is engaged in a more comprehensive study of all known examples of this type of vase which he hopes will be published in due course.

5 Cros, G., Nouvelles fouilles de Tello (1910), pp. 40–42 Google Scholar.

6 Including one by the writer, who once considered the possibility that this fragment may represent a brick structure; see Delougaz, P., Plano-Convex Bricks and the Methods of their Employment, “Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization,” No. 7 (Chicago, 1933), p. 33 Google Scholar.

7 Andrae, W., Das Gotteshaus und die Urformen des Bauens in alten Orient (1930) p. 76 Google Scholar.

8 Hall, H. R. and Woolley, C. L., Ur Excavations. Al-‘Ubaid (1927), pp. 91–94 and Pl. XXXIGoogle Scholar.

9 As suggested by zu Eitz, A. in “Nomadic Tradition in the Prehistoric Near East” (Bulletin of the American Institute of Iranian Art and Archaeology V, No. 2 [1937])Google Scholar.

10 See Frankfort, H., The Art and Architecture of the Ancient Orient (1957), Pl. 3c Google Scholar.

11 E.g. Kh. V–14 from the Small Temple in O 43 at Khafajah; see Delougaz, and Lloyd, , Pre-Sargonid Temples, p. 112, Fig. 98Google Scholar.

12 In the Dubuque lecture, of which this paper is a part, I ventured to suggest that the hut with young ones emerging from it is no mere pastoral scene, but represents birth.

13 A tope by means of which a bull is tethered can be seen on a “Scarlet Ware“ vase from Tell Agrab; see Delougaz, P., Pottery from the Diyala Region, O.I.P. LXIII (1952), pl. 12Google Scholar.

14 Reproduced from Zervos, C., L'art de la Mésopotamie (Paris, 1915) pl. 212Google Scholar.

15 Only part of the rim is reproduced in line drawing in Banks, E. J., Bismaya (1912), p. 242 Google Scholar, where the stepped design is identified as a “Temple Tower.”

16 About 33 cm. in diameter and 26 cm. high, with walls varying between 12 and 16 mm in thickness.

17 See note 15.

18 It was this pattern, perhaps exaggerated in line drawing, which led to the interpretation of the first fragment from Telloh as representing a whole brick or a part brick structure (see note 6).

19 A few of the larger fragments from the Diyala region were published in preliminary reports, while most remain unpublished. It is intended to include them in the proposed study of the steatite vases.

20 See note 5.

21 Bismaya, pp. 259–76.

22 Parrot, A., Mission archéologique de Mari I. Le temple d'Ishtar (Paris, 1956), pp. 113–23Google Scholar.

23 Ibid., p. 41.

24 We estimated the length of this period at about 350 years; see Delougaz, and Lloyd, , Pre-Sargonid Temples in the Diyala Region, p. 134 Google Scholar. But even if this seems too long, the period certainly lasted for more than a few generations.

25 This inscription was first published by Banks, (Bismaya, p. 266)Google Scholar and later by Luckenbill, D. D. in Inscriptions from Adab (O.I.P. XIV [1930]), pl. 1, No. 1 Google Scholar.

26 Moortgat, A., Frühe Bildkunst in Sumer (M.V.A.G. 40, Heft 3 [1935]), p. 24 Google Scholar.

27 This need not necessarily imply nomads nor even a “Nomadic Tradition,” as suggested by A. zu Eitz for instance (see note 9), but could be connected with a specialized group within a complex society.

28 Delougaz, P., Piano-Convex Bricks, pp. 37–38 Google Scholar.

29 See Iraq V Pt. 1, pp. 1–4 Google Scholar, and Delougaz, P., The Temple Oval at Khafajah (O.I.P. LIII [1940]), pp. 140–45Google Scholar.