Nuzi

Nuzi (Hurrian Nuzi/Nuzu; Akkadian Gasur) at modern Yorghan Tepe (also Yorgan Tepa and Jorgan Tepe), Iraq was an ancient Mesopotamian city 12 kilometers southwest of the city of Arrapha (modern Kirkuk) and 70 kilometers southwest of Sātu Qala, located near the Tigris river. It was occupied from

the Ubaid period in the 5th millennium BC until late in the 2nd millennium BC then, after

a period of abandonment, in the Parthian era. It reached major importance in the Akkadian Empire period when it was known as Gasur and again in the Mitanni period when its name was Nuzi.

Late Chalcolithic

Pottery sherds were found from the Halaf/Ubaid periods. In the Uruk period levels

mudbrick construction occurred and finds included spouted vessels, bevel-rimmed bowls, a small copper animal figurine and a cache of drilled marble stamp and cylinder seals.

Early Bronze

Early dynastic pottery was found in one pit, from pavements and graves, with no interruption with the following Akkadian Empire occupation. It was a provincial seat of a governor known from a clay sealing reading: "Itbe-labba, govern[or] of Gasur" found at Tell Brak in modern Syria. 222 Akkadian Empire period (c. 2334–2154 BC) cuneiform tablets were found at the site. They are primarily dated to the time of rulers Naram-Sin and Shar-kali-sharri and written in Old Akkadian. A school tablet mentioned Tuṭṭanabšum, daughter of Naram-Sin. Finds at

this level included stone figurines, a copper axe and copper daggers, a shell seal

mounted on a copper pin, and 5 cylinder seals.

thumb|Sketch of the Nuzi map

The most famous item found at this level is the Nuzi map, the oldest known map discovered. Although the majority of the tablet is preserved, it is unknown exactly what the Nuzi map shows. The Nuzi map is actually one of the so-called Gasur texts, and predates destruction

by fire of the city at this end of the Early Bronze Age. Gasur was a thriving commercial center, and the texts reveal a diverse business community with far-reaching commercial activities. It is possible that Ebla was a trading partner, and that the tablet, rather than a record of land-holdings, might indeed be a road map. The area

below the Rahium river is labeled "20(bur) – 1(eše) of irrigated gardens, belonging to Azala".

Ur III Period

A stone plaque, of uncertain original provenance, was found at the temple of Istar at Assur reading "Ititi, the ruler, son of Ininlaba, dedicated (this object) from the booty of Gasur to the goddess Istar". Alternative reading of the inscription has Inanna vs Istar. The city name is written as Ga-sag<sup>ki</sup> vs the Ga-sur<sup>ki</sup> found at Gasur. The father's name means "Innin is a lion" (Innin is another name of Inanna) and is known from a text found at Yorghan Tepe. The name of Ititi is also found in 5 Yorghan Tepe texts. The city of Assur is also mentioned in those texts, once in the same form as the Ititi inscription. The sign forms have been dated to either the Akkadian period or shortly thereafter. An Ititi was appointed as governor of the northern province at Kazallu by Ur III ruler Shulgi (c. 2094–2046 BC). With the

uncertainty on the degree of overlap between the Ur III empire and Akkadian Empire

it is unclear if this is the same person.

Middle Bronze

The site was occupied to a lesser extent in the Ur III, Isin-Larsa, and Old Babylonian periods following a sack of the city. The relevant deposits were thick

but without architectural remains. A few cuneiform tablets from this era were found. The history of Nuzi is closely interrelated with that of the nearby towns of Eshnunna and Khafajah.

Nuzi, a provincial town in the 14th century BC

thumb|Tablet from Nuzi: legal dispute over land.

The best-known period in the history of Yorghan Tepe is by far one of the city of Nuzi in the 15th-14th centuries BC. At this time the central complex contained two temples (to Šawuška/Ištar and Teššub) and a palace. The tablets of this period indicate that Nuzi was a small provincial town of northern Mesopotamia at this time in an area populated mostly by Hurrians. Despite the presence of two temples most votive activity

at Nuzi in this period is that of household religions with elements of ancestor

worship where the eldest son inherits the family cult statue. Usually the tablets of Yorghan Tepe, Kirkuk, and Tell al-Faḫḫar are grouped together under banner of Nuzi tablets. Only 0.18% of tablets contained a date formula

of any kind, generally local. They can, however, be chronologically ordered by internal

clues such as the names of officials and prosopographical data.

Administration

Nuzi was a provincial town of Arrapha. It was administered by a governor (šaknu) from the palace. The tripartite palace, situated in the center of the mound, had many rooms arranged around a central courtyard. The functions of some of those rooms have been identified: reception areas, apartments, offices, kitchens, stores. The walls were painted, as was seen in fragments unearthed in the ruins of the building.

Archives that have been exhumed tell us about the royal family, as well as the organization of the internal administration of the palace and its dependencies, and the payments various workers received. Junior officers of the royal administration had such titles as sukkallu (often translated as "vizier", the second governor), "district manager" (halṣuhlu), and "mayor" (hazannu). Justice was rendered by these officers, but also by judges (dayānu) installed in the districts. Free subjects of the state were liable to a conscription, the Ilku, which consisted of a requirement to perform various types of military and civilian services, such as working the land.

Archaeology

thumb|Mesopotamia - 2nd millennium BC

The site has a roughly square 200 meter by 200 meter main mound which was protected

by a city wall. Only a small portion of the wall was excavated but gates are apparent

by deep wadis in the northeast, southwest, and southeast. The city's main road, well

drained, ran from the northeast gate to the southwest gate, separating the central

temples and palace. A secondary road led from the southeast gate to join the main road.

A number of private homes were excavated 200 meters north of the main mound on two small rises. Originally thought to be extramural residences it is now believed, partly on textual evidence, that there was an outer town with its own wall, now destroyed by modern agriculture.

The excavators defined a number of occupation strata. The Nuzi occupation

lasted several centuries and its chronology is slightly disputed. The

excavators dated Stratum II, the destruction of the city, at c. 1500 BC. Later

work has proposed a more recent date of c. 1430-1330 BC. The stratigraphy is complicated

because the excavators defined these main strata, "pavements", from a few deep soundings while

specifying levels A through G for the temple and a different strata I—VIII for the northwest ridge and the southeast edge of the mound. The only correlation given was Temple A equals sounding Stratum I and "edge" Stratum II. The dig was mainly worked by Edward Chiera, Robert Pfeiffer, and Richard Starr under the auspices of the Iraq Museum and the Baghdad School of the American Schools of Oriental Research and later the Harvard University and Fogg Art Museum.

Excavations continued through 1931 with the site showing 15 occupation levels. A number of soundings were conducted at the prehistoric site of

Kudis Sagïr about five kilometers to the south. The hundreds of tablets and other finds recovered were published in a series of volumes with ongoing publications.

thumb|House-shaped offering stand, Yorghan Tepe, ancient Nuzi, Iraq, Stratum II, ceramic - Harvard Semitic Museum

To date, around 5,000 tablets are known, mostly held at the Oriental Institute, the Harvard Semitic Museum and the Iraq Museum in Baghdad. Those from Gasur are written in the Akkadian language while

though from Nuzi are in a Hurrian influenced dialect of Akkadian. Many are routine legal and business documents with about one quarter concerning the business transactions of a single family, found the homes of Tehip-tilla and Surki-tilla on the northwest rise. The vast majority of finds come from the Hurrian period during the second millennium BC with the remainder dating back to the town's founding during the Akkadian Empire. A discovered sealing read "Saustatar, son of Parsatatar (Baratarna), king of Mitani" (the Mitanni Empire). An archive contemporary with the Hurrian archive at Nuzi has been excavated from the "Green Palace" at the site of Tell al-Fakhar, southwest of Nuzi.

The temple area had seven occupation levels, Temple G (Gasur), Temple F (Gasur/Nuzi transition), and Temples A-E (Nuzi). Temple G was a single shrine which in Temple

F was transformed into a double shrine.

References

External links

Inscriptions found at Gasur/Nuzi - CDLI
History of the Baghdad School of ASOR 1923–1969
B. Lion, « Nuzi, une ville du monde hourrite » 1998