The third feature of the period is the appeal of archaeologists to the most ancient eras of Mesopotamia, to its prehistory. It is no longer the flashy ruins that attracted the attention of treasure hunters, travelers, and artists, but abandoned caves and invisible hills that become the object of work, as a result of which the Paleolithic cave sites of Shanidara and the Neolithic settlements of Jarmo and Hassuna were discovered

etc. This revealed to the world unknown ancient pages of the history of Mesopotamia.
Thus, from the palaces of late Assyria to the Paleolithic caves, the archaeological study of the past of this country proceeded. The initial amateurism was replaced by the development of a truly scientific methodology. Archeology has moved from the search for sensational things to solving the most important problems, highlighting entire stages in the history of Mesopotamia.

But Ashur is not yet a real desert, and the full-flowing Tigris flows right under the remains of its walls! What can we say about the south of Mesopotamia, where the ancient centers of Mesopotamian civilization were located - the cities of the Sumerians.
And here we move on to the third episode of the German archaeological epic in Iraq - the excavations of one of the earliest Sumerian cities - Uruk (Varka). Work began in 1912, but was soon interrupted by the First World War. Only 14 years later did German archaeologists return here, and, apart from the break for World War II (1939–1946), they are still digging for local antiquities. At different times this expedition was led by different people. Among them we can mention the names of Julius Jordan, Konrad Preiser, Wilhelm Kensch, Julius Lenzmann.
Already the first trenches laid on the tell of Varka yielded cuneiform tablets with the name of the buried city - U Ruki. The Bible calls it Erech, mentioning it immediately after Babylon. The ancient Greeks knew about Erech, calling it Orkhon. Then this name disappeared from history. In the 3rd century. n. e. Uruk was abandoned by its inhabitants and was never reborn.
What did the long-term excavations of the German expedition in Uruka give science? They, first of all, showed that Uruk was the city where the most significant event in the history of human culture took place - on Uruk soil, for the first time, a threshold emerged through which people stepped from the darkness of centuries of the preliterate period into a life illuminated by the light of writing. Indeed, it was in Uruk at the end of the 4th millennium BC. e. Cuneiform archaic writing (a proto-literate period in the history of Mesopotamia) appeared for the first time. However, all these years, the Germans were digging only a few temple complexes in the very center of the city - complexes of sanctuaries of the gods Anu (god of the sky) and Inanna-Ishtar (goddess of love and fertility), leaving aside the residential areas and fortifications of Uruk. Nevertheless, the multi-meter layers of buildings in the studied area and the objects they contained allowed scientists to trace the first stages of the emergence of the Sumerian civilization: religious architecture, cylindrical carved seals, stone vessels with relief images, the marble head of the goddess Inanna, etc., etc. In addition, we should recall the terrible natural and climatic conditions of the south of Mesopotamia - a flat, sun-scorched plain.

Excavations at Ur (Leonard Wooddy)

However, the English archaeologist Sir Leonard Woolley experienced all these “delights” of local life in full. Over the course of 12 long field seasons, each of which lasted 5–6 months, he excavated the southernmost Sumerian city - Ur, located near the modern Iraqi city of Nasiriya on the Euphrates. Ur stands out noticeably even against the background of other famous Sumerian cities. To begin with, it existed for an unusually long time - from the first Sumerian kings (beginning of the 3rd millennium BC) to the era of Darius and Alexander the Great. Neither countless enemy invasions nor natural disasters could force its inhabitants to leave their home for centuries. But what the hordes of conquerors failed to do, nature did. The Euphrates suddenly changed its course and went almost 16 kilometers east of the city walls. It was impossible to live even a day on this hot plain without water. And the brilliant city turned into a cluster of featureless hills, painted in the gray-yellow colors of the desert. Over time, its location was forgotten. Until quite recently, our information about Ur was limited to only a few vague quotations from the Bible and Assyro-Babylonian cuneiform texts created many centuries after the collapse of the Sumerian civilization. We know, for example, from later inscriptions that in the 18th century. BC e. The Babylonian king Hammurabi subjected the rebel city to a horrific defeat. Apparently, it was at this time that the biblical patriarch Abraham and his family left the defeated Ur. Since then, even the Bible no longer mentions Ur. The city had to be found again in the 19th century. In 1854 D.E. Taylor, the English consul in Basra, was the first to establish: a cluster of ruins, known among local Bedouins as Tell al-Mukkayir (“Resin Hill”), was ancient Ur, which was confirmed by cuneiform clay tablets found here. However, extensive excavations at the site could only begin many years later.
In 1922, the Englishman Leonard Woolley began to carry out this task. Excavations were carried out here for twelve years. The archaeologist managed to achieve a lot. Lush palace ensembles, massive temple walls, a stepped ziggurat tower and, finally, royal burials of fantastic wealth appeared from the depths of the earth with enviable consistency. But, perhaps, the most important thing is that Woolley finally managed, unlike his other colleagues, to break away from the attractive religious and administrative center of the settlement and begin to study residential urban areas. Therefore, there is every reason to believe that only after the work of Leonard Woolley in the city of Ure did the ancient Sumerian civilization appear before the eyes of mankind in all its splendor and grandeur.
Almost in the same years (20-40s of the 20th century), the Frenchman Andre Parrot conducted excavations in Mari (Syria), the Americans - in Nippur, Nuzi and Tepe-Gavre, the British - in Nineveh, Ubeid, Arpaciya and, together with the Americans - in Kish and Jemdet Nasr, and the Germans continued to methodically study the center of U ruk. This was the "golden age" of Mesopotamian archaeology.
One after another, the large and small tells of Mesopotamia, after excavations, revealed their secrets to people. Fragment by fragment, the main stages of the richest and longest Mesopotamian history were revealed. Gradually, scientists realized that behind the shiny façade of Sumerian-Akkadian culture were hidden some earlier and more modest predecessors.

Ill. 14. L. Woolley

At the origins of Mesopotamian civilization

Just some 40–50 years ago, almost all reputable scientific monographs and articles on the archeology of Mesopotamia remained completely silent about the initial stages of the pre-Sumerian, preliterate history of Iraq and Syria. Archaeological work has traditionally been carried out mainly in the south of the country, on the Mesopotamian plain, that is, where the oldest finds, if any, were buried under thick alluvial deposits. Following the logic of the reasoning of geographers, botanists and zoologists, the origins of early cultures with agricultural and livestock farming had to be sought in the north of the region, in the mountainous and foothill regions.
Archaeologists have long ignored Northern Mesopotamia. But it was there, in the mountains and foothills of Zagros, Taurus and Sinjar, that the wild ancestors of wheat and barley grew, and wild goats, the ancestors of later domesticated sheep and goats, grazed in the free meadows. And so, after the Second World War, in the 50s, scientists began to study these forgotten lands. First of all, they were attracted by traces of the habitation of human communities that were at the stage of transition from the Mesolithic to the Neolithic, that is, groups with the beginnings of agriculture and cattle breeding, but still within the boundaries of a hunting-gathering economy. In northern Iraq, in the mountains of Kurdistan, American archaeologists Robert Braidwood and Ralph Solecki began intensive surveys of the most promising areas. And so Solecki, after the sensational discoveries of Neanderthal burials in the Shanidar cave, discovered an open site not far from the entrance to this very cave - Zevi-Chemi-Shanidar. It belonged, according to radiocarbon dating, to approximately the 9th millennium BC. e. The researcher drew attention to the extraordinary abundance of animal bones in the site layer - laboratory analysis showed that the vast majority of them belonged to sheep. Moreover, three-fifths of all individuals were under one year old. This indicated that the sheep were already domesticated: young lambs were slaughtered so that the queens could be milked. Stone tools from Zevi-Chemi-Shanidar are also of great interest: rough stone grain grinders, ground axes, sickles in the form of flint knife-like insert plates attached to a bone handle with bitumen or resin. We do not know which cereal plants the inhabitants of the site used to reap with these sickles. It is also unknown whether these cereals were wild or cultivated. Nevertheless, the first steps in the formation of a new productive economy of the agricultural-pastoral type are presented here quite well.
Even more important were the results of many years of work by a large archaeological and botanical expedition led by Robert Braidwood (USA) in Iraqi Kurdistan (the so-called “Iraq-Jarmo” project). For the first time in the history of Middle Eastern archaeology, geologists, zoologists, botanists and climatologists, together with archaeologists, undertook a comprehensive study of the natural environment surrounding local primitive man. Their discoveries led to the conclusion that the ecology of that time was not significantly different from the modern one. Of particular importance for the further development of Mesopotamian archeology were the excavations of R. Braidwood's expedition at two archaeological sites in Iraqi Kurdistan - in Karim Shahir and Jarmo. The ancient settlement of Karim Shahir is located north of the town of Chamchamal in the Kirkuk Governorate. It was not possible to determine its exact time. But judging by the analogies with finds from the very early layers of Jericho (Palestine), Karim-Shahir dates back to the Mesolithic period (9th millennium BC) and, although open, is a temporary, seasonal site. The main sources of food for local residents were hunting, gathering and fishing. The presence of sickles with flint inserts and coarse grain grinders in the site layer cannot serve as a decisive argument in favor of the emergence of agriculture. The presence of such tools indicates only the processing of cereals, but not their cultivation.

Among the new technical achievements of the inhabitants of Karim Shahir is the appearance of polished stone axes and rough clay figurines. This monument is the threshold from which the “Neolithic revolution” began in Mesopotamia, that is, the transition to agriculture and cattle breeding as the basis of the economy. And clear traces of its higher stage are shown to us by another settlement - Jarmo in Kurdistan, dating back to the beginning of the 7th millennium BC. e. It was studied by R. Braidwood in 1949–1952. According to him, Jarmo entirely falls under the category of “primary, truly settled agricultural communities of Zagros.” The settlement itself covers an area of ​​about 1.2 hectares, consists of adobe above-ground houses and is located on the ledge of a mountain plateau, overhanging a deep gorge. The thickness of the cultural layer reaches 7.6 m. Fragments of ceramics are found only in the upper third of the almost eight-meter thickness of the hill. The assumption of the existence of developed agriculture in Jarmo is based not so much on the finds of stone tools for harvesting and grinding cereals, but on the discovery of grains of cultivated plants there, including Emmer’s wheat and two-row barley.

New ways of obtaining food left quite a lot of free time for the residents of Jarmo for other things. It is significant that at this time stone and clay tiles for some kind of game appeared, as well as cult clay figurines of women and various animals, which indicates the beginning of the flowering of the art of the Neolithic tribes of Northern Mesopotamia.

“A decisive milestone,” notes I.M. Dyakonov, “the creation of an economy of reproduction of the product has been completed, and although it is still slow, the process of comprehensive use of the opened prospects is beginning.” And one of its most striking manifestations was the wide access of the highlanders of Zagros and Sinjar to the vastness of the Mesopotamian plain. Intensive development of new fertile lands began, which noticeably accelerated the entire course of cultural development of local agricultural and pastoral communities and brought them very close to the threshold of civilization.
And it is not at all by chance that only after scientists realized the importance of the northern regions of Mesopotamia for understanding the origins of the local civilization, serious field research began there in the north and the most important discoveries immediately followed.
In 1942–1945 English archaeologist Seton Lloyd and Iraqi archaeologist Fuad Safar excavated Tell Hassuna, 25 km south of Mosul, which hid inside the remains of a village of farmers and herders of the 6th millennium BC. e. This first explored monument gave the name to the entire sedentary early agricultural culture of Northern Mesopotamia - Hassun. Its creators made crude but practical ceramics, stylized female figurines (fertility cult), and built rectangular above-ground dwellings from blocks of clay mixed with straw. “The way of life of the first settlers of Hassuna,” writes the German scientist B. Brentjes, “makes it clear why their culture quickly spread over hundreds of kilometers. Probably, as a result of centuries of cultivation, the soil in the mountains was depleted or the population increased so much that people were forced to leave their country and go in search of new lands. Where they liked pastures and arable land and where there were no enemies, they remained to live. Otherwise, having collected the harvest, we moved on...”
So, it was the Hassun tribes who began the widespread development of the Mesopotamian plain. But as we moved south, rain-fed (non-irrigated) agriculture began to experience serious disruptions. And in Tell es-Sawwan (“Flint Hill”), located on the right bank of the Tigris, 11 km south of Samarra, in the 60s of the 20th century. Archaeologists from the Iraqi Department of Antiquities discovered a large settlement of 2.5 hectares, fortified by a deep ditch and a high adobe wall, which arose in 5600 BC. e. Two buildings were excavated inside the walls: one (“House No. 1”) had two floors and 14 rooms, the second was even larger. Part of “House No. 1” was occupied by a temple of four rooms. Among the most numerous finds are figurines of men and women made of clay and alabaster. But the most important thing is that among the cereals found there are types of wheat and barley, the cultivation of which is possible only with artificial irrigation. This means that the simplest forms of irrigation appeared in Mesopotamia already in the 6th millennium BC. e. Important results were also brought by long-term studies of the Hassun village of Yarym Tepe 1 in the Sinjar Valley by Russian archaeologists (1969–1976).
At the beginning of the 5th millennium BC. e. The Hassun culture is replaced (or supplanted) in the north of Mesopotamia by the newcomer Halaf culture. And although Halaf ceramics were first discovered quite by accident in Syria back in the 30s, targeted study of this culture began only in the 50s-70s, when American and English archaeologists explored such interesting Halaf monuments as Arpachiya and Tepe Gawra in the area Mosul, and a Russian expedition excavated the Khalaf tell Yarym-Tepe 2 over a wide area and the entire thickness of a 7-meter cultural layer (in 1969–1976). The Halafans created the most elegant and varied ceramics in shape, decorated with magnificent paintings. Round architecture (“tholos”) – residential and cultic, developed religious ideology with the image of the mother goddess (fertility cult), agriculture and cattle breeding as the basis of the economy characterize the main features of this culture.

Somewhere at the end of the 6th - beginning of the 5th millennium BC. e. some North Mesopotamian tribes reached the very south of the plain and reached the shores of the Persian Gulf. Seton Lloyd and Fuad Safar, during excavations at the site of Abu Shahrain (the ancient city of Eredu) in the early 50s, discovered that its lowest layers contained ceramics very similar to the late Hassun and dating back to the end of the 6th - beginning of the 5th millennium BC. e.
The chain of pre-Sumerian early agricultural cultures is completed by the so-called Ubeid culture (second half of the 5th - mid-4th millennium BC). It was first discovered in tell El-Ubaid near ancient Ur in Southern Iraq. At the end of the 20s. English archaeologists worked there. While exploring this tell, they discovered unfamiliar painted pottery under the remains of a Sumerian temple - dark green shards fired almost to a glassy state, decorated with clear geometric designs applied in dark brown and black paint. Later, under the silt deposits, it was possible to uncover the reed huts of the first inhabitants of the village with exactly the same painted dishes. Thus, another unknown culture appeared in the archaeological chronicle of Mesopotamia, which, in its chronological position, immediately preceded the great Sumerian civilization.
In 1940, Iraqi specialists excavated an Ubaid village in Tell Uqair near Baghdad. Here, solid adobe houses made of rectangular mud bricks with walls almost a meter high have been discovered, and a fairly wide street has been cleared. The basis of the economy of the local residents was agriculture, cattle breeding and fishing (clay models of boats, stone weights for nets and bones of large fish were found). The Ubaid culture (its origin remains unknown) quickly spread throughout Mesopotamia, displacing (or destroying) the magnificent Halaf culture in the north.

Discoveries continue

As for the monuments of the Sumerian era, after World War II the Germans continued excavations in Uruku, the Americans in Nippur and Kish, the British (M. Mallone) again began excavations at Nimrud.

Even more intensive research by archaeologists unfolded throughout Mesopotamia in the 60-70s. XX century At the same time, the list of countries participating in this grandiose archaeological epic has also expanded noticeably: Italy, Japan, Denmark and Russia have joined the traditional participants - England, France, Germany and the USA. Hundreds of different monuments from all eras were excavated: from cave sites of primitive man in the mountains of Kurdistan to huge cities of the 1st millennium BC. e. such as Nineveh and Babylon (Iraqi Antiquities Directorate). However, already the Iran-Iraq war of 1980–1989. greatly reduced both the number of foreign expeditions in Iraq and the scope of their research activity. The final blow to the archaeological study of the country with the participation of foreigners was dealt by the operation of the Americans and their allies in 1991 - Desert Storm. In addition, during the aerial bombardment, many world-famous ancient monuments were severely damaged - for example, the famous ziggurat of Ur-Nammu in Ur, built in the 3rd millennium BC. e.
Nevertheless, Iraqi scientists continued to conduct archaeological study of their country, as far as possible, even during these difficult years. And I want to tell you about one of their remarkable discoveries here. In 1988, archaeologist Muzahim Mahmud Hussein, during excavations in Nimrud in an underground crypt under the floors of the palace of Ashurnazirpal II, discovered the stone sarcophagi of two Assyrian queens, where, in addition to the remains of the highest persons themselves, there were 20 kg of gold jewelry of the finest work - earrings, rings, necklaces, bracelets, pins, etc. Based on the cuneiform inscriptions on the sarcophagi, it was possible to restore the names of the noble deceased: Atalia - the wife of King Sargon II (721-705 BC) and Yabai - the wife of Tiglath-pileser III (744-727 BC) AD). Thus, the countless treasures of the Assyrian rulers are not a legend, not a fiction, but a reality.

Chapter 3 At the origins of the first civilization of the planet

History begins in Sumer

Back in the 9th–8th millennium BC. e. Iraq became the scene of the "Neolithic Revolution" - the most important of all revolutions in human history. In the foothills of Kurdistan, moistened every winter by rains from the Mediterranean Sea, man ceased to be a wandering hunter, dependent on the vagaries of nature, and turned into a farmer, tied to a small piece of land, from which he now received basic food products. He built himself a home from clay and invented new types of tools. Herds of domesticated sheep, goats and cattle provided him with a constant and easily accessible source of meat, milk, wool and leather. Each large family probably built its own house, cultivated its own field, and tended its own herd of domestic animals. And several families, united together, formed a village - the embryo of a social organization in the form of a rural community.
Later there were other “revolutions”: metal replaced stone, villages grew into cities, cities united (often against their will) into kingdoms, and kingdoms into empires. But life itself, the work of a person tied to mother earth and dependent on the seasonal cycles of nature, has not changed here from those ancient times almost to the present day.
5,000 years before the birth of Christ, the foothills of Zagros and Sinjar in northern Iraq were inhabited by Neolithic farmers and herders living in small villages and using tools dating back to the Stone Age. However, already two thousand years later, the “era of history” begins in Mesopotamia, but it begins at the other end of the great Mesopotamian plain - in the southern part of the Tigris-Euphrates valley, in Sumer. “History begins in Sumer,” the famous American orientalist Samuel Kramer once said, later putting this phrase in the title of one of his best popular science books. And this is the true truth. The bright light of written tradition (the appearance of cuneiform), which suddenly broke out between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers more than 50 centuries ago, brought to us from the darkness of millennia evidence of the life and deeds of one of the greatest peoples of antiquity - the Sumerians.

O Sumer, the great land among all the lands of the Universe, flooded with unfading light, defining divine laws for all peoples from sunrise to sunset!.. -

Was there something in the daily life of the Sumerians that distinguished them from many other peoples? So far, no clear distinguishing evidence has been found. Each family had its own yard next to the house, surrounded by dense bushes. The bush was called “surbatu.” With the help of this bush it was possible to protect some crops from the scorching sun and cool the house itself.

A special jug of water was always installed near the entrance to the house, intended for washing hands. There is equality between men and women. Archaeologists and historians are inclined to believe that, despite the possible influence of surrounding peoples who were dominated by patriarchy, the ancient Sumerians took equal rights from their gods.

The pantheon of Sumerian gods in the stories described gathered for “heavenly councils.” Both gods and goddesses were equally present at the councils. Only later, when stratification is visible in society, and farmers become debtors to the richer Sumerians, do they give their daughters under a marriage contract, respectively, without their consent. But, despite this, every woman could be present at the ancient Sumerian court and had the right to own a personal seal...

The waters of the Tigris and Euphrates made vast territories fertile, thanks to which, more than five thousand years ago, favorable conditions were created for the emergence and development of highly developed civilizations. Powerful states extended not only in Mesopotamia, but also in the territory of Syria, Western Asia, and often even on the borders with Egypt. Their wealth irresistibly attracted neighboring aggressive barbarian tribes, who in large numbers randomly moved throughout the Middle East. In contrast to the conservative, stable statehood of Egypt, hostile despotic empires chaotically replaced each other here. Over the course of a thousand-year history, the territory of Mesopotamia was consistently dominated by the Sumerians, who laid the foundations of civilization here and gradually assimilated it. Then the Babylonians, Assyrians, Persians.

In countless destructive wars and fires over time, naturally, neither the royal throne nor any other piece of furniture dating back to the times “before our era” was preserved. Today we can imagine the attributes of home furnishings, the decoration of palaces and temples only from archaeological finds, relief images, fragments of memorial plates and steles, since the tradition of depicting gods, priests, and later kings existed in Sumer since ancient times. Scenes of rituals, mythological subjects, compositions from the lives of kings and courtiers are abundantly supplied with everyday details - samples of clothing of the nobility and ordinary warriors, interior elements and samples of furniture of palaces and temples. It should be noted that archaeological finds with similar images in the territory of Mesopotamia largely provided evidence for scientists of the existence of the ancient Sumerian civilization and the highest level of development of their culture...

The main value of the Sumerian family was children. The sons became by law the full heirs of all their father's property and economy, the continuers of his craft. They were given the great honor of ensuring the posthumous cult of their father. They were to see to the proper burial of his ashes, the continued honoring of his memory and the perpetuation of his name.

Even as minors, children in Sumer had fairly broad rights. According to the deciphered tablets, they had the opportunity to carry out acts of purchase and sale, trade transactions and other business transactions.
All contracts with minor citizens, according to the law, had to be formalized in writing in the presence of several witnesses. This was supposed to protect inexperienced and not very intelligent youth from deception and prevent excessive wastefulness.

A significant part of the court documents that have reached us, “ dityl”, was devoted to issues of marriage and family relations. The found archives of the courts are thousands of clay tablets with records of marriage contracts, agreements and wills, which, according to the laws of the city-states of Sumer, were required to be drawn up in writing and officially certified. The archives contain a huge number of court records in divorce cases, adultery cases, controversial issues in the division of inheritance, and a great variety of cases considered in all areas of family relations. This indicates a high level of development of Sumerian jurisprudence in the field of family law, the basis of which was the respect of its citizens for public order and justice, a clear awareness of their responsibilities and the guarantee of rights. The main link of society in Sumer was the family, family clans, so the highly developed judicial system stood for the protection of family values ​​and the order that had developed over centuries.

The way of life in the Sumerian family was patriarchal. The father, a man, was in charge. His power was a copy of the power of the ruler or ensi within one family clan; his word was decisive in the most important family and economic issues. Already at the beginning of the third millennium BC, marriage was monogamous, although a man was allowed to have a concubine, usually a slave. If the wife was infertile, she herself could choose a second wife-concubine for her husband, but she, by her position, occupied a step lower, and could not demand equality with her legal wife-citizen...

Most of the known Sumerian court documents were discovered during excavations of the famous "hill of tablets" in Lagash. According to scientists, this is where the court archive was located, where the records of trials were kept. Tablets containing court records are arranged in a certain order established by custom and are strictly systematized. They have a detailed “card index” - a list of all documents, in accordance with the dates of their writing.

French scientists and archaeologists made a huge contribution to deciphering court documents from Lagash. J.-V. Sheil and Charles Virollo, who at the very beginning of the 20th century were the first to copy, publish and partially translate the texts of the tablets from the found archive. Later, already in the mid-twentieth century, the German scholar Adam Falkenstein published several dozen detailed translations of court records and verdicts, and largely thanks to these documents, today we can quite accurately restore legal procedures in the city-states of Sumer.

The recording of court decisions by the most ancient secretaries was called ditilla, which literally means “final verdict”, “completed trial”. All legal and legislative regulation in the city-states of Sumer was in the hands of the enzi - the local rulers of these cities. They were the supreme judges, they were the ones who had to dispense justice and monitor the implementation of the laws.

In practice, on behalf of the ensi, righteous justice was carried out by a specially appointed panel of judges, who made decisions in accordance with established traditions and current laws. The composition of the court was not constant. There were no professional judges; they were appointed from representatives of the city nobility - temple officials, prefects, sea merchants, clerks, augurs. The trial was usually conducted by three judges, although in some cases there could be one or two. The number of judges was determined by the social status of the parties, the severity of the case and a number of other reasons. Nothing is known about the methods and criteria for appointing judges; it is also not clear for how long judges were appointed and whether their work was paid...

The fate of great archaeological discoveries is sometimes very interesting. In 1900 An expedition from the University of Pennsylvania discovered during excavations at the site of the ancient Sumerian city of Nippur two heavily damaged fragments of a clay tablet with almost illegible text. Among other more valuable exhibits, they did not attract much attention and were sent to the Museum of the Ancient East, which was located in Istanbul. Its keeper F.R. Kraus, having connected parts of the table with each other, determined that it contained the texts of ancient laws. Kraus cataloged the artifact in the Nippur collection and forgot about the clay tablet for five long decades.

Only in 1952 Samuel Kramer, at the prompting of the same Kraus, again drew attention to this table, and his attempts to decipher the texts were partially crowned with success. The poorly preserved table, covered in cracks, contained a copy of the legal code of the founder of the Third Dynasty, Urr, who ruled at the very end of the third millennium. BC - King Ur-Nammu.

In 1902, the discovery of the French archaeologist M. Jacquet thundered throughout the world, who, during excavations in Susa, found a slab of black diorite - a more than two-meter stele of King Hammurabi with a code of laws engraved on it. The Code of Ur-Nammu was compiled more than three centuries earlier. Thus, the dilapidated tablets contained the text of the earliest legal code that has reached us.

It is likely that it was originally carved on a stone stele, just like the codex of King Hammurabi. But neither it, nor even its modern or later copy has survived. The only thing that researchers have at their disposal is a partially damaged clay tablet, so it is not possible to completely restore the code of laws of Ur-nammu. To date, only 90 of the 370 lines that scientists believe constitute the full text of Ur-Nammu's legal code have been deciphered.

In the prologue to code, it is said that Ur-Nammu was chosen by the gods as their earthly representative in order to establish the triumph of justice, eradicate disorder and lawlessness in Ur in the name of the well-being of its inhabitants. His laws were designed to protect “the orphan from the tyranny of the rich, the widow from those in power, the man who has one shekel from the man with one mina (60 shekels).”

Researchers have not reached a consensus on the total number of articles in the Ur-Nammu codex. With some degree of probability, it was possible to reconstruct the text of only five of them, and then only with certain assumptions. Fragments of one of the laws talk about the return of a slave to the owner, another article addresses the issue of the guilt of witchcraft. And only three laws, however, also not fully preserved and difficult to decipher, represent extremely interesting material for the study of social and legal relations that developed in Sumerian society.

They sound something like this:

• “If a person injures another person’s foot with a weapon, he will pay 10 shekels of silver.”
• “If a man breaks another man’s bone with a weapon, he pays one mina in silver.”
• “If a person injures another person’s face with a weapon, then he pays two-thirds of a mina of silver”...

The transition from hunting and collecting wild plants to agriculture and cattle breeding, which occurred in the Neolithic era about 10 thousand years ago, marked fundamental changes in human life. It became the impetus for truly revolutionary changes in society. Agriculture leads to the emergence of the first settled settlements in the Middle East, and with them the first property. There is a need to certify the rights to what you own, to brand your property. The first seals that appeared in Mesopotamia served this purpose. Seals can serve as an interesting object for research. They clearly demonstrate the change in the technology of processing various materials in the Middle East after the resettlement of Sumerian tribes there.

Materials and processing techniques used by the Ancient Sumerians

First of all, it should be noted that to process any material, a mineral or stone is used, the hardness of which is no less, or even better, greater than the material being processed. Of these minerals that are hard enough to cut stone, quartz is especially worth noting. There are two main types of it. The first type is macrocrystalline, transparent quartz - amethyst, rock crystal, rose quartz. Rock crystal could be found in the form of stones of various sizes in the Tigris and Euphrates, so it has been available and used since ancient times. Mesopotamia also had its own rose quartz; amethyst had to be imported from Egypt, Turkey or Iran.

The second variety of quartz is chalcedony and various microcrystalline layered quartz - agate, tiger's eye, jasper, carnelian. This also includes flint. Jasper was found in the Zagros mountains, and chalcedony, agate, and carnelian were brought from India and Iran.

In the technique of cutting seals, there were three main methods of processing the material. The first is preliminary rough processing with a rotating grinding wheel. Then drilling using a bow drill. The “bow” of such a drill moved back and forth, depending on this, the drill turned first in one direction, then in the other. The carver could either secure the sample being processed and hold the drill vertically, or hold the sample itself and position the drill horizontally. The third technique is final hand finishing. The cutter was held directly in the hand or mounted on a wooden handle...

The son continued his father's work, ruling with a firm hand for 53 years: from 605 to 562 BC. At that time, Babylon already numbered two hundred thousand people. He erected temples, restored ancient buildings, built canals and palaces. Under him, the southern part of the city was completed, the first stone bridge across the Euphrates was built. There is a myth that tunnels were also built under the river! Nebuchadnezzar built the Hanging Gardens for his incomparable wife Semiramis. Moreover, according to the memoirs of contemporaries, Semiramis was one of the most cruel and lustful women of that time. But also the most beautiful.

It was under this ruler that Babylon began to look the way historians described it: streets clearly drawn in accordance with the geometry, a smooth wall surrounding the city in the form of a regular quadrangle. This city is still the largest known walled city in the world. Along the wall there was a deep ditch filled with water. The wall itself was almost thirty meters wide!...

“Beautiful” was the sacrificial sheep intended for the ritual. They could award the epithet “beautiful” to a priest who possessed the necessary ritual attributes and a symbol of power, or an object made according to ancient ritual canons. Beautiful, possessing the highest degree of beauty, among the ancient Sumerians was that which most closely corresponds to its inner essence and its divine destiny, and therefore is most suitable for fulfilling a certain function assigned to it - cult, memorial.

The cult function of the object was to participate in ritual ceremonies, royal or church. These objects provided a symbolic connection with deities and departed ancestors.

If an object participates in current social life and confirms the high social position of its owner, then it fulfills the pragmatic function assigned to it.

Today it is believed that Babylonia was not a separate country. Babylon is the last surge of the dying kingdom of the Sumerians. The first king of the most beautiful and most mysterious city is believed to have been the great Hammurabi, who reigned from 1792-1750 BC. It was he who, with a strong hand, united the country, which had been scattered after the next turmoil, and who resumed trade, construction, and tightened laws that made it possible to prolong the death throes of the Sumerian civilization.

The Code of Hammurabi contained 282 articles, which included criminal, administrative, and civil laws. A real find for our lawyers, who saw that in ancient times people were not judged by their position in society or wealth. It was believed that the scroll with the laws of Hammurabi was given by the sun god himself. The strong were punished if he offended the weak. The basic form of vendetta flourished: an eye for an eye. Everything was simple and at the same time bloody. But it's effective. They were executed for robbery. If the robber had previously broken through a wall in the house, then just before the break he was buried, it’s good that he wasn’t alive. Children were killed for stealing. Robbers of temples and palaces were killed. Dealers were killed. The sheltered white slave was killed. For adultery, both were drowned: the cheater and the one with whom she cheated. If a wife killed her husband because of another man, she was impaled. If someone who came to put out a fire stole something, he was thrown into the same fire. If a son raised his hand against his father, both of his upper limbs were cut off. If a house that a builder built collapsed and killed the homeowner, the builder was executed. For an unsuccessful operation, the doctor's hands were cut off. Some of the administrative articles seem very successful in light of the rampant corruption and negligence of officials, doctors and various companies that exist today...

Ur is one of the oldest Sumerian city-states of the ancient southern Mesopotamia (Mesopotamia), existed from the 4th millennium to the 4th century BC. e. Ur was located in southern Babylonia, south of modern Tell el-Muqayyar in Iraq, near Nasiriyah, on the west bank of the Euphrates River. One of the first Europeans to visit the mound above the city was the Italian Pietro della Valle in 1625, who discovered bricks with cuneiform writing here.

The first excavations of Ur were carried out in 1854 by D. Taylor, an employee of the British consulate in Basra, for the British Museum. The ruins of the temple of the local god Sin were discovered, as well as interesting necropolises, with burials either in round coffins, or under brick vaults, or in clay vessels. In 1918, R. Campbell-Thompson conducted excavations in Ur, and in 1919−22. - G. R. Hall

The most extensive excavations of the city began in 1922 under the direction of Sir Leonard Woolley. 42-year-old Woolley led a joint American-English expedition of the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania, which received significant funds for the excavations of Ur.

Woolley dug there for thirteen years, employing up to 400 workers. But the city turned out to be so large and the cultural layer so deep that the expedition was able to excavate only a small part of the hill during this time, and reached the lower layers in a tiny area. The excavation site was a very deep pit tapering downward.

Among Woolley's discoveries, which thundered throughout the world, are the tomb of Queen Shubad, the standard of war and peace with the oldest images of war chariots, and the first stringed musical instruments known to scientists. Most of the exhibits went to the British Museum. Also, under the leadership of Woolley, the majestic ziggurat at Ur was freed from thousands of years of drift.

The most numerous and interesting monuments uncovered by excavations date back to the reign of the I and III dynasties of Ur. The reign of the First Dynasty (XXV century BC) dates back to 16 royal tombs, in which numerous examples of luxurious utensils made of gold, silver, alabaster, lapis lazuli, obsidian and other materials were found, sometimes using mosaic techniques .

2 Lagash

In 1877, French Vice-Consul Ernest de Sarzec arrived in the Iraqi city of Basra. Like many other diplomats of that time working in the Middle East, he was passionately interested in antiquities and devoted all his free time to exploring the near and far surroundings of Basra. From the local population, he heard stories about bricks with strange signs that were often found in the Tello tract, located north of Basra.

Arriving at the site, Sarzek began excavations. They continued for several years and were crowned with success. Under a whole complex of sloughed clay hills, Sarzek discovered the ruins of Lagash, and most importantly, a huge, well-systematized archive, consisting of more than 20 thousand cuneiform tablets that had lain in the ground for almost four millennia.

As it turned out, Lagash was in many ways atypical for the cities of Sumer: it was a cluster of settlements surrounding the previously established main core of the city. A whole gallery of sculptures of the city's rulers was discovered in Lagash, including the now famous group of sculptural portraits of the ruler Gudea. From the inscriptions carved on them and from the texts of clay tablets, scientists learned the names of dozens of kings and other prominent people of that time who lived in the 3rd millennium BC. e.

In 1903, French archaeologist Gaston Croy continued excavations at Lagash. In 1929-1931, Henri de Genillac worked here, and then Andre Parrot for two more years.

Ur is one of the oldest Sumerian city-states of the ancient southern Mesopotamia (Mesopotamia), existed from the 4th millennium to the 4th century BC. e. Ur was located in southern Babylonia, south of modern Tell el-Muqayyar in Iraq, near Nasiriyah, on the west bank of the Euphrates River. One of the first Europeans to visit the mound above the city was the Italian Pietro della Valle in 1625, who discovered bricks with cuneiform writing here.

The first excavations of Ur were carried out in 1854 by D. Taylor, an employee of the British consulate in Basra, for the British Museum. The ruins of the temple of the local god Sin were discovered, as well as interesting necropolises, with burials either in round coffins, or under brick vaults, or in clay vessels. In 1918, R. Campbell-Thompson conducted excavations in Ur, and in 1919−22. — G. R. Hall

The most extensive excavations of the city began in 1922 under the direction of Sir Leonard Woolley. 42-year-old Woolley led a joint American-English expedition of the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania, which received significant funds for the excavations of Ur. Woolley dug there for thirteen years, employing up to 400 workers. But the city turned out to be so large and the cultural layer so deep that the expedition was able to excavate only a small part of the hill during this time, and reached the lower layers in a tiny area. The excavation site was a very deep pit tapering downward. Among Woolley's discoveries, which thundered throughout the world, are the tomb of Queen Shubad, the standard of war and peace with the oldest images of war chariots, and the first stringed musical instruments known to scientists. Most of the exhibits went to the British Museum. Also, under the leadership of Woolley, the majestic ziggurat at Ur was freed from thousands of years of drift.

The most numerous and interesting monuments uncovered by excavations date back to the reign of the I and III dynasties of Ur. The reign of the First Dynasty (XXV century BC) dates back to 16 royal tombs, in which numerous examples of luxurious utensils made of gold, silver, alabaster, lapis lazuli, obsidian and other materials were found, sometimes using mosaic techniques .

2 Lagash

In 1877, French Vice-Consul Ernest de Sarzec arrived in the Iraqi city of Basra. Like many other diplomats of that time working in the Middle East, he was passionately interested in antiquities and devoted all his free time to exploring the near and far surroundings of Basra. From the local population, he heard stories about bricks with strange signs that were often found in the Tello tract, located north of Basra.

Arriving at the site, Sarzek began excavations. They continued for several years and were crowned with success. Under a whole complex of sloughed clay hills, Sarzek discovered the ruins of Lagash, and most importantly, a huge, well-systematized archive, consisting of more than 20 thousand cuneiform tablets that had lain in the ground for almost four millennia.

As it turned out, Lagash was in many ways atypical for the cities of Sumer: it was a cluster of settlements surrounding the previously established main core of the city. A whole gallery of sculptures of the city's rulers was discovered in Lagash, including the now famous group of sculptural portraits of the ruler Gudea. From the inscriptions carved on them and from the texts of clay tablets, scientists learned the names of dozens of kings and other prominent people of that time who lived in the 3rd millennium BC. e.

In 1903, French archaeologist Gaston Croy continued excavations at Lagash. In 1929-1931, Henri de Genillac worked here, and then Andre Parrot for two more years.

3 Nippur

Nippur is one of the oldest cities of Sumer, located on the Euphrates, south of the branch of the Iturungal tributary. Nippur was a sacred city for the ancient Sumerians; there was a temple of the main god of the Sumerians, Enlil.

In 1889, an American expedition led by J. Peters and G. Gilprecht began work at the proposed location of Nippur. In addition to them, the expedition included H. Haynes - a photographer, a business executive - and three more archaeologists. There were several hills in the excavation area of ​​the city of Nippur. Archaeologists numbered them and started from hill No. 1. In it they found the ruins of the royal palace, in hill No. 5 they found a whole library of “clay books.” But at this time, inter-tribal fighting among the Arabs unexpectedly broke out. And the archaeologists were forced to leave the excavation site.

Only a year later, two from the former group, J. Peters and H. Haynes, decided to return to Mesopotamia. This time, archaeologists discovered and carefully examined the ziggurat, and in hill No. 10 they found a temple and 2 thousand “clay books.”

In 1948, after a long break, American archaeologists returned to Nippur. This time they found ancient religious figurines, court records, and tablets with economic records. Later, in 1961, an American expedition found in one place, called the “treasure,” more than 50 figurines, from which the religious traditions of the local population could be determined.

4 Eridu

Eridu is one of the oldest cities in Sumer. According to Sumerian mythology, this is the very first city on Earth. The first archaeological work in Eris was carried out in 1855 by John Taylor. He outlined a vast pentagonal platform, surrounded by a brick wall and equipped with a staircase, in the middle of which there are the remains of a multi-story tower.

Further series of excavations followed in 1918–1920 and 1946–1949, organized by the Iraqi Department of Antiquities. R. Campbell Thompson, Fuad Safar and Seton Lloyd took part in the expeditions. Archaeologists were attracted by the legend that Eridu existed before the flood. It turned out that the earliest of the open temples was built at the turn of the 5th millennium BC. e.

During the excavations, a ziggurat was discovered, mud houses and public buildings were discovered, as well as the ruins of the foundations of repeatedly erected temples, built on the site of earlier sanctuaries on platforms in the form of rectangular rooms (they were built from mud bricks), including a temple (the size of room) of the first settlers and the temple of Ea with the remains of sacrifices - fish bones. The remains of the royal palace were also discovered. In the discovered necropolis of Eridu of Ubeid times, there were about 1000 graves made of adobe with funeral equipment, food, and utensils. Religious objects, ceramics, tools, etc. were also found.

Temples at the site of shrine worship were recreated and rebuilt over the centuries. Archaeologists outlined 18 horizons and identified 12 temples, which were regularly rebuilt and restored in the same place.

5 Borsippa

Borsippa is a Sumerian city located 20 km southwest of Babylon. Borsippa is famous for the remains of a large ziggurat, the height of which even today is about 50 meters, which has long been mistaken for the famous Tower of Babel.

The first excavations of the Borsippa ziggurat began in the mid-19th century by Henry Ravlinson. In 1901-1902, Robert Koldewey conducted excavations there. In 1980, Austrian excavations began in Borsippa, which concentrated on the study of the Temple of Ezida and the ziggurat. Work was interrupted during the Iraq wars, but was resumed again and again. During the excavations, many legal tablets and a number of literary and astronomical texts were found. They belong mainly to the later periods, beginning with the Chaldean dynasty.