The Medieval Urban Landscape in Northeastern ...

Proceedings, 9 th ICAANE, Basel 2014, Vol. 3, 95–105

Karel Nováček – Miroslav Melčák

The Medieval Urban Landscape in Northeastern Mesopotamia (MULINEM): First Two Years of the Project More than fifteen sites of either confirmed or conjectured urban status existed in the Central Tigris and Adiabene regions between the 6th and 17th century AD. The presented project investigates their diversity, temporal dynamics and mutual relations. The excavations of Samarra undertaken by E. Herzfeld and F. Sarre one hundred years ago represent a formative step in the archaeology of Islamic cities. Nevertheless, since the end of these excavations, little progress has been made in our knowledge of medieval urbanism in the hinterland of Samarra, i.e. in the Central Tigris region and Northeastern Mesopotamia. Besides general studies on the region (Hoffmann 1880; Le Strange 1905; Fiey 1965; Morony 2005; Wheatley 2001) and historical-topographical analyses (e.g., Heidemann 1996), the published archaeological contributions reflect only a cursory or geographically narrow interest of individual scholarship (Sarre/Herzfeld 1911: 210–212; Sarre/Herzfeld 1920: 322–329; Edmonds 1932; Venco Ricciardi 1971; Córdoba 2005). On one hand, the reasons for this intellectual gap can be seen in the long-lasting cultural and scientific isolation of these regions (now predominantly Kurdish), and, on the other hand, in the shifting priorities within the discipline itself, where a regionally-defined interest in urban networks has found a prominent place only in the most recent years. The Central Tigris area with the adjacent region of the «Land of Hazza» centered around Arbīl which we have chosen in our investigation of the structure and dynamics of medieval Islamic centers, 1 has great potential for several reasons. First, during the Abbasid Caliphate, the region formed part of the communication corridor of key importance between the centre of the empire and its northern periphery, as well as a part of the wider hinterland of the Abbasid capitals of Baghdad and 1

Our three-years project (2013–2015) supported by the Czech Science Foundation (No. 13-19266S), represents a continuation of the previous research dealing with the archaeological topography and long-term urban evolution of the Assyrian Arbail – medieval Irbil (Nováček et al. 2008; Nováček et al. 2013).

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Nováček – Melčák

Fig. 1. Map of the region, urban sites under study and reconstructed courses of medieval routes (drawing by L. Starková and K. Nováček).

Samarra. The density and diversity of the central places in this region reflect its importance. According to our preliminary survey, combining analysis of historical topographies with satellite imagery, more than fifteen sites of either confirmed or conjectured urban status appeared in the region delimited by the Tigris, Great Zāb, and Little Zāb rivers, and the

The Medieval Urban Landscape in Northeastern Mesopotamia (MULINEM)

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Zagros Mountains in the period from the 6th to the 17th century AD (fig. 1). Apart from Arbīl and Altun Köprü, all sites were abandoned during the Ottoman era at the latest. Furthermore, the state of preservation of the sites and their visibility both in the satellite imagery and in the terrain is very good, particularly in the Central Tigris area and Makhmur Plain, where the degree of the modern agricultural impact is still relatively small. Thus the sites are very suitable for investigation using methods of remote sensing and non-invasive survey. In 2013–2014, the western and southern parts of the study area became a war zone and the sites in this region (9 of the total of 16 sites) ceased to be accessible. These circumstances forced us to shift emphasis in the research on these sites to the analysis of written sources as well as satellite and aerial images. In these cases, our findings remain unverified hypotheses. Yet, several towns known from medieval Arabic geographies and biographical dictionaries have been located with high probability. This is the case of Hadīthat al-Mawsil and al-Bawāzij, two towns that played an important role as regional centres on the Central Tigris between the 8th and 12th (13th?) centuries AD. Hadīthat al-Mawsil was re-founded by the last Umayyad caliph Marwān II before the mid-8th century in place of a previous Christian settlement. Some indications in our sources lead us to the tentative conclusion that the city lost its urban character just before the Mongol invasion. The satellite imagery provides a view of a huge, c. 300ha area of low mounds and architectural remains adjacent to the eastern terrace edge of the Tigris river, between the present-day villages of Sultān Abdullāh and Tell al-Ša’īr. The deserted, regularly planned city shows traces of monumental buildings and courses of the town wall. One of the outstanding structures could hypothetically be connected with a deserted congregational mosque, which was described by al-Maqdisī as the only non-mud-brick structure of the city. In 1923, C. J. Edmonds described a group of Middle Islamic architectural monuments in the lower Little Zāb basin, at the place locally called al-Ismā´īlīya, and connected it with the town of al-Bawāzij (Edmonds 1932). In 2013, three monumental mausoleums in two different locations (two of them locally called Imām Ismā´īl and Šaykh Hamad respectively, the third one remains unnamed) were still standing, although in a ruined state. The structures are characterized by lavish interior decoration executed either in stucco or via geometrically-composed fired bricks (hazarbaf ) (fig. 2). The mausoleums were apparently built on the outskirts of medieval settlements but an urban context cannot be assumed here so far. Conspicuous remains of an urban site were identified only c. 7,5 km NE of the mausoleums (fig. 3). In the satellite images, one can recognize a large 138-ha enclosure of trapezoidal plan which was fortified by a rampart, originally a mud-brick wall with bastions. There are also traces of open canal systems that once entered the enclosure. On the west side, a narrow projection extends out of the fortified area, ending with a large rectangular mound, probably a citadel. The position of the abandoned town corresponds well with some descriptions of al-Bawāzij in the works of medieval Arabic geographers, but its dating remains uncertain.

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Fig. 2. Imām Ismā´īl, interior of the ruined mausoleum, state in 2013 (photo by O. Khorshid).

As for our fieldwork, in 2013 and 2014, we concentrated on three central sites in the Adiabene region (Kafr Azza, Old Makhmūr, Altun Köprü), each very different from the other in terms of size, past status and state of preservation. The town of Kafr Azza (probably alternatively referred to, in the medieval period, as Hazza) was founded in the Late Sasanian or Early Islamic period as an alternative centre of the Arbīl province, as is indicated by the name «Land of Hazza», which occurs several times in the sources. The archaeological remains of the city have been identified with a high probability only 10 km SW of Arbīl, between the villages of Azza and Qunyān (Sardar). The settlement area of irregular plan followed both a longitudinal West–East axis and an important canal running NE-SW, whose most distant traces are identifiable in the satellite images in the suburb of Arbīl, in the vicinity of the Kilik Mišik Tell. This canal could be the same as a canal called al-Jathulīk mentioned as still in use in a Chaldean source dated to 1491 AD. According to the image analysis and survey, the total area of the site amounts


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Fig. 3. Topographical situation in surroundings of Tell Ali with a deserted city and two groups of mausoleums; traces of deserted canals by dashed lines, deserted villages by hatched areas (image of CORONA mission DS1104-2138DF011, 16 August 1968, drawing by K. Nováček).

to c. 80 ha.2 The settlement area comprises one central tell and several tens of large, mostly low, ploughed-up mounds. We succeeded in corroborating that, in most cases, the mounds correspond to remains of medieval structures or built-up areas masoned of fired bricks. The settlement witnessed a maximum extent in its initial phase, i.e. in the Late Sasanian and Early Islamic Periods (roughly to the 10th century AD) when its area reached c. 75 ha. In the following period (c. the 11th–14th century AD), the site was substantially reduced; according to pottery analysis, the zone of intensive settlement use stayed compact but it shrank to

2 The site reconnaissance was carried out in autumn 2013, courtesy of Directorate of Antiquities

in Arbīl. The detailed survey was conducted one year later (October 2014) as a joint activity of MULINEM and Erbil Plain Archaeological Survey (EPAS), dir. by Jason Ur, Harvard University. We thank Jason Ur for his kind cooperation in the preparation of the survey.

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Fig. 4. Settlement area in the Azza–Qunyan zone (EPAS Site No. 215) with survey polygons (black lines), brick fragments scatters (white hatched areas), deserted canal (white dotted line) and zone of most intensive and long-term settlement (crosshatched area). Satellite image Formosat-2, 23 December 2013 (drawing by L. Starková and K. Nováček).

c. 31 ha, abandoning the central tell – a former nucleus of the city (fig. 4). This shrinkage of extent finds parallels in the textual sources: while Ibn Hawqal described Kafr Azza in the late 10th century as a town (madīna), Yāqūt al-Hamawī and Ibn al-Mustawf ī, some 250 years later, mention only a village (qarya). Detailed topography of the city is, nevertheless, a rather complex issue that needs a careful comparison of archaeological records with available textual evidence, which is beyond the scope of this preliminary information. The survey of the second centre – Old Makhmūr (Makhmūr al-Qadīma or Eski Maxmūr) – opens somewhat different questions. The site was identified in the CORONA satellite imagery in 2010 (Mühl 2013: 212) and 2012 (Nováček 2012: 81–83) and has become a subject of detailed surveys and mapping since October 2013. The site located on the SE outskirts of the modern town of Makhmūr is locally known as Old Makhmūr, but no mentions in the sources have been reliably connected with the site so far (Fiey 1965: 127). About 120 ha large, the most likely unfortified site stretches along a barely cultivated landscape, and hence its remains are extremely well preserved in relief. The settlement area comprises


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Fig. 5. Eski Makhmūr, situation of the site with the most important features 1. a water reservoir? 2. ‹urban quarters›. 3. a vaulted structure, presumably a church. 4. Early Islamic residences (qusūr) (satellite image WordView 2, 2013, drawing by L. Starková and K. Nováček).

several ruined structures and low mounds (fig. 5). The central part of the site is shaped into a strip with the main axis in a NW–SE direction and a high concentration of architectural features arranged in a seemingly regular pattern resembling an urban neighborhood. All wall courses, visible on the surface, maintain the general orientation of the building area (NW– SE or NE–SW). The western limit of this ‹quarter› is occupied by a remarkable rectangular mound concealing a large structure with maximal dimensions of 57 x 34 m whose longitudinal axis is oriented NE–SW. The northeastern part of the building–originally domed, now collapsed–is divided into four square compartments arranged in a T-shape. This form of subdivision resembles the plan of a church sanctuary and the structure should be tentatively interpreted as an Early Medieval church. The domed rooms could have served as souterrain tomb chambers (a crypt or martyrion) which would mean that the ground floor level of the eastern part of the church used to be above the current level of the surface. The nucleus of the settlement is flanked by large, isolated structures. At least three mounds of a rectangular plan probably contain ruins of fortified building complexes. One of these mounds in the SW part of the site bears visible portions of a rectangular perimeter wall

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Fig. 6 Eski Makhmūr, an Early Islamic castle (qasr), plan of surface remains of the structure in the modern satellite image (drawing by L. Starková and K. Nováček).

Fig. 7 Eski Makhmūr, an Early Islamic storage jar with honeycomb decoration, coming from illicit excavations (photo and drawing by K. Nováček).


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(53 x 42 m) on its summit, built with limestone boulders bound by gypsum mortar, as well as sparse traces of inner constructions joining the wall (fig. 6). These fortified residences are typologically very close to qusūr, Umayyad castles in Syropalestine, or Early Abbasid residences at al-Hīra. The isolated features surrounding the compact site nucleus are added by a 1,5-ha square enclosure (c. 120 x 120m) in the north part of the area, created by a 3–5 m high rampart. We consider it to be a large water reservoir. The surface pottery from the area provides uniform evidence of the Late Sasanian to Early Islamic Periods (fig. 7). The ceramics of Uruk, Neo-Assyrian, Hellenistic and Parthian Periods have only been collected at the western and southern edges of the site, where the anthropogenic relief had already been flattened, which suggests a more complex settlement history. Old Makhmūr represents an extraordinarily well preserved Early Islamic site of apparently central function with hints at the presence of an ‹Islamic› elite. Their residences enclosed an ‹urban nucleus› settled most probably by a Christian population. The city was situated in a strategic position at the edge of the fertile Makhmūr Plain, close to Hassan Ghazi Pass, where an important route leading from the Central Tigris area to Arbīl crossed over the mountain ridge. It would be worthwhile to cite al-Hīra, once the capital of the Lakhmids in central Iraq, as a close parallel to the architectural findings at Old Makhmūr (Talbot Rice 1934; Toral-Niehoff 2014: 75–82). Diverse ties also connect the morphology of the site with the Levant of the Umayyad period. The third example introduces a case of a small town in a strategic position which survives to the present. Altun Köprü (Pirdi) was situated on the historical route leading from Baghdad to Mosul via Arbīl. Occupying a 13-ha island in the Little Zāb river and being connected to the banks by two bridges, the town offered the only perennially reliable crossing of the river in the whole region. Our investigation benefited from a continual line of accounts recorded by European travellers visiting the site between the 16th and early 20th century. This material, being confronted with a unique view of the town in an Ottoman miniature from 1534 (Gabriel 1928; Eroğlu et al. 2008: 190) enabled us to define the main trajectories in the urban and architectural development of the site, which were afterwards verified by a survey conducted in the complex environment of the living city. We can preliminarily conclude that the town gained urban status in the early 16th century AD at the latest, but probably much earlier; we are working with the hypothesis of an urban extension from the island out to the western bank of the river in the Middle Islamic period. During the late Ottoman period, however, the town underwent a deep transformation, which resulted in a total change of the urban plan as well as in a structural pauperization accompanied by the loss of all former architectural landmarks (town wall with gates, congregational mosque, governor’s palace). We have been also able to fix the chronology of the famous bridges which gave the town its name.

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To conclude, we have to emphasize a high degree of formal variability of central places in the region under study. The cities differed in terms of size, formal elements of groundplan, presence of perimeter fortifications, inner articulation of space (namely, presence of a citadel), water management, number and size of large structures etc. The diverse forms of these cities suggest a hierarchical pattern within the urban network and possibly also a higher level of cooperation within the settlement structure. Moreover, the constellation of central places in Adiabene was by no means static, although the long-term continuity and high degree of resilience against political changes seems to be the most distinctive feature of the urban landscape in NE Mesopotamia. On the other hand, several towns might have been abandoned or lost urban status within periods that are generally considered as times of stability and prosperity (Mahoze/Tell Mahuz in the 9th century, al-Sinn and Hadīthat al-Mawsil in the 12th century). As the project continues, our aim is to interpret these shifts in meaning of individual nodal points, as well as to search for an explanation of the final collapse of the whole urban network in the Ottoman period.

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Karel Nováček, University of West Bohemia, Plzeň, Czech Republic. Miroslav Melčák, Oriental Institute, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague, Czech Republic.