TELL ARBID

SUMMARY

The eight season of excavations on Tell
Arbid has added extensively to knowledge
of urban occupation on the site in the Early
Djezireh II—Illb periods, that is, Nineveh 5
and Early Dynastic III according to the
conventional periodization. The sizable
extent of the town has been confirmed for
the times of Nineveh 5 incised and excised
ware culture. The town appears to have
been divided into small districts that were
furnished with granaries serving as grain-
storage facilities for the use of the
indigenous population. In the later part of
the 3rd millennium BC, the town center
must have been dominated by an ‘acropolis’
of sorts, its slopes reinforced with specially
constructed terraces. On the summit of this

eminence, there was a structure, pro-
visionally designated as the “Public
Building”. Of interest is the “Building
with stone entrance” of Early Dynastic III
date, discovered in area “SD”. Assuming
our preliminary interpretation of this com-
plex is borne out in the course of further
research, we would be dealing with
a “district” temple that would have been
contemporary with other “central” sanc-
tuaries presumably to be found on the
‘acropolis’. While only further investi-
gations can bring answers to these
questions, we cannot but recognize the full
richness of the forms of urban life evidenced
by the ruins of the 3rd-millennium BC
town on Tell Arbid.

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