Tell es-Sawwan was a city in ancient Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia is a toponym for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran.Widely considered to be the cradle of civilization, Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the...

 110 kilometers north of Baghdad

Baghdad

Baghdad is the capital of Iraq, as well as the coterminous Baghdad Governorate. The population of Baghdad in 2011 is approximately 7,216,040...

, and south of Samarra

Samarra

Sāmarrā is a city in Iraq. It stands on the east bank of the Tigris in the Salah ad-Din Governorate, north of Baghdad and, in 2003, had an estimated population of 348,700....

.

History

The site is a primarily Ubaid, Hassuna

Hassuna

Hassuna or Tell Hassuna is an ancient Mesopotamian site situated in the Ninawa Governorate of Iraq west of the Tigris river, south of Mosul and about 35 km southwest of Nineveh.-History:...

, and Samarran culture occupation with some later Babylonian graves. It is considered the type site

Type site

In archaeology a type site is a site that is considered the model of a particular archaeological culture...

for the Samarran culture.

Archaeology

Tell es-Sawwan is an oval mound 200 metres (656.2 ft) long by 110 metres (360.9 ft) wide with a maximum height of 3.5 metres (11.5 ft). The main mound was surrounded by a defensive ditch. The site was excavated by a team from the Iraqi Directorate General of Antiquites in seven seasons between 1964 and 1971. The second season was led by Khalid Ahmad Al-a'dami and the sixth and seventh season by Walid Yasin.

Further reading

• Abdul Qadir al-Tekriti, The Flint and Obsidian Implements of Tell es-Sawwan, Sumer, vol. 24, pp. 53–36, 1968
• Keith Flannery and Jane C. Wheeler, Animal Bones From Tell as-Sawwan Level III (Samaran Period), Sumer, vol. 23, pp. 179–182, 1967
• Donny George Youkana, Tell Es-Sawwan: The Architecture of the Sixth Millennium BC, NABU, 1997, ISBN 1857750056
• H Helbaek, Early Hassunan vegetable food at Tell es-Sawwan near Samarra, Sumer, vol. 20, 1966
• C. Breniquey, Rapport sur deux campagnes de fouilles à Tell es-Sawwan, 1988-1989, Mesopotamia, vol. 27, pp. 5-30, 1992
• F. Strika, Clay human figurines with applied decoration from Tell Es-Sawwan, Mesopotamia, vol. 33, pp. 7-21, 1998
• Joan Oates, The Baked Clay Figurines from Tell es-Sawwan, Iraq, vol. 28, no. 2, pp. 146-153, 1966