The Archaeology of Prehistoric Arabia

The Archaeology of Prehistoric Arabia
Author: Peter Magee
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 327
Release: 2014-05-19
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1139991639

Encompassing a landmass greater than the rest of the Near East and Eastern Mediterranean combined, the Arabian peninsula remains one of the last great unexplored regions of the ancient world. This book provides the first extensive coverage of the archaeology of this region from c.9000 to 800 BC. Peter Magee argues that a unique social system, which relied on social cohesion and actively resisted the hierarchical structures of adjacent states, emerged during the Neolithic and continued to contour society for millennia later. The book also focuses on how the historical context in which Near Eastern archaeology was codified has led to a skewed understanding of the multiplicity of lifeways pursued by ancient peoples living throughout the Middle East.

Bahrain Through The Ages - the Archaeology

Bahrain Through The Ages - the Archaeology
Author: Shaikha Haya Ali Al Khalifa
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 527
Release: 2012-11-12
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1136141707

Introduction, Shoreline changes in Bahrain since the beginning of human Occupation, Variation in holocene land use patterns on the Bahrain Islands: construction of a land use model, The human biological history of the Early Bronze Age population in Bahrain, Dental anthropological investigations on Bahrain, India and Bahrain: A survey of culture interaction during the third and second millennia, The prehistory of the Gulf: recent finds, The Gulf in prehistory, Some aspects of Neolithic settlement in Bahrain and adjacent Regions, Early maritime cultures of the Arabian Gulf and the Indian Ocean. The origins of the Dilmun Civilization, The island on the edge of the world', Burial mounds near Ali excavated by the Danish Expedition, Dilmun - a trading entrepôt: evidence from historical and archaeological sources, Dilmun and Makkan during the third and early second millennia B.C, Death in Dilmun, The Barbar Temple: stratigraphy, architecture and Interpretation, The Barbar Temple: its chronology and foreign relations Reconsidered, The Barbar Temple: the masonry, The land of Dilmun is holy, Bahrain and the Arabian Gulf during the second millennium B.C.: Urban crisis and colonialism, The chronology of City II and III at Qal'at al-Bahrain, Iron Age Dilmun: A reconsideration of City IV at Qal'at al-Bahrain, MAR-TU and the land of Dilmun, The shell seals of Bahrain, Susa and the Dilmun Culture The Dilmun seals as evidence of long distance relations in the early second millennium B.C., Indus and Gulf type seals from Ur, Animal designs and Gulf chronology, Eyestones and Pearls, The Tarut statue as a peripheral contribution to the knowledge of early Mesopotamian plastic art, Commerce or Conquest: variations in the Mesopotamia-Dilmun Relationship, The occurrence of Dilmun in the oldest texts of Mesopotamia, The Deities of Dilmun, The lands of Dilmun: changing cultural and economic relations during the third to early second millennia B.C., Trade and cultural contacts between Bahrain and India in the third and second millennia B.C., Bahrain and the Indus civilisation, Dilmun's further relations: the Syro-Anatolian evidence from the third and second millennia B.C.; Tylos and Tyre: Bahrain in the Graeco-Roman World, A three generations' matrilineal genealogy in a Hasaean inscription: matrilineal ancestry in Pre-Islamic Arabia Bahrain and its position in an eco-cultural classification-concept of the Gulf: some theoretical aspects of eco-cultural zones, Dilmun and the Late Assyrian Empire, Some notes about Qal'at al-Bahrain during the Hellenistic period, The Janussan necropolis and late first millennium B.C. burial customs in Bahrain, Qal'at al-Bahrain: a strategic position from the Hellenistic period until modern times, The presentation and conservation of archaeological sites in Bahrain, The Barbar Temple site in Bahrain: conservation and presentation, The traditional architecture of Bahrain.

Cultures in Contact

Cultures in Contact
Author: Joan Aruz
Publisher: Metropolitan Museum of Art
Total Pages: 376
Release: 2013
Genre: Art
ISBN: 1588394751

The exhibition "Beyond Babylon : Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C.," held in 2008 - 2009 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, demonstrated the cultural enrichment that emerged from the intensive interaction of civilizations from western Asia to Egypt and the Aegean in the Middle and Late Bronze Ages. During this critical period in human history, powerful kingdoms and large territorial states were formed. Rising social elites created a demand for copper and tin, as well as for precious gold and silver and exotic materials such as lapis lazuli and ivory to create elite objects fashioned in styles that reflected contacts with foreign lands. This quest for metals--along with the desire for foreign textiles--was the driving force that led to the establishment of merchant colonies and a vast trading network throughout central Anatolia during the early second millennium B.C. Texts from palaces at sites from Hattusa (modern Bogazköy) in Hittite Anatolia to Amarna in Egypt attest to the volume and variety of interactions that took place some centuries later, creating the impetus for the circulation of precious goods, stimulating the exchange of ideas, and inspiring artistic creativity. Perhaps the most dramatic evidence for these far-flung connections emerges out of tragedy--the wreckage of the oldest known seagoing ship, discovered in a treacherous stretch off the southern coast of Turkey near the promontory known as Uluburun. Among its extraordinary cargo of copper, glass, and exotic raw materials and luxury goods is a gilded bronze statuette of a goddess--perhaps the patron deity on board, who failed in her mission to protect the ship. To explore the themes of the exhibition--art, trade, and diplomacy, viewed from an international perspective--a two-day symposium and related scholarly events allowed colleagues to explore many facets of the multicultural societies that developed in the second millennium B.C. Their insights, which dramatically illustrate the incipient phases of our intensely interactive world, are presented largely in symposium order, beginning with broad regional overviews and examination of particular archeological contexts and then drawing attention to specific artists and literary evidence for interconnections. In this introduction, however, their contributions are viewed from a somewhat more synthetic perspective, one that focuses attention on the ways in which ideas in this volume intersect to enrich the ongoing discourse on the themes elucidated in the exhibition.

Bahrain

Bahrain
Author: Fred H. Lawson
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 137
Release: 2019-03-05
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0429717857

First published in 1989. Bahrain is at the same time unique among the Arab oil-producing Gulf states and indicative of future developments in these emirates. Its uniqueness lies in the social, political, and economic structures of the country: The indigenous population is characterized by a peculiar set of overlapping cleavages; the country's industrial work force has a history of militant action and a degree of political consciousness unmatched in neighbouring states; and the islands' economy has achieved a level of diversification into non-petroleum-related activities that is the envy of planners in the surrounding area. This study provides an overview of current trends on the islands and of the social and historical context from which they have emerged. It is intended as an introduction to Bahraini affairs for the general reader and thus makes use of the existing literature wherever possible.

The Archaeology of Prehistoric Arabia

The Archaeology of Prehistoric Arabia
Author: Peter Magee
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 327
Release: 2014-05-19
Genre: History
ISBN: 0521862310

This book provides the first extensive coverage of the archaeology of the Arabian peninsula from c. 9000 to 800 BC. Providing a wealth of detail on the environmental and archaeological record, it argues that this ancient region was in many ways very different from the surrounding states in Egypt and Mesopotamia. It examines the adaptation of humans to Arabia's environment and the eventual formation of a unique society that flourished for millennia.

Looking for Dilmun

Looking for Dilmun
Author: Geoffrey Bibby
Publisher: Stacey International Publishers
Total Pages: 276
Release: 1996
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9780905743905

Dilmun features both in Mesopotamian myth, as a blessed land where death is unknown, and in the trade records of the Mesopotamian city of Ur as a real place, the source of Ur's copper supplies. The quest for the real Dilmun began in a relatively light-hearted way in 1953, when Geoffrey Bibby seized the opportunity to revisit Bahrain, in order to explore the thousands of undated burial mounds that decorate the Bahraini landscape. A brief season's digging was enough to establish the existence of a major civilization dating from around 2300 BC, contemporary with Ur and Babylon and showing evidence of trade with the Indus Valley civilization. Thus began a major undertaking, eventually encompassing more than 20 annual expeditions. These revealed the existence of cities and temples not only on Bahrain, but along 250 miles of coast and islands as far north as Kuwait and extending 60 miles into the interior of Saudi Arabia, as well as a second and earlier civilization some 300 miles east, in Oman, which Bibby identified with the legendary copper-rich land of Makan. And the final extraordinary revelation was the discovery in Saudi Arabia of pottery contemporary with the very earliest Stone Age settlements in Mesopotamia, c.5000 BC, extending the early history of the Gulf region back by over 1000 years and raising the possibility that Mesopotamia was first settled from Arabia.

Dilmun

Dilmun
Author: Daniel T. Potts
Publisher:
Total Pages: 254
Release: 1983
Genre: Bahrain
ISBN:

Dictionary of the Ancient Near East

Dictionary of the Ancient Near East
Author: Piotr Bienkowski
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Total Pages: 364
Release: 2010-03-09
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780812221152

An authoritative guide to the whole of the cradle of civilization.

The Archaeology of the Arabian Gulf

The Archaeology of the Arabian Gulf
Author: Michael Rice
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 388
Release: 2002-03-11
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1134967934

The archaeological remains in the Gulf area are astounding, and still relatively unexplored. Michael Rice has produced the first up-to-date book, which encompasses all the recent work in the area. He shows that the Gulf has been a major channel of commerce for millenia, and that its ancient culture was rich and complex, to be counted with its great contempororaries in Sumer, Egypt and south-west Persia.

Art of the First Cities

Art of the First Cities
Author: Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, N.Y.)
Publisher: Metropolitan Museum of Art
Total Pages: 566
Release: 2003
Genre: Art, Ancient
ISBN: 1588390438

Catalog of an exhibition being held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art from May 8 to Aug. 17, 2003.