From Ebla to Guzana: The Image of Power in Syria between the Bronze and Iron Ages (original) (raw)

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This research delves into the evolution of power representation in ancient Syria from the Bronze to Iron Ages, primarily focusing on architectural accomplishments, royal archives, and the depiction of kingship through art and ceremonial practices. The paper highlights the originality and continuity of architectural features and rituals that defined the public image of Syrian kingship and distinguishes these from contemporary Mesopotamian customs.

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The First Temples in antis. The Sanctuary of Tell Al-Rawda in the Context of 3rd Millenium Syria

While Jan-Waalke Meyer and his team, at the present time, successfully pursue the excavation of Steinbau VI, a superb temple in antis situated at the centre of the tell of Chuera, it is with great pleasure that I offer him the lines which follow. They are intended to be a modest tribute to the excavator of one of the principal Early Bronze Age cities of Syria, whose parallels with the site of Al-Rawda are striking: these two cities, founded in the Early Bronze Age, are new cities with preconceived urban plans. They are both organised around a network of streets in which concentric streets and radial arteries arranged in a star pattern cross each other, and they have both produced temples in antis. Apart from our common research on similar themes, this article provides a new link between our two sites and our two teams, whose encounters have always been a source of enrichment and pleasure.

The First Temples in antis : The Sanctuary of Tell Al-Rawda in the Context of 3rd millennium Syria

2010

The temples in antis are buildings where the lateral walls of the main hall of worship are continued on the facade on either side of a vestibule. This article shows that this widely spread architectural form, which has a very long history, appears to have occurred approximately at the same time throughout northern and central Syria and in the northern Levant as soon as around 2500–2400 BC. The recent discovery in Syria of a series of temples in antis dated to the 3rd millennium offers an opportunity to re-examine all the existing evidence in the light of these new data. In particular, the excavation of Tell Al-Rawda, in the interior of Syria, offers the exceptional opportunity of studying an entire sanctuary of the end of the 3rd millennium, with its sacred enclosure and its dependences. A comparison of Syrian temples in antis of the 3rd millennium enables us to shed light on the major characteristics of these buildings from the point of view of their form, their orientation, their ...

Monumentalizing Identities: North Syrian Urbanism, 1200-800 BCE

Despite the political decentralization of the period, the early Iron Age in North Syria (ca. 1200-900 BCE) was also an era of cultural and social innovation. One index of this creativity was the development of a distinctive urban monumental style in North Syria combining large architecture with carved and decorated stone slabs. The ruling elites of these city-states created an environment for the display of ideologies that both influenced and were influenced by the region’s new social, cultural, economic, and political realities. This monumental urbanism provided the setting for the development of new regional identities and also had a large influence on the public face of the cities of the Neo-Assyrian empire. Chapter 1 is an overview of the history of the region, history of research, and the main issues to be investigated. Chapter 2 describes the theories and methodologies guiding the analysis of the data. This framework draws upon perspectives developed for the analysis of signification in general (semiotics), ideology, ethnicity, and architecture. Chapter 3 presents arguments indicating how the reliefs and the meaning-rich urban architecture (such as gates, palaces, and temples), as permanent orientating points on the landscape, played an important part in forming identity groups. References to religion and, especially, ancestors were major components in the discourses involved in molding social identities. Chapter 4 considers the relationship between North Syria and Assyria. While Assyria was influenced to a substantial degree by North Syria’s urbanism, it did not “borrow” the specific elements in a rote manner but rather adapted and transformed them to meet its imperial requirements. North Syrian adoption of Assyrian styles and forms may be described as emulation, but evidence exists that this process was not entirely subservient but could incorporate expressions of resistance. The Catalogue contains the data forming the basis for the analyses in Chapters 3 and 4. In it, I look closely at three aspects of the Iron Age North Syrian cities on a site- by-site basis: the overall urban morphologies, the monumental architecture, and the accompanying reliefs. I also propose chronologies by site using the available archaeological, art historical, and inscriptional evidence.

Ancient Syria: Introduction

Buccellati, G. 1988. “Ancient Syria: Introduction.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 270: 1–2. https://doi.org/10.1086/basor1357001.

Damascus: Layers of Civilisations

2021

Damascus is the capital city of Syria and a pivotal point of connection that lies in the heart of the Middle East. In this essay, I present a full account of the complex religious and architectural changes layered on the ground of some parts of the city. It is relatively a mythical reading of those historical sites since its ancient creation.The long and intricate history related to the site on which the nowadays Umayyad Mosque beautifully illustrates the reason behind the use of the term “Layers of Civilisations” – as a title in this study. The continuity of the Mosque/Church/Temple complex - particularly that of the temenos - stresses the fact that this city has always been a sacred and religious ground for the people inhabited it.The long-lasting seven gates that surrounded and still surrounding the old city and the mythical and historical accounts connected to each of them are being explored. The vast array of legends, sacred stories woven around each corner of the city stresses...

About Some Fragments of Decorations from Early Syrian Palaces and Residences

Studia Eblaitica, 2024

The systematic excavation of Ebla, in north inner Syria, with the quantity and quality of the evidence thus far brought to light for both the mature Early Syrian period (Early Bronze IVA, c. 2400–2300 BC) and the mature and late Old Syrian periods (Middle Bronze I–II, c. 2000–1600 BC), allows us to examine in a new light evidences yielded by other Syrian sites, and to reconstruct in a more complete way the overall picture of the artistic expressions of Syria between Early Bronze IVA and Middle Bronze II. In this perspective, I will examine here some Early Syrian evidence coming from two sites of upper Syria, Tell Bi‘a/Tuttul and Tell Selenkahiyeh. They are quite different in size and political role, and it might be interesting to place them within the more general frame of the development of the artistic expressions of pre-classical Syria.

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