Bernard Geyer, Jean-Yves Monchambert, Canals and water supply in the lower Euphrates valley (original) (raw)
Related papers
Geoarchaeology, 2024
The last two decades witnessed increasing scholarly interest in the history of water management in southern Mesopotamia. Thanks to many geoarchaeological research projects conducted throughout the central and southern Iraqi floodplains, a general understanding of the macrophases of anthropogenic manipulation of this vast hydraulic landscape has been achieved. However, current narratives mostly rely on studies at a regional scale and are based on excessively long chronological phases (often spanning a whole millennium). A finer‐tuned analysis at a submillennial scale is needed to better appreciate the dynamics that led to the development of artificial canals and irrigation systems and the creation of harbours in cities and other navigation‐related facilities. The Iraqi‐Italian QADIS project is addressing this issue through a systematic geoarchaeological investigation in the south‐eastern area of the Qadisiyah province. We aim to update the current narrative by analysing case studies involving specific periods of occupation. We performed 17 boreholes to propose a date on the functioning period of the hydraulic works in five selected archaeological sites of this region. This approach allowed us to understand changes in water management strategies in both the short and the medium term (i.e., on a scale of centuries). In this paper, we present the results for the fourth and third millennia B.C.E. This period witnessed a crucial passage from the basic exploitation of natural watercourses for irrigation and occasional navigation to the emergence of the first system of artificial canals and intraurban harbours.
The Origins of Levee and Levee-Based Irrigation in the Nippur Area—Southern Mesopotamia
Oriental Institute , 2021
This paper aims to understand the geo-archaeological development of one of the major palaeochannel levees to the northeast of Nippur in southern Mesopotamia, and also reveal when these levees began to aggrade so that benefitting from their levee slopes for irrigated agriculture became possible. These levees were reported in several previous works; however, they provide different interpretations, as some authors called them the ancient Tigris while others considered them as one of the ancient branches of the Euphrates. However, in the present study, two fieldwork trips have been carried out in this area: first in 1990, when Gibson and Wilkinson were able to record a series of sections by means of the exposed section of the Third River Drain project, and secondly in 2013 when Jaafar Jotheri conducted fieldwork as part of his PhD study. Archaeological data and radiocarbon dates have been used and integrated with lithological interpretation of the levees. As a result, it seems that the levees were initiated probably as herringbone canals in the fourth millennium bc and were sustainable over some 4,000 to 5,000 years. This supports the idea that this type of herringbone canal system is long lasting and easy to maintain, while the massive and extensive canal systems of later periods were difficult to maintain and had a relatively short life.
Holocene fluvial and anthropogenic processes in the region of Uruk in southern Mesopotamia
For decades, it has been unclear as to how the world's first cities, in southern Mesopotamia, not only arose in a fluvial environment but also how this environment changed. This paper seeks to understand the long-term fluvial history of the region around Uruk, a major early city, in relation to water-human interactions. This paper applies geomorphological, historical and archaeological approaches and reveals that the Uruk region in southern Mesopotamia had been under the influence of freshwater fluvial environment since the early Holocene. It further demonstrates how canals and long-term human activities since the mid Holocene have been superimposed on the natural river channel patterns. Fieldwork has been conducted to ground-truth features identified applying remote sensing techniques. Five sediment cores were analysed to elucidate palaeoenvironmental changes. Radiocarbon ages for organic samples suggest that the oldest sediment layers, at a depth of 12.5 m, are from the Early Holocene, while results from diatom analyses imply that the whole sediment column was deposited in a freshwater environment. Intensive networks of palaeochannels and archaeological sites within the study area have been reconstructed and these networks have been divided into four different time intervals based on changes in channel courses. The first is from the early 4th to the late 1st millennium BCE; the second is from the late 1st millennium BCE to the middle 2nd millennium CE; the third lasted from after the Islamic period until the 1980s; the fourth is from the 1980s until the present. Key results include evidence for freshwater environments and favourable settlement conditions had already formed by the 8th millennium BCE. The favourable settlement environment resulted in stable (long-lived) canals between the 4th millennium BCE and 1st millennium CE. A significant settlement and irrigation expansion occurred in the early 1st millennium CE. Major abandonment ensued in the late 1st millennium CE and lasted until the mid 2nd millennium CE.
"Geoarchaeological research was performed to reconstruct the floodplain history in the surroundings of two ancient Mesopotamian cities: Tell ed-Der and Sippar. The mapping of the floodplain is based on facies analyses of the sedimentary succession of 225 hand-operated boreholes. The archaeological sites Tell ed-Der and Sippar are closely linked to a palaeochannelbelt of the Euphrates, located in the western part of the study area. Channel activity started at least in ca 3100 BC/5050 cal BP, until ca 1400-1000 BC/3350-2950 call 13P. The channel belt was part of an avulsion driven multiple Euphrates channel network that gradually became abandoned from the second half of the 2nd millennium BC. A second mapped Euphrates, Tigris or joint Euphrates -Tigris palaeochannel belt became abandoned well before 3100 BC, Examples of natural processes as well as human interactions triggering avulsion are given. Moreover, textual, archaeological and geological data show clearly that flood-control techniques and the construction of large-scale dikes seemed to be a common practice. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights"
Hydraulic landscapes in Mesopotamia: the role of human niche construction
Human niche construction emphasizes the capacity of organisms to modify their environment and thereby influence their own and other species’ evolution. For the hydraulic landscapes of southern Mesopotamia we employ geoarchaeological data, remote sensing and ancient texts to suggest that major irrigation systems in the central Mesopotamian plains were a form of herringbone system and that they developed through human niche construction as a result of the elaboration of crevasse splays along raised levees. The remarkable duration of these systems (some 4000 plus years) suggest that (a) they were sustainable over many millennia and (b) the short component canals could be managed by small lineages. However, equally they could be brought under the administration of the state.
Ancient canals, marshes and proximity of the sea heavily characterised the landscape and environment of the ancient State of Lagash in southern Iraq, from the mid-fifth to the second millennium BC: indeed the diachronic changes that can be analysed thanks to geological and archaeological observation and investigation show how this waterscape definitely influenced the shapes of settlement and the organisation of ancient societies from a cultural, economic and biological point of view. Recent excavations at Tell Zurghul in southern Iraq are giving the possibility to test, in the field, the presence of water: ancient cuneiform sources, from the mid-third millennium BC, show the intense programme of the rulers of the State of Lagash in managing water through the construction of canals and the regulation of marshes characterised by marine water due to the proximity of the sea. In this respect, human actions (such as the digging of canals) and natural conditions (such as the reduction in the fifth millennium and the progressive growth in the fourth millennium BC of water level) are recognisable in the field, and they of course explain the morphology of the site in the past and the changes it suffered even in the present: water in fact is doubtless a fundamental resource for suitable conditions of formation and growth of a urban centre, but it also limits the possibility of extending occupation on the entire surface (as, e.g. the exploitation of lands for agricultural purposes).
Recognition criteria for canals and rivers in the Mesopotamian floodplain.pdf
UCL Press., 2019
The ability to distinguish between the remaining traces of rivers and those of canals would greatly increase our understanding of water history and management within a given area. Such an understanding would lead in turn to a greatly enhanced understanding of the landscape, social structure, political life and economy of that area. For the Mesopotamian floodplain, intensive water-management activities, together with the frequent avulsions of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, have rendered channel networks complex and interlocked. This complexity has long confused researchers in regard to channel origins, and whether they are natural or anthropogenic, or a combination of the two. It is a challenging task, but the present work proposes and discusses seven key differences between the two types of channels, namely topographical cross-sections, crevasse splays, marshes, meandering, cut-offs and oxbow lakes, channel patterns, and stream directions. The discussion is based on geomorphological, remote-sensing, historical and archaeological data. It is concluded that, for a given channel, these differences may be sufficient to establish its origin.