Hi! This video will cover the Sumerian and
Akkadian periods of the ancient Near East. We'll be covering some sites
in ancient Sumer and then moving on to the Akkadian dynasty and looking at "Stele of Naram-
Sin". So starting off with Sumer. Sumer was organized into city-states,
which meant that eventually became quite easy to conquer
because it was so divided. Each city- state usually had one or two
patron gods or goddesses for whom
there would be ziggurats with temples on top constructed,
and these were sites where the citizens
would bring their contributions to the temple complexes,
so these contributions made up an important part of
city life, and we will look at
Uruk first, which is modern Warka, as one of the earliest
cities, so there is a ziggurat complex that survives in
somewhat poor shape that was probably dedicated to the sky god
Anu, and then there are also a number of
works -- sculptures,
vessels that survive from Uruk
that, unfortunately, a number of them were taken
from the Baghdad Museum, but a lot of them have been returned, so we'll look at one of the
examples
of a work that was taken from the Baghdad Museum, so
Uruk was established around 3500 BCE -- so quite early,
and this will be one of the first site we'll
think about. Just looking at the map, Sumer is down in this area
and when we move up to the Akkadian dynasty -- we're not sure the exact site at the capital,
but a little bit farther to the north and west of Sumer,
so over this way in between the two rivers of the Tigris and Euphrates
here, and, of course, previously we were in Egypt, which is over in
this area. Alright, so starting off looking the "Warka Vase"
what I'm showing you here is the alabaster vase on one side
and then a roll out, so that you can see all the registers of the vessel
so starting off, you have stylized plants, then a row of animals,
and then a row as nude figures in composite view,
so other their faces are profile, their shoulders are slightly
facing forward, and then their legs are pretty much in
profile, but they've stripped down, and they're bringing a variety of offerings
up to probably the temple complex -- the ziggurat/
temple complex -- giving us an idea of what these offerings were like,
so you can see the see these figures all holding different vessels and then in the rollout,
as well.
You can see also this vessel is in fairly
fragmentary condition and that this portion
is filled in, so a lot of is
a guess by art historians and archaeologists. It's an
hypothesis as to what was represented there based on what survives.
As I mentioned, some of these were stolen from the Baghdad
Musuem in 2003, and this was one of these --
one of the examples that was taken. It was actually ripped from its
pedestal, but luckily it was eventually returned.
This one gives us a nice a sense, as I said, of the offerings,
and then the top register gives us a sense of how these
offerings accumulated -- here on this side. This is probably
a priestess, who is receiving the offerings or it could be
an appearance of the goddess herself. Here, you have another
figure bringing an offering directly in front of her, and then you also have
what's probably
the ruler of Warka (or Uruk).
The ruler, who is wearing this cap that we associate
with rulers in the ancient Near East in a number of cases.
He seems to be joining together with either the priestess or this
appearance at the goddess in some kind of ritual or ceremony,
and he's the only figure that is as tall as the goddess [or priestess], so clearly he's an
individual of high status.
The goddess [or priestess] is clearly the main attraction, however,
all of the offering are behind her.
All of the offerings are behind her
and there are a number of markers of status just in terms of her dress and her headdress
lots of markers of her importance, but clearly the two most important
the goddess and then this figure here -- probably the leader.
Another of work of art
from ancient Sumer is the "Victory Stele
of Eannatum", and this gives us a sense of the
military action that was going on in the ancient Near East,
and this victory stele commemorates a victory of this ruler.
He was the ruler Lagash, and he was a figure that
claimed connections to the divine, which we can see in the writing
on the fragments this stele, but also on the iconography
itself. The iconography tells us that he believed that a god
came and assisted him in this battle. So first off, it's pretty easy to spot Eannatum.
You can see him here. He's clearly differentiated by his
fancy garment. You can see this sash
extending across. He has bun in his hair, which a lot of
rulers did in the ancient Near East. He's separated from his troops, which are
following
close behind him. He's not that much taller than they are,
but we definitely can tell that he's an individual of significance.
Also, down below he's slightly higher than his troops in his
chariot. You can see has a helmet on, the bun is again visible,
his arm is raised, and, again, his troops are very tightly packed behind him --
so, clearly an individual high status. It's pretty easy to spot him,
but he is about the same height as they are.
His overall physical prowess is not as large as we'll see later on
in the Akkadian rulers. Just to show you the overall stele. It is extremely
fragmentary. That's the piece we were just looking at earlier,
so you can see that's Eannatum, that's Eannatum with his troops behind in each
case.
Sometimes this is called "The Stele of the Vultures" because there are vultures running off
with body parts
of the individuals that they've defeated, and then a great part -- right here -- on the
stele
is the god who is assisting Eannatum by
bagging up some of his enemies here in this netted
bag, and bopping one on the head. And he's clearly a god
a figure of great physical prowess,
a very long beard, which was a sign of masculinity and power
in the ancient Near East.
Another finding -- one of the most famous finds from the Sumerian period comes from
the Royal Cemeteries at Ur, which was a very famous
excavation project, and "The Standard of
Ur" was probably not a military standard -- a standard would be something
placed on top of a pole and then carried into battle --
This is relatively small,
and so probably part of a musical instrument, or some kind of
decorative feature that was somehow incorporated into the
the cemeteries, but what's interesting is the way the scenes are organized and
also the information it tells us
both about battle, and also about peace
in the Sumerian culture. So, we're looking the peace side.
You can clearly see there's a figure who is the leader.
His head breaks the register here,
so you can see his head cracking through the register.
He's seated, so you can tell he's a figure of high status.
There are a number other figures of status, however, that are all seated with him,
seemingly in some kind of banqueting environment. They're all holding
vessels or cups in their hands. They are
enjoying lovely music here. This is a bullheaded lyre or
harp, which is another type of discovery that has been made in the Royal Cemeteries at Ur.
So the highest register is definitely one that
holds the most power in terms of power figures.
Along the way here, you have animals being led
along, so showing a harmonious society.
On the war side, however, we see a very different scene.
We see captives being led -- these are the captives here, here,
also here -- being led by individuals in military garb,
and these captives are being presented probably to that same ruler.
We see him again, or we see a similar figure whose head cracks through or
breaks through the register. He's clearly come off of his chariot,
which is here. He's disembarked
and then come to see these captives that are being presented to him
what we can tell from this is a little bit about the chariots -- so the chariots would have had solid
wheels, which
would have been extremely heavy, so there weren't
spokes at this time to lighten the wheels. We can see these same
solid wheels down below. We can only imagine how clunky they would be,
and we get a sense of the power of this culture, and the defeat of their enemies
because you can see it starts off kind of slowly here,
and then it starts to pick up speed as these
donkeys -- or whatever kind of horses they are --
start to go faster and faster
with their life spreading, and then you can see the captives [or defeated enemies] down below here
underneath these animals, and so it gives us a sense
of a bit of the violence, and how captives were treated,
and how showing dominance was very
important at this time. And the last culture
we will cover in this video is this Akkadian dynasty that begins to take control
of the area of the ancient Near East. The
first strong ruler that we see is Sargon,
and he was rules for over 50 years.
as I said, the location of the [capital] city is
unknown. They spoke a different language than the Sumerians, but they still used the same
cuneiform characters,
so that's something significant to mention that we're still seeing
cuneiform in both cultures, however, the language is different, so we do have a
writing system in
both cultures unlike the previous Paleolithic or Neolithic
cultures that we saw. And the kingship here is
even more connected the divine and is considered even more powerful than we
saw
in ancient Sumer, so even though individuals like Eannatum
definitely tried to connect themselves to define, we see it
at an even higher level in the Akkadian
period, so focusing in on "The Victory Stele of
Naram-Sin" we see some changes from the Sumerian period.
So first off, we see Naram-Sin as a real dominant figure here,
really towering over the entire group. No longer is the stele divided up
into registers; we see all these figures
slowly moving up this mountain side, gazing up towards their leader,
and up towards at least three stars that seem to be
at least granting them favor, or they're
looking up at them, and they're reading this as a favorable sign.
We clearly can see that this is commemorating a victory of Naram-Sin.
He defeated people in the Iranian mountains --
there's clearly a mountain -- you can see that here -- and you can see individuals:
one has a spear here; one seems to be begging for mercy;
and then a couple of them are toppling off the mountain itself,
so we can definitely tell that Naram-Sin is a figure to be reckoned with,
that we have a new type of kingship here. He has horns on his helmet,
which is a sign
that has been previously associated with divinity. He's very masculine with his
beard. He has a bead around his neck to protect him,
so Naram-Sin is clearly a dominant figure and an important figure
in this period, so this would serve
as a marker of his victory. It would bring admiration to his rule
or for his rule and it includes
inscriptions, as well. Eventually it was taken away as
war booty and brought to Iran,
so it was not discovered in its original location.
And the next video will discuss the second part
of the Near Eastern cultures.