UR

Archaeological site of Ur

Archaeological site of Ur

Background of Ancient city of Ur

In modern terms the area of Mesopotamia covers Iraq and parts of Syria and Turkey. Early settlements are dated from around 5500 BC and appear to have been based around a temple for the town's patron god or goddess; monumental temples can be found at the ancient sites of Eridu, Uruk and Ur. In around 3000 BC Uruk in southern Mesopotamia (Sumer) was probably the largest city in the world - some estimate it as the same size as Rome was in the first century AD. The city was based around the temple of Inanna (the Great Goddess of Love and War), and is also the home of the world's earliest recorded writing which developed into Sumerian, having initially taken the form of pictures (Collins, 2008).

In around 2350 BC the southern city states were united by the Emperor Sargon, king of the Akkad region who centralised administration and introduced the Akkadian language. His dynasty ruled Mesopotamia for 150 years, but with its collapse, Mesopotamia again descended into the turmoil of cities asserting their independence, chief among them being the city of Ur, which under the ruler Ur-Nammu entered the period now known as the Third Dynasty of Ur. Impressive monuments of this period in Mesopotamia's history are the ziggurats, solid pyramid-shaped towers with a shrine at the top. The story of the Tower of Babel is derived from one of the most famous ziggurats, built in the city of Babylon.

The city of Ur, once the largest in the world and the crown jewel of one of humanity's first civilizations, sits in a wasteland at the edge of a war zone. The ruins, which were inhabited from roughly 3000 to 300 B.C., consist mostly of brick walls, some of which are partially restored, revealing the outlines of monumental complexes such as shrines, storehouses, and elite residences. The ruins of the city cover roughly 30 acres around the ziggurat. As one walks through the larger site, potsherds crunch underfoot. It is impossible not to step on them. The Sumerians simply tossed their rubbish in the streets, gradually raising the level of their cities as garbage accumulated over hundreds of generations. And a few hundred yards from the ziggurat, there is the great necropolis of Ur, where dozens of tombs and pits lie open, their inhabitants removed by British archaeologists decades ago (De Mieroop, 2004).

Third Dynasty of Ur

Like previous rulers, those of the Third Dynasty of Ur had to fight against influxes of tribes coming into Mesopotamia from the surrounding areas, attracted by its wealth and fertility. The empire finally collapsed under Ur-Nammu's grandson, Ibbi-Su (c. 2028-2004 BC), leading to the cities of Lower Mesopotamia competing for control over the following 300 years.

In the north of Mesopotamia, the city of Ashur (an important trading centre for cloth, tin and silver) had been brought under control at the end of the nineteenth century BC by a soldier called ...