The Lives of Sumerian Sculpture by Jean M. Evans

Author:Jean M. Evans
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2012-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Locating the Asmar Hoard

To begin, the stratigraphic context of the Asmar sculpture hoard must be established. This is not, however, a straightforward exercise. According to the Diyala publications, the Asmar hoard was excavated between the altar and the long north wall of the D 17:9 sanctuary of the Square Temple (Figure 34).5 The 31.85-m findspot elevation for the Asmar hoard, however, is some 45 cm below the earliest Square Temple floor (Square Temple I at 32.3 m). Poorly recorded levels in the Abu Temple were excavated among the published sequence of Archaic Shrine, Square Temple, and Single-Shrine Temple. More specifically, at least three floor levels were present in D 17:9 between the latest-recorded floor level of the Archaic Shrine (Archaic Shrine IVC) and the earliest Square Temple floor level (Square Temple I). This is where the Asmar hoard should be located. That is, the burial of the Asmar hoard is stratigraphically earlier than the Square Temple.6

The exact location of the cut for the hole containing the Asmar hoard is unknown. Clay packing over the hole dug for the Asmar hoard, however, plausibly suggests its location.7 The statues in the Asmar hoard were placed in a hole dug especially for their burial; they were stacked in rows of three or four statues each, with the largest statues at the bottom. Tablet clay was then packed into the hole. Unlike a dirt fill, clay packing would have prevented a depression from forming where the hole had been dug. It would be necessary to use clay packing if the hole for the Asmar hoard were being dug in relation to a floor that was either in use or intended for use.

It would be reasonable to expect therefore that the 31.85-m findspot elevation for the Asmar hoard would correspond to a floor level encountered during excavation. This is confirmed by the published description of the hole for the Asmar hoard, which was packed for “30 cm beneath the actual pavement” with clay rolled into balls.8 An unpublished field notebook of the Abu Temple excavations, maintained by Lloyd, records the elevation of this “pavement.” Lloyd wrote that the Asmar hoard was “buried in a hole beneath a pavement (?) (31.81) the spaces between filled with spherical lumps of tablet clay and covered in with the same material.”9 The 31.81-m “pavement” roughly corresponds with the 31.85-m findspot elevation of the Asmar hoard; in all likelihood, they are one and the same.10

Some details are available for the poorly recorded remains that were encountered in the northern area of the Abu Temple between the Archaic Shrine and the Square Temple building periods. According to Lloyd’s field notebook, a small mudbrick structure below the D 17:9 altar of Square Temple I and a circular hearth full of ashes some distance before it belonged to a 32.16-m floor level.11 Below the 32.16-m level was the 31.81-m “pavement” roughly corresponding with the findspot elevation of the Asmar hoard. Finally, a third level between the Archaic Shrine and the Square Temple, for which no elevations were recorded, was designated the “predecessor” to the Square Temple.

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