The organization of domestic activities in Upper Mesopotamian households and neighborhoods during the Early Bronze Age: A micro-archaeological and architectural approach.

Abstract

In this dissertation I analyze economic and social conditions in households and neighborhoods in Upper Mesopotamia, ca. third millennium B.C.E. Most investigations of domestic residences in the ancient Near East have focused on elite residences. In contrast, I analyze wealthy and commoner households to test current models of domestic economy, family structure, house types, and residential organization within rural and urban communities. Generations of archaeologists have devised models to explain the functioning of cities in ancient Mesopotamia. Implicit in many models is a focus on the elites and historic events. Little is known, however, of the everyday life of elites and commoners. I take a bottom-up approach and analyze daily domestic activities and the interactions between households and urban processes. In order to recover additional domestic evidence, I apply a technique only recently developed, micro-debris analysis (the study of artifacts under 10 mm in size), to identify the residues from daily activities. My goals are to ascertain domestic economy, family structures, and residential organization in Upper Mesopotamia during the Early Bronze Age. I analyze micro-debris from 370 sediment samples from a diversity of contexts at sites in south-eastern Turkey: two urban centers, Titrish and Kazane, and one rural village, Tilbes. Micro-archaeology involves the collection and quantification of small artifactual remains that are not recovered by traditional dry-sieving techniques. Whereas the large finds may be scavenged, discarded, or curated in periods of abandonment, smaller debris is often swept into corners or trampled into floor surfaces. The distribution of micro-debris often correlates with primary activity areas. Specifically, micro-archaeology provides an effective way for identifying multiple family units within single structures, areas of lithic retouching or production within households, and households of greater or lesser economic status. This study represents one of the few attempts at activity area analysis at a Mesopotamian site. Micro-archaeology complements the traditional analysis of features, macroartifacts, and architecture. Together with the architectural study of domestic forms, micro-archaeology provides important insight into daily life in ancient Mesopotamian cities and villages.