Which are the deepest roots of that mix of cultures that we use to call ‘Mediterranean Civilization’? Which are comminglings and exchanges which produced its most complete fruit, i.e. the city, a place for landscape-modelling communities? And which elements did contribute to build up that baulk of customs, ideas, and innovations which compelled to confrontation and hybridizations different peoples for millennia? What did it made, from pottery to metallurgy, from gastronomy to architecture, from art to religion, of a sea a cradle of civilization? Archaeology may help in disentangling such questions, seeking unexpected answers , by tinkering what ancient Mediterranean peoples left buried in the ground. A privileged point of view of our course is the ancient Phoenician city of Motya, located exactly at the centre of the “sea in the middle”. Throughout the live experience of excavation, with images taken on the field, this course will let you touch the many tesserae of the great mosaic of the Mediterranean Civilization. The field diary of the archaeologist, and the handpick will be the two tools, which will lead us across the sea to discover what such early cities actually were, and how their contribute is still a major part of our shared memory.
2.3 A society in a network
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Do curso por Sapienza University of Rome
At the Origins of the Mediterranean Civilization: Archaeology of the City from the Levant to the West - 3rd-1st millennium BC
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Sapienza University of Rome
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Concept of the city
Conheça os instrutores
Lorenzo NigroProf.
Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia
[MUSIC]
How did it function, this institution which was called city-state, and
which was invented in southern Levant?
We can get some more information from this example that is the Palace of
the Copper Axes, an extraordinary discovery done by
Sapienza University of Rome in Central Jordan in the last decades.
As we see, this building was actually the central place
of a city leading through the whole 3rd millennium BC.
So we can use it as an example for studying how it works in
a society in this early period when the city was more or less invented.
So we see that the palace, which was actually the center of the power,
was a building divided into two wings, and inside it many items were concealed.
And there was at that time a distinguished architecture for central Jordan.
You see here, what is interesting is that it was planned so
there is a central corridor.
There are two pavilions.
One is the water to public relationships, let's say a reception suite.
And the place in which they could get together, feasting,
or even consumpting foods.
And on the other side, there is a place in which they used to produce
precious items and to store precious items.
So, this was the one that likely was kept safe until
the pick axe cut through this layer which was set on fire
around the mid of the third millennium BC or somewhat later.
So there was a pillared hall.
You see here this pillared hall.
There were four pillars arrayed in the middle of the hall.
And during the last day of life of this palace,
this room was filled up with old stuff.
Actually it was originally a storerooms for cereals, which were the most important
production of the agriculture controlled by the city.
And you see here these pithois, that means huge jars, more
than 150 liters of capacity, filled up with seeds of barley.
So, from studies of this barley, we know that it was very well cultivated.
And it was selected.
And that means that there was a central administration taking care of this.
Then, of course, in this fantastic room there were many, many items.
They were, for us, a key to understand
the ancient city work and function.
And so you see here some more pithoi.
They were painted and decorated.
They were all made by hands except the neck which was made on the wheel.
That means the potters wheel, a new tool which was introduced
exactly in this period, exactly by this institution that is the palace.
So here see some studies of the capacity of the vessels, and
some applied symbols over the vessels.
These are another very interesting information because we know that
they wanted to mark who was the owner of the pithois.
Or in some cases, who was the producer or what was concealed inside the jar.
Like the metallic jar, which was used for olive oil.
So studying in the distribution of of this pottery in the countryside of
that means on the hills west of the town towards the Jordan river.
We identified some places where olive oil and
olive trees grows are still present, showing that
these were the farms producing what was then shipped to the city.
So, an indirect proof that the city-state,
the palace as its center, and these are all the catching area producing stuff.
Some items like this fine calcite mace head
is hanged at the existence of a, by a place,
because this is a typical good that we found in tombs.
So perhaps the place in which they used to cultivate olive
trees were also the place in which they bury their dead.
Because they needed the oil for
the funeral service or customs.
So it is very interesting.
Then some other elements which are part of the ideology of the newborn city.
For example the snakes over this vase.
These are, of course, vessels which were used in the palace or
in the temple for activities which are connected with the ideology of the city.
Because you cannot have a city and a state without a religion,
an ideology supporting this kind of power and of social organization.
Now we go through a great variety of pottery.
What is very important for archeologists like us
as indicates of Phoenicians to the west is when we are able to identify
that a production was produced exactly for some special use.
For example, among definitions,
the vessels that they use as table service of the day included into burials.
Or in this case, this of jugs, which were of the palace service.
So they were just produced for the palace and for
the people leaving members of the elite, like this extraordinary krater,
or ceremonial krater, like a World Cup,
which is an imitation in pottery of an original made of copper.
You see, in fact, that there is burnishing over the surface.
And this object possibly belonged to the ruler of the city, to the king, as it was
found together with other very interesting items in the center of this Pillared Hall.
Then we have miniature vessels, which have some kind of religious uses.
Or they were used by children.
Then there are again of vessels and
there are extraordinary vessels, luxury vessels such as this jug.
This is a red polished, red varnished jug, which is an imitation
of an original copper prototype.
And you see that the prototype are the belt fixing two halves together.
And these kind of vessels is imitated in pottery.
And it has been studied and it is typical of these luxury context,
such as palaces or burials in central Palestine and
south Jordan during the mid of the third millennium B.C. So,
we see that the city is also elaborating its own language,
also a language which is made of items.
The items of everyday lives became, they bear a meaning.
The meaning is we are the ruling class.
We are the ones who have the power in their hands, and
we are the one who have the wealth in their hands.
So this marks really a step in the history of social organization.
And this is the idea which will be exported to the West.
That is, the ruling class has to have access to special things,
to special items, to special productions.
Such as this special pottery for jugs which has been traced through
the ceramic fabric as you see with
analysis, and chemical and physical analysis.
So back to the palace.
We see another very symbolic find.
The potters wheel, as I was saying,
that it was used just for the vessels produced for the palace.
So there is this other issue that is innovation.
Innovation is brought by the palace.
The city is bringing up innovation,
because innovation means the capacity of controlling production, and
production is of course what makes the palace actually rich and power.
So they always invest in innovation.
And that time, innovation meant to use it a disc of basalt
to produce a better vessel, a more resistant and also more beautiful vessel.
Because there is also an aesthetic value which was given for
the first time a significance in the 3rd millennium B.C. And
you see here, speaking about aesthetics, that of course the Canaanites,
the people living in southern Levant, were attracted by the Egyptians.
The Egyptians were traveling back and
forth along the coast on the sea and in the Wadi Araba,
that is that valley which connects the Red Sea with the Dead Sea.
So this way was very important.
This has been called the copper route because it's the the way
through which you get the copper ores, the copper mines of and
what two very interesting places in the South of Jordan.
So along the route of copper, the Canaanites met the Egyptians.
And it was really a terrible spark because they were in touch
with a completely new and extraordinary civilization.
And they started to imitate some small items or
object which had a symbolic value in the Egyptian milieu and
the Egyptian concept of life,
which gained another one among the Canaanites.
And so we have the lotus flower.
You see here the imitation of one of the lotus flower produced in but
with an Egyptian style.
And look at the comparison from Megiddo, rrom Tell-el-Mutesellim.
And they started to import these palette which were used for
the makeup of women, but as a symbol of wealth,
a status symbol of social belonging to a high social class.
And of course mace heads, as you will see, and many other items.
Then, in the central of this Pillared Hall, we also found
the of a bear and possibly the skin of the bear.
So, the bear skin was a symbol of power, and symbol of military power in antiquity.
And possibly, as it was found together with four copper axes,
these were the weapons and the clothes of a military ruler, or
a military chief, that is the king of.
So again, we have the metal which point us that the disconnection to the South.
You see the moment in which these axes were found.
They were not very strong weapons, but they were symbolic weapons.
As the analysis demonstrate, it's just one,
the biggest specimen had been actually used.
The others were never used.
They just were there because they were a symbol of power.
So they were not used as weapons, but they were used just for symbols.
And they were gathered together with the bearskin.
So we have here a reconstruction of the hall as it looked like
at the time when the city was destroyed.
And what resulted from the very careful analysis
which was carried out in the [FOREIGN] of Rome,
which is one of the most skilled institution in the world for
studying antiquities.
In this way, and what came out was that these axes are in connection
with the two main sources of copper to the south,
pointing again to this connection through the Sinai Peninsula with Egypt.
And the map give an idea of all the circulation of goods and of people,
which occurred at that time and which was at the beginning of the city-state and
of the idea of city in a very far country such
as it was this region, that is central Jordan.
You see how many finds can a fire.
Kept into the building for the archeologists,
and how many they were restored.
And then there were other rooms, again, which was the link
with Egypt has been recently demonstrated by another discovery in Wadi el-Jarf,
French expedition, an Egyptian and French expedition,
discovered an harbor dating back from the fourth and
the fifth dynasty of Egypt which was actually the harbor through
which the Egyptians crossed The Red Sea and reached the Sinai.
And from that they could easily get the copper mines.
And the excavation in this area discovered this site,
which actually was just a small fortress, a small stronghold to control this route.
And if you look at the building technique of this Ras Budran, it is exactly
the same that we can identify in Central Jordan in the Khirbet palace of Batrawy.
And that means that the Canaanites were taking inspiration
from the Egyptians and that they were in touch.
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