Tell Taban is an archaeological site in north-eastern

Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...

in the

Al-Hasakah Governorate Al-Hasakah Governorate (; ; , also known as , ''Gozarto'') is one of the fourteen Governorates of Syria, governorates (provinces) of Syria. It is located in the far north-east corner of Syria and distinguished by its fertile lands, plentiful water ...

. It is the site of the ancient city of Ṭābetu.

Archaeology

The site was first excavated from 1997 until 1999 as a salvage operation in response to the effects of the Hassake dam. A number of inscribed objects, mostly building inscriptions, were found. The site was again excavated in 2005 through 2010. More inscriptions and an archive containing over 100

cuneiform Cuneiform is a Logogram, logo-Syllabary, syllabic writing system that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. Cuneiform script ...

tablets were found, dating to the Old Babylonian and Middle Assyrian Periods.

History

Ṭābetu

The city was mentioned in 18th century BC as a regional center named Ṭābatum in the tablets of the kingdom of Mari, and was destroyed by

Samsu-Iluna Samsu-iluna (Amorite: ''Shamshu-iluna'', "The Sun (is) our god") (–1712 BC) was the seventh king of the founding Amorite dynasty of Babylon. His reign is estimated from 1749 BC to 1712 BC (middle chronology), or from 1686 to 1648 BC (short chron ...

of Babylon. Afterward the city come under the control of

Terqa Terqa is an ancient city discovered at the site of Tell Ashara on the banks of the middle Euphrates in Deir ez-Zor Governorate, Syria, approximately from the modern border with Iraq and north of the ancient site of Mari, Syria. Its name had b ...

for a time. A few centuries later it came under the rule of the Assyrians after the fall of the

Mittani Mitanni (–1260 BC), earlier called Ḫabigalbat in old Babylonian texts, ; Hanigalbat or Hani-Rabbat in Assyrian records, or in Egyptian texts, was a Hurrian-speaking state in northern Syria and southeast Anatolia (modern-day Turkey) with In ...

Autonomous kingdom

An autonomous dynasty ruled the city between the 14th and 12th centuries BC under the suzerainty and acknowledging the supremacy of the Middle Assyrian kings; the rulers of Ṭābetu styled themselves "the kings of Ṭābetu and the Land of Mari". By the time of middle-Assyrian period kingdom of Ṭābetu, the designation "Mari" was likely used to indicate the lands around Ṭābetu and did not refer to the ancient kingdom of Mari located on the

Euphrates The Euphrates ( ; see #Etymology, below) is the longest and one of the most historically important rivers of West Asia. Tigris–Euphrates river system, Together with the Tigris, it is one of the two defining rivers of Mesopotamia (). Originati ...

. Another possibility is that Mari from the Ṭābetu king's title correspond to "Marê"; a city mentioned c. 803 BC in the stele of Nergal-ereš, a

Limmu : In the history of Assyria, Limmu was an Assyrian eponym An eponym is a noun after which or for which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. Adjectives derived from the word ''eponym'' include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic'' ...

of the

neo-Assyrian The Neo-Assyrian Empire was the fourth and penultimate stage of ancient Assyrian history. Beginning with the accession of Adad-nirari II in 911 BC, the Neo-Assyrian Empire grew to dominate the ancient Near East and parts of South Caucasus, Nort ...

king

Adad-nirari III Adad-nīrārī III (also Adad-nārārī, meaning "Adad (the storm god) is my help") was a King of Assyria from 811 to 783 BC. Family Adad-nīrārī was a son and successor of king Shamshi-Adad V, and was apparently quite young at the time of hi ...

. Marê was mentioned in association with Raṣappu which was likely located in the southern and eastern slopes of the

Sinjar Mountains The Sinjar Mountains (, , ), are a mountain range that runs east to west, rising above the surrounding alluvial steppe plains in northwestern Iraq to an elevation of . The highest segment of these mountains, about long, lies in the Nineveh Gov ...

. The origin of the dynasty is vague; the first known two rulers bore

Hurrian The Hurrians (; ; also called Hari, Khurrites, Hourri, Churri, Hurri) were a people who inhabited the Ancient Near East during the Bronze Age. They spoke the Hurro-Urartian language, Hurrian language, and lived throughout northern Syria (region) ...

names. However, "the land of Mari" is mentioned in the Hurrian

Mitanni Mitanni (–1260 BC), earlier called Ḫabigalbat in old Babylonian texts, ; Hanigalbat or Hani-Rabbat in Assyrian records, or in Ancient Egypt, Egyptian texts, was a Hurrian language, Hurrian-speaking state in northern Syria (region), Syria an ...

an archive of

Nuzi Nuzi (Hurrian Nuzi/Nuzu; Akkadian Gasur) at modern Yorghan Tepe (also Yorgan Tepa and Jorgan Tepe), Iraq was an ancient Mesopotamian city 12 kilometers southwest of the city of Arrapha (modern Kirkuk) and 70 kilometers southwest of Sātu Qala, ...

, and tablets dating to the 15th and 14th centuries BC from Tell Taban itself reveal that the inhabitants were

Amorites The Amorites () were an ancient Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic-speaking Bronze Age people from the Levant. Initially appearing in Sumerian records c. 2500 BC, they expanded and ruled most of the Levant, Mesopotamia and parts of Eg ...

. The dynasty could have been Amorite in origin but adopted Hurrian royal names to appease the Mitannian empire. The kings of Ṭābetu seems to have acknowledged the authority of Assyria as soon as the Assyrian conquest of Mitanni began; in return, the Assyrians approved the continuation of the local dynasty whose rulers were quickly Assyrianised and adopted Assyrian names replacing the Hurrian names. This is a list of the kings of Ṭābetu who belonged to the same dynasty.

References

Sources

* *Shibata, Daisuke, Middle Assyryrian Administrative and Legal Texts from the 2005 Excavation at Tell Taban: A Preliminary Report, Al-Rāfidān, vol. 28, pp. 63–74, 2007 *Shibata, D., "An Old Babylonian Manuscript of the Weidner God- List from Tell Taban.", Iraq, vol. 71, pp. 43– 52, 2009 *Yamada, S., "Old Babylonian School Exer-cises from Tell Taban.", Pages 45– 68 in Scribal Educationa and Scribal Traditions. Vo l . 1 of Culture and Societies in the Middle Euphra-tes and Habur Areas in the Second Millennium BC. Edited by Shigeo Yamada and Daisuke Shibata. Studia Chaburensia 5. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2016 *Yamada, S., "An Adoption Contract from Tell Taban, the Kings of the Land of Hana and the Hana-Style Scribal Tradition.", RA, vol. 105, pp. 61–84, 2011

Archaeology

History

Ṭābetu

Autonomous kingdom

References

Sources

See also