Everything about Adab totally explained
Adab (modern
Bismaya,
Iraq) was an ancient
Sumerian
city between
Telloh and
Nippur
Archaeology
A group of
ruin mounds are what remains of the ancient city. The mounds are about 1.5 km(1 mile) long and two miles wide, consisting of a number of low ridges, nowhere exceeding 12 m(40 ft.) in height, lying in the
Jezireh, somewhat nearer to the
Tigris than the
Euphrates, about a day's journey to the south-east of Nippur.
Excavations conducted here for six months, from Christmas of 1903 to June 1904, for the
University of Chicago, by Dr.
Edgar James Banks, proved that these mounds covered the site of the ancient city of Adab (Ud-Nun), hitherto known only from the
Sumerian king list and a brief mention of its name in the introduction to the
Hammurabi Code (c. 2250 B.C.). The city was divided into two parts by a
canal, on an island in which stood the
temple, E-mach, with a
ziggurat, or stepped tower. It was evidently once a city of considerable importance, but deserted at a very early period, since the ruins found close to the surface of the mounds belong to
Dungi and
Ur Gur, kings of
Ur in the latter part of the third millennium B.C. Immediately below these, as at
Nippur, were found artifacts dating to the reign of
Naram-Sin and
Sargon, ca. 2300 BC. Below these there were still 10.5m (35 ft.) of stratified remains, constituting seven-eighths of the total depth of the ruins. Besides the remains of buildings, walls and graves, Dr. Banks discovered a large number of inscribed clay tablets of a very early period, bronze and stone tablets, bronze implements and the like. But the two most notable discoveries were a complete statue in white marble, apparently the earliest yet found in
Mesopotamia, now in the museum in
Constantinople, bearing the inscription E-mach, King Da-udu, King of, Ud-Nun; and a temple refuse heap, consisting of great quantities of fragments of vases in marble,
alabaster,
onyx,
porphyry and
granite, some of which were inscribed, and others engraved and inlaid with
ivory and precious stones. Banks sold
cuneiform tablets from the site to private collections.
Fewer than fifty texts, scattered from
Yale University to
California to
Istanbul, have been published from Bismaya. The cuneiform tablets found at the site await publication. In the meantime, there's a
Sumerian comic tale of the
Three Ox-drivers from Adab (
translation
).
Further Information
Get more info on 'Adab'.
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