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Paleolithic and Epipaleolithic periods The Paleolithic occupation of Mesopotamia is limited to the mountainous regions of the Zagros and the Taurus and a few oases in the Syrian steppe. In the Sajur Basin, on the Syro–Turkish border, Acheulean stone tools have been found.[18] These have also been recovered from the oasis of El Kowm in the central Syrian steppe, together with the remains of Homo erectus, which could be dated to 450,000 years old.[19] Lower Paleolithic sites are also known from the Iranian side of the Zagros Mountains.[20] Middle Paleolithic stone tools are known from Barda Balka, a cave-site east of Kirkuk.[21] A number of Neanderthal burials have been excavated in Shanidar Cave, and a Mousterian stone tool assemblage recently excavated in Arbil may have been produced by either Neanderthals or anatomically modern humans.[22][23] Shanidar has also yielded an Epipaleolithic occupation characterized by a Kebaran stone tool assemblage.[23] The Natufian in Upper Mesopotamia, contemporaneous with the Zarzian in the Zagros, is attested over a much wider region and is characterized by open-air sites which were semi-permanently occupied. In the Zagros, this period has been excavated at Zawi Chemi Shanidar and M'lefaat.[23][24] In the area of the Syrian Upper Euphrates, villages of Natufian hunter-gatherers that were occupied since the 11th millennium BC have been excavated at Abu Hureyra and Mureybet.[25] Pre-Pottery Neolithic period Roughly built stone walls surrounding T-shaped stone pillars under a modern steel walkway and roof in a hilly landscape Overview of Göbekli Tepe with modern roof to protect the site against the weather The early Neolithic human occupation of Mesopotamia is, like the previous Epipaleolithic period, confined to the foothill zones of the Taurus and Zagros Mountains and the upper reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates valleys. The Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA) period (10,000–8700 BC) saw the introduction of agriculture, while the oldest evidence for animal domestication dates to the transition from the PPNA to the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB, 8700–6800 BC) at the end of the 9th millennium BC. This transition has been documented at sites like Abu Hureyra and Mureybet, which continued to be occupied from the Natufian well into the PPNB.[25][26] The so-far earliest monumental sculptures and circular stone buildings from Göbekli Tepe in southeastern Turkey date to the PPNA/Early PPNB and represent, according to the excavator, the communal efforts of a large community of hunter-gatherers.[27][28] Jarmo Samarra culture Halaf culture Chalcolithic period Main articles: Ubaid period and Uruk period The Fertile Crescent was inhabited by several distinct, flourishing cultures between the end of the last ice age (c. 10,000 BC) and the beginning of history. One of the oldest known Neolithic sites in Mesopotamia is Jarmo, settled around 7000 BC and broadly contemporary with Jericho (in the Levant) and Çatal Hüyük (in Anatolia). It as well as other early Neolithic sites, such as Samarra and Tell Halaf were in northern Mesopotamia; later settlements in southern Mesopotamia required complicated irrigation methods. The first of these was Eridu, settled during the Ubaid period culture by farmers who brought with them the Samarran culture from the north. This was followed by the Uruk period and the emergence of the Sumerians. |
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