The Ancient Near East. History, Society and Economy.
Routledge: London & New York.
This is for sure one of the reference works about the history of the Ancient Near East, dealing also with aspects of historical economy of the ancient pre-classical world.
Liverani leads the reader (throughout six chapters) from the very beginning of prehistory, the Neolithic and Chalcolithic periods, until the end of the Persian empire.
Tell Mozan is quoted several times (pp. 117, 137, 154f.) as also Urkesh, spelled as ‘Urkish’ (pp. 117, 137, 154, 170, 290):
— “Tell Mozan (ancient Urkish) provides evidence for a Hurrian culture still heavily influenced by the south, but at the same time unique in its characteristics” (p. 117).
— “The ensi were local city rulers, while the ‘lords’ were the tribal chiefs of the steppes beyond the urbanised areas. This control over Upper Mesopotamia is confirmed by the spread of Naram-Sin’s inscriptions. Some of them were left in Nineveh, Basetki (north of Assyria) and Diyarbakir. Moreover, one of Naram-Sin’s palaces was excavated at Tell Brak, and we know that one of his daughters married the king of Urkish (Tell Mozan)” (p. 137).
— “The ethno-linguistic realm of the Hurrians was another example of a political entity with expansionistic ambitions located in the periphery, between the Mesopotamian alluvial plain and the mountains surrounding it. Two late or post-Akkadian inscriptions have been found in this region: the first one belonged to Tish-atal and was found at Tell Mozan (in the Upper Khabur region); the second one belonged to Atalshenni and was found at Samarra (in the Middle Tigris). Both these kings had Hurrian names, but only the first inscription was written in Hurrian. These kings declared that they controlled the area from Urkish to Nawar. The first city was Tell Mozan itself, while the second one could have been either Nagar (Tell Brak), or a region in the Samarrian hinterland” (pp. 153f.).
— “In this way, the kings [note by M. De Pietri: of Ur III] tried to keep the circulation along the Tigris and access to Upper Mesopotamia under control. This strategy was meant to oppose the rise of the Hurrians (Urkish-Nawar) and the incursions of the people inhabiting the Zagros area” (p. 170).
— “From as early as the mid-third millennium BC, Upper Mesopotamia had experienced the development of a series of Hurrian city-states and several attempts at political unification, from the kings of Urkish and Nawar to the empire of Shamshi-Adad” (p. 290).
Back to top: Mario Liverani 2003