Use areas in Unit A6

Amer Ahmad – July 2023

Synopsis

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Discussion

The use areas can be identified based on architectural presence such as structures, installations, and their relationships within the context. Architectural analysis involves studying the physical elements and spatial descriptions of a built environment to understand its intended functions and purposes.

The kitchen (evidence of the third millennium BC)

As is mentioned in the structures section, the northern excavations showed us the main monumental of the service quarter of AP Palace of the third millennium BC, where the kitchen that is about 62.3 m2 in size and is identified through the installations and the bounded walls with a stone foundation and mudbrick upon them. Three sections were identified in the kitchen:

Room D1

The section is identified by its walls and the installations that indicate an important providing of the kitchen elements, the northern boundaries are wider than the others, while the eastern boundary is composited of large stones and shares with the western boundary of the courtyard in A16, the drainage system runs under its walls from the north to south linking the sector D with C.

Room D2

This room is identified as an Iwan. It shares room D1 by the doorway a4 in the eastern boundary while the southern boundary with sector C7 is the doorway a3, the room shares the northern boundary with room a1 the sector D3.

Room D3

This room is identified by the wide northern wall and it is known as a Closet where several Glyptics of the king and the queen and their courtiers were found in its accumulations.

Non-residential phase use areas

This period is identified by the numerous modifications that were made to the construction of the configuration where the whole palace was no longer used as a royal residence. It is clear through the rebuilding of walls upon the oldest one such as the north and south boundaries in sector D1, for instance, the wall f44 upon the f78, and also the narrowing of the doorways in several positions in the service quarter.

The Isin/Larsa use areas

After the abandonment of the palace and its collapse, the area provided pit burials a18 which showed flatly laid sherds underneath the lowest bricks of the tomb and also remains of tannur wall, and the tomb a19. The ash and trash pits had been cut into the walls of the kitchen in the north and east boundary of sector D1, the late occupations provided a hearth and kiln as well.

Other evidences

In room D2 a deep sounding was conducted near to f123 to determine the chronology of the period preceding the palace, A particularly hard packing was found it was a compacted layer determined to not serve as the foundation for the palace itself. Instead, this layer was associated with an earlier period (the Early Dynastic period). In addition, the southern excavation of A6 was conducted in 1992 and provided the bathroom C6 and room C7 that linked the kitchen with the southeast parts of the service quarter.