Function

Yasmine Mahmoud – September 2025

Background

The excavations of J4 aimed to achieve three goals:
1- To verify a specular arrangement for the temple terrace monumental staircase, by exposing apossible continuation of the J2 Apron in J4.
2- Determin if the same depositional situation found in J1 and J2, is also present in J4, meaning that the 3rd millennium layers are situated right beneath Mittani layers.
3- To better understand the situation east of the monumental staircase, and learn more about the activities in that area.
The results of the one season excavation revealed asymmetry instead of specularity, and confirme the same depositional situation found in J1 and J2. The comprehensie understanding of J4 was better clarified by the excavations of J6 in the following years.

Architecture

We cannot speack of real architecture in J4. the area consists of mainly accumulation layers, with very few structures pertaining to the use period of the space.

The bin installation

f93 A semi-cercular structure of bricks and stone foundation and pebble floor, belonging to the Middle Mittani use period. The function of the bin is still not clear, as it is located very close to tthe sacred area, despit the fact that the monumental access was no longer visile when it was constructed. The bin was empty, and the hypothesis of the storage function still stands despite not finding any stored items there.

The eastern bound of the revetment wall

^Wall1 is the aggregation of lime stones that were thought to represent the eastern Aperon, forming a specular arrangement with the Apron in J2. After the examination, it is more palusible that this wall forms the eastern bound of the temple terrace as the continuation of he revetment wall. f10 was built during the Imperial Akkadian period and remained isible until the Mittani period. The assumption of f10 as an Apron was drawn from the similarities in building techniqques for oth structures. Howeer, there was no continuation of the structure in K71, nor did it continue south into K72 as it should have if it really was an Apron. This arrangement place this structure higher than the Apron in J2. TThe excavations in J6 revealed that f218 is part of f10 (or f219 as it was labeled in J6 or ^Wall12 as a specific label in J6), and together they form the eastern side of the revetment wall, revealing a tendency towards asymmetry

https://urkesh.org/MZ/A/J06/G/T/LoRes/J06t241%20V22d9002%20U719%20pC.jpg