Near East Kingdoms

Shahdad (City) (Eastern Iran)

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The city states of Sumer formed one of the first great civilisations in human history (see feature link). This Near Eastern civilisation emerged a little way ahead of that of Africa's ancient Egypt, and up to a millennium before that of the Indus Valley culture.

Southern Mesopotamia (modern Iraq and the western edge of Iran) was subjected to permanent settlement during the Pottery Neolithic and, by the late fourth millennium BC, Sumer formed approximately a dozen leading city states, by which time other regions were emerging as population centres in their own right. Elam was located to the east of Sumer, with its own selection of city states at its core (and see feature link).

This region was located on an alluvial plan below the Zagros mountains, and its remoteness meant that it took some time for it to assimilate Sumer's groundbreaking social, agricultural, and administrative inventions. Even farther east was the Iranian plateau and what is now central and eastern Iran. A city-building culture emerged here in the third millennium BC, notably through the Jiroft culture and Helmand culture.

The city of Shahdad was part of the former culture, the Jiroft. It was located on the western edge of the Dasht-e Lut, Persian for the 'Empty Desert', one of the hottest places in the world. The city's ancient name is unknown and cannot yet be tied to any potential candidates.

Situated at the end of a small delta on a dry plain, Shahdad's remains were discovered in 1968. It was excavated by an Iranian team in the 1970s, principally under Ali Hakemi of the Archaeological Institute of Iran. However, Sir Aurel Stein, famous for his archaeological work in surveying large swathes of Central Asia and the Near East, had already slipped into Persia at the end of 1915 to discover the first hints of eastern Iran's lost cities.

Recently an additional survey has also been carried out to add to the extant knowledge about the site. This was alongside similar investigative work at Tepe Graziani, a small settlement a few kilometres to the east of Shahdad which has been named for the Italian archaeologist who first surveyed the site. A much more important site, Bampur, lay far to the south of this region.

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(Information by Peter Kessler, with additional information from Encyclopaedia Britannica (Eleventh Edition, Cambridge (England), 1910), from The Sumerians: Their History, Culture, and Character, Samuel Noah Kramer ('List 1' of Sumerian rulers, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1963), from Historical Atlas of the Ancient World, 4,000,000 to 500 BC, John Heywood (Barnes & Noble, 2000), from The Ancient Near East, c.3000-330 BC, Amélie Kuhrt (Routledge, 2000, Vol I & II), from Cultural Atlas of Mesopotamia and the Ancient Near East, Michael Road (Facts on File, 2000), from Mesopotamia: Assyrians, Sumerians, Babylonians, Enrico Ascalone (Dictionaries of Civilizations 1, University of California Press, 2007), from The Archaeology of Elam, D T Potts (Cambridge University Press, 1999), from The Elamite World, Javier Álvarez-Mon, Gian Pietro Basello, & Yasmina Wick (Eds, Routledge, 2018), and from External Links: Some Thoughts in Neo-Elamite Chronology, Jan Tavernier (PDF), and the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature, and Early Kings of Kish, Albrecht Goetze (Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol 15, No 3, 1961, pp 105-111 and available to read via University of Chicago Press Journals), and Archaeology.org, and The World in Between (Archaeology Magazine), and A Reappraisal of Shahdad: Chronology, Seals, Metal and Clay Objects (Parseh Journal of Archaeological Studies, Year 2, Issue 6, March 2019).)

c.4000 BC

The settlement of Shahdad emerges as early as the fifth millennium BC, and certainly by about 4000 BC. As part of the Jiroft culture it quickly begins to grow as international trade expands with Mesopotamia.

Elamite cities on the plain to the east of Sumer benefited from direct contact, but cities with more easterly locations also swiftly caught up, connected into a network of trading routes which stretched east to the Indus and north to Hissar and the BMAC (click or tap on map to view at an intermediate size)

Later tomb excavations reveal the creation during the fourth millennium BC and later of spectacular artefacts amid stone blocks which are painted in vibrant colours. These include several extraordinary, nearly life-size clay statues which are placed with the dead.

The city's artisans learn to work lapis lazuli, silver, lead, turquoise, and other materials which have been imported from as far away as eastern Afghanistan, as well as shells from the distant Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean.

c.3100 - 2700 BC

The Uruk IV influence suddenly fades around 3100 BC (or 3200 BC in some modern sources) for reasons unknown. Older traditions re-emerge in places which had previously taken on board Uruk influences.

A cylinder seal from the Uruk IV period, dated about 3500-3100 BC, depicting a bear or lion attacking buffaloes, with an attendant hero also depicted in the field

The Uruk-inspired centre at Susa in Elam seems to be taken over by immigrants from the Zagros mountains (or at least it witnesses an indigenous return to pre-Uruk political and cultural controls).

A new political entity emerges which discards Uruk IV cuneiform and language to replace it with 'Proto-Elamite' language, a precursor to the usage of all later Elamite city states. This ends the spirit of regional unity which previously seemed to predominate in the surrounding villages and towns, such as Abu Fanduweh, Chogha Mish, and Tepe Sharafabad.

The proto-Elamite period witnesses the development of a semi-pictographic writing system for the east. Susa begins to be influenced by the cultures of the Iranian plateau to the east (see feature link), and it dominates the lowlands to the west of the Zagros mountains. But it also cuts off these access points from post-Uruk IV Sumer, enforcing new trading connections which go through Susa itself.

Located at the end of a small delta on a dry plain in central-eastern Iran, to the north of Jiroft and Tepe Yahya, Shahdad was excavated by an Iranian team in the 1970s

Approximately four hundred kilometres to the south in the modern province of Fars, the city of Anshan becomes prominent and expands in size, dominating the highlands of the southern mountain range.

Proto-Elamite communities which had played a part in the initial rise of civilisation in Elam and across the Iranian plateau seem to have exhausted their potential soon after 2800 BC. Across the Ramhormoz plains and in the Kur river basin, proto-Elamite records come to an end along with centralised urban life.

Farther east, urban living seems to be abandoned. At the same time, major cities such as those at Shahdad, Konar Sandal, and Shahr-e Sokhta reach their maximum size, suggesting a kind of absorption of all available resources to the detriment of the surrounding settlements.

c.2400 BC

A metal flag is created in Shahdad around this time, only to be uncovered by archaeologists over four thousand years later. Mounted on a copper pole which is topped with a bird, perhaps an eagle, the flag depicts a man and woman facing each other, one of the recurrent themes in the region's art at this time.

A metal flag which was found at Shahdad, one of eastern Iran's early urban sites, with the find being dated to about 2400 BC, depicting a man and woman facing each other, one of the recurrent themes in the region's art at this time

c.2004 BC

The 'Third Dynasty' city of Ur is defeated by the Simashki ruler, Kindattu, together with the people of Susa, ending the third dynasty and Sumerian civilisation. The land of Elam becomes a powerful kingdom under its Simashki rulers, but the entire region is experiencing a climate-induced downturn. Similar effects are seen as far west as Bronze Age Iberia.

At the same time the majority of the hundreds of settlements both large and small which pepper the Iranian plateau and the hot and increasingly arid central and eastern Iranian regions now fade and are abandoned.

Reasons are likely to be complex, initiated by the climate dip, but perhaps also related to changes in trade routes which themselves could be induced by the changing weather patterns which include reduced rainfall. The growing power of the Oxus civilisation may also play a role in diminishing the value of these cities.

The ruins of the once-vast city of Ur were excavated in 1922 by Sir Leonard Woolley, which is when the 'Royal Tombs' were discovered (External Link: Creative Commons Licence 4.0 International)

The list of casualties includes Shahdad, Konar Sandal, and Shahr-e Sokhta, while Tepe Yahya has already been abandoned. Urban life does not return to eastern Iran until after 500 BC, and the Jiroft and Helmand cultures are forgotten.