Near East Kingdoms

Tepe Yahya (City) (Western 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 was divided into approximately a dozen 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. Access to Sumer was in the Zagros foothills, circling the marshes, but this meant difficulties in communication, and a feeling in Sumer of there being comparative barbarians on their eastern flank.

Culturally, Elamite kingdoms achieved less than their more advanced neighbours, and imported much of what they needed, including writing from Sumer and architecture from the later city and empire of Babylon. Elamite records are also extremely sparse in recording local events, and large areas of its history are almost totally unknown except through Sumerian records.

The 'Old Elamite' site of Tepe Yahya was located to the east of Elam itself, within today's Kerman province of Iran (ancient Carmania). It sits roughly ninety kilometres from Jiroft, which itself began to develop around 4000 BC. The site forms a circular mound of about twenty metres in height and around one hundred and eighty-seven metres in diameter.

It was excavated in six seasons across AD 1968-1971, 1973, and 1975 under the direction of Carl Lamberg-Karlovsky on behalf of Harvard University's American School of Prehistoric Research at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. This was a joint operation with what is now Shiraz University. A young D T Potts was part of the team in 1973 and 1975.

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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), from Jiroft and the Aratta Kingdom, Richard Covington (The Circle of Ancient Iranian Studies, Saudi-Aramco World 55, No 5, Sept/Oct 2005), 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 Early Bronze Age of Iran as Seen from Tepe Yahya, C C Lamberg-Karlovsky & Philip L Kohl (Penn Museum Expedition Magazine, Vol 13, No 3-4).)

c.4500 BC

Far to the west of Tepe Yahya, the proto-Elamite settlement of Chogha Mish has grown to a size of seventeen hectares. Around the early-to-middle part of the fifth millennium BC the settlement's main monumental building is destroyed.

Tepe Yahya was an early centre for the production and distribution of steatite (soapstone), a material which is used in making vessels, seals, and other objects

This destruction coincides with several settlements in the eastern half of the Susiana plain being fully abandoned while, in the western half, Susa is expanded. This is simultaneous with Tepe Yahya itself being founded (archaeological 'Period VI') from a preceding Pottery Neolithic settlement ('Period VII').

c.3800 - 3400 BC

The 'Period VI' coarse ware pottery period at the late Pottery Neolithic settlement of Tepe Yahya is superseded around 3800 BC by the regional 'Period V' local production which can be termed 'Yahya Culture'. Perhaps coincidentally, Susa emerges around the same time as an important regional centre at the start of the Uruk IV period in Sumer.

This fades around 3400 BC as the settlement enters the 'Period IVC' phase of its archaeology until about 3100 BC. It is not abandoned (despite inaccurate claims to that effect), even though this is the height of the 'Susiana polity' far to the west, with the city of Susa absorbing large populations from its own neighbouring settlements.

This pink-toned Pottery Neolithic jar comes from Sha'ar Hagolan in the Levant, a Yarmukian site which witnessed some of the earliest appearances of full-blown pottery

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.

The Uruk-inspired centre at Susa in Elam seems to be taken over by immigrants from the Zagros mountains. A new 'Susa III' political entity emerges which discards Uruk IV cuneiform and language to replace it with 'Proto-Elamite', a precursor to the usage of all later Elamite city states.

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.

This coincides approximately with other regional changes, such as the abandonment of the Susa III-related, Period IVC enclave at Tepe Yahya around 3100 BC, in favour of 'Period IVB' (circa 3100-2700 BC).

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)

Pottery of this period (circa 2800 BC) has been likened to finds from Jiroft to hint at the emergence in the region of a locally-produced civilisation. It is one with connections, however. Tepe Yahya contains proto-Elamite tablets which exhibit the same type and style as those of 'Susa III'.

c.2600 BC

The Indus Valley city of Mohenjo-Daro is built and is laid out almost identically to Harappa. It even grows in time to house a larger population than its twin as the civilisation reaches its height.

Trading links exist of perhaps a millennium in duration between it and the small Iranian plateau cities - such as Tepe Yahya - and the Oxus civilisation, and especially with the cities of Elam. However, no Indus pottery has been found at Tepe Yahya, with the possibility that it becomes bypassed by more effective trading centres.

c.2278 - 2270 BC

It is Abalgamash of Marhashi who is responsible for leading the forces of Elam, Kupin, Zahara, and Meluhha, (a settlement of the Indus Valley civilisation) in a coalition against the Akkadian empire. This force invades the western reaches of Elam (no doubt involving Susa) to free it of late Sargon-period occupation and await retribution from his successor, Rimush.

Sargon 'the Great', the warrior king of apparently humble origins, unified Sumer for (perhaps) the first time in recorded history through a series of campaigns and the defeat of the current holder of Sumer's equivalent of a high kingship

After this rebellion, Elam has to be re-conquered by Rimush, and genuine Elamite history can be traced from this point. The state of Marhashi is clearly now a cohesive entity, one which borders Anshan to the east.

The Akkadian presence in Elam is maintained in Susa through the official language of bureaucracy, while local rulers carry Sumerian titles which reveal full Akkadian dependence - often ensi (governor) of Susa or shagina (general) of Elam, or both.

Tepe Yahya remains occupied into the early second millennium BC, but cannot be matched to any ancient city names. Therefore no connection can be made between it and the events of the Elamite states. Abandonment follows, seemingly well before the short mid-millennium dark age is experienced around 1600-1500 BC which is also experienced in distant Babylonia.

Following the climate-change-induced collapse of indigenous civilisations and cultures in Iran and Central Asia between about 2200-1700 BC, Indo-Iranian groups gradually migrated southwards to form two regions - Tūr (yellow) and Ariana (white), with westward migrants forming the early Parsua kingdom (lime green), and Indo-Aryans entering India (green) (click or tap on map to view full sized)

A climate-related dip may partially be the cause as similar effects are seen as far west as Bronze Age Iberia. The growing power of the Oxus civilisation may also play a role in diminishing the value of this and other cities such as Shahdad and Shahr-e Sokhta.

A short period of unremarkable renewed occupation starts around 1000 BC, covering archaeological periods I-III with 'Period I' being the most recent. Now it forms part of the province of Carmania, but occupation here ends around AD 400 during the Sassanid period.