DISCUSSION

This chapter identiies several important factors in the production and construction of space in Upper Mesopotamian cities. I argue that these highly nucleated settlements had multiple administrative and social centers that formed during urbanization. The production of space in these cities was conservative, often maintaining the use or function of an area even during extensive rebuilding or renovation. A key planning principle was the production of defensible space, whether by original design or subsequent modiication. I suggesT that the concept of armature may be applicable to these cities, and may unify otherwise scattered elements of a city's structure. Although winding streets and semi-orthogonal architecture give an appearance of an organic growth pattern, streets and, in some cases, whole neighborhoods show supra-household planning, both through designation of lot size and coordinated construction. Finally, I argue that careful attention to the life history of these cities is the best way to reveal similarities and differences in their development and the interplay between activities that structure space and the structuring effects of space.

Taken together, these observations show that the production of space in Upper Mesopotamian cities took place in multiple overlapping social spheres, including the city government that focused on infrastructure, mid-level planners or developers (Algaze et al. 2001: 69; Matney 2002) who built some residential areas in conjunction with neighborhood organizations and leaders, and residents who modified space according to their needs. Viewed in this manner, the production of space in Upper Mesopotamian cities suggests a sociopolitical order consisting of power sharing rather than top-down domination or purely disorganized, organic development. The spatial result of the sociopolitical order suggested here is a varying degree of city planning, as described by Michael Smith's scale (2007). Thus, these cities have examples of coordination among buIldings in institutions, public space, and neighborhoods; supra-household planning of neighborhoods, streets, and infrastructure; and some standardization in the kinds of spaces preferred by city residents. In some cases, coordination may be expresseD very loosely or in a nonlinear fashion, as in armature, requiring large horizontal exposures of sites before patterns can be idenTified.

Production op space in Mesopotamian cities

Although this analysis focuses on examples from third-millennium Upper Mesopotamia, many of the spatial principles discussed here are seen in earlier, pre-urban periods and in subsequent urban periods throughout much of Upper and Lower Mesopotamia (Henrickson 1981; Keith 1999, 2003; Stone 1995, 2007; Ur 2012). The maintenance of notions of social space across the millennia throughout Mesopotamia may testify to the continuance of social structures such as tribes and lineages during the shift to cities and states (Cooper 2006b:61). The emphasis on kinship and consensual decision making in these social structures resists domination by urban authorities. The complex and often new social roles formed in cities served to integrate a diverse society, but also resisted yielding autonomy to city government (Yoffee 1979:21, 1995:289, 2005:62, 214). In this context, urban authorities may have had to work hard to build a loyal population. Stone (2007:228) argues that second-millennium Lower Mesopotamian cities competed with one another for prestige, and may have installed or refurbished infrastructure to attract residents.

Despite textual evidence for powerful rulers at different places and times, and the assertion by some that third-millennium Upper

Mesopotamian cities were oligarchies ruled coercively by the palace and a few elite households (Sallaberger and Ur 2004; Steinkeller 1993:124; Weiss et al. 2002), many scholars of these polities view the city as a bastion of heterarchy (Crumley 1995) and corporate political strategies (Blanton, Feinman, and Kowalewski 1996) in which everyday residents and individual households played a central role in urbanization and the production and governance of urban space (Creekmore 2008; Fleming 2004; Stone 2007; Ur 2004). This assertion does not deny the existence of social stratification or even possibly segregation among city residents in some cases. Instead, I argue that the making of cities is a shared, conflicting process that incorporates the needs of multiple social groups within society. In the production of space in the city, we see the give and take between Adam Smith's (2003) "regime" or John Mollenkopf's (1992) "ruling coalition," made up of the ruling families and associated factions, and the "grassroots," or "everyday" people. At the same time, a careful consideration of a city's life history reveals that cities with similar basic structure may have very different developmental pathways. Future attention to the principles of the production and construction of space discussed here, in conjunction with a life history approach and the range of theoretical angles summarized by Michael Smith (2011) may help us unpack the complexity of urbanization and recognize the agency of different sociopolitical groups In society.