Following the demographic and cultural crisis of the ‘Intermediate period’, Syria experienced a new wave of urbanisation, very similar to the Upper Mesopotamian one. The Proto-Syrian culture of the third millennium bc had certainly been finer and more elaborate. However, the new Old Syrian culture of the Middle Bronze Age was much more stable and established among its population. In this period, numerous walled cities appeared, following the model already developed during the second urbanisation of the Early Bronze Age. The best attested cities of this phase span from Carchemish in the north, whose inner city was built in the Middle Bronze Age, while the outer city was a Neo-Hittite development, to Qatna in the south, with its square ditch and impressive fortification wall. This was a common type of wall, with an earthen rampart. Its construction also provided a ditch surrounding the wall, enforced with stone foundations, and plastered in order to be smooth and solid. On top of this earthen rampart there was the wall, built in stone or bricks. The function of these walls in relation to the introduction of siege machinery has already been mentioned. Naturally, the weakest point of the wall was the gate, which was generally chambered and provided with watchtowers. Amongst the various known examples of this type of fortification, Ebla (Tell Mardikh) is the most complex (Figure 13.5).
Outside the walled cities, villages maintained their communal structure, governed by simple institutions. This was in marked contrast with Mesopotamia, which saw the pre-eminence of the temple and palace economy even in the countryside. States were regional authorities, centred on a fortified capital and its royal palace, which acted as the seat of the king and as a main administrative centre. The Syrian temples of the Middle Bronze Age therefore did not have any function other than the cultic one. They
Figure 13.5 Ebla in the Middle Bronze Age: axonometric view of the south-western city gate.
Were small, simple structures, with one main room and a portico entrance, or a portico, a main room and a cella. On the contrary, palaces were much more complex and considerably larger structures, with storehouses, workshops and administrative buildings. Palaces, then, constituted the nucleus of Old Syrian culture, which expressed itself through a rich and elaborate material culture (from seals to metallurgy, pottery, and so on).
Among the major centres of the region, some remain unexplored for this period (such as Aleppo), or badly excavated (such as Carchemish). Luckily, Qatna (Tell Mishrife), Alalah (Tell Atchana) and Ebla (Tell Mardikh) provide valuable information on this period. Recent excavations in Qatna have only managed to uncover the beginning of the Late Bronze Age (fifteenth century bc). However, it is known that the city was already one of the most important centres in Syria in the eighteenth century, alongside Aleppo, main city of Yamhad. In Level VII of the Alalah excavation, there is the so-called palace of Yarim-Lim, as well as an administrative archive which provides some political information that will be taken into consideration later on. Apart from its impressive fortification wall and gates, Old Syrian Ebla also had three palaces, one on the acropolis and two on the terraces below it. There were also several temples, a fortress, a royal cemetery and a residential quarter with small and standardised houses with simple furniture.
Old Syrian culture had some similarities with Mesopotamian culture, not in terms of a direct influence of the latter, but because of the inclusion of Syria in the political and cultural spheres of the Amorite world, which extended from the Mediterranean to Khuzistan. Despite the fact that Lower Mesopotamia had lost its central role, it still maintained its prestigious status, and Akkadian became the main diplomatic and administrative language of the period. This was mainly because Akkadian had spread in conjunction with cuneiform writing. The diffusion of Akkadian also brought to the diffusion of its administrative procedures. However, they still had to be adapted to different socio-economic needs. Old Syrian culture also had some distinctive features, such as the different role of the temple and the low agricultural yields. The latter limited the amount of available surplus for the palaces and led to the survival of village communities. Moreover, there was the increased role played by commercial and farming activities and the increased instability and exposure to crises of all sorts.
On a political level, following the former supremacy of Ebla and the reconstitution of a system of city-states not far different from the one attested in the Early Bronze Age, Syria experienced a phase of political fragmentation between the twentieth and nineteenth century bc and of increased unity in the eighteenth century bc. At that time, a large part of Syria was under the control of Yamhad and its capital Aleppo. Yamhad was still an emerging state under Sumu-epuh, rival of Yahdun-Lim of Mari and then Shamshi-Adad. However, it was his son Yarim-Lim who became the main leader of a regional political entity, whose power was comparable to the one of Mari, Eshnunna and Babylon. Yamhad was therefore able to become one of the main protagonists in the conflicts and the diplomatic and commercial relations of the period.
Yarim-Lim’s army is attested in Mesopotamia during the war that brought an end to Shamshi-Adad’s reign. Even at the time of Zimri-Lim, the king of Aleppo declared war to a city as distant as Der, along Elam’s border. These distant, yet short-term, conflicts were part of the Amorite tendency to wage war and seal inter-state alliances. It is nonetheless significant that no Mesopotamian state (neither Shamshi-Adad, nor Zimri-Lim), despite being close and involved in the commercial networks of Syria, ever managed to occupy this region militarily. The Euphrates region thus solidly remained under the control of Aleppo, which had Emar as its main harbour and even parts of Mesopotamia as far as the Balikh.
With Zimri-Lim’s generation, Mari experienced a more stable period. The matrimonial ties between Zimri-Lim and the royal family ofAleppo, the increased political stability, the succession of the more modest Hammurabi on the throne of the energetic Yarim-Lim, brought a period of increased peace and stable commercial relations. However, the Emar-Balikh line remained the fixed boundary between Yamhad and Mari. When Hammurabi of Babylon ended the royal dynasty of Mari, Yamhad, left untouched by this conquest, would stop its expansionistic ambitions. However, it maintained control of Upper Syria.
The supremacy of Yamhad did not affect the independence of Qatna. Throughout the Mari Age, the latter ruled over a smaller coalition of cities. At the time, relations between Yamhad and Qatna were difficult. This fact led the ruler of Qatna, Ishi-Adad, to seal an alliance with Shamshi-Adad. Yasmah-Addu thus married a princess of Qatna. It is possible that through this alliance Shamshi-Adad was able to claim that he had reached the Mediterranean and Lebanon. The insurmountable presence of Yamhad and Shamshi-Adad’s reference to Lebanon (and not to the Amanus, located further north), leads to the assumption that the Assyrian king had reached the Mediterranean by travelling from Mari, through Palmyra, Qatna and Lebanon. Soon after Shamshi-Adad’s death, Ishi-Adad also passed away and was succeeded by Amut-pi-El. The latter preferred to seal an alliance with Yamhad, through the mediation of Zimri-Lim.
In the far north of Syria, the kingdom of Carchemish and other centres between the Euphrates and the Taurus (Urshum, Hashshum and Hahhum) were not formally included in the kingdom of Yamhad. These states were important for their commercially strategic position. They seem to have stayed out of the political and military disputes between the larger states, aiming at keeping good commercial relations with whoever was in power in Upper Mesopotamia and Syria. Therefore, just like other northern centres, so Aplahanda, king of Carchemish, maintained good relations with both Shamshi-Adad and Yasmah-Addu, and his son Yatar-Ami did the same with Zimri-Lim.
If the Mari archives provide a picture of the inter-regional relations of the period, the archives from Alalah VII provide information on Syria for the following period. Local Syrian kings are attested recognising the authority of Yamhad. They used the title of awllum (‘man’) for themselves and of sarrum (‘king’) for the ruler of Aleppo, or, less frequently, the one of ‘king’ for themselves and that of ‘great king’ for the king of Aleppo. After all, the first king of the dynastic sequence attested in the Alalah archives was the son of a king of Yamhad. He was placed by the latter on the throne of Alalah following his loss of the city of Irrite (Urfa), due to a revolt.
The archives attest to two generations of kings at Alalah: Yarim-Lim, son of the king of Yamhad Abba-El, and Ammi-taqum. They ruled during the reigns of Aleppo’s kings Abba-El (son of the Hammurabi of the time of Zimri-Lim), Yarim-Lim II, Niqmepuh and then Irkabtum, Hammurabi II and Yarim-Lim III. The latter’s reigns were shorter and bring us to the first half of the seventeenth century bc, when Alalah VII was destroyed. At the time, the political role of Ebla must have been similar to the one of Alalah, with a relatively wealthy local dynasty (at least judging from the archaeological data), who recognised the supremacy of Yamhad. Just like Alalah, this phase of Ebla abruptly ended in the mid-seventeenth century bc.
More information on the collapse of Yamhad and the destruction of several north Syrian centres comes from Hittite sources, which will be considered later on for the Old Hittite kingdom. At this stage, we can say that by the mid-seventeenth century bc, Hattusili I and Mursili I were in conflict with Yamhad and the other north Syrian states. Initially, Hattusili I attacked the cities in the north, mainly Alalah VII, Hashshum and Hahhum (the burnt level of Lidar Huyuk). The Syrian states tried to join forces against the Hittites, further supported by Carchemish and Yamhad. The Hittite attack was barely held back, but its army had to retreat slightly. In a second phase, Mursili I attacked again, reaching further south, and put to an end the kingdom of Aleppo, destroying several cities, such as Ebla, and taking control over northern Syria.
The conquest of Ebla is attested in the so-called ‘Song of Liberation’. This text describes the desire of the conqueror to free and relieve those enslaved, an intention that met the opposition of the main local powers. A few centuries later, the Hittite kings would recall with concern the former power of Aleppo and acted in order to avoid the return of such a great kingdom in northern Syria. This fear, initially acceptable due to the political and military role of Yamhad in the eighteenth and seventeenth centuries bc, became increasingly anachronistic. After its conquest by Mursili I, Aleppo would never regain its former supremacy. Moreover, throughout northern Syria the destructions of the seventeenth century bc accelerated processes of de-population and de-urbanisation in the area.
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