Mesopotamia

Earliest city states of Mesopotamia appeared in the southern part of the Mesopotamian plain with the civilization known as the Sumer. Akkadian was a Semitic language used in this area starting in about 2600 B. C. The Akkadian word for this part of Mesopotamia was Sumer (Sumerian), the modern day word for this civilization. The Sumerian civilization included a group of cities that emerged around 3000 B. C.; however, ancestors of the Sumerian civilization were in Mesopotamia much earlier. The plains had few natural resources, limited rainfall, and no timber, stone, or metals. The earliest of the urban settlements, Eridu (see Fig. 1.4), was during the fifth millennium B. C. Eridu, centered on a temple complex built of mudbrick near the Euphrates River in a small depression that allowed water to accumulate. The location was at the location of a marsh, desert, and alluvial soil, and had a constant supply of water. Eridu was not really a city, but its neighbor Uruk (see Fig. 1.4) could be called a city. Between 3800 and 3200 B. C. was the most important period of Uruk’s history. Uruk’s growth was to cover an area of

Fig. 1.4 Tigris and Euphrates Rivers with the major cities during antiquity (Violet, 2006)

About 550 ha (about half the size of Rome at its peak in A. D. 100). Uruk found ways to sustain its economic vigor over the centuries. However in around 3100 B. C. the trading links disappeared, possibly because the water supplies around Uruk began to dry up or the land was overly cultivated that the rural economy needed to support the city collapsed (Freeman, 2004). Uruk’s demise was most likely connected to the rise of many smaller city states each developing its own access to water and surrounding land. Around 2330 B. C. southern Mesopotamia was conquered by Sargon of Akkade, history’s first recorded emperor.

The sources of water for urban centers during early civilizations included canals connected to rivers, rainwater harvesting systems, wells, aqueducts, and underground cisterns. Figure 1.4 Shows the major urban areas during the early Bronze Age. Table 1.1 Summarizes the sources of water for urban centers of the Bronze Age (4000-1100 B. C.). In ancient Mesopotamia, during the Bronze Age urban centers of the Sumer (Sumerian) and Akkud (Akkadian) (III millenium B. C.) had a canal(s) connected to the Euphrates River or a major stream for both navigation and water supply for daily uses. In Mari a canal connected to the city from both ends and passed through the city (Viollet, 2006). Servant women filled the 25 m3 cistern of the palace with water supplied by the canal. Later on other cisterns were built in Mari and connected to an extended rainfall collection system. Terracotta pipes were used in Habuba Kebira (in modern Syria), a Sumerian settlement in the middle Euphrates valley in the middle of the IV-th millennium B. C. (Viollet, 2006).

Table 1.1 Summary of sources of water for cities, settlements, and palaces of the early civilizations (4000-1100 B. C.)**

* Probable.

** Information on Mesopotamian sites and Indus Valley is from Viollet (2006).

Inscriptions of Sennacherib (son of Sargon II) refer to a great network of canals, often describing them in the context of elaborate gardens and parks. Sennacherib was the king of Assyria (705-681 B. C.) succeeding his father. He relocated the imperial capital from his father’s city of Khorsabad to the long established town of Nineveh, which he enlarged. For the new imperial capital he started the development of an elaborate water supply system. He constructed, in phases, a large canal network for not only agriculture, but also to sustain life in the new urban area, part of the Assyrian urbanism. Ur (2005) reassessed Sennacherib’s canal network using aerial photography and satellite imagery. The project was most likely constructed in four phases: the Kisiri canal (year built, 702 B. C.); the Mount Musri canal (694 B. C.); the Northern System (ca. 690 B. C.); and the Khinisi system (ca. 690-688 B. C.). These years are based on work by Avrial M. Bagg (2000) as reported in Ur (2005). The canals received water from both rivers and springs and the canals followed the natural terrain (Ur, 2005). The canal lengths, as reported by Ur (2005) are 13.4 km for the Kisiri canal; 46.4 km for the Northern System, and 55 km for the Khinis canal. To give an idea of the canal sizes, the canal near Bandwai had been excavated 80 m wide and 20 m deep (Ur, 2005).