During the early first millennium BC, several factors combined to launch a number of regions in the Arabian peninsula toward complex statehood. Agricultural intensification due to improved irrigation, the production of surpluses under the control of local elites, the domestication of the camel enabling long-distance caravan trade in aromatics, and pressure from outside aggressors (principally Assyria) all contributed to state formation processes in southwestern and northwestern Arabia, while in the Persian Gulf and southeastern Arabia, tributary relations with Assyria on the part of local rulers were documented.
By far the best known of these states arose in south Arabia where thousands of inscriptions, many of them historical or annalistic, shed light on the intense competition between rulers and regions that resulted in the consolidation of successive Sabaean, Minaean, Qatabanian, Hadramawt, and Himyarite states. Although we know little of the earliest supraregional state in the region, Awsan, there is an unbroken record of state-level, highly organized, militaristic societies with standing armies and important external trade and diplomatic relations from the eighth century BC, when two Sabaean kings are mentioned in Assyrian royal inscriptions, to the coming of Islam in the seventh century AD. Broadly speaking, this millennium can be divided into four main periods: (1) the period of the mukarribs (‘unifiers’ or ‘federators’) of Saba, eighth to sixth century BC; (2) the period of the kings of Saba, fifth to first century BC; (3) the period of the kings of Saba and dhu-Raydan, first to third century AD; and (4) the Himyarite period, fourth to sixth century AD. South Arabian society was supported by an intensive agricultural regime dependent on irrigation. Major dams, like the one at the Sabaean capital Marib, stored water and enabled the production of massive agricultural surpluses. Large, walled cities (Marib, Sirwah, Baraqish, Shabwa, Najran, etc.) dot the south Arabian landscape, along with smaller towns, villages, and farmsteads in a complex hierarchy of settlement. High standards of stone masonry and an arid climate have resulted in an extraordinary level of preservation at many sites. Monumental tombs, replete with alabaster statuary, bronze weaponry, and ceramics; silver and base metal coinage, inspired originally by Athenian coinage; a rich repertoire of icon-ographic elements in architectural decoration and metalwork; and a passion for highly visible, elegantly carved public inscriptions, characterize south Arabia’s civilizations.
In northwestern Arabia, the site of Tayma grew into a major urban center during the sixth century BC when the neo-Babylonian king Nabonidus moved his residence there from 553 to 543 BC. A large city wall enclosing an important settlement with temples and industrial areas makes this the largest archaeological site in the region. At about the same time, an important settlement on the northeastern outskirts of the al-’Ula oasis, known as Khuraybah, began to grow. The site, where Saudi excavations have recently begun, is attested in the Bible as Dedan (e. g., Genesis 10.7, etc.) and was home to a trading emporium founded by Minaean merchants from south Arabia who thereby established an important commercial center near the northern end of the incense route.
Other important Iron Age remains have been identified in the Jawf oasis of north-central Arabia, ancient Adummatu of the Assyrian sources, but these have not yet been investigated intensively. Assyrian accounts of campaigns in the region make it clear, however, that tribal confederations of camelbreeding nomads occupied much of the north Arabian desert in the early and mid-first millennium BC. The archaeology of this population is virtually unknown, although some of the abundant rock art to be seen in the region probably dates to this period.
Assyrian sources also record the receipt of tribute from several kings of Dilmun but these predate the occupational evidence from the major palatial building on Qalat al-Bahrain which was used during the mid-first millennium. Ceramics and a rock crystal stamp seal in Achaemenid court style suggest that a provincial administrator in the service of the Achae-menid Persian Empire may have used the building. Otherwise, there is little archaeological evidence of Persian control at this time.
The Iron Age in the Oman peninsula witnessed an explosion of settlement. to the introduction of qanat or falaj irrigation technology, many new oasis settlements were established, some of which were walled. Date palm cultivation probably expanded at this time and the use of the domesticated dromedary camel is attested. Sites like Muweilah, Rumeilah, al-Thuqaibah, and Hili 17 reflect the existence of large communities living in multiroomed, mud brick houses. Bronze weaponry has been recovered in large quantities in cemeteries such as al-Qusais, on the outskirts of Dubai. Iron Age graves have been found all over southeastern Arabia, and Izki, according to Assyrian sources, was the base of a king named Pade who sent tribute to the Assyrian ruler Assurbanipal in the seventh century BC.
World History
