Identity and Adornment in the Third-millennium <scp>bc</scp> Mesopotamian ‘Royal Cemetery’ at Ur

Gansell, Amy Rebecca

doi:10.1017/s0959774307000042

Cited by 15 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…anthropology (Molleson & Hodgson 2003;Soltysiak 2006), ethnobotany (Miller 1999;2000;Tengberg et al 2008), gender and role archaeology (Pollock 1991b;McCaffrey 2008;Cheng 2009;Gansell 2007), history of technology (La Nice 1995) and history and social context of ancient music (Barnett 1969;Rakic 1998;de Schauensee 1998;Cheng 2009; see also Aruz & Wallenfels 2003;Zettler & Horne 1998;Irving & Ambers 2002;and in particular Tinney 1998;Winter 2010). The graveyard was situated in the centre of the city thus making it better controlled by the seats of power and reflecting the ideological and political centrality of elite funerals (in the sense of McCauley & Lawson 2007).…”

Section: Massimo Vidalementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The aim of this article is to develop the interpretation of PG 1237 in terms of its formation and taphonomy, an effort already begun for this and other graves of the Cemetery by other scholars (Winter 2010;Gansell 2007).…”

Section: State Of the Questionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Both Winter (2010, 231) and Gansell (2007) focused rather on the evidence of ritualism. According to Gansell, the deposition of jewellery with the dead within tombs and across the Royal Cemetery demonstrates that stock articles were worn in standard configurations.…”

Section: State Of the Questionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Woolley (1934, 30) lists the types of ornaments preferentially associated with men (rings of gold and silver chain, large beads on the headdress) and women (gold hairribbons, wreath of gold and lapis beads with pendants, large gold lunate ear-rings, hair-rings of coiled gold wire, gold and silver combs, floral tips). Both Gansell (2007) and Pollock (1991a,b) developed Woolley's suggestions, ultimately concluding that '… people wearing vegetal wreaths are gendered as female, and those wearing "brims" [i.e. showy headbands with beads] are identified as male' (Gansell 2007, 37-8).…”

Section: Rams and Lyres: Musicians For The Deadmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…She recognizes as the richest assemblages (often worn by the main, royal occupants of some graves) those including the 'gold wreath sets ' (2007, 32). Along the southwestern wall of the shaft (Gansell 2007 , fig. 4) a row of burials with this gorgeous attire is segregated from a parallel unbroken row of 'women' with less-showy 'choker-based ornaments'.…”

Section: Rams and Lyres: Musicians For The Deadmentioning

confidence: 99%

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PG 1237, Royal Cemetery of Ur: Patterns in Death

Vidale¹

2011

CAJ

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This article discusses the identity of the people buried in the Great Death Pit PG 1237, a mass grave of the Royal Cemetery of Ur, and the ways they died and entered the shaft. Admittedly, the evidence required to positively solve the many taphonomic and osteological questions involved does not exist, because of the way the site was excavated and published in the early twentieth century. Nonetheless, the original excavators’ skill and unquestioned care in mapping and recording still prepares the ground for new alternative interpretations. As the ‘Rams Caught in a Thicket’ (two statuettes found in the mass grave) may have been the front parts of lyres, and almost all the dead might have entered the shaft impersonating musicians, singers and dancers, the paramount importance of music in the funerals of Sumerian elites is emphasized. New radiographic evidence recently suggested that some of the buried persons were killed violently, refuting the traditional theory of a voluntary mass suicide by poison. The bodies of the victims might have been formally prepared and serially brought to the pit in burial groups. Stratigraphy and spatial distribution reveal consistent depositional patterns dictated by specific rituals, as already proposed on the basis of more limited evidence by other authors. Formal arrangement and ritualism, in turn, support Woolley's identification of the graves as sacred constructions and thus reaffirms their royal character. The article ends by considering the historical meaning of the nature of these impressive funerals at the verge of the political unification of Mesopotamia by the house of Sargon.

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