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Konar Sandal is a
The site is associated with the hypothesized "
Cultural Relationships beyond the Iranian Plateau: The Helmand Civilization, Baluchistan and the Indus Valley in the 3rd Millennium BCE.
Paléorient 34(2):5-35, Archaeological sites in Iran Bronze Age sites Former populated places in Iran Buildings and structures in Kerman Province Helmand culture Jiroft culture
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...
archaeological site, situated in the valley of the Halil River
Halīl River or HalīlRood (also ''Haliri River'', known as the ''Kharaw'' or ''ZarDasht River'' in its upper reaches) is a river stretching for some running in the Baft, Jiroft and Kahnuj districts of Kerman Province, Iran.
The Halil rises a ...
just south of Jiroft
Jiroft ( fa, جیرفت, also Romanized as Jīroft; formerly, Sabzāwārān, Sabzevārān, Sabzevārān-e Jiroft, and Sabzvārān) is a city and capital of Jiroft County, Kerman Province, Iran. At the 2006 census, its population was 95,031, in ...
, Kermān Province, Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
.
Description
The site consists of two mounds a few kilometers apart, called Konar Sandal A and B with a height of 13 and 21 meters, respectively. At Konar Sandal B, a two-story, windowed citadel with a base of close to 13.5 hectares was found. Also found in Konar Sandal were tablets with scripts of unknown nature. Near Konar there are several other ancient sites from the same time period such as Hajjiabad-Varamin, the graveyards located at Mahtoutabad, and the mounds of Qaleh Koutchek.Jiroft culture
The site is associated with the hypothesized "Jiroft culture
The Jiroft cultureOscar White MuscarellaJiroft(2008), in: Encyclopedia Iranica. "For archeological accuracy the terms "Jiroft" or "Jiroft culture" employed to define a specific ancient Iranian culture and its artifacts should only be cited within ...
", a 3rd millennium BC culture postulated on the basis of a collection of artifacts confiscated in 2001, criticized for conjecture about material not found in secure archaeological contexts and probably including forgeries. So the excavation of Konar Sandal is important in discovering artefacts in context.
Yousef Majidzadeh
Yousef Majidzadeh ( fa, یوسف مجیدزاده, born 1938) is an Iranian archaeologist and director of the excavations at Ozbaki, Qabristan and Jiroft. He is a native of Tabriz.
In 2007, Majidzadeh presented a seminar in Kerman entitled “J ...
, head of the archaeological excavation team in Konar Sandal which began work after the 2001 confiscation, has identified the site as an "independent Bronze Age civilization
A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system).
Ci ...
with its own architecture and language". Majidzadeh suggests they may be the remains of the lost Aratta
Aratta is a land that appears in Sumerian myths surrounding Enmerkar and Lugalbanda, two early and possibly mythical kings of Uruk also mentioned on the Sumerian king list.
Role in Sumerian literature
Aratta is described as follows in Sumeri ...
Kingdom. Other conjectures (e.g. Daniel T. Potts, Piotr Steinkeller) have connected the site with the obscure city-state of Marhashi
Marhaši ( Sumerian: ''Mar-ḫa-šiKI'' , ''Marhashi'', ''Marhasi'', ''Parhasi'', ''Barhasi''; in earlier sources Waraḫše. Akkadian: "Parahshum" ''pa2-ra-ah-shum2-ki'') was a 3rd millennium BC polity situated east of Elam, on the Iranian platea ...
.
A 2013 research paper about the South mound states that excavations during 2006 to 2009 "revealed the remains of three successive settlements dating to the fourth millennium BC".
Excavation re-commenced in 2014 and revealed art works of "complexity and beauty" and artifacts that proved that the society had several writing systems. According to National Geographic
''National Geographic'' (formerly the ''National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as NAT GEO) is a popular American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. Known for its photojournalism, it is one of the most widely ...
, the content of the mounds is significant:They turned out to contain the remains of two major architectural complexes. The northern mound included a cult building, while in the southern one were the remains of a fortified citadel. At the foot of the mounds, buried under many feet of sediment, were the remains of smaller buildings. It’s believed that the two mounds had once formed part of a unified urban settlement that stretched many miles across the plateau" ... rtifacts"have been dated to between 2500 and 2200 B.C.hey are said to be evidence of Hey or Hey! may refer to: Music * Hey (band), a Polish rock band Albums * Hey (Andreas Bourani album), ''Hey'' (Andreas Bourani album) or the title song (see below), 2014 * Hey! (Julio Iglesias album), ''Hey!'' (Julio Iglesias album) or the ti ...the "development of a complex civilization".
References
Further reading
* * Elisa Cortesi, Maurizio Tosi, Alessandra Lazzari, Massimo Vidale (2008)Cultural Relationships beyond the Iranian Plateau: The Helmand Civilization, Baluchistan and the Indus Valley in the 3rd Millennium BCE.
Paléorient 34(2):5-35, Archaeological sites in Iran Bronze Age sites Former populated places in Iran Buildings and structures in Kerman Province Helmand culture Jiroft culture