Puzrish-Dagan (modern Drehem) is an important

archaeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology an ...

Al-Qādisiyyah Governorate Al-Qadisiyah Governorate ( ar, القادسية, translit=Al Qādisiyah), also known as Al-Diwaniyah Governorate ( ar, ٱلدِّيوَانِيَّة ''ad-Dīwānīyah''), is one of the governorates of Iraq. It is in the center-south of the count ...

(

Iraq Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...

). It is best-known for the thousands of

clay tablets In the Ancient Near East, clay tablets (Akkadian ) were used as a writing medium, especially for writing in cuneiform, throughout the Bronze Age and well into the Iron Age. Cuneiform characters were imprinted on a wet clay tablet with a stylus ...

that are known to have come from the site through

looting Looting is the act of stealing, or the taking of goods by force, typically in the midst of a military, political, or other social crisis, such as war, natural disasters (where law and civil enforcement are temporarily ineffective), or rioting. ...

during the early twentieth century.

History of research

Puzrish-Dagan came first to the attention of scholars when

coming from the site started to appear on the antiquities market in 1909-1910. Based on information from the antiquities traders who sold the tablets, Puzrish-Dagan could be identied with modern Drehem in Iraq. Since then, some 12,000 tablets thought to have come from the site have been published. The objects are scattered across numerous collections, for example those of the

Royal Ontario Museum The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is a museum of art, world culture and natural history in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is one of the largest museums in North America and the largest in Canada. It attracts more than one million visitors every year ...

, the Oriental Institute, Harvard Museum, and the

Iraq Museum The Iraq Museum ( ar, المتحف العراقي) is the national museum of Iraq, located in Baghdad. It is sometimes informally called the National Museum of Iraq, a recent phenomenon influenced by other nations' naming of their national museum ...

. The site was surveyed by

Robert McCormick Adams Robert McCormick Adams Jr. (July 23, 1926 – January 27, 2018) was an American anthropologist and secretary of the Smithsonian Institution (1984–94). He worked in both the Near East and Mesoamerica. A long time professor of the University of C ...

as part of his important archaeological work in the region. Iraqi archaeologists excavated the site in 2007 under the direction of Ali Ubeid Shalkam. The Iraqi-Italian QADIS-project surveyed the site in 2016. From 2016 to 2019 the University of Bologna and the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities and Heritage conducted a program of coordinated remote sensing and surface surveys in the Qadisiyah province including at Drehem. It determined that the site had an extent of 60 hectares. It determined that the city was surrounded by canals, was laid out as an urban grid, had a number of administrative building, and had a harbor. The Oriental Institute has received permission to start new excavations at the site as part of their renewed work at the nearby site of

Nippur Nippur (Sumerian language, Sumerian: ''Nibru'', often logogram, logographically recorded as , EN.LÍLKI, "Enlil City;"The Cambridge Ancient History: Prolegomena & Prehistory': Vol. 1, Part 1. Accessed 15 Dec 2010. Akkadian language, Akkadian: '' ...

and carried out a preliminary

survey Survey may refer to: Statistics and human research * Statistical survey, a method for collecting quantitative information about items in a population * Survey (human research), including opinion polls Spatial measurement * Surveying, the techniq ...

in 2019.

The site and its environment

Puzrish-Dagan is located some southeast of Nippur, of which it has sometimes been called a

suburb A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area, which may include commercial and mixed-use, that is primarily a residential area. A suburb can exist either as part of a larger city/urban area or as a separate ...

. The site consists of two areas; a northern and a southern mound. The northern mound measures for a total area of . The southern mound is slightly larger: it measures , is high and occupies an area of . Parts of the site are now obscured by modern agricultural fields and several irrigation canals cut through it. The mound has been described as a "beehive" due to the illegal looting taking place since the early 1900s. Based on the site morphology, the southern mound possibly contains a

ziggurat A ziggurat (; Cuneiform: 𒅆𒂍𒉪, Akkadian: ', D-stem of ' 'to protrude, to build high', cognate with other Semitic languages like Hebrew ''zaqar'' (זָקַר) 'protrude') is a type of massive structure built in ancient Mesopotamia. It has ...

. Both mounds probably contain large buildings over in length. Traces of the walls are still visible on the surface and the regularity of these traces suggests that the buildings were planned and built within a short period of time. The QADIS-survey has documented possible traces of a city wall, a large temple complex next to the ziggurat, ancient canals that ran alongside and through the settlement, as well as a harbor.

Occupation history

Traces of the Early Dynastic,

Akkadian Akkadian or Accadian may refer to: * Akkadians, inhabitants of the Akkadian Empire * Akkadian language, an extinct Eastern Semitic language * Akkadian literature, literature in this language * Akkadian cuneiform Cuneiform is a logo- syllabi ...

and

Ur III The Third Dynasty of Ur, also called the Neo-Sumerian Empire, refers to a 22nd to 21st century BC ( middle chronology) Sumerian ruling dynasty based in the city of Ur and a short-lived territorial-political state which some historians consider t ...

periods have been found at the site according to a 1967 publication of the Iraqi Directorate General of antiquities. The QADIS-survey found

sherds This page is a glossary of archaeology, the study of the human past from material remains. A B C D E F ...

dating to the Middle Uruk period and confirmed that the Ur III period was probably the most important settlement level at Drehem. Evidence for the

Isin-Larsa The Isin-Larsa period (circa 2025-1763 BCE, Middle Chronology, or 1961-1699 BCE, Short Chronology) is a phase in the history of ancient Mesopotamia, which extends between the end of the Third Dynasty of Ur and the conquest of Mesopotamia by King ...

as well as the

Parthian Parthian may be: Historical * A demonym "of Parthia", a region of north-eastern of Greater Iran * Parthian Empire (247 BC – 224 AD) * Parthian language, a now-extinct Middle Iranian language * Parthian shot, an archery skill famously employed by ...

and/or

Sasanian The Sasanian () or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians (, ) and also referred to by historians as the Neo-Persian Empire, was the last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th-8th centuries AD. Named ...

periods has also been found. The thousands of texts coming from the site all date to the Ur III period.
hangyu Liu, "Prosopographical Statistics Appendix of the article 'Prosopography of individuals delivering animals to Puzriš-Dagan in Ur III Mesopotamia'", Cuneiform Digital Library Preprints, 24.0, 1 April 2022 In the absence of excavations these texts from provide the most information on the nature of the settlement at Drehem. Puzrish-Dagan was founded by king

Shulgi Shulgi ( dŠulgi, formerly read as Dungi) of Ur was the second king of the Third Dynasty of Ur. He reigned for 48 years, from c. 2094 – c. 2046 BC (Middle Chronology) or possibly c. 2030 – 1982 BC (Short Chronology). His accomplishme ...

as an important administrative center in the ''bala'' tax system of the Ur III period. Witnessed by thousands of

cuneiform Cuneiform is a logo-syllabic script that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Middle East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. It is named for the characteristic wedge-sha ...

tablets, livestock (cattle, sheep, and goats) of the state was centralized at Drehem and subsequently redistributed to temples, its officials and royal palaces. The temples of nearby Nippur were the main destinations of the livestock.

References

Al-Qādisiyyah Governorate Archaeological sites in Iraq