Jemdet Nasr - Material Culture

Material Culture

Apart from the proto-cuneiform tablets, Jemdet Nasr gained fame for its painted polychrome and monochrome pottery. Painted pots display both geometric motifs and depictions of animals, including birds, fish, goats, scorpions, snakes and trees. However, the majority of the pottery was undecorated, and the fact that most painted pottery seems to have come from the large central building suggests that it had a special function. Pottery forms included large jars, bowls, spouted vessels and cups.

A number of cylinder seals, stamp seals and cylinder seal impressions on the clay tablets have been found at Jemdet Nasr. Stylistically, these seals are a continuation of the preceding Uruk period. The cylinder seals display humans as well as animals in a very crude style. Over 80 of the clay tablets bore a sealing, showing humans, animals, buildings, containers and more abstract designs. Interestingly, none of the sealings on the tablets was made by the seals that were found at the site, indicating that sealing either occurred outside Jemdet Nasr or that seals could also be made of perishable materials. One sealing, found on thirteen tablets, lists the names of a number of cities surrounding Jemdet Nasr, including Larsa, Nippur, Ur and Uruk.

The exact findspots of many objects retrieved during the 1920s excavations could no longer be reconstructed due to the poor publication standards, so that many can only be dated by comparing them with what has been found at other sites that do have a good stratigraphy and chronological control. Many of the objects found during the 1920s could be dated from the Uruk period to the Early Dynastic I period. Very few copper objects were found in Jemdet Nasr. These included an adze, a fish-hook and a small pendant in the shape of a goose. A particular type of stone vessel with ledge handles and a rim decorated by incised rectangles has so far not been found at any other site. The function of a number of flat polished stones incised with lines forming a cross is uncertain, but it has been suggested that they were used as bolas. They are common in Uruk period sites. Because clay as a raw material is widely available around Jemdet Nasr, clay objects are very common. Clay objects included baked clay bricks, clay sickels, fragments of drain pipes, spatulas, spindle whorls and miniature wagon wheels. Beads, small pendants and figurines were made of bone, shell, stone, clay and frit.