Assur 2025

This third volume of the series Exploring Assur presents the results achieved at Assur, modern Qal’at Sherqat, through the 2025 fieldwork and analytical programme.

This third volume of the series Exploring Assur presents the results achieved at Assur, modern Qal’at Sherqat, through the 2025 fieldwork and analytical programme. Edited by Karen Radner, Jana Richter, and Andrea Squitieri, the book contains contributions by Katleen Deckers, Eileen Eckmeier, Rafał A. Fetner, Helen Gries, Veronica Hinterhuber, F. Janoscha Kreppner, Karina Länger, Birgül Öğüt, Alessio Palmisano, Karen Radner, Jana Richter, Jens Rohde, Claudia Sarkady, Vanessa Schauer, Andrea Squitieri, and Poppy Tushingham.

The excavations in trench NT1 substantially refine the stratigraphic sequence of the New Town. They provide new evidence for the long-term continuity of occupation at Assur after its conquest in 614 BC. Two successive Hellenistic occupation phases can now be distinguished: the newly identified, earlier Building C and the later Building A. Beneath these levels, the large late Neo-Assyrian Building B emerged as a substantial high-status residence with a central reception hall, courtyards, and associated rooms. Originally covering an area of approximately 770 square metres, it is among the largest private residences presently known from Assur. The building evidently escaped destruction during the events of 614 BC, and preliminary ceramic analyses suggest that at least parts of it remained in use well after the conquest of the city.

Geoarchaeological coring demonstrated that the city’s defensive moat may originally have exceeded five metres in depth and also clarified the construction history of several temples in the Inner City. Coring beneath the cella of the Ishtar Temple produced a layer of imported sand and a radiocarbon date reaching back into the Early Dynastic I period, pushing the earliest attested occupation of Assur into the early third millennium BC.

The small finds from the Neo-Assyrian period include a bronze duck weight, bronze fibulae, fragmentary stone vessels made from serpentine and banded calcite, and a clay cylinder seal. A standout find of Hellenistic date is a double-mould-made male figurine wearing the distinct Macedonian hat called kausia. The cuneiform finds comprise fragments of inscribed bricks and clay cones of Assyrian rulers including Puzur-Aššur III (ca. 1521–1498 BC) and Adad-nerari I (1305–1274 BC), reused in later architecture.

Basketry and leather remains provide exceptionally rare evidence for organic craft traditions in northern Mesopotamia, including what is very likely the first securely identified Neo-Assyrian basketry specimen. The leather finds from Hellenistic graves document working techniques such as folding, embossing, and drawstring closures. Their preservation is due to vegetable tanning using tannin-rich plants such as oak, poplar, and mulberry, all attested in the archaeobotanical record at Assur. Ongoing studies are identifying an ever wider range of cultivated and imported woods and other plants, now including the first secure attestation of cedar (Cedrus sp.) and oats (Avena) at Neo-Assyrian Assur. Local arboriculture is evidenced by tree prunings of fig and palm trees as well as vines.

Phytolith analyses of Hellenistic burial contexts revealed the intentional inclusion of plant materials in these graves. A dried fruit of Black Mulberry (Morus nigra) placed in one of these grave is the first securely identified specimen in the ancient Middle East. The burial population is predominantly young, with all identifiable adults being female and very limited evidence for pathological conditions.

The volume also contains a study of the Selman House, originally constructed in 1904 as part of Walter Andrae’s excavation compound to house two key team members: the accountant Shaul Salman and the cook Raouf, both from Hillah. Later, it was occupied by the excavation’s imperial Ottoman representative Abdelkadir al-Pachachi, later the curator of antiquities at the newly established Iraq Museum in Baghdad. The chapter reconstructs the social world of early twentieth-century archaeology at Assur and traces the building’s continued use within the modern excavation project.

Table of Content

A. Continuing fieldwork in the New Town of Assur in 2025 (Karen Radner)

B. The Selman House and its inhabitants: architecture and social entanglements in Late Ottoman Iraq (Jana Richter)

C. Geoarchaeological studies in 2025 (Eileen Eckmeier)

D. Radiocarbon dates from the 2025 campaign: coring in the Ishtar Temple and excavation in the New Town (Karen Radner & Andrea Squitieri)

E. Continuing the excavation of trench NT1 in the New Town of Assur in 2025 (F. Janoscha Kreppner, Jens Rohde, Jana Richter, Veronica Hinterhuber & Alessio Palmisano)

F. Studies on the pottery excavated in the New Town of Assur, 2023–2025
F1. Selected pottery from a floor of the early Hellenistic Building C – a first morphological assessment (Poppy Tushingham)
F2. Selected pottery from floors of Building B: evidence for its late Neo-Assyrian occupation and its continued use after 614 BC on the basis of ceramic morphology (Jana Richter)

G. Small finds from Assur, 2025 (Andrea Squitieri & Helen Gries)

H. Cuneiform finds from Assur, 2025 (Poppy Tushingham & Jana Richter)

I. Human remains from Assur, 2024 and 2025 (Rafał A. Fetner)

J. Plant remains from Assur, 2023 and 2025
J1. Wood identifications from charcoal remains primarily of the 2025 season at Assur (Katleen Deckers)
J2. Plant identifications from light fraction samples of the 2025 season at Assur (Claudia Sarkady)
J3. Phytoliths from burial contexts in the New Town of Assur, 2025 (Birgül Öğüt)
J4. A fruit of the Black Mulberry (Morus nigra) from an early Hellenistic burial in Assur (Jana Richter & Claudia Sarkady)

K. Basketry and leather remains from Assur, 2023 and 2025
K1. Basketry remains from the late Neo-Assyrian Building B (Veronica Hinterhuber)
K2. Leather remains from Hellenistic graves, 2023 and 2025 (Karina Länger & Vanessa Schauer)

L. Preliminary conclusions for 2025 (Karen Radner & Andrea Squitieri)

• Edited by Karen Radner
• Edited by Jana Richter
• Edited by Andrea Squitieri