This Fertile Land: Signs and Symbols in the Early Arts of Iran and Iraq

by Margaret Cool Root (Editor)

This volume accompanies an exhibition of the same name at the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology, February 4-September 30, 2005. Far more than merely a catalogue of the exhibition, it offers for a wide readership an introduction to the art of late prehistory (around 4000 BC) in Iran and Iraq, by bringing together a range of expressive visual tools-seals, sealings, and painted pottery. The focus is on a time before written expressions of belief, mythology, identity, or administrative documentation, but also a time of ripened recourse to other visual strategies of communication that set the stage for writing as we conceive it. A series of 11 imaginative interpretative essays explores the evidence and the methods we can use to approach an understanding of the role of visual imagery (of signs and symbols) in late prehistory, and to ask questions of this material as a means of approaching possible social meanings. The book is lavishly illustrated, and includes catalogue entries for every object included in the exhibition.

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Margaret Cool Root is Professor and Curator Emerita in the Department of the History of Art and the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology, University of Michigan.

Reviews

[Gavin White · Rating 2 out of 5]

I came across this title in the library at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. I thought 'Wow' this is just what I have been looking for. However, it didn't take long to be disappointed.
On the good side, the book does contain many photos and drawings of seals and painted pottery, and the text provides a good overview of the basic subject matter at hand. But that is where it stopped for me. The stated purpose of the book was to analysis and interpret art motifs in ancient Near Eastern art. As far as I am concerned it failed to achieve this objective.
The book is a composite made up from contributions from various students who each take an individual approach to interpreting decorated artifacts. One such essay took the unsubstantiated starting position that any male figures with any kind of animal are to be understood as 'shaman'. From that point the argument, such as it was, was entirely circular.
Even worse was the case of the crossed circle that appears in many designs. In the cuneiform writing system the circle-cross is read as UDU meaning 'sheep' - that is substantiated. But is it then at all acceptable to transfer this meaning to the visual arts? Especially when it doesn't produce any sensible results. In a similar manner, sets of wavy lines are interpreted as a symbol of water - on the grounds that they look a bit like water.
To be fair, the discipline of symbolic analysis in prehistory is fraught with difficulty and the total lack of written texts means that any kind of literary corroboration is impossible. To even start getting at the meanings of ancient art I believe a very different approach is needed - one that takes a broad look at the motifs and the pictorial contexts in which they are found. Unfortunately this book didn't explore this potentially fruitful avenue.
Within the field of Mesopotamian studies, I have found two books that have approached this type of subject matter with greater success but they have had to confine themselves to the field of royal ideology and are very reliant on textual and/or archaeological evidence. These two books are: 'The mythology of Kingship in Neo-Assyrian art' by Mehmet-ali Atac, and 'Animal Symbolism in Mesopotamia' by Chikato Watanabe - I hope to write reviews on both shortly.