Early Dilmun Seals from Saar: Art and Commerce in Bronze Age Bahrain

by Harriet Crawford

Four thousand years ago the land of Dilmun lay at the crossroads between the civilized world and the mysterious East. Its merchants prospered greatly from the lucrative trade in copper and luxury goods which passed through their country. After much debate, Dilmun was finally identified in the 1950s as the island of Bahrain in the Arabian Gulf. Only very recently have archaeologists been able to investigate any town or village of this culture, and thus discover anything of the Dilmun way of life. This book is the first in a series presenting the excavations at ancient Saar, where the London-Bahrain Archaeological Expedition is working to uncover a complete Dilmun settlement. The work aims to bridge the gap between the amateur and the professional by using a new format, with graphics and illustrations. Scholarly data is included, but arranged so as not to impede the main text. Thus the information is conveyed in a comprehensive manner, which should make the fascinating Dilmun civilization accessible to everyone. In this volume, the structure and contents of the temple, the town's most prominent building, is presented in detail, with separate chapters on pre-temple buildings, the architecture of the temple, and different phases in the temple's history. An introduction places the Saar site in its historical and geographical context, and there are sections on finds in the temple including seals and pottery, on dating the temple, on the temple and Dilmun society and evidence of cultic practices found in the temple. Appendices provide a summary of earlier excavations, a list of archaeological contexts and finds arranged by context number and by material and type.

96 pages, Paperback

First published July 29, 1997

About the author

Dr. Harriet Crawford (Institute of Archaeology, University College London): Director, The Joint Kuwaiti-British Archaeological Expedition to As-Sabiyah. Dr. Crawford has had a long and distinguished career in Western Asian archaeology, having written numerous articles and books. She has a long-standing love of the Sumerians and their civilization. Prior to initiating the British Archaeological Expedition to Kuwait, she was a director of the successful London-Bahrain Archaeological Expedition, which excavated at Saar. She is currently an Honorary Visiting Professor at the Institute of Archaeology, UCL, and a Fellow of the McDonald Institute, Cambridge.