Discovery of unique 7000-year old pottery in West of Iran

EghtesadOnline: Pottery pieces unique in terms of the single color and bi-color illustrations dating back to the Dalma Culture have been unearthed in Nadali Beig Hill, Kermanshah Province, the Public Relations Office of the Research Institute of Cultural Heritage and Tourism (RICHT)reported.

News ID: ۷۷۳۴۷۷

24 January 2017

RICHT quoted head of the exploration team in Nadali Beig Hill, Hannan Bahranipour, as referring to the background of the excavations in the region, according to IRNA.

“Explorations were conducted with regard to the risk of destruction of Nadali Beig Hill located in the southwest of the city of Sonqor due to the building of a dam over Jamishan River.”

The archaeologist said that in this exploration season two trenches with the size of 5x5 meters and a stair bore hole with a size of 3x5 were studied in the western and central sections of the hill under investigation.

According to Bahranipour, on the basis of the results achieved in the explorations it was specified that the thickness of the deposits in Nadali Beig Hill is over four meters mainly dating back to the Copper and Middle Stone Age and the Dalma Culture.

He listed the findings in the explorations in Nadali Beig Hill as identification of several construction stages, remains of residential units, remains related to industrial activities and a large number of various potteries belonging to the Copper and Middle Stone era the architecture of which is made of adobe with clay mortar and built with the orthogonal plan.

The archaeologist described the variety of the pottery as unique and said the objects included pieces in single color and bicolor Dalma illustrations, the Dalma pressure pottery and pottery with thick red mud covering.

The head of the exploration team in Nadali Beig Hill said according to the preliminary study of the findings it seems that the most important settlement era on the Nadali Beig Hill dates back to the fifth Millennium BC and the Dalma Culture.

He noted that of course in recent centuries parts of the area had been used as the cemetery of the Islamic era and in some of the trenches remains of the burials could be observed.

Bahranipour said exploration in the Nadali Beig Hill was important as four decades have passed since the last excavations in the area with such an antiquity and all the archeological information about the Copper and Stone Age in Central Zagros are based on foreign archeological studies in pre-revolution period.

Stressing that such explorations have provided outstanding results in the field of archeology of the Copper and Stone eras in Central Zagros, he expressed hope that with the completion of the studies on the findings new light would be shed on the Copper and Stone Age in Central Zagros.

It should be noted that the Dalma pottery tradition including illustrated pottery, pottery with volumetric carving, pressure, punchy and added decorations, simple pottery with thick red mud covering enjoys a relatively vast area from northwest Iran to Central Zagros.