The American Research Institute of the South Caucasus is pleased to present:
“Highland Fortress-polities and Their Settlement Systems in the South Caucasus”
Emily Hammer, New York University, ARISC Fellow
Location: Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences, Naxçivan Section, H.Aliyev Avenue 76, Naxcivan City, Azerbaijan
Date: July 31, 2013, 11 am
Overview: In the Late Bronze Age (1500-1150 BC) and Iron Age (1150 BC-300 AD), fortresses dotted hilltops and rock outcrops in the highlands of eastern Turkey, northwestern Iran, and the south Caucasus (modern Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia). After a long period of mobility and pastoral economy that left few archaeologically-visible settlements during the preceding Middle Bronze Age (2400-1500 BC), Late Bronze and Iron Age fortresses marked the reappearance of a more settled mode of life, the transition to an agricultural economy, and the emergence of the first complex polities in the region. However, little is known about the location, size, and character of the domestic settlements that must have been associated with these fortresses or the identity and subsistence strategies of their inhabitants.
Landscape-oriented archaeological research in the Şərur Plain of Naxçıvan, Azerbaijan, has revealed a multiple fortress-settlement complex that offers the opportunity to examine the ancient populations living in the shadows of fortresses..
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