1 Archaeological investigations on the Citadel of Erbil: Background, Framework and Results Dara Aｽ Y ﾘﾊﾊｮ, Abdullah Kｫﾊﾙﾝｫ Kｫﾙ, Sangar Mﾊｫﾃﾃ, Saber Hﾝﾝﾄ Hçﾝﾝｮﾄ, Mary Sｫﾖﾖﾙﾝﾊﾄ and John MGｮﾄﾄｮﾝ The size, location and length of occupation of the citadel of Erbil mark it out as one of the most important sites in Mesopotamia with the potential to contribute fundamentally to the archaeological understanding of the area. Surface survey has already demonstrated that the mound has remains going back at least 6,000 years and the likelihood is that it will in fact be older than that, while recent work on the ancient cuneiform texts (MacGinnis 2014) has highlighted the exceptional status of the city in the history of Iraq and Kurdistan. In short, the citadel mound contains an unparalleled sequence of occupational layers accessible at no other site. There is no doubt of the calibre of the remains at Erbil. There is also no doubt that this could translate directly into a fundamental contribution to Mesopotamian archaeology. Scientific excavation of the citadel mound is certain to produce a sequence which will assume a central role in the archaeology of Iraq and Kurdistan. Background At this stage it is not known when an actual settlement was first founded in Erbil. In general terms the presence of mankind is documented in Kurdistan from the paleolithic, that is from around 70,000 years ago onwards. With respect to Erbil, attention is drawn more specifically to the evidence for a presence in the mesolithic period (ca. 13000-8500 BC) found near the foot of the citadel (Nováček et al. 2013, 2). The presence in the surrounding plains of sites with occupation of the Halaf period (5800- 5300 BC) makes it highly likely that Erbil too will have been home to a Halaf settlement, though this remains to be actually demonstrated. Potsherds from the citadel mound do however show that there was a settlement at Erbil by the Ubaid period (5300-4500 BC) (Novácek et al. 2008, 276; Nováček et al. 2013, 2). The Uruk period (4500-3000 BC) is not yet directly attested on the citadel though mention should be made of the important Uruk remains found at the nearby mound of Qalinj Agha (al Soof 1966; 1969; al-Soof and es-Siwwani 1967; Hijara 1973). By the late Early Dynastic period, ca. 2300 BC, however the city was sufficiently important to be a destination for messengers from Ebla (MacGinnis 2014, 46). There is as yet no evidence as to whether Erbil was ever incorporated in the Akkadian empire but the city does feature as an objective of a military campaign of the Gutian king Erridu-Pizir. Thereafter the information from historical sources gradually increases. At the end of the third millennium Erbil was incorporated within the Ur III empire and surface survey has thrown up sherds which date to this period. In the early second millennium the city very likely regained its independence and was then caught up in the growth of Qabra and that city’s downfall at the hands of Šamši-Adad and Daduša (MacGinnis 2013). There must then have followed a time when further periods of independence alternated with incorporation in the Mittanni and then Middle Assyrian states. The Neo-Assyrian period was certainly a high- water mark in the city’s fortunes when it was famed for its temple of Ishtar and served as a terminal for military campaigns; in the reign of Sennacherib Erbil benefitted from a major canal project bringing water into the city from the mountains to the northeast. Following the fall of Nineveh in 612 BC it is not known for certain whether Erbil fell under the control of the Babylonians or the Medes, though the latter seems more likely (Curtis 2003, 166-7; Stronach 2012, 678). In the Achaemenid period Erbil will have been a thriving centre – direct evidence for this is surprising limited but the city does appear both in the Behistun inscription and in the Passport of Nehtihur. Alexander briefly stopped in Erbil before marching to Babylon but little else is know about the city’s fortunes in the Hellenistic period. During the Parthian period Erbil was the capital of Adiabene, a client kingdom whose ruling family may have converted to Judaism, though this did not stop a large church being been built there in the mid second century. When the Sassanians came to power in 224 BC they replaced the local dynasty with a Persian governor and Erbil became the seat of a marzban; but the city continued as an important Christian centre and the cathedral was reconstructed between 450 and 498 AD. During the early Islamic period, Erbil appears to have been relatively unimportant, but its political and economic importance returned when it became the capital of an independent Kurdish emirate in the 12th century AD under the Kurdish Emir Zain al- Din Ali Kuchuk Begtegin. The appointment of Sultan Muzaffer Ed-Din Kokburi as ruler in 1190 ushered in a golden age, and the city developed a lower town, Al- Muzaffariyah. Erbil was the subject of repeated Mongol attacks but eventually fell under Mongol suzerainty by negotiation. In 1534 it was occupied by the Ottoman Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent and continued under Ottoman rule until 1918, albeit with some interruptions such as when the city was besieged and captured by the Persian ruler Nadir Shah in 1743.