The Protohistoric and Antique Landscapes of Qaryat al-Faw

The Saudi Heritage Commission Archaeological Mapping Project (2021-2022)

Authors

  • Guillaume Charloux CNRS, UMR 8167 Orient & Méditerranée https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0051-7803
  • François Cristofoli RCHeritage
  • Thomas Creissen Evéha International
  • Majed Alanizi Heritage Commission, Saudi Ministry of Culture
  • Antoine Darchambeau Evéha International
  • Alessia Prioletta French National Centre for Scientific Research CNRS, UMR 8167 Orient et Méditerranée
  • Sabrina Save Amélie SARL
  • Jérémie Schiettecatte French National Centre for Scientific Research CNRS, UMR 8167 Orient et Méditerranée
  • Najla Alsuair Heritage Commission, Saudi Ministry of Culture
  • Abdulelah Altaymani Heritage Commission, Saudi Ministry of Culture
  • Quentin Vitale LabComGEO-HERITAGE, CNRS-UMR 5133-Archéorient
  • Alexandrine Wadel RCHeritage

Keywords:

Arabian oasis, pre-Islamic city, Bronze age necropolis, avenues of tapered structures, prospection

Abstract

Capital city of successive major tribal principalities, Qaryat al-Faw was a key commercial centre in the South of the Arabian Peninsula in antiquity. Rediscovered in the early 20th century, the site has been excavated by King Saud University since 1972. In 2021-2022, in view of its nomination for inscription on the UNESCO World Heritage list, the Saudi Ministry of Culture has commissioned RC Heritage Co. to initiate urgent conservation studies, and develop preliminary research for the site enhancement and preservation. This work has led us to a reappraisal of the archaeological cartography of the site. Preliminary surveys revealed the overall organisation of the micro-region in the different periods of its occupation, in particular a strongly connected network of avenues, necropolises and water sources in protohistory, and a concentrically organised oasis in antiquity, surrounded by a palm grove with thousands of plantation pits watered by a channel network, a caravanserai area, and an open-air sanctuary.

References

al-Ansary A.R.T. 1979. ‘Adwā' jadīdah ‘ala dawlat Kinda min ḥilal āṭār Qaryat al-Faw wa nuqushi-hā. Pages 3–11, plates 1–3 in A.M. Abdalla, S. al-Sakkar, R.T. Mortel (eds), Studies in the History of Arabia 1. Riyadh: University of Riyadh Press.

al-Ansary A.R.T. 1982. Qaryat al-Fau. A Portrait of Pre-Islamic Civilisation in Saudi Arabia. London: Croom Helm; New York: St. Martin’s press.

al-Ansary A.R.T. 1984. The Fourth Season in Qarya (al-Faw). Pages 11–24 (ar.) in A.R.T. Al-Ansary(ed.). Studies in the History of Arabia. Pre-Islamic Arabia 2. Riyadh: King Saud University Press.

al-Ansary A.R.T. 1997. Qaryat al-Fau. Pages 371–373 in E.M. Meyer (ed.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East. Vol. 4. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press.

al-Ansary A.R.T. 2002. Al-Gerrha, the Port of ‘Qaryat’ al-Fau. Pages 7–17 in JF Healey &

V. Porter (eds), Studies on Arabia in honour of Professor G. Rex Smith. Journal of Semitic Studies Supplement.

al-Ansary A.R.T. 2010. Qaryat al-Fāw. Pages 310–363 in A.I. al-Ghabban et al. (eds.). Routes d'Arabie. Archéologie et histoire du royaume d'Arabie Saoudite. Catalogue Exposition Louvre Museum (14 juillet–27 septembre 2010). Paris: Somogy.

al-Ansary A.R.T. 2019 a–f. Qaryat (al-Fāw). The excavations (Volume 1 2019a–c), The artefacts (Volume 3 2019d), The ceramics (Volume 4 2019e). The coins (Volume 5 2019f). Riyadh: Saudi Commission for Tourism and National Heritage, King Saud University.

al-Ansary A.R.T. & Tayran S. 2005. Qaryat al-Faw, “Madinat al-ma‘bid”. Pages 98–106.

Almazroui M., Nazrul Islam M., Athar H., Jones P. D. & Ashfaqur Rahman M. Recent Climate Change in the Arabian Peninsula: Annual Rainfall and Temperature Analysis of Saudi Arabia for 1978–2009. International Journal of Climatology 32, no 6 (2012): 953 66. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.3446.

Beeston A.F.L. 1976. Warfare in ancient South Arabian (2nd-3rd centuries A.D.). Qahtan. Studies in Old Arabian Epigraphy. 3. London: Luzac and Co.

Beeston A.F.L. 1979. Nemara and Faw. Bulletin of the Armerican School of Oriental and African Studies 42: 1–6.

Benoist, A., M. Mouton & J. Schiettecatte. 2002. The Artefacts from the Fort at Mleiha: Distribution, Origins, Trade and Dating. Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies: 59–76.

Bramkamp R.A., Gierhart R.D., & Owens L.D. 1963. Geologic map of the western Rub Al Khali quadrangle, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. IMAP. USGS, 1-218 A, 1:500.000.

Bukharin M.D. 2009. Towards the earliest history of Kinda. AAE 20: 64–80.

Chevalier A., Schiettecatte J., Tzortzis S. & Wermuth E. 2021. The Bronze and Iron Age funerary landscape in central Arabia. Pages 119–48 in M. Luciani (ed.), Archaeology of the Arabian Peninsula 2: Connecting the Evidence. Proceedings of the Workshop held at the 10th ICAANE in Vienna, April 2016. Oriental and European Archaeology 19. Vienna: Verlag der Östereichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.

Dalton, M., McMahon J., Kennedy M.A., Repper R., Al Shilali S.E., AlBalawi Y., Boyer D.D. & Thomas H. 2021. The Middle Holocene ‘Funerary Avenues’ of North-West Arabia. The Holocene. https://doi.org/10.1177/09596836211060497

Field, H. 1970. Rock-drawings from Saudi Arabia. Occasional paper. Miami: Field research projects.

Garbini, G. 1976. Iscrizioni sudarabiche. Annali dell'Istituto Orientale di Napoli 36/2: 293–315.

Gawlikowski, M., Juchniewicz, K., al-Zahrani, A., 2021. Aynuna. A Nabataean port on the Red Sea. Seven seasons of Saudi-Polish excavations (2014-2018), Warsaw: PCMA. ed.

Gernez G. 2007. L’armement en métal au Proche et Moyen-Orient: des origines à 1750 av. J.-C.. Sciences de l’Homme et Société. Ph.D. Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - Paris I. https://tel.archives-ouvertes.fr/tel-00339404

Ghoneim W. 1980. Saudi Arabian. Archiv für Orientforschung XXVII: 317–324.

Gilmore, M., Ibrahim (al-), M. and Murad, A.S. 1982. Preliminary Report on the Northwestern and Northern Region Survey 1981 (1401). Atlal 6: 9–23.

Giraud J. 2010. Early Bronze Age graves and graveyards in the eastern Jaʾlan (Sultanate of Oman): an assessment of the social rules working in the evlution of a funerary landscape. Pages 71–84 in L. Weeks (ed.) Death and burial in Arabia. Society for Arabian Studies Mononographs 10. Oxford: Archaeopress.

Hausleiter A. & Zur A. 2016. Tayma in the Bronze Age (c. 2000 BCE): Settlement and Funerary Landscapes. Pages 135–173 in M. Luciani (ed.), Archaeology of North Arabia: Oases and Landscapes. Proceedings of the colloquium held in Vienna, December 6–7, 2013. Oriental and European Archaeology; Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.

Hausleiter A., D’Andrea M. & Zur A. 2018. The Transition from Early to Middle Bronze Age in Northwest Arabia: Bronze Weapons from Burial Contexts at Tayma, Arabia and Comparative Evidence from the Levant. Zeitschrift Für Orient-Archäologie 11: 412 436.

Herbert J. 1984, Qaryat Al Fau. A city in the sand. Video documentary. Wadlow Grosvenor International.

al-Jallad, A. 2014. On the genetic background of the grave inscription at Qaryat al-Fāw. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 77/3: 445–465.

Jamme A. 1966. Inscriptions photographed at Qaryat al-Fa’w by Ambassador Parker T. Hart (Documentation arabe IV), Rivista Degi Studi orientali 41: 289–301, pl. I–II.

Jamme A. 1967. New Hasean and Sabean inscriptions from Saudi Arabia. Oriens antiquus 6: 181–187, pl. XLVII–XLIX.

Jamme A. 1970. The pre-Islamic Inscriptions of the Riyadh Museum. Oriens antiquus 9: 115–139.

Jamme A. 1973. Miscellanées d’ancient arabe IV. Washington.

Kennedy, D. 2011. The “Works of the Old Men” in Arabia: Remote Sensing in Interior Arabia. Journal of Archaeological Science 38/12: 3185−3203.

Kennedy M.A., McMahon J., Thomas H., Boyer D.D., Repper R., Dalton M. & AlKhaldi K. 2021. Dating the Pendant Burials of North-West Arabia: First Radiometric Results from the Khaybar Oasis, Saudi Arabia. AAE 32: 183−97.

Kepinski C. 2007 Tribal links between the Arabian Peninsula and the Middle Euphrates at the beginning of the second millennium BC. PSAS 37: 125 34.

Kervran, M. 2013. Un siècle obscur de l’histoire de Tylos : 131-240 après J. C. Pages 271–309 in C.J. Robin & J. Schiettecatte (ed.) Les préludes de l’Islam. Ruptures et continuités des civilisations du Proche-Orient, de l’Afrique orientale, de l’Arabie et de l’Inde à la veille de l’Islam. Orient & Méditerranée 11. Paris: De Boccard.

Laursen S.T. 2017. Royal Mounds of A’ali in Bahrain: The Emergence of Kingship in Early Dilmun. Aarhus: Aarhus University Press.

Laursen S.T. & al-Otaibi 2023 (in press). From Dilmun to Wadi al-Faw - A forgotten desert corridor, c. 2000 BC. AAE.

Lippens P. 1956. Expédition en Arabie centrale. Paris: Libraire d’Amérique et d’Orient Adrien-Maisonneuve.

Macdonald M. C. A. 2009. Wheels in a Land of Camels: Another Look at the Chariot in Arabia ». Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy 20/2: 156 84.

Macdonald M.C.A. 2012. Wheeled vehicules in the rock art of Arabia. Pages 358 395 in M. Khan (ed.), The Arabian Horse. Riyadh: King Fahd National Library.

Masry A.H. 1977. The Historic Legacy of Saudi Arabia. Atlal 1: 9–19.

Matter A., Mahjoud A., Neubert E., Preuser F., Schwalb A., Szidat S., Wulf G. 2016. Reactivation of the Pleistocene trans-Arabian Wadi al-Dawasir fluvial system (Saudi Arabia) during the Holocene humid phase. Geomorphology 270: 88–101.

Méry S. 2010. Results, limits and potential: burial practise and Early Bronze Age societies in the Oman Peninsula. Pages 33–44 in L. Weeks (ed.) Death and burial in Arabia. Society for Arabian Studies Mononographs 10. Oxford: Archaeopress.

Mouton M. 1997. Les tours funéraires d’Arabie, Nefesh monumentales. Syria 74: 81–98.

Mouton M. & Schiettecatte J. 2014. In the Desert Margins. The Settlement Process in Ancient South and East Arabia. Rome: « L’Erma » di Bretschneider.

Mouton, M., Tengberg M., Bernard V., Le Maguer S., Reddy A., Soulié D., Le Grand M. & Goy J. 2012. Building H at Mleiha: new evidence of the late pre-Islamic period D phase (PIR.D) in the Oman peninsula (second to mid-third century AD). Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 42: 205–21.

Nayeem M.A. 1990. Prehistory and Protohistory of the Arabian Peninsula. 1 Saudi Arabia. Hyderabad: Hyderabad Publishers.

Northedge A. 2008, The Umayyad Desert Castles and Pre-Islamic Arabia. Pages 243–260 in K. Bartl et A. Moaz. Residences, castles, settlements: transformation processes from Late Antiquity to Early Islam in Bilad al-Sham. Proceedings of the International Conference held at Damascus, 5-9 November 2006. Orient Archäologie 24. Rahden: M. Leidorf.

al-Otaibi F.b.N.S. 2018. Tumuli Graves in Wadi Al-Faw. Riyadh Region (An Archaeological Study). Unpublished Ph.D., King Saud University.

Overlaet B. & Haerinck E. 2014. Monumental Tombs along the Arabian Caravan Routes. Pages 205–2014 in Eric Gubel. From Gilead to Edom. Studies in the Archaeology and History of Jordan in Honor of Denyse Homès-Fredericq on the Occasion of Her Eightieth Birthday. Ed. by Ingrid Moriah Swinnen. (Akkadica Supplementum, 12). Brussels: Assyriological Center Georges Dossin.

Petraglia M.D., Groucutt H.S., Guagnin M., Breeze P.S. & Boivin N. Human responses to climate and ecosystem change in ancient Arabia. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117/15: 8263 70.

Philby H.S.J.B. 1949. Two notes from Central Arabia. The Geographical Journal, 113/Jan.-Jun.: 86–93.

Potts D.T. 1988. Trans-arabian routes of the pre-Islamic period. Pages 45−80 in F.E. Peters (ed.) The Arabs and Arabia on the Eve of Islam. Farnham: Ashgate publishing.

Robin, C.J. 1981. Les montagnes dans la religion sudarabique. Pages 263–77 in R.G. Stiegner (ed.) Al-Hudhud, Festschrift Maria Höfner zum 80. Geburstag. Graz: Karl-Franzens Universität.

Robin C.J. 1988. Two inscriptions from Qaryat al-Faw mentioning Women. Pages 168–176 in D.T. Potts (ed.), Araby the Blest, Studies in Arabian Archaeology. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press.

Robin C.J. 2010. L’Antiquité. Pages 80–99 in A.I. al-Ghabbān et al. (dir.). Routes d’Arabie: archéologie et histoire du royaume d’Arabie Saoudite. Paris: Musée du Louvre – Somogy.

Robin C.J. 2012. Matériaux pour une typologie des divinités arabiques et de leurs représentations. Pages 7–118 in I. Sachet & C.J. Robin (ed.). Dieux et déesses d’Arabie, images et représentations. Orient & Méditerranée 7. Paris: De Boccard.

Robin C.J. 2016. Gerrha d’Arabie, cité séleucide. Pages 223–50 in F. Duyrat, F. Briquel-Chatonnet, J.-M. Dentzer & O. Picard (eds.) Henri Seyrig (1895-1973). Actes du colloque Henri Seyrig (1895-1973). Syria Supplément 3. Beyrouth: Presses de l’Ifpo.

Robin C.J. & Prioletta A. 2013. Nouveaux arguments en faveur d’une identification de la cité de Gerrha avec le royaume de Hagar (Arabie orientale). Semitica et Classica 6: 131 85.

Ryckmans G. 1949. Inscriptions sud-arabes. Huitième série. Le Muséon 42: 55–124, pl. I–VIII.

Ryckmans G. 1951. Inscriptions sud-arabes. Neuvième série. Le Muséon, 64: 93–126.

Ryckmans G. 1957. Graffites sabéens relevés en Arabie sa‘udite. Rivista degli Studi orientali 32: 557–563.

Ryckmans G. 1984. Alphabets, scripts and languages in pre-Islamic Arabian Epigraphical Evidence. Pages 73–86 in A.R.T. Al-Ansary (ed.), Studies in the History of Arabia. Pre-Islamic Arabia 2. Riyadh: King Saud Univ. Press.

al-Said, S. 2018. The Kingdoms of Ḏākir, ʾAmīr, and Muhaʾmir in the Light of a New Inscription from al-Fāw, Saudi Arabia. Zeitschrift Für Orient-Archäologie 11: 404–11.

al-Said, S. 2019. Al-Nuqūsh. Pages 255–258 In collective book, Dalīl mataḥif qasm al-aṯār, jāmaʿat al-malik Saʿūd, Qaryat al-Fāw. Riyadh: King Saud University.

Schiettecatte J., Al-Ghazzi A., Charloux G., Crassard R., Hilbert Y., Monchot H., Mouton M. & Siméon P. 2012. The Oasis of Al-Kharj through Time: First Results of Archaeological Fieldwork in the Province of Riyadh (Saudi Arabia). Proceedings of the Seminar of Arabian Studies 43: 285 308.

al-Sheiba A.H. 1987. Die Ortsnamen in den altsüdarabischen Inschriften (mit dem Versuch ihrer Identifizierung und lokalisierung). Archäologische Berichte aus dem Yemen 4: 1–62.

Whalen N., Killick A., James N., Morsi G. & Kamal M. 1981. Suari Arbaian Reconnnaissance 1980. Atlal 5: 43-58.

Wissmann H. von. 1964. Zur Geschichte und Landeskunde von Alt-Südarabien. Sammlung Eduard Glaser. 3. Sitzungsberichte der Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-historische Klasse, 246. Vienna: Böhlaus.

Zarins, J., Ibrahim, M., Potts, D.T. & Edens, C. 1979. Saudi Arabian Archaeological Reconnaissance 1978. The Preliminary Report on the Third Phase of the Comprehensive Archaeological Survey Program – The Central Province. Atlal 3: 9–42.

Zarins, J., Whalen N., Ibrahim M., Morad A. & Khan M. 1980. Comprehensive Archaeological Survey Program. Preliminary Report on the Central and Southwestern Provinces Survey. Atlal 4: 9 36.

Zarins J., Rahbini A.-A. & Kamal M. 1982. Comprehensive Archaeological Survey Program. 2 – Preliminary Report on the Archaeological Survey of the Riyadh Area. Atlal 6: 25 38.

Downloads

Published

08/01/2023

How to Cite

Charloux, G., Cristofoli , F. ., Creissen, T., Alanizi, M. ., Darchambeau, A., Prioletta , A. ., Save, S., Schiettecatte, J. ., Alsuair, N. ., Altaymani, A. ., Vitale, Q. ., & Wadel, A. . (2023). The Protohistoric and Antique Landscapes of Qaryat al-Faw: The Saudi Heritage Commission Archaeological Mapping Project (2021-2022). Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies, 52, 45–71. Retrieved from http://archaeopresspublishing.com/ojs/index.php/PSAS/article/view/1562

Issue

Vol. 52 (2023): Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies Volume 52 2023: Papers from the fifty-fifth meeting of the Seminar for Arabian Studies held at Humboldt Universität, Berlin, 5–7 August 2022

Section

Articles

License

Archaeopress Publishing, Oxford, UK

Most read articles by the same author(s)

1 2 > >>