Ubaid

A small tell of Ur which has given its name to a culture c 5000-3000 BC in southern Mesopotamia, where it underlies practically every city of Sumer. It later spread to the north, displacing the Halaf culture and becoming the first culture to cover the whole of Mesopotamia. It is distinguished by a well-made buff pottery, frequently overfired to a greenish color, and painted in dark brown or black. In the south, stone was scarce, but there were terra-cotta pounders, sickles, hoes, and axes. Temples were built (e.g. Eridu, Gawra), ancestral in structure and siting to those of Sumerian times. At Al 'Ubaid are the remains of a temple with copper statues and reliefs, and mosaic friezes of the 1st Dynasty of Ur c 2600 BC. The period represents the time when the first villages, and later, the first towns and cities, appeared and many of the characteristics of Sumerian civilization emerged. It expanded greatly and between 4500-3700 BC, it influenced almost the entire Near East, from coasts of Syria to Iranian plateau and the Arabian Gulf. It lasted until the beginning of the Uruk period.

The small tell of Al Ubaid near Ur in southern Iraq has given its name to the prehistoric culture which represents the earliest- settlement on the alluvial plain of south Mesopotamia. The Ubaid culture has a long duration, beginning before 5000 be and lasting until the beginning of the Uruk period (<4000 be or later, depending on the chronology favoured). In the mid-5th millennium be, the Ubaid culture spread into northern Mesopotamia, replacing the Halaf culture. The Ubaid culture is characterized by large village settlements and the appearance of the first temples in Mesopotamia, initially modest in scale, but growing to substantial size, and probably an important economic role, by the end of the period (see Eridu and Tepe Gawra). Equipment includes a buff or greenish coloured pottery, decorated with geometric designs in brown or black paint; tools such as sickles were often made of hard fired clay in the south, but in the north, stone and sometimes metal were used for tools. There is little evidence of craft specialization or social differentiation. Overlying the remains of the Ubaid period settlement at the type site was a small but lavishly decorated temple of the Early Dynastic period, excavated by Sir Leonard Woolley in 1922. The decorations included statues and reliefs made in copper sheet on a bitumen base or core, a frieze of figures in shell and limestone inlay, columns covered in copper sheeting and others decorated with mosaics of red, white and black stones. An inscription records that the temple was dedicated to Ninhursag, the Sumerian mother goddess, and was built by A-anne-padda, son of Mes-anne-padda. This latter king is recorded by the King List as the founder of the First Dynasty of Ur; this suggests a date before 2500 bc for this temple.