Kingdom of Awsan
This article includes a Arabian paganism | |||||||
History | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
• Established | 8th century BC | ||||||
• Disestablished | 7th century BC | ||||||
| |||||||
Today part of | Yemen |
The ancient Kingdom of Awsān (
History
First impressions in the mid-1990s, based on ceramics found by M. Saad Ayoub at the unexcavated site, date a resurgence of the city to the end of the 2nd century BCE lasting until the beginning of the 1st century CE (which corresponds quite well to the epigraphic data attesting the only deified South Arabian king that was just the king of Awsān precisely around this time). About 160,000 m² were encircled by walls, and the foundations of dwellings built of fired brick have been noted. Culture depended on annual flood irrigation in spring and summer, when flash floods down the wadis temporarily flooded the fields, leaving light silt that has since been wind-eroded, revealing the ancient patterns of fields and ditches. Radiocarbon dating of irrigation sediments in the environs suggest that essential irrigation was abandoned in the first half of the 1st century CE, and the population dispersed. This time the site was never rebuilt.
Hagar Yahirr was the center of an exceptionally large city for
The siting of Ḥajar Yaḥirr is consistent with other capitals of petty kingdoms, at the mouths of large
References
- Caravan Kingdoms: Yemen and the Ancient Incense Trade Freer Gallery, Washington, 2005. Exhibition of archeological objects from Yemen, setting Awsan in context. Catalogue.
- Robert Hoyland, Arabia and the Arabs: From the Bronze Age to the Coming of Islam (series Ancient Peoples)
- Freya Stark and Jane Geniesse The Southern Gates of Arabia: A Journey in the Hadhramaut
External links
- Télédetection archéologique dans la Wadi Markha (in French)