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Science 20 August 1993:
Vol. 261. no. 5124, pp. 995 - 1004
DOI: 10.1126/science.261.5124.995
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Articles

The Genesis and Collapse of Third Millennium North Mesopotamian Civilization

H. Weiss 1, M. -A. Courty 2, W. Wetterstrom 3, F. Guichard 4, L. Senior 5, R. Meadow 6, and A. Curnow 1

1 Tell Leilan Project, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520-7425
2 Unité de Recherche associé 723, Centre National de Recherche Scientifique, Laboratoire d'Hydrologie et de Géochimie isotopique, Université de Paris-Sud, F-91405 Orsay
3 Harvard Botanical Museum, Cambridge, MA 02138
4 Centre de Faibles Radioactivités, Laboratoire Mixte Centre National de Recherche Scientifique-Centre d'Énergie atomique, Avenue de la Terrase, F-91190 Gif-sur-Yvette
5 Department of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85716
6 Zooarchaeology Laboratory, Peabody Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138

Archaeological and soil-stratigraphic data define the origin, growth, and collapse of Subir, the third millennium rain-fed agriculture civilization of northern Mesopotamia on the Habur Plains of Syria. At 2200 B. C., a marked increase in aridity and wind circulation, subsequent to a volcanic eruption, induced a considerable degradation of land-use conditions. After four centuries of urban life, this abrupt climatic change evidently caused abandonment of Tell Leilan, regional desertion, and collapse of the Akkadian empire based in southern Mesopotamia. Synchronous collapse in adjacent regions suggests that the impact of the abrupt climatic change was extensive.


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