Some Ancient Sites in the Sinjar District

Abstract

The following paper is an account of a survey made on behalf of the Liverpool Institute of Archaeology, as part of the work of the Neilson Expedition to the Near East. The object of this survey was to investigate as many ancient sites as possible in the neighbourhood of the Jebel Sinjar, in order to link up the Khabur region, so thoroughly examined by Mr. Mallowan in 1934, with the river Tigris and the archaeologically better known area to the east of it. The writer's personal interest was largely concentrated upon the formidable array of mounds representing settlements of the pre-Christian era, with some emphasis on those dating from prehistoric times. He was, however, also fortunate in having the assistance of Mr. G. R. Reitlinger, whose comments on and photographs of some of the Islamic and other late remains form the subject of a separate section of this article in this number of Iraq. It was a chance circumstance that Sir Aurel Stein was at the same time at work upon a survey of the Roman Limes, also covering the Sinjar district. This seemed to justify a somewhat cursory examination of sites which were obviously Roman.