Mari, Redraw The Map Of The Ancient World

Mari was discovered in 1933, on the eastern flank of Syria, near the Iraqi border. A Bedouin tribe was digging through a mound for a gravestone that would be used for a recently deceased tribesman, when they came across a headless statue.

Mari has been excavated in annual campaigns published in Syria, 1933–39, 1951–75. The 21 seasons up to 1975 were led by Andre Parrot. Less than half of the 1000 x 600-meter area of Mari has been uncovered as of 2005. Although archaeologists have tried to determine how many layers the site descends, it has not proved possible as of 2008. According to the archaeologist André Parrot, “each time a vertical probe was commenced in order to trace the site’s history down to virgin soil, such important discoveries were made that horizontal digging had to be resumed.”

The Mari Tablets belong to a large group of tablets . More than 25,000 tablets in Akkadian were found in the Mari archives, which give information about the kingdom of Mari, its customs, and the names of people who lived during that time. More than 8,000 are letters; the remainder includes administrative, economic, and judicial texts. The tablets, according to Andre Parrot, “brought about a complete revision of the historical dating of the ancient Near East and provided more than 500 new place names, enough to redraw or even draw up the geographical map of the ancient world.”^[  Almost all of the tablets found were dated to the last 50 years of Mari’s independence, and most have now been published. The language of the texts is official Akkadian .

 Mari had been inhabited since the 5th millennium BC, but the real significance of the city was during the third and second millennia BC.

The city flourished from about 2900 BC, since it was strategically important as a relay point between the Sumerian cities of lower Mesopotamia, and the cities of northern Syria. Sumer required building materials such as timber and stone from northern Syria, and these materials had to go through Mari to get to Sumer.

After a period of eminence, Mari was destroyed in the mid-24th century BC. This destruction brought a period of relative decline in importance in the region, and the city was reduced to no more than a small village. Historians are divided as to who destroyed the city.

The status of the city was revived again under an Amorite dynasty.   The royal palace of Zimri-Lim, a king of Mari, contained over 300 rooms. The palace was possibly the largest of its time, and its reputation in neighboring cities and kingdoms was well-known. The state archives were also built during this time.

Mari was destroyed again around 1759 BC by Hammurabii, sixth king of Babylon. This is known from the numerous state archives tablets that recount Hammurabi turning on his old ally Zimrilim, and defeating him in battle. After this destruction, it was inhabited sporadically by Assyrians and Babylonians .

The growth of the city from a small village to an important trading center was due to its diverse economy in the ancient world. The city came to control the trade lanes between different regions such as western Iran, Mesopotamia and parts of  Anatolia. Cities that Mari is confirmed to have traded with include Ur, Aleppo, and Ugarit. The cargo brought through the city grew to include dates, olives, pottery, grains and stone.

Maysa Wassouf