Page 167 - The Tigris Expedition

The Tigris Expedition

There is always something intriguing about a buried city. Step­
ping down from a present ground level higher than the former
roofs is like climbing through a trap-door down into the unknown
past, following streets untrodden perhaps for thousands of years, as
in the town discovered on Bahrain. On the north coast we were to
i climb from the sand-dunes at the foot of a sixteenth-century
Portuguese fort down into a sunken city that had been teeming with
life in Sumerian times. The fort on top, now nothing but pictur­
esque ruins on a prominent bluff overlooking the sea, had been built
by the Portuguese shortly after they conquered Bahrain from the
Arabs in 1521. They had rebuilt a fort originally constructed by
early Arabs who came to this island immediately after the days of
Mohammed the Prophet. The Arabs, in turn, had used stones, some
of which had been taken from even older buildings of unknown
origin, possibly found emerging from the local sand.
Next to this fort Bibby’s party had also been tempted to dig. Here
was something hidden under a large sandy mound overlooking the
sea, and as the white sand was removed a complete buried city
appeared, and under it another, and still another. The streets and
buildings were always carefully laid out east-west and north-south.
The site witnessed of prosperity as well as disaster. About 1200 bc
the city had been burned. Underneath were the walls of buildings
dating from 2300 bc, on which the subsequent town had stood
before the fire. This earlier city was contemporary with the mound
burials and Sumerian voyages to Dilmun. They dated from what
Bibby termed the Dilmun period. We walked together down into
the oldest city. We stopped at a huge and solid city wall with a gate
directly facing the sea. Here we found ourselves surrounded by tall
stone walls, in an open square where a main avenue flanked by stone
buildings led to this big gate and the sea. From the open plaza inside
the city wall other streets took off at right angles.
Bibby pointed through the lofty gate. Huge sand dunes had
blown up in front to bar the view, but when the wall was built this
gate had led directly to the water, which was still right down below.
‘Here ships docked four to five thousand years ago, in the
Dilmun period, to load or unload their cargo,’ said Bibby. He
turned from the gate and pointed to the ground in the open square
we stood on: ‘And here we found the evidence of oversea trade.
Here the cargo was unloaded. It was here and in the streets of the
town that we found numerous scraps of unworked copper. Also
copper fishhooks, bits of ivory, steatite seals and a carnelian bead.
All represented materials foreign to Bahrain.’
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