Death and Burial: Mesopotamia

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The evidence for burial practices in Mesopotamia is quite extensive, and cemeteries have been discovered at a number of sites, for example Kish and Tell Abu Salabikh. One of the largest cemeteries was excavated at Ur. In the late 1920s, Leonard Woolley excavated nearly two thousand burials. Of these six hundred sixty were dated to the Early Dynastic period (2900–2300 B.C.). The majority of burials were simple inhumations, in which the body, wrapped in reed matting or placed in a coffin, was set at the bottom of a rectangular pit. Clothed and accompanied by personal belongings, the deceased generally held a cup. Sixteen burials stood apart in terms of their wealth, structure, and evidence for ritual, including human sacrifice. Woolley called these "royal tombs," assuming they contained Ur's deceased kings and queens. Without the Royal Cemetery of Ur, our knowledge of the art of the Sumerians in the middle of the third millennium B.C. would be severely limited. In the Ur III period there is evidence for family tombs beneath the floors of houses although at least some of the kings were buried in an elaborate underground mausoleum.

The Grave of Puabi

Only one of the Royal Tombs at Ur survived largely intact. The excavator, Leonard Woolley, revealed an earth ramp leading down about five meters into a pit approximately twelve by four meters. On the ramp, as if guarding the entrance to the grave, lay the bodies of five men with copper daggers. At the foot of the ramp was the decayed remains of a vehicle, possibly a sled, with the bones of two oxen and four men. In the middle of the pit were the remains of a wooden chest decorated with lapis lazuli and shell inlay, against which lay the body of a man. Other bodies lay near the northeast corner of the grave. At the southern end of the death pit the bodies of ten women wearing elaborate headdresses were positioned in two rows facing each other. Some of these attendants were associated with musical instruments, including a harp and lyre. A stone built tomb chamber was located to the northeast with its floor nearly two meters below the level of the death pit. Inside the tomb were four bodies. Clearly the most important was that of a woman just under five feet tall and roughly forty at the time of her death. Her body was adorned with beads of gold, silver, lapis lazuli, carnelian, and agate, as well as other pieces of elaborate jewelry, including cylinder seals, one of which had an inscription that identified her as Puabi, the queen.