Ur Excavations II; The Royal Cemetery | Ur Excavations II; The Royal Cemetery

General

Title:	Ur Excavations II; The Royal Cemetery
Date:	1934
Author:	Woolley, Leonard
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication place:	Oxford

Files

General

Objects: Ur Excavations II; The Royal Cemetery | Ur Excavations II; The Royal Cemetery Export: JSON - XML - CSV

U Number	Museum Number (UPM Date Reg Number)	Museum Number (BM Registration Number)	Museum Number (UPM B-number)	Description (Catalog Card)
9935B	(none)	(none)	(none)	(A) Silver earring with lunate ends. (B) Fragments of a silver charm: 1 - gold lentoid bead; 1 lapis ditto; 1 carnelian ring bead.
9306A	(none)	(none)	(none)	(A,B) Two Shell plaques Found together. Engraved, one with a puma, the other with a wild goat. 003sq Originally mounted in bitumen With these were three strips of bone inlay for border and 4 pairs of lapis strip border, total of lapis length 005
9306B	(none)	(none)	(none)	(A,B) Two Shell plaques Found together. Engraved, one with a puma, the other with a wild goat. 003sq Originally mounted in bitumen With these were three strips of bone inlay for border and 4 pairs of lapis strip border, total of lapis length 005
(none)	30-12-574	(none)	(none)	(none)
9139A	(none)	1928,1009.377	(none)	(none)
(none)	(none)	(none)	(none)	(none)
10949	(none)	(none)	(none)	(none)
(none)	30-12-522	(none)	(none)	(none)
13792	(none)	1930,1213.7	(none)	1 gold earring. 2 interlaced spiral rings, with broadened lunate ends.
8752	(none)	(none)	(none)	1 gold foil diadem. Broken in 3 pieces. Each end perforated for attachment to forehead.
8409	(none)	(none)	(none)	11 beads. Lapis double conoids, bugle carnelian and gold beads.
14336	(none)	(none)	(none)	12 beads: lapis lazuli double conoids.
8716	(none)	(none)	B17031	12 lapis lazuli beads Double conoids, ring beads, and one thus [drawing] and 1 discoid bead
8429	(none)	1928,1009.75	(none)	13 beads 1 double conoid, L 0027, faceted gold bead 2 double conoid, L0023, faceted lapis. 2 double conoid lapis. 4 barrel lapis. 1 ribbed ball lapis. 1 barrel carnelian. 2 banded agate beads - white and red bands.
10346	(none)	1928,1010.165	(none)	13 Gold (Mulberry?) Leaves Strung in normal manner with carnelian rings & lapis bugles. cf. Field Note.
10338	(none)	(none)	(none)	13 Gold (Mulberry?) Leaves Strung with carnelian rings and lapis bugles in the normal manner Worn round forehead
10350	(none)	(none)	(none)	13 Gold (Mulberry?) Leaves Strung with lapis bugles and carnelian rings in the usual manner
10329	(none)	(none)	(none)	13 Gold (Mulberry?) leaves Strung with lapis bugles and carnelian rings. Each leaf has a gold tang bent double thus forming two tubes for two strings of beads. Against the leaf on either side a small carnelian ring bead, then 2 lapis bugles, carnelian ring, leaf, etc.
8785	(none)	1928,1009.97	(none)	144 paste? beads
8446B	(none)	(none)	(none)	178 beads Lapis double conoids, barrel beads and bugle beads Carnelian barrel beads 4 minute gold beads Originally these formed [A-C] 3 necklaces apparently worn round the neck one above the other. The bottom necklace consisted of the larger lapis beads, the necklace above of smaller lapis. The top string of lapis, carnelian and gold. Gold and carnelian were always next to one another, and between each gold and carnelian apparently 2 lapis.
8446C	(none)	(none)	B16803	178 beads Lapis double conoids, barrel beads and bugle beads Carnelian barrel beads 4 minute gold beads Originally these formed [A-C] 3 necklaces apparently worn round the neck one above the other. The bottom necklace consisted of the larger lapis beads, the necklace above of smaller lapis. The top string of lapis, carnelian and gold. Gold and carnelian were always next to one another, and between each gold and carnelian apparently 2 lapis.
8446A	(none)	(none)	B16803	178 beads Lapis double conoids, barrel beads and bugle beads Carnelian barrel beads 4 minute gold beads Originally these formed [A-C] 3 necklaces apparently worn round the neck one above the other. The bottom necklace consisted of the larger lapis beads, the necklace above of smaller lapis. The top string of lapis, carnelian and gold. Gold and carnelian were always next to one another, and between each gold and carnelian apparently 2 lapis.
10161	(none)	(none)	(none)	2 Beads Fluted gold ball on a copper core Rounded double conoid carnelian
14066	(none)	(none)	(none)	2 beads: large double conoids. Dark stone. Possibly burnt lapis.
12112A	(none)	(none)	(none)	2 Cylinder seals & copper pin. (A) Steatite greenish: 2 registers; above, deer on mountains; below, men fighting animals. Poor cutting. (B) Shell, decayed. Figures & animals. Hopeless no photograph (C) Copper pin plain.

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Locations: Ur Excavations II; The Royal Cemetery | Ur Excavations II; The Royal Cemetery Export: JSON - XML - CSV

Context Title	Context Description	Description (Modern)
Royal Cemetery \| PG	The excavation area abbreviation PG grew to refer to a large region, at least 60x80 meters, in the southeastern portion of the Neo-Babylonian temenos but below the level of that wall. The area is most often referred to as the Royal Cemetery. The abbreviation PG, however, was initially used to designate individual graves: PG1422, for example, refers to Private Grave number 1422. The first PG numbers were assigned in season 5 when a series of trial trenches (see TTD, TTE, TTF, and TTG) were excavated in the area. These trenches were expanded to uncover more and more graves over the next few seasons. The last number assigned in the PG sequence was around 1850 but numbers were often reassigned for publication and even in the field some numbers were combined as they were recognized to come from one large grave rather than two separate ones. Others were deemed too fragmentary to publish; furthermore, several hundred additional graves were found in Pit X, an expansion of the PG area dug in 1934. The total number of graves excavated in the Royal Cemetery is thus extremely difficult to determine. Woolley reports that there may once have been as many as three times the total number of graves he recorded, as he found many plundered and almost completely destroyed. Despite being called the Royal Cemetery, there were only 16 graves that Woolley actually dubbed 'royal.' He believed that these formed the core of the burial ground and that many others wanted to be buried nearby. The cemetery lay outside the original temenos, the core of the city, and was apparently a dumping ground through much of its history. Stratigraphic layers of sealings (see SIS) help to date the main period of the Royal Cemetery to the Early Dynastic III, though there are also graves of the Akkadian and perhaps some of the early Ur III period here. Well beneath the main PG area are also graves of the ED I and Uruk periods, but these were mainly uncovered in pits dug within or adjacent to area PG (see PJ, Pit W, Pit X, Pit Y and Pit Z). Most burials in area PG were simple inhumations with few artifacts, but the ones Woolley called royal were much more elaborate. Apart from having rich artifacts, they also showed evidence of human sacrifice -- many bodies were found in 'death pits' outside the main 'royal' burial. The people found in these death pits may have been attendants who went into the afterlife with their king or queen, yet no other indication of this practice is found elsewhere in Mesopotamia. Nor do we know who these 'kings and queens' were. The dating of the graves makes it difficult to associate them with a known dynasty at Ur and there were very few names found with any of the bodies. Only the burial of Puabi, the Queen, can be directly identified by her cylinder seal and she does not appear on any king list. References to Mesannepada and his wife Ninbanda, a king and queen of the first dynasty of Ur, were found but not in specific graves. Instead, they were found in material above the main graves and would imply that the royal tombs pre-date the first dynasty. Woolley spent a great deal of time and energy excavating the Royal Cemetery and the majority of his field notes concern it. Recording of contexts here, then, is better than anywhere else at Ur. Nonetheless, not all of the graves were mapped and photographs were often difficult to obtain.	(none)
PG/1422	(none)	(none)
Burial 1	(none)	(none)
Burial 10	(none)	(none)
Burial 11	(none)	(none)
Burial 12	(none)	(none)
Burial 13	(none)	(none)
Burial 14	(none)	(none)
Burial 15	(none)	(none)
Burial 16	(none)	(none)
Burial 17	(none)	(none)
Burial 18	(none)	(none)
Burial 19	(none)	(none)
Burial 2	(none)	(none)
Burial 20	(none)	(none)
Burial 21	(none)	(none)
Burial 22	(none)	(none)
Burial 23	(none)	(none)
Burial 24	(none)	(none)
Burial 25	(none)	(none)
Burial 26	(none)	(none)
Burial 27	(none)	(none)
Burial 28	(none)	(none)
Burial 29	(none)	(none)
Burial 3	(none)	(none)