Tell Hassuna — Type Site of Hassuna Culture
Tell Hassuna · Hassuna Mound
Proto-Hassuna, Hassuna, Samarran (6500–5500 BCE)·Hassuna culture·🇮🇶 Nineveh Governorate, 35 km south-west of Mosul, west bank Tigris, Iraq
About
About Tell Hassuna — Type Site of Hassuna Culture
Between two wadis south-west of Mosul, this 1943–44 excavation by Seton Lloyd and Fuad Saffar defined the Hassuna culture — earliest ceramic Neolithic in northern Iraq — through 15 building levels. Hassuna levels I–IX show rectangular multi-room houses with bins and hearths, coarse and painted wares, earliest Halaf precursors. Samarra levels overlay. Famous incised vessels and clay sling missiles characterize. Agricultural village with wheat/barley, sheep/goat economy and simple irrigation.
Why it mattersFoundational Neolithic sequence for Upper Mesopotamia; first Hassuna–Samarra–Halaf chronology.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Pottery invention origin in north vs south
Theories
- 01Hassuna represents sedentary farming without centralized authority
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- c. 6000 BCE
- Period
- Proto-Hassuna, Hassuna, Samarran (6500–5500 BCE)
- Culture
- Hassuna culture
- Purpose
- Type mound for earliest pottery Neolithic farming villages in northern Mesopotamia — stratified Hassuna cultural sequence
- Excavation
- Excavated
1943
Lloyd and Saffar excavate type site
1944
Definition of Hassuna pottery culture published
On the ground
Structures & features
36.4640° N · 42.9635° E · 310 m · 2 mapped features
Hassuna Level V houses
villageRectangular mudbrick houses with storage bins and plaster floors
36.4645° N · 42.9640° EHassuna incised pottery deposit TT9
depositIncised and burnished ware horizon defining Hassuna classic phase
36.4635° N · 42.9630° E
Gallery