Archaeologists and geologists have identified a deliberately placed layer of sand beneath the foundations of the Ishtar Temple in Assur, Iraq, dating to between 2896 and 2702 BCE. The finding establishes the earliest absolute date for the city and shows that Assur functioned as an active urban center more than 4,700 years ago. The evidence provides new information about the origins of the cult of the goddess Ishtar and the adoption of Mesopotamian ritual practices in northern Iraq.
Assur, located on the western bank of the Tigris River, served as the political and religious center of the Assyrian state. Its importance in the first millennium BCE is well documented, but its third-millennium origins remained unclear. Excavations conducted from 1903 to 1914 under Walter Andrae uncovered the Ishtar Temple, yet the earliest foundation layers were inaccessible. In 2024, the Assur Excavation Project, based at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, used modern coring technology to reach these deeper layers inside the temple cella.
The team collected sediment cores from Temple H, the oldest construction phase of the site, and found a one-meter-thick sand layer beneath the foundation. Radiocarbon dating of charcoal located immediately above the sand placed the construction of the temple between 2896 and 2702 BCE, during the Early Dynastic I period. Temple H represents the earliest occupation level in Assur, providing a new reference point for the city’s foundation.
Analysis of the sand revealed epidote-group minerals, glaucophane, zoisite, and lawsonite, which are characteristic of blueschist-facies metamorphic rocks. These minerals indicate a source in the Zagros Mountains rather than the nearby Tigris River. The sand appears to have been derived from local aeolian deposits, recycled from the Upper Miocene Injana Formation and transported through the Lesser Zab River. The selection of this material demonstrates a deliberate choice based on its geological properties rather than convenience.
Placing sand under temple foundations served as a ritual in southern Mesopotamia to purify the ground for sacred structures. This layer provides the first evidence of the practice in northern Mesopotamia, showing that early Assur inhabitants adopted ceremonial traditions from the south while sourcing materials from northern regions. The sand may have held connections to Hurrian religious landscapes, linking the Ishtar cult with Shawushka, a goddess worshiped in nearby areas, and reflecting a combination of southern and northern influences in the temple’s design.
Other major temples in Assur, including the Sin-Shamash and Anu-Adad complexes, do not contain similar sand layers. The selective use of sand in Temple H indicates ritual importance and cultural signaling, highlighting the temple’s role as a political and symbolic structure.
This study represents the first systematic mineralogical examination of archaeological sand in Iraq. By integrating archaeological, historical, and mineralogical data, the research shows how construction materials provide information about urban planning, ritual practices, and long-distance cultural connections. The sand beneath the Ishtar Temple shows that the founders of Assur applied specialized ritual knowledge and combined influences from different regions.
The findings clarify Assur’s earliest phase and demonstrate the value of combining multiple research methods to reconstruct ancient cultural landscapes. The temple foundations now offer direct evidence of architectural and ritual practices in early Mesopotamia.
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