Introduction 

View of the excavation site at Tell al-Muqayyar (ancient Ur) in 1931-2, looking to the north east 

From Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 3)  

My additions in blue, showing the locations of 3 of the ‘royal graves’ (PG 777, 779 and 789) discussed below    

The redoubtable Leonard Woolley, who began his excavation at Ur in November 1922, soon became aware of the existence of a vast cemetery here.  However, he delayed his detailed excavation of it until the autumn of 1027 and continued for 3 or 4 years before publishing his final report (see Leonard Woolley, referenced below, 1934 a and b).  As we shall see, almost all of our knowledge of Ur in the ED period derives from this work.  

As Peter Moorey (referenced below, at pp. 24-5) observed: 

1. “Woolley’s digging showed that the graveyard had lain in an area of waste land used to dump rubbish just below the city walls, as was common practice in Sumer.  Already by the time of the [earliest burials here], long occupation at Ur had created a mound of settlement debris ( a ‘tell’) upon which the contemporary city stood. Its rubbish, sloping away from the walls over which it had been tipped, provided ample room for a burial ground.”  
   

As William Hafford (referenced below, at p. 198) observed, Woolley’s famous ‘Royal Cemetery of Ur’: 

1. “... is only one part of [this] large and very deep burial ground ... The site’s initial excavators divided [it] ... into three primary layers or periods of burial that might be considered discrete cemeteries within it.” 
   

He pointed out that:

1. ✴burial in the lowest (= earliest) layer probably ended in the ED I-II period; and 
   

2. ✴burial in the upper layer started in the Akkadian period.
   

However, we are concerned here with the middle layer, which:

1. ✴varied in thickness from 1 to 3 meters and had accumulated here after the first phase of burials; and 
   

2. ✴was subsequently covered by another layer of debris that had been created by a similar process of ‘waste management’ at some time before the start of phase 3. 
   

As William Hafford pointed out, it contained some 750 burials.  However, we are primarily concerned with the 16 of these burials that Woolley designated ‘royal graves’ (see below). 

As Richard Zettler (referenced below, 1998, at p. 21) observed, Woolley referred to these  debris layers  as  ‘Seal Impression Strata’ (SIS) because of the large number of seals and clay sealings that were recovered from them, which included: 

1. ✴archaic tablets and seal impressions from the earlier strata (SIS 8-5), dated to the ED I-II period, which provided a terminus post quem for the  ‘royal’ burials above; and 
   

2. ✴other seals and sealings from the later strata (SIS 1-2), which  included:
   

3. •a sealing naming Mesanepada king of Kish; and
   

4. •a lapis lazuli cylinder seal that had belonged to Queen Nintur, Mesanepada’s wife;
   

5. potentially provided a terminus ante quem, [as discussed below]. 
   

In other words, the private and royal graves that Woolley excavated between SIS 5-8  and SIS 1-2 can be dated to the period between:

1. ✴the ED I-II period (= the date of the tablets and seal impressions recovered in SIS 5-8); and 
   

2. ✴the time that the seal/ seal impressions of Mesanepada and  Nintur were consigned to SIS 1-2 (see the discussion below). 
   

This second layer of debris sealed the “Royal Cemetery’ and subsequently provided a platform for the burials of the Akkadian period.  

So-called Royal Graves.

Locations of Leonard Woolley’s 16 ‘royal graves‘ , image from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 273)  

My addition in blue: PG 779 (which contained the ‘Standard of Ur’) and PG 1237 (the so-called ‘Great Death Pit)  

My additions in red: graves with ‘royal inscriptions’  (see Douglas Frayne, referenced below, at pp. 377-408)   

Location of PG 755 (not one of Woolley’s 16), from Paul Zimmerman (referenced below, 1998, Fig. 40, at p. 93)  

As Peter Moorey (referenced below, at p. 26) observed, the great majority of the graves excavated in the cemetery: 

1. “... consisted of a shaft from 4 to 12 feet deep, [which contained] the body, rolled in matting or placed in a simple coffin of wood, basketry or baked clay.  The body was provided with simple household vessels, tools, weapons and personal ornaments.” 
   

However, Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 33) identified 16 burials that: 

1. “.. stand out from all the rest, not simply because of their richness (and, indeed, most of them have been plundered and their wealth must be taken on credit), ... but for peculiarities of structure and ritual.” 
   

He explained that, while most of the  graves, ‘whether rich or poor’ were, in structural terms, relatively the simple, his 16 ‘royal graves’ all; 

1. “... include a building of one or more ... chambers constructed in stone or brick, and the burial [process seems to have involved] ... ceremonies in which a great part was played by human sacrifices.  ... [Although] we find almost as many variants [among them] as there are [graves], ... in all those that are well preserved, the outstanding features of:
   

2. ✴a built [burial] chamber; and
   

3. ✴a number of human [bodies in addition to that of the main occupant of the grave]; are present.”  
   

Aubrey Baadsgaard et al. (referenced below, 2011,  at p. 28), in their paper on human sacrifice at Ur, observed that, in these ‘royal’ burials; 

1. “The [built] chamber was reserved for ‘the principal royal burial’ [= the person for whom the grave had been prepared,  who was] sometimes entombed with personal attendants.  The bodies of other retainers were found on the floor of a pit outside the chamber or in a subsidiary pit adjacent to it.  Woolley called these ‘death pits’, the largest of which, [PG 1237], contained the remains of 74 retainers.” 
   

On the basis of their scientific examination of two of the surviving skulls from these graves (one of  a young female from grave PG 1237 and the other of a young, mature male from PG 789, both of which are now in the Penn Museum), these authors established (see pp 38-9) that these two:

1. “... court retainers were violently killed by means of blunt force trauma.  Since the two [skulls] ... come from two different ‘royal [graves]’, it is reasonable to assume a similar cause of death for the majority of attendants buried in other [‘royal’ graves.” 
   

It certainly seems that, during  a (possibly short) period of time in the ED III period, some (presumably rich and powerful) men and women at Ur went to their respective graves with a number of attendants who, as Aubrey Baadsgaard et al. argued (at p. 38), had been:

1. “... killed, preserved and dressed, and their bodies purposefully arranged in a tableau mort in the ‘royal’ [grave], to continue [in the service of their erstwhile master or mistress] in the netherworld.”   
   

Since the analysis that follows is focussed on the political history of Ur in this period, I concentrate below mainly on the five of these ‘royal’ graves (all highlighted in red in the plan above) that are associated with one or more ‘royal inscriptions’ (as defined by Douglas Frayne, referenced below, at pp. 377-408).  However, I have also included:

1. ✴PG 779, which, although  contained no epigraphic evidence, did contain an important ‘royal’ artefact known as the ‘Standard of Ur’; and 
   

2. ✴PG 755, which Woolley catalogued as a private (= non-royal) grave because, although it was of ‘simple construction’ and seems to have housed only a single corpse: 
   

3. •the corpse in question was that of  a young warrior who (as we shall see) was probably called Meskalamdug (a known ‘royal’ name at Ur); and
   

4. •he had been buried with one of the richest collections of objects found in a single grave in the cemetery.  
   

PG 779: Find Spot of the So-called Standard of Ur 

Plan of PG 779: from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 24): my additions in red  (S = Standard of Ur)  

PG 799 is one of the two largest of Woolley’s ‘royal’ graves, (the other being the nearby PG 1236 - see below).  Interestingly, these two graves share another characteristic: in each case:

1. ✴an outer door to the stone structure leads into a long narrow chamber (Chamber A) running along its whole width;
   

2. ✴a second door in this chamber leads into two adjoining square chambers (Chambers B and C) that each occupied about half the building's width; and
   

3. ✴a second door in Chamber B leads into another long  chamber (Chamber D) that took up the whole back part of the building. 
   

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 59) recorded that: 

1. “On the slope below the steps [that led down to Chamber A], there were ten copper spears in a row ... and, below them (but so decayed as to be scarcely recognisable), were the bones of the soldiers of the guard; there seemed to be five bodies, but it was impossible to be sure.”
   

The chambers within had been looted, but Woolley noted that enough survived in Chamber A to suggest that it had:

1. “... apparently [been] a burial chamber, and an important one.” 
   

Chambers B and C were also  essentially destroyed, although Woolley guessed that a human skull in the latter had belonged to a female attendant.  However: 

1. “In Chamber D, there were the remains of at least four human bodies, [although] they were represented by very scanty fragments and even the skulls of two were lacking.  Beads were, as usual scattered over the floor, [along with a number of precious objects, including] a gaming-board of engraved shell plaques with lapis lazuli borders, set in silver ... At the south-west end, there were remains of two more bodies, one very fragmentary; the better preserved had its head in the corner of the chamber, close to the south-west wall ... Above the man's head and slightly to the right of it, against the stones of the tomb wall, [were the remains of] the so-called Standard' of Ur, marked ‘S’ in the plan above].” 
   

It seems that, although looters had effectively cleared thr grave, this corner of Chamber D had fortuitously escaped their depredations.  

‘Standard of Ur’ 

So-called Standard of Ur (U. 11164) from Chamber D, PG 779  (as reconstructed in 1973)  

Now in the British Museum (BM 121201): images from the museum website    

This object had originally been a wooden box with a rectangular base and two narrow trapezoidal sides separating a pair of wide, rectangular panels.  As Dorota Ławecka (referenced below, at p. 337) observed, in its original state, each of the four main faces of the box was:

1. “... covered with geometric and figurative mosaics made of pieces of shell, red limestone and lapis lazuli set in bitumen [in three horizontal registers].” 
   

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 61) recorded that:

1. “The wood which had been its core had vanished (traces of its grain could be distinguished on the bitumen afterwards) and the bitumen in which the tesserae were set had gone to powder, so that the tesserae were loose and kept in place only by the soil.  With the decay of the wood, the main panels had been telescoped together, with the result that the triangular ends had been pushed out and broken ...” 
   

He named the precious object the ‘Standard or Ur’ because it had apparently been located near the shoulder of the dead man, suggesting that he had carried it on his shoulder like a battle standard. 

Woolley, having described the intricate way in which the excavators had preserved the mosaic designs that had once decorated the box, observed (at p. 62) that:

1. “Taken as a whole, the standard is unusually authentic and, considering how peculiarly liable to destruction it was, wonderfully perfect.”
   

The original decorated box was reconstructed in the British Museum, where it was first exhibited in 1928.  However, it subsequently deteriorated and was completely dismantled and reassembled on a new mount in 1973. 

Details from the  war and peace sides of the Standard of Ur: original images from British Museum (BM 121201)  

Dorota Ławecka (referenced below, at pp. 337-8) summarised the visual imagery of the mosaics on this object as follows: 

1. “One of the long sides (the ‘war’ side, shows a victorious battle of chariots and infantry (most probably belonging to an army of the city-state of Ur) and, in the upper [register], conquered enemy warriors as they are brought before [a figure that is usually identified as] the king [see below].  The other long side (the ‘peace’ side) shows men bringing animals and large bundles of various shapes [presumably to Ur].   In the [upper register on this side], we see a banquet scene typical for [the art of this period]: the ‘king’ himself and other participants, each holding a cup in hand, are entertained by a singer and a lyre player. Both trapezoid end sides were decorated ... [with] fantastic scenes not directly related with the main narrative.  Following Woolley’s original usage, the object is still customarily labeled [the Standard of Ur], even though there are no clues as to its actual function.”  
   

I discuss the imagery of the mosaics on the standard in detail on my page on the ‘Standard of Ur’.  For the moment, I will simply observe that, although PG 779 was almost completely plundered long before its excavation, the survival of this extremely valuable and prestigious object makes it certain that it was the grave of a very important person.  In my view, the person in question was almost certainly the man who was portrayed on each of the images above:

1. ✴on the war of the standard, he stands at the centre of the upper register, having emerged from a war chariot in order to deal with a queue of recently-taken prisoners of war; and 
   

2. ✴on the peace side, he is the only seated figure facing right (and also distinguished by his flounced skirt) as he presides over what is almost certainly a banquet in celebration of  this recent victory.
   

On both images, he is the the tallest figure depicted (as emphasised by the fact that, in each case, his head interrupts the upper decorative border), which strongly suggests that:

1. ✴this had been  a very important victory; and
   

2. ✴he had commanded the victorious  army of Ur, presumably as its king. 
   

PG 1236: Grave of A’Anzu ?

This grave (like those of PG 779, discussed above) was made up of four interconnecting chambers.  Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 111) observed that it is:

1. “..., somewhat [larger] than PG 779, which, in most respects, it closely resembles.  Robbers had broken into it through the roof of the outer chamber [= ‘Chamber A’] ... and had thoroughly plundered the contents.”
   

Woolley identified it as the grave of [A’Anzu] on the basis of a seal that he found here (probably in Chamber D - discussed  below]. 

Grave Goods from Chamber A 

Reconstructed sceptre (?)  from Chamber A, PG 1236   (U. 12442)  

Now in the British Museum (exhibit BM 122201); image from the museum website  

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 113)  recorded that:  

1. “In [Chamber A], there very few fragments of human bone, remains of an ostrich-shell with encrusted ornament in mother of pearl and lapis lazuli, and a copper libation-vase. ... Scattered about the floor there were beads of gold and lapis lazuli ... and parts of a wreath with gold leaves and gold rosettes, ... [together with the cylinder seal of A’Anzu - see below].  The most interesting object [in this chamber] was found in fragments, but these fortunately lay together, many of them in position, and it was possible to reconstruct it [see the illustration above].   Small triangles of shell and lapis lazuli inlay, shell and pink limestone rings, and small curved lapis pieces making rings of the same diameter, and bands of very thin gold leaf with impressed designs together made up the decoration of a sceptre (or handle of a fly- whisk?); one end had a mushroom-shaped cap of white shell inlaid with a rosette in red and blue, the other end was plain.”
   

Seal of A’Anzu

Seal of A’Anzu (U. 12461), from  PG 1236: inscription (RIME 1.13.1.1. CDLI, P418046)   

Now in the British Museum (exhibit BM 121544); image from the museum website  

Sketch by D. Collon of the seal impression above, from Juliane Reade (referenced below, 2001, Figure 3, at p. 19) 

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 113) recorded that this seal was discovered in Chamber A of tPG 1236, although this might have been an error: later in this volume, both Eric Burrows (at p. 316) and Léon Legrain (in entry 54, at p, 340) recorded the find spot as Chamber D. 

As the parting shot in his account of this grave, Leonard Woolley (as above) observed that this seal: 

1. “... is a very unusual [one], with a scene of soldiers and a chariot [in the lower register]. ... It bears the inscription [A’Anzu], which may be the name of a king.” 
   

Gianni Marchesi (referenced below, 2004, at p. 182) similarly remarked on this: 

1. “... very unusual design in two registers: 
   

2. ✴[in the upper register], there are:
   

3. •a contest scene (a nude hero between two rampant lions); and
   

4. • a whirligig of lions. which resembles the whirligig of dagger-armed men that is found on the cylinder seal of King Mesanepada [see below]; and  
   

5. ✴in the lower register, a man is trampling an enemy with his [chariot] while some foot soldiers escort a naked prisoner, [in a] scene immediately reminds us of the so-called ‘war side’ of the [Standard of Ur - see above].”  
   

He also noted (at pp. 182-3) that the images in these seal reliefs are redolent of images associated with at least two other broadly contemporary kings:

1. ✴the reliefs on what were then two recently-discovered seal impressions of King Ishqui-Mari from Mari  (RIME 1.10. 17.2, CDLI, P418042 and RIME 1.10. 17.3, CDLI, P431184): see also Davide Nadali,referenced below, Figures 1 and 2, at pp, 195-6 and D); and Dominique Beyer (referenced below, at paragraphs 83-99).
   

2. ✴those on the ‘Stele of the Vultures’ of King Eanatum of Lagash. 
   

In other words, there is a body of iconographic evidence to support Woolley’s contention (see above) that ‘A.Anzu’:

1. “... may be the name of a king.
   

To take this further, we should first look at the inscription on the seal, which contains only a personal name: ‘a-(an)anzu2{muszen}’ (A’Anzu, followed by the ideogram ‘MUSHEN’, which indicates that Anzu is the name of a bird).  Interestingly, this was almost certainly the name given to a lion-headed eagle that was depicted on Eanatum’s  ‘Stele of the Vultures’ as the emblem of Ningirsu, the patron god  of Lagash/Girsu.  Gianni Marchesi (referenced below, 2004, note 73, at p. 183) translated it as:

1. “The father is (as mighty as) the thunderbird [=Anzu/ Indugud].”
   

Furthermore, a man called Enna-il, who was probably a king of Kish, described himself as the son of A-Anzu (see RIME 1.8.1=3.1; CDLI, P462184) and, while there is no reason to think that this A-Anzu and the owner of the seal from PG 1236 were one and the same person, this coincidence does suggest that A-Anzu could be a royal name (or nickname ?). 

In fact, Gianni Marchesi (referenced below, 2004, at p. 183 ) argued against the identification of A’Anzu as a king of Ur: although he acknowledged that the iconography of the relief pointed to a royal owner, he pointed out that the lower part of the original inscription is lost, which:  

1. “... means that the name [A’Anzu in this inscription] was likely followed by a title, written in the second case of the inscription, and that the title in question could not be lugal (king).”  
   

As he explained (in note 172): 

1. “LUGAL is a very long sign; if [it had been] there, its initial part would still be visible in the preserved upper part of the second case of the inscription.”  
   

He therefore concluded that: 

1. “No doubt the possessor of this seal had been a high-ranking personage, but he was probably neither a sovereign nor the principal occupant of PG 1236.”   
   

I have to say that, even if A’Anzu was not a king at the time that he used this seal, he was surely the son of a king and, furthermore, of a king who could be credibly described as being as mighty as Anzu.

Woolley’s Graves and Death Pits PG 789 and PG 800  

Reconstruction of tombs PG 789 and PG 800, with the respective death pits:

adapted from Paul Zimmerman and Richard Zettler (referenced below, 2021, Figure 15.7, at p. 293 ) 

My additions in white and red      

This section deals with the complicated matter of the spacial/stratigraphic and chronological relationships between the graves and death pits illustrated in the 3D graphic above.   When Leonard Woolley discovered them, he famously assumed that he had found the burial chambers of a king and queen, together with their associated death pits, which he labelled as PG 789 and PG 800 respectively. 

However, in 1998, Paul Zimmerman (referenced below) argued (at p, 19) argued that:

1. ✴Woolley’s association of his PG 800 death pit (hereafter labelled PG 800a) and his PG 800 burial chamber (hereafter PG 800b) was open to question; and
   

2. ✴while it is possible that PG 800b:
   

3. “... never had a ‘death pit’ or forecourt of any kind, ... [it is perhaps more likely] that its forecourt [actually] lay beneath the floor of PG 789 [see the 3D graphic above].”
   

A number of scholars have developed these hypotheses and, in 2021, Paul Zimmerman and Richard Zettler (referenced below, ay pp. 293-4) firmly concluded that:

1. “... PG 789 and Woolley’s ‘construct’  PG 800 represent not two, but three royal tombs, created in the [chronological] sequence [PG 800b, PG 789, PG 800a, ... which means that]  Woolley’s PG 789 and PG 800 represent ... a sequence of three royal burials ...” 
   

In my view, the best way of understanding the background to this complex debate is to look at the sequence in which Woolley made these discoveries, as established (at pp. 290-1) by Zimmerman and Zettler in their paper of 2021: 

1. ✴on 17th October 1927 , Woolley began his excavation of this part of the cemetery; 
   

2. ✴on 20th November, he reported the discovery of the death pit PG 800a and of 13 bodies and a harp at its southwestern end; and
   

3. ✴on 6th December, he reported the discovery of what he described as a ‘wooden wardrobe box’ in the death pit (see the 3D graphic), adding that he had detected the vault of a then unopened burial chamber (later labelled PG 789) below it. 
   

As Zimmerman and Zettler observed (at p. 290), in the December report:  

1. “Woolley expressed an initial hope that the [unopened burial chamber] might be the royal burial [chamber] that he assumed would be linked with the death pit [PG 800a], but quickly dismissed the notion.”
   

In a supplement to these reports, Woolley gave a detailed account of the death pit PG 800a, which he prefaced with the disappointing news that: 

1. “... we did not find the actual body of the king who must have been buried here.” 
   

Presumably, the presence of the 13 bodies at the southwestern end of this death pit had prompted him  to anticipate the discovery of the associated burial chamber of their king.  However, as Zimmerman and Zettler (as above) observed (at p. 294):

1. “...  the [putative burial] chamber originally associated with [ PG 800a] remains as elusive today as [it was] in 1927/8.” 
   

This brings us to the burial chamber PG 789.  Zimmerman and Zettler (as above) recorded (at p. 290) that, in his report of 3rd January 1928, Woolley turned to the disappointing results of its excavation: when he had removed the remains of the wardrobe from PG 800a, he had discovered that the chamber below had been thoroughly looted.  However, while digging down around it, he  established that it stood in the corner of a large, un-plundered death pit that was laid out about 1.5 meters below PG 800a (see the 3D graphic above).  He also made a particularly interesting observation: it seemed that the wardrobe in PG 800a had been strategically placed to cover the hole through which the looters had gained access to the burial chamber of PG 789, suggesting that the looting of the latter had taken place during or after the completion of PG 800a.  At least by the time of his final report (see Leonard Woolley, referenced below, 1934a, at p, 72), he had come to the conclusion the former was the case, and Zimmerman and Zettler (as above) agreed with this conclusion: they argued (at p. 294) that: 

1. “The fact that the workers who laid out [PG 800a] had apparently looted the burial chamber PG 789 may suggest that [PG 800a] was much later in time, and that the memory of PG 789’s [putative] royal occupant had long since faded.” 
   

Finally, we come to PG 800b.  Zimmerman and Zettler (as above) recorded (at pp. 290-1) that it was only after Woolley had described the death pit of PG 789 in some detail in his report of 3rd January 1928 that he turned to his discovery of this burial chamber.  They quoted the relevant passage verbatim:

1. “Behind [the burial chamber PG 789] just described, there was another chamber built of stone and roofed with brick: constructionally, it is not part of [the PG 789 burial chamber] but... abutted on it.  I am strongly inclined to believe that it is slightly later in date (though the floor is rather lower) and is to be connected with the [death pit PG 800a] described in my last report.  In fact, I believe that here we have the missing [burial chamber] to which that [death pit] was an appanage.  In that case:
   

2. ✴the plundered [burial chamber PG 789] is that of the (nameless?) king; and
   

3. ✴the present chamber [now PG 800b], is that of his queen, buried after him, but as nearly as might be in the same grave, though with an independent shaft and individual sacrifices [= individual death pits].
   

4. The queen is named on her lapis cylinder seal ‘Shub-ad’ [= Pu-abum - see below] ...” 
   

Thus, Woolley was confident oin the accuracy of his ‘two burial’ hypothesis.  However, as Zimmerman and Zettler (as above) observed (at p. 291):

1. “... although [Woolley] was quick to identify PG 800b as the ‘missing [burial chamber]’ for [the death pit PG 800a], he never linked the two parts of the tomb in digging.  As Woolley himself noted [in his final report], he had difficulty delimiting [the northeastern end of the death pit PG 800a] and defined the edges of the pit more by the position of objects than by any clear indications in the soil.  He stopped excavations of [this] death pit ... about 50 cm from the southwestern wall of [PG 800b] without showing definitively that they were both in the same shaft.” 
   

They then turned to the inconvenient  ‘stratigraphic facts’:

1. ✴the floor of PG 800b was substantially (40 cm) lower than that of PG 789; and
   

2. ✴its roof was flush with the floor of PG 800a, the death pit that had been laid out above PG 789. 
   

In short, the chronological sequence of what were clearly three burials must have been as follows:

1. ✴the burial chamber PG 800b was the first to be built (and it might have had an associated death pit on the area marked in the 3D graphic above);
   

2. ✴presumably shortly thereafter, the burial chamber PG 789 was built (abutting it but at a slightly higher level), with its death pit (also on this higher level) extending towards the southeast; and
   

3. ✴at some time thereafter, the death pit PG 800a was laid out at a level just above the vault of the burial chamber PG 789 (which probably facilitated the looting of this earlier chamber).
   

I will discuss these three burials below in this order.  

PG 800b: Queen Pu-abum 

Plan of the burial chamber of Queen Pu-abum (PG 800b); from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 36)   

The burial chamber PG 800b is the only one of Woolley’s 16 ‘royal’ tombs that had completely escaped the attentions of looters before its excavation (albeit that its roof had largely collapsed) and the remains of the queen’s body thus remained in situ.  According to William Hafford and Richard Zettler (referenced below, 1998, at p. 95), it was: 

1. “... laid out on a bier that sat diagonally across the northwestern end of the chamber.  She lay on her back with her hands over her abdomen.  Just under 5 feet tall, she was roughly 40 years of age at the time of her death.” 
   

They also noted (at p. 94) that three attendants had been buried with her (two near her head and one at her feet).  

Seal of Queen Pu-abum (excavation number U. 10939), 

from grave PG 800b: inscription (RIME 1.13.3.3: CDLI, P247683)   

Now in the British Museum (exhibit BM 121544); image from the website of the Morgan Library & Museum   

Pu-abum can be securely identified from the inscription on the seal illustrated above: this was one of three seals that she was wearing when she was buried (see below) but, although all three were clearly hers, this is the only one that actually identifies her (as the otherwise-unknown Queen Pu-abum - see Gianni Marchesi, referenced below, 2004, at pp. 175-8).  All three seals depict an important lady (presumably Pu-abum herself) in the context of a banqueting scene. 

Reconstruction of the clothing of Pu-abum at the time of her burial  

Image from the website of the Morgan Library and Museum  

Pu-abum’s corpse was famously dressed for burial in a manner that underlined her royal status.  As William Hafford and Richard Zettler (referenced below, 1998, at p. 95) observed:  

1. “The whole of her upper body was covered with beads of gold, lapis lazuli, carnelian and agate, [which] Woolley took to be the remains of a beaded cloak.”  
   

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 88) recorded that: 

1. “Against [her] right upper arm ... were found three gold pins ... [that] probably secured the cloak, made open on this side, as was the usual fashion.  With the pins were [a number of precious objects ... [that included] three lapis lazuli cylinder seals, ... [one of which bears the name of Pu-abum - see above].  The cylinders were perhaps tied to the pins to make toggles for securing the cloak.” 
   

As Hafford and Zettler (as above) observed, the most spectacular item in her regalia: 

1. “... was the headdress that [she] wore in death.  At its base were twelve meters of gold ribbon still coiled in ovals as if resting on or wrapping a large wig that had long since decayed.  Various strings of lapis, gold and carnelian beads sat atop, along with four wreaths of gold leaves.  Triple willow leaves with inlaid flowers and pear-shaped pendants intermingled with broader leaves,  ... [which were] later identified as poplar.”  
   

They also noted (at p. 94 and Figure 3:7) that more than 100 other (often precious) objects had been piled up in a number of heaps around the chamber floor.  

PG 789: Woolley’s King’s Burial Chamber and Associated Death Pit 

Plan of the burial chamber and death pit PG 789; from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 29)   

As we have seen, this burial chamber, which abutted that of Queen Pu-abum and slightly post-dated it, was thoroughly looted, probably during the laying out of the burial chamber PG 800a (discussed below).  Woolley assumed that  it must have been built for Pu-abum’s husband but,  as Peter Moorey (referenced below, at p. 31) observed:

1. “Without either a primary body or an inscribed seal, we shall never know whose burial this was.  Nor may we be absolutely certain that this was a male primary burial ... ” 
   

Its death pit (which had been left undisturbed) contained the corpses of no fewer than 63 men and .  Two groups of corpses stand out from the rest:

1. ✴a group of six male corpses, which Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 64) identified as the king’s bodyguard, were found in the dromus leading to the pit; and
   

2. ✴a group six female corpses, which he described  (at p. 65) as leaning against the southwest wall of the burial chamber, were those of women whom he described as:
   

3. ... the most important, (or at least the most richly adorned) of all [the corpses that were found in the pit].”
   

[A lyre (U. 10556) from PG 789 is described in my page on lyres from the Royal Cemetery] 

PG 800a: So-called King’s Death Pit

Plan of the death pit PG 800a, adapted from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 36)   

As noted above, Leonard Woolley began his excavation of this death pit before he discovered two burial chambers:

1. ✴PG 789 and its associated death pit, which were directly below it; and
   

2. ✴PG 800b, which was at an even lower level to the northeast. 
   

As Paul Zimmerman and Richard Zettler (referenced below, at p. 294) observed:

1. “... the tomb chamber originally associated with PG 800a, if where ever was one], remains as elusive today as in 1927/8.”
   

Despite the obscurity surrounding this death pit, it is worth looking at the remains of at least two interesting objects that were found here. 

[A lyre (U. 10412) from PG 800a is described in my page on lyres from the Royal Cemetery]  

Sketches of the mostly ruined inlays from the ‘wardrobe-chest’ (U. 10441-2) found in PG 800a, 

now in the British Museum (BM 121394, not exhibited) 

Images from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 94)    

The other significant remains in PG 800a were associated with the wardrobe.  Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 74) then recorded that:

1. “In the middle of the pit , just in front of the dromos, ... was a great [rectangular] wooden chest measuring 2.25  x 1.1 meters, [but its height could not be ascertained.  Although the original wood  and the contents of the wardrobe no longer survived, it] had itself been an object of art: ... along its south-east side ran a band of mosaic in shell and lapis lazuli with a design of human and animal figures in the same technique as the Standard [of Ur - see above]', but unfortunately in very bad condition [as can be seen in the illustration above. ...  All round it] was an amazing wealth of offerings:
   

2. ✴vessels of gold, silver, copper, clay; ...
   

3. ✴stones [such] as white calcite, steatite, obsidian and lapis lazuli;
   

4. ✴ silver heads of lionesses from a piece of furniture;
   

5. ✴gold drinking-tubes;
   

6. ✴gold saws and chisel;
   

7. ✴an inlaid gaming board; etc). 
   

8. The richness of the death-pit attached to [PG 789] was nothing compared to this.”
   

In a later passage (at p. 80), he added that:

1. “All the woodwork [of the wardrobe] had perished, leaving only a twisted and warped imprint in the earth, and there were no mosaic borders to guide us.  All the decoration had been on the south-east face, which was presumably the front, and all was fallen in disorder. Two narrow strips of gold with lapis lazuli between them had formed a frame or (since there was not enough of it to go round) a single border either above or below, to a long strip of mosaic executed in the technique of the Standard [of Ur] ... The fallen fragments of it lay all along the front of the box and all that could be done was to pick them up in the order in which they lay ... and try to reset them.  [Unfortunately], something in the nature of the soil at this point had so attacked the shell that the surface was all gone and all the internal detail of the figures was  therefore lost (and many were eaten right away and even their outlines were unrecognisable).  Plate 94 [reproduced above], shows all that I could make out of the ruin, and it shows little.”
   

Actually, three of the surviving reliefs are of some interest, because (as discussed in my page on the standard of Ur) they make direct reference to the mosaics on the standard:

1. ✴my image A, which represents a mountain goat, appears in the top register of one of its end panels;
   

2. ✴my image B, which shows a man wearing a wrapped-over short skirt and carrying a heavy backpack reflects two of the ‘foreign’ tribute bearers depicted in the bottom register of the peace side; and
   

3. ✴my image C, which shows the lower part of two more men (presumably ‘foreigners’) wearing wrapped-over short skirts, a motif that is repeated on a number of occasions on both the peace and war sides of thee standard.
   

Clearly, the remains of wardrobe had not been discovered in its original location: as Paul Zimmerman and Richard Zettler (referenced below, at p. 294) observed: 

1. “It is perhaps also worth asking whether the large number of artefacts found at the northeastern end of the death pit might have come originally from PG 789’s tomb chamber ... ”
   

In other words, while the wardrobe itself and the ‘wealth of offerings’ around it cannot have been associated with the burial of Queen Pu-abum (as Woolley had argued), they might well have been left here by the looters of the burial chamber of PG 789.

PG 1050  

Plan of PG 1050; from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, Figure 14, at p. 95)   

My additions in red: separate burials identified by Paul Zimmerman (referenced below, 1998, at pp.19-20)  

As shown in the plan above, Leonard Woolley conceived of this grave as a single structure split by cross-walls into four chambers.   However, Paul Zimmerman (referenced below, 1998, at pp.19-20) argued convincingly that there were four separate burials here at different levels, which he labelled:

1. ✴1050a (the uppermost structure);
   

2. ✴1050b (the ‘reed coffin’);
   

3. ✴1050c (the thick floor and its associated walls and burials, considered by Woolley to be PG 1050’s principal burial); and
   

4. ✴1050d (the ‘death pit’). 
   

He observed (at p. 20) that:

1. “... divorcing [his 1050c] from the rest of [Woolley’s PG 1050] solves the riddle of how this level was plundered without disturbing the upper levels.  Woolley puts the reader through a tortured explanation of how thieves, in antiquity, could have gained access to this part of PG 1050 by tunnelling in from the side, [but he] never found the thieves’ purported shaft.  I find it much easier to believe that the thieves gained access [to 1050c] from directly above, and they did not disturb the upper level of the grave because it had not yet been built.” 
   

PG 1050 c/d: Grave and Death Pit of Queen Ashusikilam (?)

Plundered tomb chamber (Zimmerman’s PG 1050c - see below) 

From Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b. Plate 48)  

My red ‘X’ indicates the distorted ‘copper cauldron’ under which seal of Queen Ashusikilam (see below) was found  

On this basis, we need only discuss here Zimmerman’s PG 1050c, which Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 94) described as follows:

1. “At the bottom of a layer of filling, there was a floor of mud brick 0.50 m. thick, extending unbroken over the space between the walls; on it had been the main burial ... Against the southwest side were the remains of a wooden coffin ... [that] had been broken open and the bones inside it were in hopeless confusion ... On the body, which lay with the head northwest, there were some beads of gold, lapis lazuli and carnelian, and traces of silver.  By the foot of the coffin were [two vases, along with] the broken skull of a second person, presumably one of the attendants.  In the middle of the floor lay [two more vases] and to the northeast of this was a copper cauldron, ... [which had been] completely crushed and broken [marked ‘X’ in the illustration above]; below it were found a little clay vase in the form of a nut as well as the large lapis lazuli cylinder seal inscribed with the name Akalamdu [see below].  By the head of the coffin there were heaped together many clay pots ... [and], ranged along the north-west side of the pit were more clay vessels, all broken .... Also by the head of the coffin was the white calcite vase ... The whole of the centre of the pit was empty except for the few scattered objects already described.”  
   

Seal of Queen Ashusikilam

Seal of Queen Ashusikilam (e U. 11825) from grave PG 1050 c: inscription (RIME 1.13.4.1; CDLI, P247682)  

Now in the Penn Museum (CBS 17720) image from Leonard Woolley (referenced below,1934b, Plate 198, number 65)  

The lapis lazuli seal from grave PG 1050c that made the impression illustrated above, which is now in the Penn Museum (CBS 17720), carries the following inscription (RIME 1.13.4.1; CDLI, P247682):

1. ‘Akalamdu, king of Ur: Ashusikilam (is) his wife’
   

According to Léon Legrain (in Leonard Woolley, referenced below, 1934a, entry 65, at p. 341), the image created by the seal depicts: 

1. “Three crossed lions of royal style [attacking] an upturned ibex [on the left] and a bull.” 
   

As noted above, it was found under a battered ‘copper cauldron’ in the northeastern corner of the burial chamber (marked with a red ‘X’ in the illustration above).  Gianni Marchesi (referenced below, 2004, at p. 178) argued that, although:

1. “... the seal was found [in this grave] without an associated body, ... the inscription clearly states the identity of the person to whom [it] had belonged.”
   

He assumed that this person was Ashusikilam, the wife of King Akalamdu of Ur, who:

1. “... was probably a queen, even if she did not bear the title of ‘queen’ (eres) on her seal.”
   

Marchesi (as above) argued (at p. 178)  that Queen Ashusikilam was probably buried in PG 1050c.  However, as Peter Moorey (referenced below, at p. 33) had previously observed:

1. “It is very much to be regretted that ... [PG 1050c] was so badly plundered ... [and] so ravaged that it was not [even] clear what the sex of the primary burial had been.”
   

In other words, we cannot be sure that the ravaged corpse in the wooden coffin was that of Queen Ashusikilam, albeit that (at least in my view) the presence of her seal here makes this very likely.   

PG 1054  

Plan of PG 1054: from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, Figure 16, at p. 103): my additions in red   

As Paul Zimmerman (referenced below, 1998, at pp. 20-1) observed, the grave that Leonard Woolley labelled ‘PG 1054’ is arguably made up of two distinct structures, which he labelled:

1. ✴1054a (the uppermost structure), which was:
   

2. •discovered below an unusually dense group of non-royal graves close to the modern ground level; and
   

3. •contained four burials (his ‘burials A-D’) at four different levels,; and
   

4. ✴1054b, (an unviolated burial chamber).
   

He argued that:

1. “... there is [actually] no evident architectural interrelationship between the two structures.  Woolley seems to have considered them to be part of the same grave simply on [the basis of] their relative positions: the upper structure was directly above the lower.”
   

He suggested that

1. ✴PG 1054b (like PG 1050c-d above) had been sealed at the time of the burial of its main occupant (which would account for the fact that it was discovered unviolated); while
   

2. ✴PG 1054a (like PG 1050a-b above), which: 
   

3. “... seems to have functioned as [a mausoleum]. The evidence of their multiple floors suggests that they were periodically reopened, re-floored, and prepared for the interment of additional bodies.” 
   

He acknowledged that this hypothesis was based on stylistic rather than archaeological criteria but reasonably argued that, since there is not hard evidence that these five burials were part of a single structure, splitting the sealed burial chamber from the structure above it is is methodologically less risky than ‘lumping’ all five burials into a single structure.  In other words, we should assume that the burials in PG 1054a all:

1. ✴made use of the shaft that had originally been dug for the burial of the principal occupant of PG 1054b; but
   

2. ✴were otherwise unassociated with it. 
   

PG 1054a

Plan of PG 1054a, from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, Figure 15, at p. 99): my additions in red   

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1954, at p. 75) explained that he first became aware of this group of burials after finding what he characterised as an unusual concentration of commoners’ graves close to ground level.  As he continued digging down along the face of a mud brick wall (the ‘hatched’ area at the centre of the illustration above) he came upon:

1. ✴a pair of daggers, lying side by side, each of which had a gold blade and a hilt decorated with gold studs; and
   

2. ✴a seal inscribed with the name ‘Meskalamdu, the king’, which lay between them.
   

These objects lay within the ‘footprint’ of what had been a wooden box (marked ‘dagger box’ in the plan above), next to which was a wooden coffin containing what he judged to be the body of a man (which he labelled ‘burial C’).  However, he recorded that , despite the impression given by the ‘dagger box’, the grave goods in the coffin were:

1. “... by no means of the type that one would expect from a royal person ...”
   

Woolley continued following the wall down until he met a floor of beaten clay, at which point he realised that the wooden coffin occupied ‘only a humble corner’ of a larger [rectangular] space.  He then recorded that, at this point:

1. “...we felt sure that we had not yet found the king’s grave.” 
   

However, although he found three more burials (which he labelled burials A, B and D) on the other side of the wall, he found nothing more of particular interest until he discovered what proved to be the unviolated burial chamber PG 1054b (discussed in the following section).   In short, the only significant objects that he found in PG 1054a were the contents of the ‘dagger box‘ beside the coffin of ‘burial C’. 

One of the two golden daggers (U. 11513) from the box in burial C: now in the Penn Museum (30-12-550)  

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 157) published a photograph of both of the daggers that had been placed, side by side, in this box:

1. ✴the smaller of the two (U. 11512) is now in the Iraq Museum; and 
   

2. ✴the other (U. 11513, illustrated above) is now in the Penn Museum (30-12-550).
   

According to Andreas Hauptmann and Sabine Klein (referenced below, at p. 87):

1. “The excellently burnished blade [of this second dagger] is fabricated [from a single] piece of a copper-rich gold-silver alloy.... Above the guard on the hilt and on the pommel, [some] 400 nails with spherical heads of pale greenish-yellow colour were inserted on gold sheets ... .”
   

Unfortunately, the first dagger (although similar in design) has not been investigated in this detail, and neither of them is inscribed. 

Seal  of King Meskalamdu (U. 11751), with an inscription (RIME 1.13.3.1, CDLI, P247679)   

From PG 1054a: now in the British Museum  (exhibit BM 122536) 

Image from Julian Reade (referenced below, 2003, figure 55a, at p. 103)  

As noted above, a cylinder seal in the dagger box it carried an inscription (RIME 1. 13.3.1, CDLI, P247679) identifying its owner as:

1. ‘Mes-kalam-du10 lugal’, (Meskalamdu, the king).  
   

The face of the seal is very degraded but, according to Léon Legrain (in Leonard Woolley, referenced below, 1934a, entry 55, at p. 340), the impression that it made depicts:

1. “Two crossed lions [attacking] two bulls.  [Two figures, which Legrain identified as Enkidu and a nude hunter in profile], take part in the fight. Both are probably armed with daggers.  There is a small nude hunter, full face with wild locks, below the cartouche [at the edges in the impression as illustrated above].”   
   

In the absence of evidence to the contrary, it seems likely that this King Meskalamdu owned the daggers in the box, particularly in view of the fact that they had apparently been carefully placed in the box on either side of the seal.

It is usually (and reasonably) assumed that ‘Meskalamdu the king’, the owner of this seal, ruled at Ur.  Interestingly, a king of this name also appears in the following inscription (RIME 1.13.5.1; CDLI, P431203), which is found on a lapis lazuli bead from Mari (discussed in my page of the first dynasty of Ur):   

1. “For [DN]: Mesanepada, king of Ur, the son of Meskalamdu, king of Kish, has consecrated (this bead)”, (translation from Jean-Claude Margueron, referenced below, at p. 143). 
   

As we shall see below, Mesanepada is named as king of Kish (rather than king of Ur) in a sealing that was found in SIS 1-2.

Thus, it seems likely that that the Meskalamdu of this seal: 

1. ✴was the father of Mesanepada (see below); and
   

2. ✴used the titles ‘king of Ur’ and ‘king of Kish’ (although, as far as we know, neither he nor his putative son used both titles at once).
   

Significance of the Evidence from the Dagger Box

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, at p. 107) argued that King Meskalamdu had placed his seal in the chamber of burial C as an offering to the lady who was the principal occupant of PG 1054b (see below). However, as argued above, her burial chamber had been sealed (and almost certainly forgotten) by the time that ‘burial C took place’. 

If this is accepted, then we are faced with the need to explain how and why these precious objects found their way into a wooden box  in what was, in all other respects, a very non-royal environment.  It seems to me that:

1. ✴they must have been placed here while the putative ‘mausoleum’ PG 1054 was in use; but
   

2. ✴it is unlikely that their presence here had anything to do with the man who was buried in the nearby coffin.
   

Since Woolley failed to discover a more salubrious original location for them during what seems to have been a thorough campaign of excavation, they (and, perhaps the box that contained them) must have been brought here from amore distant location  (possibly, but by no means certainly, from  King Meskalamdu’s own grave).  It seems to me that they must have been moved to this overtly non-royal environment in order to hide them, presumably either:

1. ✴by looters (in the vain hope that they could subsequently be recovered and sold); or
   

2. ✴in order to protect them from looters (perhaps at the time of an invasion). 
   

On balance, I suggest that, given the care with which the objects had been arranged in the box, the second of these possibilities is the more likely. 

PG 1054b: Grave of a Queen ?   

Left: ‘Gold’ seal from the burial chamber of PG 1054b, location now unknown (?)  

Image from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 142) 

Right: Sketch of seal impression:

Image adapted from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, Figure 23, at p. 127)   

Gianni Marchesi (referenced below, 2004, at p. 162) described this burial chamber as:

1. “... [a] stone-built sepulchral chamber, [the main occupant of which] was a high-ranking woman [who had been] buried together with four male attendants].” 
   

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1954, at p. 76) gave a vivid account of its discovery and his delight in finding it unviolated: 

1. “The stone blocking of the door was pulled away, and inside, beneath the remains of rotten wood fallen from the ceiling, lay 5 bodies, 4 of them those of men (servants, judging from their poor equipment).  The 5th was that of a woman, [whose grave goods included: 
   

2. ✴the golden headdress of one of high rank;
   

3. ✴a long curved golden pin such as we had not seen before, [which] fastened her cloak;
   

4. ✴... a fluted and engraved tumbler of gold [in her hands]; and
   

5. ✴... a golden cylinder seal, the first we have ever found, [by her side].
   

6. This clearly was a queen.” 
   

The  seal that was found by the side of this lady is illustrated above: according to Julian Reade (referenced below, 2001, at p. 21), it is only 4 cm high and is made of gold foils with ‘shell’ caps over a core of some other material (which other authors assume to be bitumen).  The impression that it makes depicts a banqueting scene in two registers: 

1. ✴in the upper register, a man and a woman, each of whom is seated, cup in hand, and attended by a servant, close to a table laden with two jars (presumably of beer) and three loaves; and
   

2. ✴in the lower register, the banqueters are entertained by a musical quartet made up of:
   

3. •two female cymbalists flanking a female singer who seems to be clapping her hands; and
   

4. •a seated man who is playing a bull-shaped lyre.
   

The fact that his seal did not carry an inscription does not preclude the possibility that the lady who owned it was a queen: after all, as we have seen:

1. ✴the three seals of Pu-abum that were found in her grave all depict banqueting scenes in two registers:
   

2. ✴all of them feature a similar banqueting table and one of them (B16728 in the Penn Museum) also features  a musical performance; but
   

3. ✴only one of them carries an inscription.  
   

PG 1237: Woolley’s ‘Great Death Pit’ 

Plan of PG 1237: from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, Figure 55, at p. 157)   

My additions in red (objects mentioned in the text below) 

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a0 at p. 113) observed that:

1. “The name ‘The Great Death Pit' was given to PG 1237 for the very good reason that it consisted of a death pit and little else.”
   

He presumably assigned adjective ‘great’ to it because it contained the remains of 74 human bodies:

1. ✴six near the northeastern wall, which he assumed were male; and
   

2. ✴another 68 which he assumed (on the basis of the personal possessions found throughout this area) were those of women who lay close to each other across the rest of the pit.
   

Body 61

Woolley (as above) listed the surviving possessions associated with each of these corpses at pp. 116-20.  The list (at p. 120) associated with a lady known only as ‘Body 61’, who lay near the western corner (marked on the lan above) stands out from the rest by virtue of the number and value of her possessions: 

1. “Gold hair-ribbon, gold leaf pendant wreath, wreath of gold triple willow-leaves, wreath of gold rings set with lapis disks silver comb with inlaid flowers, gold ear-rings, two gold hair-rings, three gold flower rosettes on silver stems, 'dog-collar' of gold and lapis, necklace of gold and lapis tubular beads and carnelian rings, necklace of large gold and lapis fluted balls and carnelian rings, necklace of gold and carnelian and gold double conoids and carnelian rings, necklace of gold balls, lapis double conoids, and carnelian rings, six gold finger rings, bracelet of gold and lapis diamonds and carnelian rings, bead cuff, gold pin  ... with lapis ball head, silver pin ... with lapis head, lapis cylinder seal (U. 12380) [and]  silver tumbler.”
   

Richard Zettler (referenced below, 2020, at pp. 27-8) reasonably argued that PG 1237, which was apparently laid out as a tableau mort of a banquet: 

1. “... may, in fact, be an intact royal burial of a type that  Woolley did not originally recognise, in which the principle (royal) figure and his/her attendants were buried together in an open pit.  Body 61, [which was the corpse of] a female holding ... a silver cup to her mouth, ... [and was found ] near the two ... [famous goat statues- (see below)] may be [the corpse of] the principle royal burial [in this so-called death pit.  This corpse]: 
   

2. •is more elaborately dressed than any of the other females in PG 1237; and
   

3. •her jewellery closely resembles that worn by [Queen Pu-adum - see above],  For example, she] wore a three-tiered headdress ... that included a frontlet and two wreaths, one with willow leaves and one with poplar leaves.  [Furthermore], the wreath with willow leaves is the only example of the type other than the one [that Pu-abum] wore ...
   

4. Moreover, ‘Body 61’, like [the body of Pu-abum], had:
   

5. ✴a higher frequency of carnelian beads and fewer lapis lazuli beads ... [than] the other royal attendants:
   

6. ✴six gold rings, three on each hand, all of the cable pattern between plain rims; and
   

7. ✴a lapis lazuli cylinder seal {see below].
   

8. [However, like two of the seals of Pu-abum], this seal had no inscription, so the] identity of Body 61 remains to be determined.” 
   

Seal of ‘Body 61’

Lapis lazuli seal (U. 12380) of ‘Body 61’ in PG 1237, now in the Penn Museum (object 30-12-3);

image from the museum website   

According to Holly Pittman (referenced below, at p. 83): 

1. “This double-register cylinder seal shows a summarily carved composition:
   

2. ✴in the top register, an unusual version of the banquet scene is depicted, showing:
   

3. •two seated female celebrants, both facing left, each raising a vessel; [and]
   

4. •a servant [who] stands behind a table holding breads; and 
   

5. ✴In the lower register, an animal combat is shown.
   

6. The combination of banquet and combat scenes is unusual but not unique on cylinder seals and other artefacts, [albeit that the ] significance of the association is unknown.” 
   

‘Goat Statues’ from PG 1237  

Two reconstructed statues of a male goat in a flowering tree, found near ‘body 61‘     

Left: U. 12357B, from the Penn Museum (30-12-702)         Right: U. 12357A, from the British Museum (BM 122200) 

Image adapted from images from the respective museums  

These two statues were reconstructed from their crushed remains, which were found very close to ‘body 61’.  Each had been constructed on a wooden core that had rotted away, but Woolley was able to reconstruct them from the indentation in the surrounding soil and surviving remains of gold foil, lapis, shell, copper, silver and red limestone.  As Naomi Miller et al. (referenced below, at p. 28) observed: 

1. “Though not identical, the goat and tree representations are very similar to one another, as are the bases, ... [and] primary iconography is the same in both objects.”
   

These authors also pointed out (at p. 32) that the rosette motif used for the flowers of the trees is sometimes a symbol of the goddess Inanna.  The protrusion behind each of the heads suggested that these objects served as supports of some kind.  (Note that this iconography of these statues is similar to that used for a shell plaque found in the grave of Queen Pu-bum (PG 800b - discussed above).

[Two lyres lyre (U. 12353 and U. 12354) from PG 1237 aredescribed in my page on lyres from the Royal Cemetery] .

PG 755: Grave of ‘Meskalamdu‘  

Plan of PG 755: from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934a, Figure 55, at p. 157)   

My additions in red (objects mentioned in the text below) 

As Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1954, at pp. 57-8) recorded, this grave had been: 

1. “... dug down into the shaft of one of the largest of the ‘royal’ tombs [i.e., PG 779 - see above], ... The first indication that we had of [its existence] was a copper spear head sticking straight up in the ground.  Following it down, we found that it was attached to a golden haft, [below which] was the hole left by the decay of a wooden shaft.  [This hole] continued] down to the corner of the grave, [which had not been violated. ... It] was in the form of] a plain earth pit, big enough to take a wooden coffin and to leave ... [enough] free space for offerings. [as illustrated above].  Along the head of the grave  were struck spears in a row, the blades downwards .... ”  
   

According to Sir Arthur Keith (in Leonard Woolley, referenced below, 1934a, at p. 403), the corpse that was laid out in the wooden coffin was that of:  

1. “...  a strongly built, powerful man , ... about [1.6 meters] in height,  ... [and] under 30 years of age at the time of death.” 
   

Since this grave:

1. ✴had the simple architectural plan that characterised the great majority of those that had been  excavated here; and
   

2. ✴it contained only a single corpse;
   

Woolley (as above) concluded that the young man in the wooden coffin cannot have been a king, albeit that, as he acknowledged:  

1. ✴his grave was ‘rather large’ compared to the other ‘normal’[= non-royal] graves; and 
   

2. ✴his grave goods were only matched in value and splendour by objects found in the graves that he had characterised as ‘royal graves’.
   

Helmet 

Electrum helmet from grave PG 755 (number 1 in the plan above); now in the Iraq Museum (IM. 8629)    

Image (of a copy ?) from the website ‘Sumerian Shakespeare‘  of Jerald Jack Starr

Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1954, at p. 58) noted that the corpse itself had almost completely disappeared, albeit that there were enough remains to indicate the way he had been placed in the coffin (see the illustration above), and that, when the earth was removed from the coffin:

1. “... the prevailing note was struck rather by the gold, clean as when it was put into the grave ... “ 
   

Importantly, a magnificent golden object that is usually characterised as a helmet (illustrated above), which was found behind the young man’s head (see number 1 in the plan above), still contained fragments of his skull, indicating that he had been wearing it when he had been placed in the coffin. 

He had also been wearing a silver belt around his waist, to which three objects had been attached: 

1. ✴a gold dagger (number 8);
   

2. ✴a whetstone of lapis lazuli on a golden ring (number 9), and
   

3. ✴his cylinder seal (number 10), although this had deteriorated too the extent that neither the scene engraved on it nor the inscription could be used to identify him. 
   

Objects Inscribed with the Name ‘Meskalamdu‘  

Left: Three gold bowls from PG 755 (numbers 2, 4 and 5 in the plan above): 

Now in the Iraq Museum (IM: 8273,  8271 and 8270 respectively) 

Image from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 163): my additions in red   

Right:Copper bowl from PG 755 (number 51 in the plan above): now in the British Museum (IBM 121661a)

Image from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 190): my additions in red  

Although the inscriptions on the young man’s seal was illegible, three golden objects that were found near his body (the lamp at location 2 and the bowls at locations 4 and 5) bear the inscription (RIME 1.13.7.1, CDLI, P431212) ‘Meskalamdu’, which was presumably the name of the deceased. The same name was inscribed on one of copper bowl that was among a  of copper vessels that were found corroded together at location 51. 

It is generally (and reasonably) accepted that Meskalamdu was the name of the young warrior who was buried here. Léon Legrain (in Leonard Woolley, referenced below, 1934a, entry 55, at p. 340) seems to have assumed that he was the same person as the King Meskalamdu who owned the seal in the dagger box that was found in PG 1054 a (see above), whom he dubbed ‘the king of the golden helmet’. However, as we have seen, Leonard Woolley himself discounted this possibility: for example, in his book of 1954 (for example), he allowed (at p. 58) that:

1. “... the exceptional richness of [PG 755]  may justify us in seeing in this Meskalamdu a prince ... [who] never occupied the throne ... ”
   

This hypothesis was accepted by (for example) Douglas Frayne (referenced below, at pp. 401-2).

Bowl Inscribed with the name of Queen Nintur  

Copper bowl from PG 755 (number 51 in the plan above): now in the British Museum (BM 121663b)

Inscription (RIME 1.13.5.4; CDLI, P2476856), Queen Nintur 

Image from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 190): my additions in red  

Another copper bowl from location 51 bears an inscription (RIME 1.13.5.4; CDLI, P2476856): ‘Nintur, the queen’.  As we shall see, this lady was probably the wife of King Mesanapada.  

Royal Inscriptions from SIS 1-2 

As explained above:

1. ✴the ‘Royal Cemetery was sealed at some point in the ED IIIa period by a layer of debris (dubbed SIS 1-2) that was dumped on it from the city above, presumably when it was no longer in use as a place of burial; and
   

2. ✴the epigraphic evidence that was found in SIS 1-2 included:
   

3. •a seal impression naming Mesanepada; and 
   

4. •a cylinder seal and two seal impressions naming (or probably naming) his wife, Queen Nintur. 
   

I will discuss this body of epigraphic evidence before discussing its relevance for the dating of the closure of the cemetery below.  

Seal Impression of King Mesanepada  

Seal of Mesanepada (U, 13607). inscription RIME 1.13.5.2; CDLI, P431204, from SIS 1 

Now in the Penn Museum (Sealing 31-16-677), image from museum website  

Reconstruction of the relief, from Léon Legrain (referenced below, 1936, Plate 30, number 518)   

As noted above, the clay jar sealing illustrated above was found in the debris level SIS 1.  The inscription (RIME 1.13.5.2; CDLI, P431204) above this last scene reads:

1. “Mesanepada, King of Kish, dam nu-gig (husband of the nu-gig)”. 
   

As noted in the website Ur Online, the narrative relief carried by the seal is arranged in three parts:

1. ✴to the left of the inscription, a lion attacks a ‘fine Gilgamesh figure’ while a naked bearded man (who wields a dagger) pulls its tail; 
   

2. ✴to the right of the inscription, we now see that this ‘Gilgamesh figure’, while under attack frm the lion, is also trying to wrest a goat from another lion (while another partly-lost animal holds this second lion by its tail ?); and 
   

3. ✴below the inscription, four small naked men are depicted on a smaller scale in a ‘swastika’ formation, as each of them points a dagger at the left heel of the man in ahead of him while reaching forward to grasp his right foot.  
   

Note that the motifs of a ‘Gilgamesh figure’ attacked by a pair of lions and a swastika (in this case, of lions) in the seal of A’Anzu from PG 1236 (above).  

Nintur, Wife of Mesanepada 

Lapis lazuli seal of Queen Nintur, wife of Mesanepada (U. 8981) from SIS 1-2:

inscription RIME 1.13.5.3; CDLI, P247685 

   Now in the Penn Museum  (exhibit CBS 16852; image from Julian Reade (referenced below, 2003, at p. 103)  

Mesanepada is also named in a seal of his wife, which was found in loose soil in SIS 1-2: this inscription (RIME 1.13.5.3; CDLI, P247685) reads:  

1. “Nintur, the queen, the wife of Mesanepada”. 
   

The relief carried by the seal is in two registers:

1. ✴in the upper register, a naked hero protects  bovids who are being attacked from each side by lions; and
   

2. ✴in the lower register, a naked figure approaches from the left as a pair of crossed lions attacks a pair of bovids.
   

Fragmentary sealing of Queen Nintur (U. 13678 and U. 13686 A, B)  from SIS 1-2 

Inscription (RIME 1.13.5.4; CDLI, P431205), Queen Nintur  

Image from Leonard Woolley (referenced below, 1934b, Plate 207, number 215 

Two fragmentary clay sealings from SIS 1-2 carry an inscription (RIME 1.13.5.4; CDLI, P431205) that names ‘Nintur, the Queen’ (the same inscription as that on the copper bowl found at location 51 in PG 755, discussed above).  The hero here is similar to the one depicted in the upper register of Mesamepada’s sealing from SIS 1 (above). 

Meskiagnun 

Fragment of a calcite bowl dedicated by Gansaman, wife of Meskiagnun (RIME 1.13.8.1, P431213) from Ur 

Now in the British Museum  (exhibit BM 122255; image from Wikimedia Commons 

This vase fragment was found in loose soil in the stratum above the royal graves in the Royal Cemetery.   The surviving inscription (RIME 1.13.8.1, P431213) reads: 

1. “For (the life of) [Meskiag]nun, king of Ur: Gansaman, his wife, dedicated (this bowl)”.
   

Douglas Frayne (referenced below, at p. 403) and Gianni Marchesi (referenced below, 2015: p. 140 and note 13 and p. 144, Ur entry 2) accept that the name of this king can be completed as Meskiangnun.  Gianni Marchesi (referenced below, 2004, note 97, at p, 168) argued that:

1. “...  on an epigraphic basis, this king of Ur seems to be an earlier ruler than Mesanepada ...”.
   

However, Douglas Frayne (as above) placed him after A’anepada (perhaps because he is described as the son of Mesanepada in the SKL ??).  In short, the date of the reign of thus king at Ur is unknown.  

1.