Teppe Hasanlu

Teppe Hasanlu
تپه حسنلو
Teppe Hasanlu is located in Iran
Teppe Hasanlu
Shown within Iran
LocationWest Azarbaijan, Iran
Coordinates37°00′16″N 45°27′30″E / 37.00456560313389°N 45.45824974408474°E / 37.00456560313389; 45.45824974408474
TypeSettlement

Teppe Hasanlu or Hasanlu Tepe (Persian: تپه حسنلو) is an archeological site of an ancient city[1] located in northwest Iran (in the province of West Azerbaijan), a short distance south of Lake Urmia. The nature of its destruction at the end of the 9th century BC essentially froze one layer of the city in time, providing researchers with extremely well preserved buildings, artifacts, and skeletal remains from the victims and enemy combatants of the attack. The site was likely associated with the Mannaeans.

Hasanlu Tepe is the largest site in the Gadar River valley and dominates the small plain known as Solduz. The site consists of a 25-m-high central "citadel" mound, with massive fortifications and paved streets, surrounded by a low outer town, 8 m above the surrounding plain. The entire site, once much larger but reduced in size by local agricultural and building activities, now measures about 600 m across, with the citadel having a diameter of about 200 m.[1]

The site was inhabited fairly continuously from the 6th millennium BC to the 3rd century AD. It is famous for the Golden bowl of Hasanlu.[2] Since June 2018, the Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization has pushed for the entire archeological site to be declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.[3]

  1. ^ a b The Cambridge History of Iran (ed. by W.B. Fischer, Ilya Gershevitch, Ehsan Yarshster). Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0-521-20091-1. Pages 57–58, 138.
  2. ^ [1] The Hasanlu Golden Bowl. Thirty Years Later, Expedition, vol. 31, no. 203, pp. 87–106, 1989
  3. ^ "Millennia-old Hasanlu under restoration, landscaping project". Tehran Times. Aug 15, 2018. Retrieved May 20, 2020.