Chalcolithic and Bronze Ages of Ahven in Bashkard County, Hormozgan, Iran

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Persian Gulf Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Bandar Abbās, Iran

Abstract

Bashkard is a mountainous hinterland in south-eastern Iran where the two cultural regions -HalīlRūd and Jāzmūriyān-, make it outstanding. In addition to their location, surface finds around the village of Ahven in this county -in particular, the site numbered 044- indicate a chronicle of human settlements and the existence of cultural-trade interactions with HalīlRūd and Jāzmūriyān. The sampled surface potsherds and a few other cultural materials (decorative beads and shells and bronze objects -especially, round and quadrangle stamp seals) there belong to Chalcolithic and Bronze Ages. In terms of the paste colors, the potsherds represent two main groups: orange and gray. The other colors (buff, brown, and reddish gray) are less common. They are decorated with geometrical, plant, and animal motives as well as bold horizontal wavy and straight bands, and incised/scratched lines (perhaps with a sharp item such as a comb); often, one of these techniques and in some cases, both are applied on the potsherds. In terms of form (rim, neck, shoulder, handle, spout, wall/body, pedestal, and bottom) they are classified into commonly used vessels such as bowls, small jugs and jars, tumblers/beakers, and small pots. Exceptionally, a shallow tray and gray pottery of rectangular shape (probably a mold) have been recovered from the surface. Their comparison with well-known southeastern sites shows that Ahven could have predominantly acted as the trade-cultural route of between southeastern establishments and the northern and southern coasts of the Persian Gulf. The author’s archaeological survey of the region is the first attempt to ascertain Chalcolithic and the Bronze Age cultural materials as presented in this article.   

Keywords

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🔓 © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Tissaphernes Archaeological Research Group, Tehran, Iran. Open Access. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. The ethical policy of Ancient Iranian Studies is based on the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines and complies with International Committee of Ancient Iranian Studies Editorial Board codes of conduct. Readers, authors, reviewers and editors should follow these ethical policies once working with Ancient Iranian Studies. The ethical policy of Ancient Iranian Studies is liable to determine which of the typical research papers or articles submitted to the journal should be published in the concerned issue. For information on this matter in publishing and ethical guidelines please visit www.publicationethics.org.

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History

  • Receive Date: 29 June 2023
  • Revise Date: 13 July 2023
  • Accept Date: 30 August 2023

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