Land Behind Baghdad: A History of Settlement on the Diyala Plains Robert McC. Adams

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This volume presents the results of archaeological field reconnaissance conducted by Robert McC. Adams in the Diyala region of Iraq between 1957 and 1958. It seeks to identify some of the converging natural and human forces that shaped successive phases of advance and decline within this small and somewhat marginal part of the Mesopotamian alluvium over a period of six millennia. While touching at times on particular historical events, the central focus is not the sharply defined ebb and flow of the historical record, but the underlying, more slowly changing relation of man to land. The study is divided into two sections. The first describes the contemporary setting of the Diyala region, outlining the most important natural variables, the basic patterns of agricultural subsistence, and some recent trends in settlement. The second section provides a chronological overview of changes in settlement patterns and agricultural systems within the region, beginning in the fourth millennium BC and reaching to the end of the nineteenth century AD.

  • Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965
  • Pp. xvi + 187; frontispiece, 22 illustrations, 9 maps, 25 tables