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Volume 101 No. 3
July 1997
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Abstract |
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Carved Ivories from Til Barsib
Guy Bunnens
Twelve carved ivories were discovered at Tell Ahmar (ancient Til Barsib) in Syria from excavations conducted by the University of Melbourne. The majority of the ivories come from the destruction debris of the earliest occupation phase of a large domestic structure (building C1). This destruction level can be dated to the second half of the seventh century B.C. on the evidence of cuneiform tablets discovered in the same level. The Til Barsib ivories can be assigned to various schools of Syrian ivory carving and find their closest parallels among the Nimrud ivories. Their presence in a domestic structure, as late as the second half of the seventh century, raises questions about the time when ivories ceased to be carved in Syria and about the social context in which they were used.
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