Bulk stable carbon and deuterium isotope analyses of bitumen artifacts from Hacinebi Tepe, Turkey: reconstructing broad economic patterns of the Uruk expansion

Abstract

This research addresses issue of inter-regional trade for the world's first colonial trading system, the economic expansion of state societies from southern Mesopotamia into southwest Iran and southeast Anatolia, through the use of stable carbon and deuterium isotope analyses of bitumen artifacts. The key goal of the project was to get beyond simply the identification of trade (Schwartz, M., Hollander, D., Stein, G., 1999. Paléorient 25 (1), 67–82) and examine broad regional patterns in the exchange system. To this end, the methodological approach of this research was focused on the reconstruction of general exchange patterns using a large sample set. The results of these analyses suggest the utility of bulk isotopic analyses in the identification of broad regional patterns, serving as a complement to detailed isotopic and molecular work on asphaltene extractions of bitumen (Connan, J., Nishiaki, Y., 2003. Vol. II: Chalcolithic Technology and Subsistence. The University Museum – The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, pp. 283–306). Some of the data indicate changes in the organization of trade at the site of Hacinebi in southeast Turkey and suggest large economic changes in Anatolia associated with the Uruk expansion.