Girikihaciyan
Giriki Haciyan · Ekinciler Mound
Late Neolithic → Halaf → Ubaid (6000–4300 BCE)·Halaf (North Mesopotamian painted) → Northern Ubaid·🇹🇷 Diyarbakır Province, Ergani District, Upper Tigris, Turkey
About
About Girikihaciyan
Girikihaciyan is a Halaf-Ubaid hamlet tell (c.6000–4300 BCE) on the Ergani-Diyarbakır highway near Ekinciler village — key Halafian type-site excavated 1968 & 1970 by Patty Jo Watson & Steven LeBlanc (Robert Braidwood Chicago-Istanbul). 175 m diam mound of Halaf painted tholoi and rectilinear houses with stamp seals, obsidian and dry-farming grains; Ubaid coda with tripartite houses. Small but deeply stratified (4 m Halaf deposits) documenting Halaf northward spread into Anatolian piedmont and Ubaid transition independence. Now roadside mound under wheat.
Why it mattersNorthernmost classic Halaf tholoi village defining Halaf-Anatolian frontier and seal-use prehistory — reference for Halaf-Ubaid transition without southern Ubaid imposition.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Why tholoi persistence here vs rectilinear shift south?
- 02Seals as property or ritual?
Theories
- 01Watson Halaf sedentism model vs Campbell feasting periphery
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- c.6000 BCE Halaf founding; Ubaid 5300–4300 BCE
- Period
- Late Neolithic → Halaf → Ubaid (6000–4300 BCE)
- Culture
- Halaf (North Mesopotamian painted) → Northern Ubaid
- Builders
- Halaf-Ubaid dry farmers
- Purpose
- Piedmont farming hamlet with Halaf painted pottery and early seal use
- Abandoned
- c.4300 BCE Late Ubaid thinning as Ergani copper focus shifts
- Rediscovered
- Excavated 1968, 1970 Watson & LeBlanc (Braidwood)
- Excavation
- Excavated
1968
Watson/LeBlanc trench uncovers Halaf tholoi with painted bukrania
1970
Ubaid tripartite and final Halaf-Ubaid monograph (Watson)
On the ground
Structures & features
38.2333° N · 39.9667° E · 890 m · 3 mapped features
Halaf tholoi cluster
settlementPainted tholoi with plaster basins
38.2335° N · 39.9669° EUbaid tripartite house (upper)
settlementUbaid rectilinear house with stamp seal find
38.2333° N · 39.9667° EObsidian workshop midden
middenHalaf obsidian debitage dump
38.2330° N · 39.9665° E