Salat Tepe (Salattepe)
Salat Tepe · Tal Salat
PPNB to Late Islamic (8500 BCE–1400 CE)·Upper Tigris PPN → Halaf/Ubaid → Uruk → Mitanni → Assyrian → Islamic·🇹🇷 Diyarbakır Province, Bismil District, Upper Tigris, Turkey
About
About Salat Tepe (Salattepe)
Rescue-excavated Upper Tigris sequence mound (PPNB to Medieval, c.8500 BCE–1400 CE) in the Ilısu Dam flood zone north of Bismil. 3 ha tell exposed Halaf–Ubaid painted ware village, Late Chalcolithic–Uruk/contact EBA agglutinated town (c.3300–3000 BCE) with Ninevite 5 pottery, Mittani cremation burials, Middle Assyrian fort and Islamic khan. Important because submerged tells (Gre Fılla neighbours) lose upper layers; Salat preserves full Upper Tigris chronology before inundation.
Why it mattersUpper Tigris type-section for Halaf-Uruk transition; documents Tigris valley adaptation before dam loss, complementing Çayönü–Gre Fılla cluster.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Missing Late Uruk expansion seen at Habuba Kabira?
Theories
- 01Tigris ferry town controlling north–south obsidian trade
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. 8500 BCE (PPNB)
- Period
- PPNB to Late Islamic (8500 BCE–1400 CE)
- Culture
- Upper Tigris PPN → Halaf/Ubaid → Uruk → Mitanni → Assyrian → Islamic
- Builders
- Successive Tigris plain farming communities
- Purpose
- River-terrace farming village and later trading/ferry town on Tigris
- Abandoned
- c.1400 CE (post-Seljuk)
- Rediscovered
- 2000 Ilısu salvage survey (M. Tekinalp); excavated 2004–2014 Ege & Tokyo Universities
- Excavation
- Excavated
c.3300 BCE
Uruk-period agglutinated town built
c.1400 BCE
Mitanni cremation cemetery
2014
Final salvage season before dam filling
On the ground
Structures & features
38.0070° N · 41.2350° E · 540 m · 2 mapped features
Uruk town wall
fortificationStone town wall of 3300 BCE layer
38.0072° N · 41.2353° EMitanni cemetery
cemeteryCremation jar cemetery on western slope
38.0068° N · 41.2346° E