L'espace domestique en Mesopotamie de la [III.sup.e] dynastie d'Ur a l'epoque paleobabylonienne.

• Author: Keith, Kathryn
• Position: Reviews of Books

L'espace domestique en Mesopotamie de la [III.sup.e] dynastie d'Ur a l'epoque paleobabylonienne. By LAURA BATTINI-VILLARD. 2 vols. BAR International Series, vol. 767. Pp. 580, figs. Oxford: BRITISH ARCHAEOLOGICAL REPORTS, 1999. [pounds sterling]84 (paper).

The excavations at Old Babylonian Ur have been discussed by numerous authors, but the results as reported in Woolley and Mallowan (1976) are far from unproblematic. Battini-Villard has made an admirable attempt to gather data from various sources, and to take into account, as much as possible, their numerous gaps and contradictions in her re-analysis of the site. Even given the difficulties in the data, she makes several interesting observations in the context of a detailed, house-by-house analysis. Her work consists of two volumes: the first is primarily a descriptive catalogue and the second consists of tables and plans. For archaeologists interested in domestic spatial Organization, it is a useful source of comparative material.

The descriptions for each house include house form, circulation patterns, door placement, surface area, features, finds, phases of use, and details of construction, Unfortunately, the author provides no summary of those characteristics which she found to have interpretive significance. Instead, most of her observations are buried in the mass of uncontextualized description. For example, she interprets the residential area buildings in Ur as either houses or chapels, disagreeing with Woolley's classification of some buildings as shops (p. 159). Support for this interpretation, however, is scattered in bits and pieces throughout the individual descriptions. The lack of an overview chapter, where such interpretations would be summarized, makes it difficult either to locate or evaluate them, which in turn limits the accessibility of the work for comparative studies.

One result of Battini-Villard's work is the development of a simple typology, in which houses with a central space or room are distinguished from houses without one. Like typological studies in general, however, the approach is a static one in which variation is neither accounted for nor dealt with very well. Documented changes in house form resulting from the sale or inheritance of parts of houses (Stone 1987) or from some rooms being closed off from use (Franke 1987) are not discussed, Nor does Battini-Villard consider the possible impact of interrelationships among households on the use of space. The...