Fort Shalmaneser: An Interim Report
1959; Cambridge University Press; Volume: 21; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.2307/4199655
ISSN2053-4744
Autores ResumoThe outer defences of the city of Calah form a rough rectangle nearly five miles in circumference. They appear to have consisted of a massive single wall, with projecting towers at intervals, supplemented on the north and east sides by a ditch, of which traces can be seen on air photographs (Iraq XVI, Pt. 1, Pl. X). On the west and south-west natural and artificial watercourses took the place of the ditch; the Tigris skirted the conglomerate terrace on which the west wall and the citadel were founded, while the Zab canal, dug by Aššurnaṣir-pal II to water the plain below the city, probably approached the south wall some distance east of the citadel and followed it westwards to an outfall on the Tigris. At the south-east corner a more complex system was developed to frustrate, or over-awe, potential enemies approaching along the great highway from Erbil, Kirkuk and the Kurdish highlands, which crossed the Upper Zab near Tell Abu Sheetha and thence probably followed the modern motor track through Abbas Rejeib to the citadel. This track now passes the bitumen wells in the valley east of the city, and crosses the city wall in the angle of a great reentrant which clearly marks the site of the heavily defended Erbil Gate (Iraq XX, Pt. 2, Pl. XIV). Some 350 m. south of this gate stands the corner tower, represented by the eastern mound of a pair now known as Tulul al Azar, which measures about 100 by 80 m. overall and stands 20 m. above the level of the plain.
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