ITCHY FEET TRAVELS

LAGASH

Nasiriyah, Iraq

June 9, 2023

This was yet another site I wanted to visit but one obscure enough that not even the locals knew about it. I went to the Department of Antiquities housed in the museum in Nasiriya and was greeted by the Head with welcome. My genuine interest in the ancient sites of Iraq was met with a graciousness that is rarely the hallmark of bureaucratic offices. I could not believe it! I was expecting miles of red tape with a denial at the end of the process. Instead, I came away with not only permission, but was offered the help of people in this department who are familiar with the sites and will show me around. All done with phone calls with nary a form in sight. Such is the welcome in Iraq.

Ali wanted to visit as well as did his friends Mohammed and Karar. Getting to Al Shatra was easy enough but it was after that that our troubles began. Past farms and fields we went with no sign of Lagash. Google had us going down roads that didn’t exist. Stopping to ask locals was met with bafflement who claimed that the place didn’t exist. It was only the phone call to the man at the site that helped us get there. Daylight was already fading when we trooped into the four-wheel drive vehicle and were driven to a couple of locations on this vast site.

A contemporary of the First Dynasty of Ur, the city of Lagash dates back to the Early Dynastic period of 2900-2350 BCE. Its first king was Ur-Nanshe of 2580 BCE. Most of the artifacts showing Ur Nanshe are at Louvre in France, subject to the same agreement between Iraq and the excavating team that has been the story of most of Iraq’s archeology. Perhaps the most famous of its kings was Gudea who ruled 2150-2125 BCE. Unlike prior statuary of Akkadian period that show valiant feats of bravery and war, the ones from this era show contemplative piety. Copies of the statue of Gudea are commonplace in shops in Baghdad among other kitsch souvenirs. I promise myself that I will go see it at the MET when I get back home.

The city was largely abandoned by the end of the Early Dynastic period and so was not built-up over the millennia. And the site is currently under excavation. Bakr, the man who is a local and has helped teams for four seasons is knowledgeable about the sites of excavation, if not the history. With admirable patience he shepherds us to a couple of locations.

It is thrilling to be here. There are no restored buildings, nor are there plaques with explanations. That is yet to come. We walk over the same pot-sherded fields, see the piles of pot sherd that have been excavated so far, see the pits marked out awaiting further work. How thrilling it is to see this. Who knows? Some years down the road I may come back to see the same place, built-up like the ruins of Babylon and Ur.