Chagar Bazar

Chagar Bazar (Šagir Bazar, Arabic: تل شاغربازار) is a tell, or settlement mound, in northern Al-Hasakah Governorate, Syria. It is a short distance from the major ancient city of Nagar (Tell Brak). The site was occupied from the Halaf period (c. 6100 to 5100 BC) until the middle of the 2nd millennium BC.

Archaeology


The site contains two mounds, a higher but smaller one to the south and a lower larger northern one. Occupation was Halaf at the northern end then at the southern end in the Late Chalcolithic period followed by full occupation in the 3rd millennium BC. The 2nd millennium BC occupation was restricted to the northern (5 hectare) mound. Chagar Bazar was excavated for three seasons by the British archaeologist Max Mallowan, with his wife Agatha Christie, from 1935 to 1937. Many of the artefacts discovered were brought to the British Museum. Besides pottery, a large number of Old Babylonian period clay tablets written in cuneiform script were discovered. Work was resumed at the site in 1999 by an expedition from the British School of Archaeology in Iraq in cooperation with University of Liège archaeologists and the Syrian Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums. During these excavations, which ended in 2002, 214 cuneiform tablets were recovered.

Chagar Bazar and its environment
Chagar Bazar is located in Al-Hasakah Governorate, approximately 35 km north of Al-Hasakah, on the Wadi Dara, a tributary to the Khabur River. The ancient site measures approximately 12 ha.

Occupation history
Chagar Bazar was already settled in the Neolithic. Excavations revealed pottery belonging to the Halaf and Ubaid cultures. By the Early Bronze Age, in the third millennium BC, Chagar Bazar had turned into a small town with the size of 12 hectares / 30 acres. The site appears to have been abandoned by the end of the third millennium BC. It was resettled and was known as Asnakkum at the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age. The town was part of the Kingdom of Upper Mesopotamia under Shamshi-Adad I and his son Yasmah-Adad. Hurrians also occupied the city and fine examples of the Khabur ware pottery dating to this period have been discovered by the excavators.