抄録
Traditionally, studies of Samarra pottery have mainly focused on collections from Iraqi sites, from which most examples of Samarra pottery have been uncovered. However, recent excavations in Syria have revealed rich assemblages of Samarra pottery, in which unique regional attributes can be seen. These assemblages can be distinguished from ‘classic’ Samarra pottery in Iraq and may be identified as a ‘west variety’ of Samarra pottery.
However, an examination of the ‘western’ Samarra pottery in the collection of the National Museum of Aleppo and from several excavated sites, has demonstrated that ‘western’ Samarra assemblages from different sites do not always share particular attributes and the ‘western’ traits are observed only randomly among them. Also, it is known that Samarra pottery is usually quite rare among the pottery assemblages at sites in the ‘west', except for Tell Sabi Abyad I.
This suggests two hypotheses. 1) The ‘western variety’ of Samarra pottery was produced at a limited number of production centers, such as Tell Sabi Abyad I, and unique local traits were individually developed at each of these centers. The ‘western’ traits of Samarra pottery should therefore be regarded as an aggregate of this varied local development. 2) Furthermore, inhabitants of other ‘western’ sites imported Samarra pottery from more than one production center, which resulted in the uneven occurrence of the ‘western’ traits within the small quantities of Samarra pottery at these sites.
These hypotheses do not coincide with a recent view of the origin of Halaf pottery, which claims that it was derived from Samarra pottery and that this process can be observed in the vast area, including the ‘west,’ where incipient Halaf ceramics are known. They suggest instead that the preceding Samarra pottery in the ‘west’ underwent diverse developments, not all of which resulted in the establishment of Halaf pottery.
