Year One of Excavations

The first major discovery at Tell Asmar was a large complex later identified as the palace of Ibiq-Adad II, a possible contemporary of Hammurabi. Further excavations revealed that Ibiq-Adad II had built his palace over the remains of Urninmar’s palace, which in turn was built on the palace of Bilalama. Rather than building his own palace, Bilalama had simply expanded on the palace his father, Kirikiri, had built by connecting the main building to another large building to the east through a series of halls and smaller chambers.

Inside the palace, excavators discovered tablets, bronze weapons, and terra cotta figurines of a naked woman and bearded man (Frankfort et al., Tell Asmar and Khafaje, 19–22). The team identified the male terra cotta figure with the god Tishpak, the patron deity of Eshnunna. Additionally, excavators retrieved over 600 tablets that helped excavators devise an accurate chronology of the site’s history (Frankfort et al., Tell Asmar and Khafaje, 24).