IOR/L/PS/11/76, P 1383/1914 (17)

Genre: Archaeological Photography

Close view of pot: 'One result of my visit to Darragaz was, as stated baove, a discovery of pottery, and to this I now propose to refer. My host knew that I was deeply interested in everything old, and informed me that when digging in some ruins at about 8 feet below the surface, some stone columns had been found and also some pottery. To describe the stone work, there were the bases of columns and a curious double stone drum [see print 16]. The illustrations who clearly the nature of these old-time remains, which were evidently hewn from the white limestone of the neighbouring range. The pottery consisted of one perfect piece and three fragments; and when shown it, I recognized with delight that it was similar to that discovered below the stratum of the earliest Elemite civilization by De Morgan in the great mound at Susa. Similar pottery has also been discovered in Russian Turkestan at Anau by an American mission under Pumpelly. The pottery, which is of a yellow colour and ornamented with a black geometrical pattern, is believed to date from perhaps the sixth millenium B.C. It proves the existence of a culture earlier than the historical cultures of Sumer and Akkad, of Elam or of Babylon, not only in Elam (the modern Persian province of Arabistan) but also at Anau in Russian Turkestan, and now in the Persian province of Darragaz. Here, owing to the proximity of the high Allah ho Akbar range and a comparatively good water supply, the conditions were especially favourable to the growth of such a civilization. It remains to add that there is not a fragment of this pottery in the British Museum, and that I shall consequently, if only in a small way, be able to add to the national collection.'