The notebooks fit into the rich history of the development of archaeology and we may search for the origins of their inception as early as 1853, when Layard (312) wrote:
‘On the second day ... I visited a large mound called Mijdel, on the right bank of the river [Khabur] about five miles above Umjerjeh ... Mijdel is a lofty platform, surrounded by groups of smaller mounds, amongst which can still be traced the lines of streets and canals’.
Whilst we cannot be certain that Mallowan knew of this early description (although a well thumbed copy of Layard’s book does belong in the Ancaster Mallowan Collection), we can perhaps presume that this early study by Layard added much to the early records for the area.
It was between the years 1881—1896 that Lieutenant General Pitt Rivers was given credit for the development of modern archaeological techniques (Barker 1982: 13); nevertheless, a lot of archaeology was still completed by trial and error as late as 1907. Sir Leonard Woolley (in ibid: 14) was later to state about the period ‘we were all ... happily unconscious of our low performance, nor did anyone from outside suggest that it might have been better’.
It was during the years 1912—1914, and in 1920 that Woolley started to make a name for himself in the archaeological world, whilst digging at Carchemish, situated on the Turkish-Syrian border; where he worked alongside T.E Lawrence, latterly known as Lawrence of Arabia (Dyson 1977: 8). In 1922, Lawrence[1] (in ibid) wrote to the Director of the University Museum of Pennsylvania stating that ‘the Mesopotamian Government is in a position to consider applications for permits to excavate. We are going to be a little particular about the quality of these excavations because Mesopotamia has suffered so much in the past from unscientific work ... so in future permits will only be given ... [to a man] who will record the finds and do the practical work: the ... Petrie[2]—or Woolley—of the business’.
By 1921 Woolley had realised that it was impossible to continue digging at Carchemish ‘as the area was unsettled due to the Turkish occupation’ (ibid: 7), and he was the man chosen, in 1922, to lead an expedition to Ur in Mesopotamia; funded jointly by the University Museum and the British Museum. In 1925 Woolley (ibid: 17), whilst still at Ur, wrote to the University Museum stating ‘I think that I have found an assistant for the general side, a young Oxford man named Mallowan, who is inexperienced but has the reputation of being clever and a hard worker, and is certainly keen to go out’; this appointment began Mallowan’s initiation into the archaeological world. In 1977 Mallowan (4) wrote that the greatest lesson he had learnt from Woolley was ‘that not to publish was a crime, and that we should brand others who have not lived up to these expectations as criminals’.
An archaeological education was not the only gain that Mallowan made whist digging at Ur; in 1930 he was introduced to the already famous crime writer, Agatha Christie, and after deciding ‘that she must be a remarkable woman’[3] (Mallowan 1977: 45) he asked for her hand in marriage. Mallowan continued to dig in Iraq, conducting his own dig at Arpachiyah in 1932, where he states ‘the staff consisted of no more than three persons, [himself], my wife, Agatha, ... and John Rose, my friend who had served as architect at Ur’ (ibid: 86). Mallowan was proud of the fact that ‘the dig was published in the second volume of Iraq within six months of its completion’ (ibid), proving that Mallowan had taken Woolley’s advice to heart. By 1935 Mallowan ‘was rightly considered to be one of the outstanding British archaeologists of his generation’ (Kolinski 2007: 73).
Gertrude Bell, a contemporary of Woolley’s and Mallowan’s, was appointed Director of Archaeology for Iraq in 1922, and although ‘she was greatly pleased with the progress and results of the work’ at Ur (Woolley in Dyson 1977: 13), she was also responsible for the drafting of an appropriate Antiquities Law for Iraq (ibid: 10). This new law effectively saw the end of museum sponsored work in the country. Museums were no longer able to divide the archaeological finds; they now had to remain in Iraq. This meant that archaeologists like Mallowan, who were mainly sponsored by museums, had to look elsewhere for new opportunities to dig (Kolinski 2007: 73). Mallowan (1977: 101) was ‘desirous of working in a part of Syria closely related to Iraq ... in this way' he 'could widen a horizon with which' he 'was already familiar’.
Following on from earlier explorations, like Layard’s in 1853, Baron Max von Oppenheim had excavated the site of Tell Halaf on the Khabur River between 1911—1913 and again in 1929 (Martin and Novák 2013). Christie[4] (1999: 57) recalls a visit made by Mallowan and herself to ‘Baron von Oppenheim in Berlin’ and shortly afterwards she and Mallowan embarked on a journey to Syria to explore the areas archaeological potential, describing a visit to Tell Halaf itself as having ‘something of the reverence of a pilgrimage to a shrine’ (ibid: 56).
By the end of this exploratory visit it was decided that Mallowan and Christie would return the following year (1935)to work on Tell Chagar Bazar situated on the Khabur River, as this had shown the most promise because ‘sherds of ... Halaf pottery had been found at the base of the mound, pointing to the possibility of obtaining at this site a long stratigraphical sequence' (Kolinski 2007: 73). In the Spring of 1936, a second season of excavations was carried out at Chagar Bazar; Mallowan also dug at Tell Arbid[5] (ibid). In the Spring of 1937, and in the Spring and Autumn of 1938, Mallowan dug at Tell Brak before moving on to look at sites in the Balikh Valley (Kolinski 2007: 73, Mallowan 1977: 125-148).
Why Research the Notebooks?
In 1977, Mallowan (4) wrote ‘there is still much to be gained through the analysis of Woolley’s discoveries [at Ur], notably the metal’; in March 2013, a team of archaeo-metallurgists from Germany and France carried out a week long analysis ‘of many metal objects from Ur[6] and will do more in-depth studies of the results back in their home countries’ (Hafford 2013). This highlights Mallowan’s advanced thinking when it came to archaeology, however, he was still very much a man of his time; prior to World War Two ‘there was little formalised recording on archaeological sites ... ditches, pits, walls, and other structural features were drawn on scale plans or sections, but individual deposits were rarely distinguished or recorded. Written information ... was still largely confined to annotations on... drawings ... and site notebooks. This information was recorded by the director of the site or a few select supervisors’ (Chadwick 1997) as was the case in Syria in the 1930s. Kolinski (2007: 75) states that he was interested in the previous excavations because ‘on the one hand' they provide 'additional evidence concerning the sites and, on the other hand, could now be more interpreted more fully, based on the evidence from more recent work’; to coin a phrase of Mallowan’s - there is still much to be gained from the analysis of Mallowan’s discoveries in Syria.
[1] As advisor on Arab Affairs to Winston Churchill at the Colonial Office (Wilson 2013).
[2] Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie (1853—1942). Petrie excavated in Egypt for the Egypt Exploration Fund from 1884—1886. Petrie’s methods were revolutionary for his time. He placed great emphasis on the observation of what he found, and the typological study of all objects (BM 2013).
[3] A decision he made after Agatha Christie dealt calmly with an extended stay in the desert due to their car getting stuck (Mallowan 1977: 45).
[4] ‘I recall a visit paid to Baron von Oppenheim in Berlin when he took us to the museum of his finds. Max and he talked excitedly for (I think) five solid hours’ (Christie 1999: 57).
[5] Kolinski (2007: 73) states that ‘Mallowan gave the name of the tell as “Arbit” [as can be seen in the notebook] but both the local population and maps... indicate that the name should be written “Arbid”, meaning “large non poisonous snake”. This is also important when subsequently trying to locate the finds at museums as they are often recorded under the original name of Arbit, as is the case at the Cambridge University Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
[6] The metal objects in question are part of the Penn Museum (previously the University Museum of Pennsylvania) collection; the last collection of artefacts to leave Iraq before Gertrude Bell helped introduce the new Antiquities Law.